8 - Towards a Better Future

Summary

“For all the work that remains, a new foundation is laid. A new future is ours to write. It must be one of economic growth that’s not only sustainable but shared. To achieve it, America must stay committed to working with all nations to build stronger and more prosperous economies for all our citizens for generations to come.”

Barack Obama

“We label the current era ‘the Great Uncertainty’ and suggest, by the deliberate use of that term, that the present conjuncture is being shaped by a remarkable, and hugely challenging, coalescence of three major processes … financial crisis … shifting economic power … [and] environmental threat … processes of change all taking place now and arguably coming to a head at broadly the same time.”

Colin Hay and Tony Payne

Whether the new foundation laid in the Obama years is as solid as the former president asserted is now the governing question in the America of Donald J. Trump. But what we have already seen is that those foundations were not as strong, nor their outcomes as adequate, as the Obama reflection implies. In his defence, of course, it should be immediately said that he knew that too. The words quoted at the top of the page came at the end of a powerful and reflective essay focused on what remained still to be done: for Barack Obama, in the last months of his presidency, this included “boosting productivity growth, combatting rising inequality, ensuring that everyone who wants a job can get one, and building a resilient economy that’s primed for future growth”. That was difficult, he implied, because of things specific to the United States – not least political gridlock, social complexity, and global responsibilities. But as the quotation from Colin Hay and Tony Payne suggests, those specificities look rather different, and even more intractable, when seen as part of a bigger and more general picture – one overwhelmed in the moment by the impact of a financial crisis “brought about by neoliberal excess”, by a new international division of labour “characterized by the rise of countries like China, India and Brazil”, and by a pattern of climate change that is both “real and accelerating” and raising serious questions about “the ongoing viability of traditional notions of economic growth and indeed the good society itself ”.