实际上，真正需要解释的不是西方相对地位为何不可避免地下降，而是其为何会暂时占据优势地位。全球人口接近70亿，而美国和西欧加起来仅有7.7亿人口。它们的人均国内生产总值(GDP)（这一指标可近似地衡量生活水平）是全球平均水平的三倍。在一个日益全球化的星球上，很难指望如此大的差异会持续下去。在克里斯托弗·哥伦布(Christopher Columbus)刚刚完成航海发现的1500年，中国和印度的GDP据估计均高于西欧，而人均GDP只是略低于西欧。在更早的1000年左右，世界各国的生活水平基本一样，而且都很低，但估计表明，中国稍稍领先。

The reversal towards an earlier norm has already started. Emerging and developing countries now account, for the first time in the modern era, for about half of total world output. Historians have offered endless explanations for the west’s temporary surge: religions that put more emphasis on the individual and his activities in this life; an intellectual climate more favourable to scientific thought; property rights that safeguarded acquisitions of wealth; less autocratic forms of government. The list is endless and doubtless all these elements played a part. In the late 18th century the government of England’s George III sent a trade mission to China, only to be rebuffed by the Chinese emperor who declared that his country had everything it required and did not need western trinkets.

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