Western power did not diminish but reconfigured after World War Two

Evidence

In the very few times in which he spoke of “the crises of modernity,” there is nothing beyond a mere intimation that the crises may be found in anything beyond the political sphere. The crises, perceived or real, are “caused in part by the diminishment of Western suzerainty over the rest of the world” (248, 257). First, it is not obvious that such a diminishment did occur, especially when the United States and its NATO allies renewed their hegemony with a new configuration after the Second World War, and when neocolonialism replaced the old with reinforced and indeed more hegemonic and vicious political and economic domination. In this respect, no serious scholar can argue that such a “diminishment” occurred. — Wael Hallaq, Restating Orientalism, 325

Categorization

• XREF: Resonates with the distinction between ‘decolonization’ as narrative and the reality of neocolonial economic-military hegemony in works like Anibal Quijano’s coloniality of power.
• ADDENDUM: Directly supports the case that ostensible retreats of Western power are reconfigurations — parallels the essay on sacrifice’s discussion of how ritual forms persist through changing social orders.