Glistening blue water, a stunning coastline, the smell of the sea, all nearby a bustling European city: The exquisite seaport of Trieste in northeastern Italy was supposed to be the idyllic in-person venue for this year’s European Dialogue on Internet Governance, or EuroDIG 2021. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, the majority of sessions took place online. But one group—the Dynamic Coalition on Data and Trust, of which I have the good fortune to be a coordinator—met in person to discuss issues around the Domain Name System, or DNS, and practical responses to DNS abuse and cybercrime. Geographically speaking, Trieste sits [...]
Editor’s note: Guest columnist Richard Gowan is filling in for Stewart Patrick, who will return July 12. Some years ago, I wrote a column about the Trump administration’s hapless diplomacy at the United Nations that noted that the U.S. faced “a brace of flash points from Iran to South Sudan.” I did not pause to think what “a brace” was. I must have assumed it meant “a lot.” A few days later, I received a wry email from a gentleman in Oxford pointing out that a brace is in fact a synonym for “a pair.” Trump, he thought, was facing [...]
Summer is the time of year when climate change dominates the public conversation, and it came earlier this year than ever before. Hurricanes are battering the Caribbean, and record heat waves—exacerbated by climate change—are scorching Europe and Western North America, with wildfires increasingly encroaching on population centers. This year, over 100,000 more acres have already burned than at the same time last year, though last year’s fire damage was record-breaking as well. Smaller, island nations are in a fight for their very survival. In this context, global efforts to gradually reduce carbon emissions seem paltry at best. The Paris Agreement [...]
