There were periods in history where civilization is perceived as equal

For more than two centuries, the Western world has lived "side" of "the other" watching it as "inferior". Today, while demographers predict us a world where Americans and Europeans put together does represent that slightly more than 10 of the world's population by 2050, the Western world must learn to live "with the other" considered "equal". Another that has values, cultural contexts, which can be certainly different from ours, that we may not always find to our liking, but we have to respect the dignity and political references.

While we are entering a "post-occidental world", we need a return on ourselves. There were periods in history where civilization is perceived as equal. It is enough to be convinced to read the correspondence of the ambassadors of Venice describing the rise of the Ottomans after the fall of Constantinople or the memoirs of Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit priest who lived in Imperial China in the 16th century, or even to return to the first years of the company of the Indies until the British exploited the weakness of an empire Mongolian declining to create their own empire during the period of the Raj. It is this sense of balance between civilizations that disappeared with the rise of European imperialism which succeeded the American "Imperial Republic".

Today, Americans and Europeans must rethink the way they see themselves in the world and their mode of interaction with each other. They must do so with a mixture of modesty, because "they are more alone" on the planet, and ambition, since they always embody a world of values, ideas and ideals autour of the concepts of democracy, rule of law and respect for human rights, which remain largely unique. They must also be satisfied that this time where "Spring Asia" coincides with "the fall of the West" is not only a challenge but a unique opportunity for us "to go to the core".

The comparative advantage of the Western world lies in demography, or even in the military, financial and economic fields but in the ideas and ideals. For the first time in the recent history of the world, a great power like China appears on the front of the world, without having a universal message to offer. It is precisely this universal message revitalized, a dignity and a new legitimacy by the seriousness of our actions and the quality of our leaders political, economic and financial, which may be the essence of the comparative advantage of the Western world. Our capitalism based on institutions and democratic values must regain its letters of nobility, he has lost, victims of the addition of the greed of some of the mediocrity of others and the failure of the control mechanisms.

At the end of the 18th century, the beginning of the period of absolute domination of the West on the world coincides with the emergence of an intellectual movement based on the idea of progress, that of the enlightenment. At the time, the progress meant the emancipation of human beings humans of any form of prejudice and superstitions and the assertions of established religions. Today what may be the components and instruments of a new "philosophy of lights" adapted to the challenge of this first half of the 21st century

"The other" is a single mirror of our strengths and our weaknesses. In a world where we will be proportionally so few, our only ambition must be to become "a niche of excellence". It is our only superiority against China, and it will remain if we really practise what we preach. In the same way, a vision of gender equality based on individualism represents our comparative advantage over the India and the caste system.

The time has come for the Western world to realize that he lives well above his means in physical terms and very below its means regards intellectual and spiritual. "