Long Waves of Growth, Hegemonic Power, and Climate Change in the World Economy : Dutch, British, US and Chinese Capitalism and Structural Polycrises

This book investigates eras of major geopolitical and socioeconomic power, development, relative demise and potential renewal, for four major political economies. It concentrates on the Dutch Golden Age of the late 1500s and 1600s, British hegemony of the 1800s, Pax Americana of the 1900s, and Chinese potential hegemony of the 2000s, as well as long wave patterns of change over successive centuries to the present (and to some degree into the future).

Dutch, British, US and Chinese economies are situated within patterns of long-term successive rise and fall (and fall and rise) of economic growth, hegemony and climate change in the world political economy, including linkages between core, periphery and semi-periphery. Patterns of multiple crises tend to appear in-between hegemonic periods, and climate change often undergoes complex dynamics through time, while currently climate anomalies are emerging during mostly long wave downswings and polycrises in the world economy.

Contemporary themes of the book include the ongoing competition for world domination between the US and China, the conflict over Ukraine-Taiwan that some think may generate world-war 3, the climate change crisis that continues to plague the world, and whether the world and its major economies are likely to undergo a Golden Age into the future. Chapter 7 of this book on US hegemony and long waves includes extracts of material that won the Myrdal Prize for Book of the Year Prize from EAEPE as well as Journal Article of the Year from Curtin Business School. Ideas from parts of Chapter 9 emanate from a volume that won Book of the Year Award from CBS. A climate change paper that won Journal Article of the Year Awards from EAEPE and CBS informed ideas that are used in several parts of this book.

The book outlines key stylized facts from the analysis and presents hypotheses for further investigation on the relationship between long-term growth, hegemony and climate change. The book uses the work of Kondratiev, Schumpeter, and company, themes in economic history, modern political economy schools, and the principles of political economy contingency paradigm to reformulate long wave, hegemony and climate change hypotheses and empirics.