When the two best teams in the Premier League [clasa superioară a campionatului de fotbal englez – n.trad.] face off, America cannot lose. Arsenal and Liverpool, as well as AC Milan, Roma, Marseille, Lyon, Chelsea and (so far) Manchester United, all have American owners. In 1994, the last time the USA hosted the World Cup, they didn’t even have a domestic soccer league.

When they do it again in 2026, they will do so from the position of owning a significant stake in at least three of Europe’s domestic leagues. The planet’s favorite game is largely launched from American boardrooms. But maybe for you the cultural influence check is higher than that. Well, let’s not forget that American universities continue to dominate world rankings.

Or that America accounts for 45% of global art sales by value, more than the UK, China and the next two markets combined.

Participating in the Venice Biennale is now like entering a new jazz age, where experts from around the world try to convince American patrons how to spend the profits of their country’s economic boom.

But even these aspects do not fully capture America’s continuing grip on the human imagination, best exemplified by the culture wars. Although some of the main philosophical ideas came from France, the movement known as the “Awakening” was the US’s gift to other advanced democracies. (Only, to their disappointment, he did not come with a receipt [pentru o eventuală returnare – n.trad.].)

America now has more cultural influence than it did during its supposed unipolar moment in the 1990s. The police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis three years ago sparked protests in London, Paris and beyond. The brutal treatment of Rodney King in 1991 did not have such an international resonance.

At that time, British conformist intellectuals did not follow the American political press as if it were the internal affairs of the Kingdom, and they did not tell each other to stop swearing and “do better” [expresii tipic americane – n.trad.]and these slang borrowings with a question intonation are even less pronounced.

Adaptation of what Jefferson said [al treilea președinte american – n.trad.] about France: everyone, or at least everyone who is educated and liberal, seems to have two countries now – their country and America. At the same time, the geopolitical influence of the USA is weakening. The past few months have been a reminder of the limitations of American foreign policy in the Middle East.

This once undisputed superpower also failed to convince much of the planet to participate in sanctions against Russia. After 20 years spent in Afghanistan, he had little to brag about there. Bretton Woods Institutes [FMI și Banca Mondială – n.trad.] trying to stay relevant.

The proliferation of armed conflicts, also identified in a recent report by the International Institute for Strategic Studies, suggests that the Pax Americana is beginning to give way, if not the Pax Sinica [China – n.trad.]then no kind of Pax.

As during the Cold War, the US has trouble hearing the “global south,” then called the “Third World” and soon renamed again, as the liberal protocol moves further toward its precise instability.

What is happening to the United States in the 21st century is too complex to be captured by the vague term “decline.” As the American economy’s contribution to the world economy shrinks, America’s influence on world culture—over the tastes, language, and habits of foreigners—is at an all-time high.

Whether your concerns are higher (where can I do my Masters?), mediocrity (what show am I on tonight?) or popular (who owns Declan Rice?) [un fotbalist – n.trad.], you will not escape from America. It has been two decades since the US lost ground to China in the traditional power plan. By now, the indirect effect on American prestige should have been felt in other areas.

Surprisingly, they are insignificant. Is it good for Americans? We can conclude how it could be.

One of the things that helped post-war Britain come to terms with the loss of its empire was the realization that English ruled the world, that British pop music was impregnable, and that its national radio station was a universal landmark. (Another was the crude but comfortingly foolish belief that the usurper, America, was populated by ethnic “cousins.”) No other European power went through decolonization protected by such a soft cushion.

At the same time, all that cultural brilliance blinded the British to such an extent that they did not even realize how low they had fallen from the table of the greatest geopolitics. As a result, serious miscalculations were made, for example, distancing from the European project, which at that time was in its infancy. Comparisons between the decline of the United Kingdom and the decline of America are mostly useless.

On the one hand, with America’s population of 330 million, it would be impossible to sink that low. But I wonder if she will find it as difficult as the British to realize her degraded geopolitical status and adjust her national policies to compensate. The preservation of this enormous cultural influence is a great cushion to soften the fall of a superpower that has passed its prime.

But the whole trick is not to fall asleep on it.

Janan Ganesh, Financial Times (acquired by Rador Radio Romania)