A man takes pictures at sunset in Sarajevo, Bosnia, May 6, 2020 (AP photo by Kemal Softic).

Perhaps no activity is more inherently human than the attempt to find meaning, whether in the circumstances of our lives or the broad sweep of history. As Viktor Frankl taught us in his seminal book, “Man’s Search for Meaning,” with meaning comes purpose; understanding the “why” often helps us find the “how.” This seemingly hard-wired effort to discern the meaning of the events taking place around us begins with identifying important signposts and determining their significance. For us at WPR, the most obvious one we look for is crisis—whether political, economic or humanitarian; whether caused by social processes, natural phenomena […]

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at a joint press conference in Berlin, Germany, Dec. 17, 2020 (AP photo by Michael Sohn).

At the end of a tumultuous and disorienting year for the international community, it seems only fair to take stock of where we stand. The answer is clear: We are between storms. COVID-19 and climate change—the first a dramatic gale whipping the globe, the second a far deadlier gathering hurricane—have brought fresh urgency to international cooperation. The first injections of coronavirus vaccines have brought hope that the pandemic can be defeated soon, though we are far from out of the woods. Meanwhile, with the United Nations gearing up to take a bolder leadership role, a new U.S. president pledging a […]

Former Google AI researcher Timnit Gebru speaks in San Francisco, California, Sept. 7, 2018 (Photo by Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch).

Google sparked an uproar earlier this month when it dismissed Timnit Gebru, the co-leader of a team of researchers at the company studying the ethical implications of artificial intelligence. Google maintains that it accepted her “resignation,” but Gebru, who is Black, claims she was fired for drawing unwelcome attention to the lack of diversity in Google’s workforce. She had also been at loggerheads with her supervisors due to their request that she retract a paper she had co-authored on ethical problems associated with certain types of AI models that are central to Google’s business. On the Trend Lines podcast this […]

A building at Google’s campus in Mountain View, California, Sept. 24, 2019 (AP photo by Jeff Chiu).

Earlier this month, Timnit Gebru, the co-leader of a team of researchers at Google specializing in the ethical implications of artificial intelligence, was unceremoniously ousted from her position. Some of the circumstances that led to her departure are disputed, but Gebru—a Black woman in a field that is overwhelmingly white and male—claims she was forced out for drawing unwelcome attention to the lack of diversity in Google’s workforce. She also claims she was “silenced” for her refusal to retract a paper that she had co-authored on ethical problems associated with certain types of AI models that are central to Google’s […]

President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He sign “phase one” of a U.S.-China trade agreement, in the White House, Washington, Jan. 15, 2020 (AP photo by Steve Helber).

One of the great traditions in U.S. trade policy circles is the semiannual gathering of former U.S. trade representatives. Started two decades ago by Sherman Katz at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and carried on by William Reinsch, who holds the Scholl Chair in International Business at CSIS, the meetings bring together many of the former top U.S. trade officials to share insights on current economic issues. It is a unique event that pools the accumulated wisdom of several decades; there are no similar gatherings of former U.S. secretaries of state or defense. This year’s version—held online, of […]

Containers are loaded on a cargo ship at the port in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, May 3, 2020 (AP photo by Hau Dinh).

Capping eight years of tough, on-and-off negotiations, representatives from 15 countries across the Asia-Pacific gathered in a virtual meeting last month to sign a gargantuan new free trade agreement, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. Encompassing all 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, along with Japan, China, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand, RCEP will cover around 30 percent of both the world’s population and GDP, making it the world’s largest trading bloc. While its trading rules and market access provisions are not as far-reaching as the other main multilateral agreement in the region, the Comprehensive and Progressive […]

Photo by 692 Productions, courtesy of Dambisa Moyo.

“It’s very easy for us to forget that things in the global economy and geopolitically were already somewhat precarious before COVID hit in earnest,” says Dr. Dambisa Moyo. “As we start to think about what a post-pandemic recovery looks like, I think it’s very important to have that context in mind.” This is why, for Dr. Moyo, “COVID is an accelerator to the challenged environment that was already occurring.” Dr. Moyo is a widely acclaimed economist and author of four New York Times bestselling books, most recently, “Edge of Chaos: Why Democracy Is Failing to Deliver Economic Growth—and How to […]

The Dave Johnson coal-fired power plant is silhouetted against the morning sun in Glenrock, Wyo., July 27, 2018 (AP photo by J. David Ake)

Humanity is at war with the living planet, endangering our prosperity and indeed our very survival on Earth. That is the stark message of the 30th Human Development Report, “The Next Frontier: Human Development and the Anthropocene,” released last week by the United Nations Development Program. For too long, we have pursued an economic model of development based on unsustainable production and consumption, heedless of the impact on the natural world in which we are inextricably embedded. The bill is now coming due. The COVID-19 pandemic, which began as a zoonotic disease, is only the latest example of the pressures […]

A man passes the New York Stock Exchange, Nov. 16, 2020 (AP photo by Mark Lennihan).

In addition to its human toll, the coronavirus pandemic has wreaked economic havoc around the world. Entire economies ground to a virtual standstill as governments implemented strict lockdowns to prevent the spread of the virus. The impact on individual countries has only been exacerbated by the disruptions to global trade caused by the pandemic, and uncertainty still surrounds the shape of the economic recovery that will come in its aftermath. But even before the pandemic, the developed economies of Western democracies faced structural obstacles to growth that have called into question their models of governance, even as China’s high-growth development […]

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian during a briefing at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Beijing, Feb. 24, 2020 (AP photo by Andy Wong).

