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The conventional wisdom which started to develop from the middle of the last decade, and really gained hold with the 2008 financial and economic crisis, is that this is going to be the Asian century – particularly in the economic realm with the growth of China and India. But is this wisdom wrong? Is the dominance of Asia really inevitable?

It is a good time to be posing this question given the signs of life we are seeing from the US economy and President Obama’s much discussed pivot or rebalancing to Asia. The US’s continuing soft power advantage, coincides with the slow-down/rebalancing of the Chinese economy and economic/financial turbulence in India - which has been hit with slowing growth and is teetering on the edge of a currency and debt crisis again.

It is not simply an economic story given Asia is now the region where spending on defence and arms is rising fastest – as China modernises its military in competition with India and Japan, and south east Asian countries are also ramping up their defence spending – contrasting with declining defence spending in the US and Europe. The reason for Obama’s pivot to Asia is to focus scarcer military and economic resources on Asia and the Pacific.

The event will co-hosted by the Asia Society http://asiasociety.org/
Presenter: Ritula Shah