The current economic crisis is not merely the result of bad policy, corrupt leadership, and corporate and consumer greed (though there is evidence of all these as the dust clears, the crisis is even more fundamental than that). This crisis is not a cyclical event — like the predictable return of Atlantic hurricane or Indian Ocean cyclone seasons. The present crisis is closer to a devastating earthquake, and a great deal of the immediate effort is on developing solutions that focus mainly on damage control and trying to mitigate ongoing rumbling and tremors.

This massive upheaval is happening along a familiar fault line that everyone knew was there. Globalization, shifting demographics and the spread of technology have merged with such speed, innovation and power that traditional financial institutions and global financial structures designed for the past century’s business models have been overwhelmed. Current short term fixes are powerless to halt the movement of these tectonic plates. It will be several years before the world financial systems adapt, change, and innovate their way to creating new systems that can serve the emergent realities.

One of these tectonic plates is the rise of the rest of the world. Americans tend to have a very ethnocentric view of the world (is this an example of mass unconscious incompetence?). Part of our new reality is that, as the new century progresses, the United States, though still a leader, will no longer enjoy the benefits of being the world’s lone super-power. For about a quarter of a century the U.S. has been the  biggest kid on the playground. The new reality is probably less that the U.S. is in decline than the fact that the other “kids” on the playground have grown up and leveled the playing field.

Let me encourage you to read Fareed Zakaria’s remarkable article, The Rise of the Rest, (and his equally remarkable book, The Post-American World).

In addition, Karl Fisch — whose powerful Did You Know? 2.0 presentation has proved eye-opening for educators, students and busnesspeople — points us to Ms. Chor Pharn Lee, strategist with the Ministry of Trade and Industry in Singapore.  She has taken Fisch’s Did You Know presentation idea and created a version with an Asian perspective.  Take the five minutes to view her Rise of the Rest. Then discuss it with your colleagues. This is the reality of the world that is emerging, in which we will do business and in which our kids will grow up, and, God willing, prosper.

Rise of the Rest on YouTube: