Originally Posted by
Ryan DCNT
A while back I read George Friedman's book The Next 100 Years, which detailed various factors that may come into play in determining global hegemony. One of the takeaways was that, historically, the entity that controls the trade routes is the global hegemon. The US, via geography, has border access to the two major global shipping lanes (the Pacific and Atlantic oceans), and due to the size and scale of the US Navy, has enjoyed unchallenged control of the trade routes.
Contrast that to the EU, which really doesn't even have a naval fleet, and it's hard to imagine them as the next great empire. Add to that the demographic decline and lack of national identity and it's even less likely.
If anything China is poised to fill that role, however it's just as likely that global hegemony is coming to an end, and we'll see a multilateral split, likely between anglo countries (US, UK, Canada, Aus), the EU, and Russia/China/India/Iran.