A protester holds a poster of German Chancellor Angela Merkel reading ‘Mrs. Merkel, here is the people’ during a rally of the Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West (PEGIDA), Dresden, Germany, Jan. 12, 2015 (AP photo by Jens Meyer).

On the surface, today’s Germany appears a model of harmony and consensus. Led by Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is beloved by the citizenry, Germany boasts the eurozone’s strongest economy, which has flourished even during the financial crisis and Europe-wide recession. Merkel, 60, heads up the country’s most popular party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), and has no serious challenger in sight. The current “grand coalition,” elected in 2013, is an affable partnership with the center-left Social Democrats; the trade unions and industry get along well, too. Many experts and journalists, such as George Packer in a recent profile in The […]

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is greeted by Chinese President Xi Jinping during a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, Feb. 2, 2015 (AP photo by Rolex Dela Pena).

Russia’s trade with China continues to grow despite the precipitous collapse in the value of the Russian ruble and the unprecedented Western economic sanctions imposed on Russia last year following Moscow’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula. Indeed, China’s economic importance to Moscow has increased as Russia’s commercial relations with Europe, the United States and Japan stagnate. Yet the Russia-China economic relationship is imbalanced, with Russia sending mostly natural resources to China and importing mostly Chinese consumer goods. As a result, the two countries will find it difficult to deepen their economic cooperation much further unless it expands to encompass high-value […]

Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias arrives for a meeting of EU foreign ministers at the EU Council building in Brussels, Jan. 29, 2015 (AP photo by Virginia Mayo).

When Greece first came close to a sovereign default in 2010, the eurozone and even the entire European Union seemed to be at risk of fragmentation. Rather than break up, the currency bloc forged new mechanisms to handle the crisis—and the balance of power on fiscal policy within the EU tilted decisively toward Germany as its economic guarantor. This pattern could now be repeated with regard to European foreign policy. Officials in Brussels insist that the victory of the hard-left Syriza party in last week’s Greek elections does not threaten the eurozone. But they worry that it could contribute to […]

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