Popular Culture Essay

The World’s Most Powerful People 2013
Forbes; October 30, 2013
FORBES creates a list at the end of each year consisting of the worlds’ most powerful people, including people that are CEOs to Political figures. This year (2013) Obama has been declared to be the second most powerful person out of 72 after holding number one for three years straight. Instead, Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin, holds the top spot after being third last year. FORBES made this decision based off more recent events unlike the years before holding into account the way the NSA leak was handled by both Presidents and the recent Government shutdown in America. They [FORBES] also bases it off of how each figure of some sort are doing finically and the influence on each 100 million people. For this year Putin wasn’t only able to unify Russia as a whole and influence much of his county (considering the approval rates of all the citizens went down 65% when he had to leave office due to the 2 term limit (Boyer, 1)) but also solidify his place at No. 1.
Connecting to what we have learned Having Putin being placed on top of the list and Obama moved down a step allows people to see a different side of the story. Putin now being the most powerful person in all of the world affects Russia and other countries surrounding it. Since he was able to solidify and unify all of Russia, the population will find this a pull factor (because it means the government is stable and not corrupt). Also, recent issues with Syria has proven both point of views by each president, Putin’s being not to attack Syria and Obama’s being to attack them for the same reason of Afghanistan. This could also be a pull factor because the common person will understand that Putin does not want to cause havoc among countries by starting a war showing that he would rather settle it peacefully. For the overall population, Putin has been able to provide jobs considering the fact that 2,08 trillion USD with a population of 145,3 trillion USD. Russia is not only showing a stability of their government but also positive influence of activity space. The population will be more active since they have more jobs that allow them to keep their GDP high and unemployment rates low. Locally, Putin has a humungous effect on the way the government will be run and the population that lives in the capital because of distance decay. Because they are so close, the word spreads faster especially now with how great technological advances are. Putin is the most powerful in the world because locally, he ensures well-being of his citizens, providing with jobs, and economical opportunities that enable local economy to grow. With this much power locally, Putin is able to have a strong, stable environment within a local community. Regionally, Putin is able to have a strong hold on all of Russia because of his massive effect locally. Through distance decay, the locals are able to spread his word for him to the outskirts of Russia. This regional effect allows him to not only control the borders and the Siberian parts of Russia but also solidify and unify the country as a whole giving him complete control over the mass of the population because of his influence on the people. Nationally, Putin is able to unify all of Russia through his influence. Since, he has effectively increased the GDP to 2,08 trillion USD, provide jobs for almost all of the nation, and keep the country out of war, he has been able to control his country and not have a nationwide shutdown unlike Obama. Putin was able to effectively receive approval of his citizens because of his choice on both Syria and the NSA incident with Snowden. With this in mind, his citizens are able to respect him as a peacemaker for not siding with America to lead an attack on Syria and a role model for other countries for how he handled the Edward Snowden incident; keeping him in asylum, protecting Snowden from the wrath of America. Putin actions nationally effects the

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