[LINK] "Could Canada be tomorrow’s superpower?"

[rfmcdonald]

Noah Smith's Bloomberg View article on Canada's potential was widely syndicated, ipolitics.ca being one of the many sources which picked it up. The critical comments here are worth noting, too.

I just finished reading Adam Tooze’s “The Deluge,” a history of how U.S. economic power changed the course of history during the world wars. It’s almost impossible for people today to realize what a big shift this was — to much of the world’s population, the U.S. has always been the Big Country, the driver of markets, innovation and geopolitical stability.

Right now, U.S. hegemony is waning. With only a quarter the population of China, there is essentially no chance that the U.S. can continue to reign supreme in the economic sphere unless China suffers a stunning collapse. But in the longer run, what shifts can we expect in the balance of economic power? Expect the U.S. to make a comeback, since its openness to immigration allows the country’s population to keep growing even after fertility levels out. India’s huge population, of course, will make it a great economic power as well.

But during the next couple of centuries, there is another country that I think has a surprisingly good chance of becoming an economic and cultural superpower. That country is Canada.

With a population of only 31.5 million (in 2013), a famously frigid climate and a below-replacement fertility rate, Canada would seem an unlikely candidate to become a superpower. But Canada has three huge, fundamental strengths that will almost certainly be telling in the long run. These are natural resources, good government and an almost unbelievably tolerant and open culture.