Britain declining?

Originally posted by Reginmund Ah yes, another one of pinguin's Britain-bashing threads, hyping the virtues of his beloved banana-republics of Latin America in a favourable comparison with the perfidious and bellicose Europeans, whose inevitable decline will soon bring them death and misery, God willing.    The topic is interesting enough, but the premise isn't.

What a delightful use of language, which gets at the heart of the motivation behind this thread.

I think to expect a small island off the coast of Europe to continue to compete economically, militarily and politically against nations many times its size and resources (Russia, China, USA) is fairly unrealistic.

On an economic level, Britain is still very powerful. Next to the USA, they are home to the second largest number of companies which are part of the richest 100 multinational corporations in the world. Britain's currency is still powerful, enough that she does not need to take up the Euro (yet). As a nation which had to transform itself from global Empire to island state, Britain has done rather well at reinventing herself.

Militarily, she still boasts an impressive navy and airforce. Her special forces (critical in today's world) are among the very best in the world, many would argue the best. She is one of only a handful of nuclear armed powers. Aside from some troubles in Northern Ireland and recent Islamist terrorism, the UK enjoys overall domestic stability.

Politically, Britain still enjoys a great deal of prestige and influence. She is a permanent security council member, she is part of the EU, she is central to the Commonwealth (which as a post-imperialist organisation has done remarkably well). British culture in the form of the English language, media productions, history and academic works enjoy widespread consumption. Britain has won all major wars she has fought in the past 100 years.

Since the industrial revolution, power was inevitably going to gravitate towards the larger states with bigger populations and more material resources. Prior to the 19th century, Britain was still able to enjoy global success as the superpower of the day thanks to her excellent navy, decent amount of urbanisation and technological innovation, and a political structure which was designed for a flexible approach to colonial affairs. The arrival of the railway enabled nations like the USA, Russia and China to finally properly exploit the vast resources which lay in their interior. As these countries urbanised, they too provided their people with more motivation to innovate technologically. The rise of nationalism and improvements in small arms capabilities enabled colonised territories to throw off domination by the European powers - not so much a problem for larger nations ruthless or wealthy enough to curb minority secession. But for Britain, this was a problem.

The decline of the British Empire overseas was an inevitability because of these factors. Britain itself could not be harvested for the resources which prop up the large superpowers of today, nor could her overseas possessions any longer be held by force given that the British population within the Empire was itself a minority, not large enough to suppress all insurrections. The End of Empire is something the British can be proud of. At a time when communism was spreading rapidly, the British rather quickly handed over independence and so avoided Marxism spreading to the overwhelming majority of her colonies. Rather than fight a protracted, embarassing and ultimately unsuccessful campaign to hold onto the Empire like France tried, the British instead relinquished it rather peacefully. She did what was in the best interests of herself and her subject peoples with that move.

So faced with the inevitability of loss of Empire, the small island off the coast of Europe instead concentrated on reinventing herself in a post-imperial world. Britain has only endured as much decline as was inevitable. With the above achievements concerning her current strengths, I think it is remarkable that the small island has done quite so well.

Britan is not declining...the fact that other "poor" nations are improving more then Britan it's logical...they had nothing and they are rising their economy...Britan economy is strong and it's improving slowly...no it's not declining, other nations will surpass Britan thats for sure..maybe will decline when a hard war starts out...but Britan has powerfull allias

Britain is declining ? Britain has already declined. The role of this country is simply insignificant compare to what they had in the beginning of the 20th centrury. It's just a regional power right now, nothing more.

Originally posted by Sarmat12 Britain is declining ? Britain has already declined. The role of this country is simply insignificant compare to what they had in the beginning of the 20th centrury. It's just a regional power right now, nothing more.

Originally posted by Illirac Originally posted by longshanks31  We have been underestimated for centuries, napolian, hitler, pinguin and this will continue for centuries, but it is good as its a good weopon in the arsenal.     hahahaha...

Edited by pinguin - 12-Nov-2007 at 18:46

Originally posted by longshanks31 pinguin if that post resembled english id gladly answer the questions, please retype and rephrase, but if it answers your questions, im glad and very happy, i go to spain on my holidays and ive never had a problem, had my wicked way with a few of the pretty ones infact

Of course it isn't ....

One little negative thing that is ever reported about "any" country and all heck breaks loose! I don't see it as declining, but more stablized then anything else in the region, that is... which is currently reported within the press! 

Zagros, an interesting post i pretty much agree with. Sadly however, a more sensible foreign policy for the British government cannot be more intelligently devised in this day and age. Trying too stay in the middle as being a bridge for atlantic politics is proving too be quite straining in todays global bias of favoring one over the other. Perhaps a resolution may not be too far off in the future?

Yes, the GBP has not been in tandem decline with the USD because of the mentioned economic detachment. In fact, it has strengthened because foreign investors, confident in the currency's stability, have invested their capital in GBP.