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In a speech today in Russia, Barack Obama said that “the pursuit of power is no longer a zero-sum game.” Dan Drezner isn’t so sure:
If he had said, “The pursuit of prosperity is no longer a zero-sum game,” I’d be fine with the passage. I still think power is a zero-sum concept, however. The two ideas are linked but hardly the same.
I suppose that’s true. Even in a Thomas Barnett-ish world where all the big players gang up to police the world, it’s prosperity and security that are positive sum, not raw power. Anyone care to try and come up with a counterexample?
