We can see the cracks starting to show in US military and economic hegemony. To be sure, they're still the most powerful country in the world, but they can obviously no longer take on the rest of the world combined like they could in the 90s.
But more insidiously, the US still seems to be the hegemonic hyperpower in terms of cultural output. Even countries that are geopolitically at odds with the US happily and ravenously consume its art, entertainment, and literature, and to a lesser extent, those from loyal vassals of the US such as Japan, south Korea, and Western Europe.
It's not just due to reach. I feel that cultural output from the US (and vassals) is genuinely more creative, technically advanced, complex, innovative, and prolific than cultural output from the rest of the world. As someone of Chinese descent who doesn't strongly identify with American culture, this weighs on me heavily.
I'll compare American and East Asian cultural output since that's what I'm most familiar with.
Hollywood cinema is obviously the gold standard the world over. American films such as The Matrix, Blade Runner, and Fight Club are full of symbolism, innovative cinematography, and complex narratives. Korean films such as Snowpiercer, Parasite, and Oldboy are not far off. In comparison, the top Chinese movies such as The Wandering Earth 2 and The Battle at Lake Changjin are rather simplistic and don't necessarily have a lasting cultural impact, even in China.
Chinese TV is pretty good, with hits like Nirvana in Fire and Reset. But there has been no Chinese series with the wide reach, critical acclaim, innovative and sophisticated narratives, and lasting cultural impact of American series like Breaking Bad, Star Trek, The Sopranos, and Friends, or Korean series like Squid Game. The average Chinese person has heard of Friends, but only a vanishingly-small number of Americans have heard of Nirvana in Fire.
Chinese pop music is largely samey-sounding ballads. Listen to one of the songs by Li Ronghao or Joker Xue, and it could've been released today, a decade ago, or two decades ago. In contrast, Western and Korean pop music are constantly evolving and trying new things. Even more creative Chinese artists like Lexie Liu, Hyph11e, South Acid Mimi, and Absolute Purity are largely following established trends and not really setting new trends. Chinese music has no answer to jazz, rock 'n' roll, hip-hop, and house. The most identifiably Chinese music simply uses traditional instruments, but there's nothing particularly groundbreaking or creative about mashing folk instruments with existing pop music. K-pop, J-pop, and even LatAm, West Asian, and Indian pop have immediately identifiable sounds, whereas most C-pop sounds like it could've been made anywhere at any time. C-pop has little appeal even in places like Hong Kong. If you look at the HK charts, they're dominated by foreign artists like NewJeans Jungkook, Yoasobi, and Taylor Swift, with a small handful of HK and Taiwanese artists, but not a single mainland artist. That seems really shameful to me.
Japanese manga and American comics are considered the gold standard, with Korean manhwa a solid third. Meanwhile, Chinese manhua suffers from amateurish art, clunky pacing, unlikeable and selfish main characters, and boilerplate, tropey plots. If you thought isekai was overdone, wait until you see the endless cultivation stories in manhua. It's kind of embarrassing, really.
It's a similar story with literature, video games, and animations.
So, why is there such a large discrepancy in the quality of cultural exports coming from the US, Japan, south Korea, and Western Europe vs the rest of the world? Is it simply that these countries are richer so more people have the opportunity to pursue art, and studios have larger budgets? Is art like technolgical advancement in that you have to build up the know-how from the ground up? Or is there some cultural or governmental aspect in countries of the International Community™ that genuinely fosters creativity?
People often talk about this in terms of soft power, but imo what's even more important is cultural self-confidence. If domestic art or art from friendly cultures is good enough to satisfy one's own needs instead of having to import everything from countries that want to subjugate your own people, I think that would greatly boost collective well-being, sense of identity, and mental health.
On a personal note, this has been a nearly obsessive worry of mine for the last year or so. I've tried talking to a therapist about it but they just suggested that I try to stop identifying as Chinese and start identifying as American. Not very helpful advice. I don't really have anyone to talk to this about, so I hope I can start a discussion here.