Editor’s Note: Every Wednesday, WPR Assistant Editor Benjamin Wilhelm curates the week’s top news and expert analysis on China. WPR contributor Rachel Cheung wrote the lead story in China Note this week. Subscribers can adjust their newsletter settings to receive China Note by email every week. There is no end in sight, it seems, to the diplomatic fallout between China and Australia, as both countries race to win new partners in the Asia-Pacific to blunt the impact of their own worsening ties. After China imposed harsh tariffs on many Australian goods, Australia has been eyeing Taiwan as an alternative market […]

President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris listen as Katherine Tai, the Biden administration's nominee for U.S. trade representative, speaks at The Queen theater in Wilmington, Del., Dec. 11, 2020 (AP photo by Susan Walsh).

“Trade is like any other tool in our domestic or foreign policy,” Katherine Tai, President-elect Joe Biden’s choice to be the next U.S. trade representative, said last Friday when her nomination was announced. “It is not an end in itself. It is a means to create more hope and opportunity for people.” Those remarks from the 46-year-old career trade official may seem self-evident. But they hint at what could become a significant change in the direction of trade policy under the new president. Since the era of bilateral and regional trade negotiations began in the mid-1980s, the mission of the […]

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and other Republican senators during a news conference to highlight their proposal for a coronavirus stimulus bill, Washington, July 27, 2020 (AP photo by Susan Walsh).

Early this year, when the realities of the COVID-19 pandemic were beginning to sink in, the governments and monetary authorities of the world’s largest economies were challenged to respond. To prevent the worst from occurring, economic rescue packages needed to meet three key criteria from the time-tested, crisis-fighting playbook: speed, size and sustainability. At the time, the policy responses could only be judged on the first two of those characteristics. On both counts, they scored quite well. Collectively, from the United States to Europe to Japan, policymakers’ efforts to address the economic fallout of the pandemic were impressive and historic […]

Indonesian workers protest against the controversial omnibus bill, in Tangerang, Indonesia, Oct. 7, 2020 (AP photo by Dita Alangkara).

In early November, Indonesian President Joko Widodo approved a controversial omnibus law that is meant to bolster Indonesia’s economy by reducing regulations and bureaucracy in areas from mining to forestry and labor to business licensing. Jokowi, as the president is known in Indonesia, has touted such reforms for years; he has claimed the new, landmark Job Creation Law, which clocks in at nearly 1,200 pages, will “create an additional 1 million jobs a year and increase worker productivity, which is below average in Southeast Asia.” Indonesia certainly does need a reduction in red tape, which has long hindered domestic and […]

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at a news conference with President Donald Trump at the White House, in Washington, Sept. 20, 2019 (AP photo by Patrick Semansky).

Australia’s government had a minor meltdown last week, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison calling an impromptu press conference to demand an apology for a “repugnant” Twitter post by a Chinese government spokesperson that contained a doctored image of an Australian soldier holding a knife to an Afghan child’s throat. The image, which Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Zhao Lijian tweeted from his verified account, had a caption that read, “Don’t be afraid, we are coming to bring you peace.” Zhao’s accompanying text in the Twitter post expressed shock at the death of Afghan civilians and prisoners at Australian hands, calling for […]

President Trump speaks at Dana Incorporated about the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade, in Warren, Mich.,  Jan. 30, 2020 (AP photo by Evan Vucci).

Editor’s Note: Guest columnist Daniel McDowell is filling in this week. When Joe Biden is inaugurated as America’s next president on Jan. 20, he is expected to take quick action to reverse many of Donald Trump’s policies. The incoming administration has spent months laying the legal groundwork for a flurry of swift, bold executive actions on issues like climate policy, immigration, transgender rights and nuclear weapons. Conspicuously absent from this list, however, is trade. Biden could undo many of the Trump administration’s most significant trade moves, like its tariffs on imports from both China and U.S. allies, with the stroke […]

Mina Al Fahal Shell refinery in Muscat, Oman, Oct. 1, 2019 (DPA photo by Alexander Farnsworth via AP).

In early November, Oman’s government announced plans to institute an income tax on high earners by 2022. The policy will break precedent in the oil-rich Gulf, where states tend to pay their citizens, rather than requiring citizens to pay the state. The question now is whether this decision will fundamentally shift the social contract in Oman, which has been an absolute monarchy for decades. Oman’s neighboring rentier economies will be watching closely to see whether direct taxation leads Omanis to more vocally demand representation in government. Oman’s experience will also have implications for U.S. engagement with the region. That Oman […]

The sun sets behind an idle pump jack near Karnes City, Texas, April 8, 2020 (AP photo by Eric Gay).

The year 2020 may well mark the tipping point for the oil and gas industry. Amid a global pandemic that has slashed oil demand by some 8 million barrels per day, the governments of key countries—China, Japan, South Korea, South Africa and others—have announced that they aim to reach net-zero emissions by the middle of the century. After President-elect Joe Biden takes office in January, he will likely add the United States to the list, and when he does, net-zero targets will apply to more than three-fifths of global CO2 emissions. It seems that the world is about to double […]

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