Now everyone is going to have to survive the aftereffects of the resulting power vacuum.
Let's be clear, I didn't say the hegemon was good, or nice, or just. What I said is that the situation could get much, much worse than it was under the past hegemony.
Yes it could. And one of the reasons is that over long time nobody will tolerate hegemon telling them how live their lives. Hegemon must be smart enough not to be one but that is not what we have.
There are bearings a country can take, foreign relations wise, that over the long term that lead to better outcomes and just quality-of-life improvements in general. Benevolence and smart relationship management com ined with military dominamce has immense soft power, of which the U.S. has left unexplored.
I just found this reading up on S.Pacific politics:
Weiner, Tim (9 October 1994). "C.I.A. Spent Millions to Support Japanese Right in 50's and 60's". The New York Times. Retrieved 29 December 2007.
Add japan to the laundry list where these organized, professionalized, politically motivated paramilitary "groups" involve themselves in the democratic process of other nations, with absolutely no control or oversight from the very society they comes from.
Its not like US hegemony has brought about peace. In fact, the US has intentionally provoked wars in nations that needed a regime change. Iraq War brought ISIS. ISIS brought terrorist attacks to EU and US.
Political instability in Africa has caused genocides. Often with a connection to US decisions. South American regime change doesn't happen as often as it did in 70s to 90s, but that was the source of a lot pain for people.
Come to think of it, it worked out great for everyone a century ago. Three-peat here we go!
Now is more like a repeat of the 1300s and a build up to an exploratory treasure voyages from China in the 1400s.
Modern wars between super powers can't be fought. They are an existential threat for the human species. Plenty of proxy wars to waste lives on though.
At that point you have two options: conciliate with the baddies or arm yourself. Including nuclear weapons- even Japan is rethinking it's stance on nuclear proliferation. This is nothing new really Europe was a war torn continent for a thousand years.
In 1000 years, if the US gets taken over, the new power that takes over will have the same reasons to keep the peasants doing what they are doing to keep the state useful as a whole at the time of the takeover. If a completely different nation state takes power openly, sure, a few idiots who have been too brainwashed to serve their old exploiters will struggle... but they'll eventually be forced to get in line or suffer. This will not affect the population at large. They'll keep doing whatever they are doing, like they have been, for many many generations all over the world. New history will make old history boring and uninteresting to the politically minded, but it will be just the same for everyone else.
The outcomes will be vastly different if it happens in the next couple of hundred years though. There is no way there will be enough decentralised resources for people to survive by themselves... so the elites losing the power will try to do everything to hold on to it. They will control food supply to starve the people and force them into war... and won't stop until a lot of damage is done on the population.
Let's not pretend history ever stopped repeating. It was always repeating. If you think the world enjoyed a brief reprieval under a single superpower, that's because you and I happened to live in privileged places.
"Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it" and what seems likely is a repeat of the 1800s and its rivalry between the great powers, only this time with modern arms. May we all survive the coming era of international strife and war.