Between the 1920s and 1950s, the US was seeing a massive influx of immigrants from all over the world. This allowed it to develop simultaneously a multitude of cultural genres and forms, which were influenced by the backgrounds of all the immigrants and their melding together. Especially WW2 saw a bunch of artists and artist-related professionals (like technicians needed to make a film) leave Europe and head to the US.
Vast sums of money and resources were invested to various culture industries (in the purest capitalist sense), especially film and music, over a course of many years with the aim of profit and cultivating propaganda.
The Hollywood golden age of the 40s, 50s and then the 80s shaped the likings of people all over the world to be more akin to what Hollywood wanted to produce.
The introduction of psychological manipulation tactics to advertising and the creation of films, music and later video games (e.g. Lowest common denominator, focus groups, etc) made American cultural export even more potent.
Simply put, the US had a headstart over everybody else, which it capitalized with big investements and then properly utilizing the advanced technical know-how that was developing regarding complex productions of culture.
Their culture will leave its mark for decades to come. Perhaps for ages. But others will eventually catch up and surpass them. It is a matter of time.
Yeah I totally see the established industry effect in terms of high production value films, TV series, and highly-polished pop music, but what really gets me is that a lot of influential musical movements such as jazz, hip-hop, punk rock, thrash metal, grunge, and house weren't made by carefully cultivated industry darlings with an elite music education, or even by fresh immigrants with a mind full of unique ideas, but by regular working-class Americans, often marginalized in their own right, just fucking around.
Why were Americans able to make such groundbreaking music, but other people can't? The standard liberal answer is that Western liberal values of individualism and free thinking encourage creativity, while socialism and collectivism punish stepping out of line via societal pressure and outright censorship. They also argue that any great bout of musical creativity came about from rebellion against the status quo, and rebellion in "authoritarian" or "collectivist" societies is mercilessly quashed, while it's tolerated in the free West.
I hope that's not the case. In the case of China, it really is true that musicians have to gain approval by local governments before performing at any ticketed event, including a vetting of lyrics. I think it's a fine policy in principle, but in practice, guidelines are really vague and many local governments come down way too hard to err on the side of caution, and I think it's really unfortunate. China is operating under siege socialism, and it's true that there are sometimes harsh limitations on artistic expression. But even so, black Americans were far, far more oppressed when they developed blues and jazz, and their dissent was certainly not tolerated at all, so I'm not sure if this argument holds water.
I think it is because they were not colonised, starving, being enslaved, fending off imperialism or trying to build a socialist project. Given time I'm sure China will continue to develop niche, underground and unique genres of music. I think looking at Hollywood films and pop music, and their Chinese analogues is barking up the wrong tree anyway. If you want real cultural content, Hollywood and pop music are completely absent of it.
Just recently I was at a music festival here (in the west) and a Chinese band was playing called Chinese football. They play indie-rock and everyone loved it. I think partially you may be looking in the wrong places, and partially it just needs more time.
I dont think the issue is "freedom". Let's take it case by case:
Jazz and blues - resulting from black culture, and was the new thing after ages of classical music dominating.
Rock and metal - started as an outlet for people reacting to the capitalist system for the most part. The US government tried hard to criminalize/suppress/regulate these music types. Also an evolution from blues.
Rap - same as metal, but later became heavily commercialized and promoted
Pop - basically industrialized music. Very little creativity involved in most cases. Mostly made to appeal to as many people as possible and is heavily promoted as the "default" genre.
The US censors its culture the same as any country, perhaps even more. It just does it more covertly and with soft means.
Another thing that is needed for a cultural expansion is prosperity and stability. China hasn't had that for nearly as long as the US. The US hasn't suffered a war within its borders for more than 140 years. The most critically acclaimed cultural projects in the US happened in the 20s, 50s, 60s, 80s and 90s, which is when the US population was prospering the most. China on the other hand has had wars and internal strife up until the 60s-70s. It has only started offering a comfortable life to the majority of the population in the 90s and 2000s.