What is trendy at Davos this year is to view the crisis as reflecting two deep global trends – for example, the declining clout of the United States. After the war in Iraq and the Bush administration’s slow reaction to Hurricane Katrina, America’s subprime mortgage crisis is perceived by many as simply accelerating the irresistible rise of Asia and the shift from a unipolar to a multipolar world, even if the wider financial crisis will equally affect Asia’s growth.