As turbulence grows in many countries, it is tempting to ask if there is a global hegemon that can sort everything out fairly.
US President Donald Trump has threatened that his country would not defend Nato allies if they failed to spend enough on their defence. Together with new trade barriers, his words suggest that the US is scaling back its ambitions for global leadership and concentrating more on its own region.
Our latest projections of national strength for 2027 take into account resources, territory, economic strength and military power. They still put China in first place, with its lead over other countries widening. But when might China move beyond leading the ranking to exert decisive influence over the world’s trouble spots and become a global arbiter?
To explore that question, we should first look at how states have assessed national power. Ancient rulers counted people, revenues, troops, ships and resources but these were separate assessments, not a single measure of national power.