Yesterday, I noticed something. I could not name a single important event in Japan post-1991 other than the 2011 earthquake -a natural disaster, not a human event. COVID was much the same. And, indeed, if one were to poll the average American, one would likely get the same sort of response. This suggests Fukuyama’s “end of history” book, published in 1992, was prescient in at least some of its contentions. The last memorable leader in Britain was Thatcher, who ceased being Prime Minister in 1990, and the last historically significant leader in France was Mitterand, who stepped down in 1995 -and the past 30 years of France’s history have been by far its least tumultuous. Italy has had some history after 1991, but, as with Japan, it was one of economic stagnation. Nothing really important has happened in Poland since the fall of the Soviet Union. South Korea, with the fall of Park, might too be entering into a historyless phase. The poorer nations -China, Russia, and, to a lesser extent, even Brazil- continue to have a history, as does the United States. But it’s questionable if even Mexico has had one since the fall of the PRI. In so many countries since the U.S.’s victory in the Cold War, events have been a blur, creating new debates, but not changing the general picture. If one disagrees with this view, I ask you -what do you expect to materially change in Japan or South Korea over the next fifty years?
Taking a blind shot here, but both JPN and SK in 2050 will become as "multicultural" and "multiethnic" as Western Europe was c.2020