What Ails America?

For our America issue, FP spoke to some of the country’s leading figures, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, columnist Thomas Friedman and FP‘s resident provocateur, Steve Walt. But what does the rest of the world think of the ailing superpower? We asked six writers from around the globe to put the United States on ...

Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images
Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images
Photo by Ezra Shaw/Getty Images

For our America issue, FP spoke to some of the country's leading figures, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, columnist Thomas Friedman and FP's resident provocateur, Steve Walt. But what does the rest of the world think of the ailing superpower? We asked six writers from around the globe to put the United States on the couch and tell us what it gets wrong -- and we certainly got an earful. From imperial hubris to gluttony to the failures of the education system, here's what they had to say about what's wrong with the state of the union today.

For our America issue, FP spoke to some of the country’s leading figures, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, columnist Thomas Friedman and FP‘s resident provocateur, Steve Walt. But what does the rest of the world think of the ailing superpower? We asked six writers from around the globe to put the United States on the couch and tell us what it gets wrong — and we certainly got an earful. From imperial hubris to gluttony to the failures of the education system, here’s what they had to say about what’s wrong with the state of the union today.

  • Imperial Hubris, by Ian Buruma
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  • The Presidency, by Sunil Khilnani
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  • Gluttony, by Vaclav Smil
  •  
  • The Fed, by Heleen Mees
  •  
  • The Dollar, by Fan Gan
  •  
  • Education, by Mishaal Al Gergawi
  •  

    Cara Parks is deputy managing editor at Foreign Policy. Prior to that she was the World editor at the Huffington Post. She is a graduate of Bard College and the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, and has written for The New Republic, Interview, Radar, and Publishers Weekly, among others. Twitter: @caraparks

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