Is the US becoming a second-class country, and can it shake off the superpower nostalgia that still haunts the UK?

The debate over the decline of US hegemony has raged and festered for 50 years, saturating the market with prophecies of American decline . Media experts ask how quickly it will fall and how much will be lost. But a fundamental question is usually ignored: what does decline mean? What is the significance, in terms of experience and everyday life, feelings and fantasies, of living in a country that has experienced its heyday?

Based on the example of post-World War II Britain and looking to America in the 2020s, Jed Esty suggests that becoming a second-ranked nation is neither catastrophic, as alarmists claim, nor preventable, as optimists insist.

Modern decline often masks white nostalgia and perpetuates conservative longing for the certainty of the Cold War. But the narcissistic lure of “lost greatness” appeals to everyone across the political spectrum. According to Esti, she finds such a wide response in the main media, because the Americans have lost access to the language of the national goal, going beyond global superiority.

Jed Esti - English professor at the Pennsylvania University.