From the American Interest: The biggest surprise, however, in the 2010s may be the breakup of the West. Just as the glue that once held the Third World is dissolving over time, the forces that once brought western Europe, the United States and Japan into a single economic and political bloc are gradually losing their strength…

It is not just the United States that is rethinking its place in the world. Europe and Japan, while not wishing to abandon their alliances with Washington (any more than Washington wants to abandon its alliances with them), are re-balancing their foreign policy portfolios. As we saw in Copenhagen, the differences between European and American approaches to questions of global governance has outlasted the Bush administration. Europe and the United States these days are often fishing for allies in the old ‘Third World” against one another rather than, as in the past, working together to block communist advances among the non-aligned. While common values and interests will persist (and rising tensions with Islam could conceivably drive Europe and the United States closer together), the West is likely to look less united and less connected in 2020 than it is today.

Excerpt from article by Walter Russel Mead, Henry Kissinger Senior Fellow for US Foreign Policy at the Council on Foreign Relations. (graphic: Carnegie Europe)