No 10 and the secretly funded lobby groups intent on undermining democracy
To accumulate power, a government with authoritarian tendencies must first destroy power. It must reduce rival centres of power – the judiciary, the civil service, academia, broadcasters, local government, civil society – to satellites of its own authority, controlled from the centre, deprived of in…
The Pandemic Depression
The COVID-19 pandemic poses a once-in-a-generation threat to the world’s population. Although this is not the first disease outbreak to spread around the globe, it is the first one that governments have so fiercely combated. Mitigation efforts—including lockdowns and travel bans—have attempted to sl…
The Post-Pandemic Economy’s Barriers to Growth
The COVID-19 pandemic could not have come at a worse time for the global economy. If history is any guide, the current period of deglobalization, public indebtedness, weakening growth, and the expanding economic role of governments does not bode well for sustainable GDP growth. NEW YORK – As the wor…
The End of American Illusion
Since the end of the Cold War, most U.S. policymakers have been beguiled by a set of illusions about the world order. On critical issues, they have seen the world as they wish it were and not how it really is. President Donald Trump, who is not a product of the American foreign policy community, doe…
Is the Almighty Dollar Slipping?
Far from signaling its imminent demise as the main global reserve currency, the greenback’s sharp depreciation is to be expected in the current macroeconomic context. The forces that could erode the dollar’s hegemony remain slower-moving and farther off. NEW YORK – The recent sharp depreciation of t…
To the Brink with China
NEW YORK – Observers of US-China relations increasingly talk of a new cold war. On top of a long-running trade war, the two countries now find themselves in a destructive cycle of mutual sanctions, consulate closings, and increasingly bellicose official speeches. Efforts to decouple the US economy f…
The-Other-Global-Power-Shift
The world is increasingly obsessed with the ongoing power struggle between the US and China. But the technology-driven shift of power away from states to transnational actors and global forces brings a new and unfamiliar complexity to global affairs. CAMBRIDGE – Since 2017, America’s National Securi…
America’s Unholy Crusade Against China
Last month, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivered an anti-China speech that was extremist, simplistic, and dangerous. If biblical literalists like Pompeo remain in power past November, they could well bring the world to the brink of a war that they expect and perhaps even seek. NEW YORK – Many wh…
A Crash in the Dollar Is Coming
The world is having serious doubts about the once widely accepted presumption of American exceptionalism. The era of the U.S. dollar’s “exorbitant privilege” as the world’s primary reserve currency is coming to an end. Then French Finance Minister Valery Giscard d’Estaing coined that phrase in the 1…
Revisiting the White Swans of 2020
At the start of the year, when COVID-19 was barely on anyone’s radar outside of China, the global economy was entering a fraught phase, facing a range of potentially devastating tail risks. And though the pandemic has since turned the world on its head, all of these threats remain – and some have be…