In the 1970s, Americans fretted over Japan's economic boom; two decades later, the European Union seemed the wave of the future. In the 21st century, America's worries have focused on the rise of China, with its massive exports and new megacities. Yet one after another of these concerns, Hansen points out, proved unfounded: “Fascism was crushed; Communism imploded; Japan is aging and shrinking; the European Union is cracking apart.”[6]