| | | | Economics Falls From Grace | | Economics' hegemony among the sciences may have come to an end, Fareed writes in Foreign Policy: After the Cold War, suddenly "the most valuable intellectual training and practical experience became economics, which was seen as the secret sauce that could make and unmake nations."
That all changed with behavioral economics, which showed that markets, people, and perhaps nations don't always behave rationally—and knocked the discipline down a peg.
"That economics has since slipped from that pedestal is simply a testament to the fact that the world is messy," Fareed writes. "As we try to understand the world of the next three decades, we will desperately need economics but also political science, sociology, psychology, and perhaps even literature and philosophy." | | Syria Is Now About Turkey and Russia | | The race for control of northeast Syria is now a struggle between Turkey and Russia, writes Aaron Stein in Foreign Affairs. Turkey wants to contain Kurdish militias; Russia wants them to submit to Assad-regime control.
It's a lesson in how vacuums can be filled. Stein argues that Washington is feeling the heat, as Turkey builds up forces—and that President Trump's call for a 20-mile "safe zone" came of pressure from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who wants it as a buffer against (not for) the Kurds, implying the natural conclusion of the US pullout: a weakened hand. | | What About the Next Crisis? | | | How safe is the global financial system, 10 years after the 2008 crash? A day after the IMF modestly downgraded global growth forecasts, IMF Managing Director Christine Lagarde writes in Foreign Policy that post-crash banking reforms remain "untested" and warns against "pressure" to roll them back. That pressure has been steady in the US, where Republicans have lambasted Dodd-Frank.
Global risk doesn't just depend on banking reforms, but on political cooperation, Lagarde writes, giving a nod to "public-good problems, including the environment and refugees" as factors. | | Chinese President Xi Jinping summed up the state of the world in an address to party officials, warning of "unpredictable international developments and a complicated and sensitive external environment," calling for "vigilance," against black-swan and grey-rhino (obvious but ignored) events.
China is facing a specific threat right now, as that global unpredictability showed its face in President Trump's trade war, which has hit Chinese high-tech production. | | France and Germany Are Still Friends | | As Europe faces uncertainty in the wake of Brexit and US isolationism, France and Germany have renewed their vows as Europe's so-called "engine" with a treaty to cooperate on EU and UN issues and deepen ties with an "economic zone."
But both leaders—French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel—have been weakened by domestic populism, and while Le Monde pushes back on the far-right criticism, it also acknowledges the treaty was less ambitious than Macron had envisioned, while Le Figaro's Caroline Galacteros writes that it changes nothing about France's declining influence. | | | Africa's relationship with global powers has long focused on post-colonial relationships, development agreements, and Chinese economic expansion—but Russia is now turning toward the continent, the Financial Times reports. Its selling point: Arms exports and potential military presence, as it has "sent arms shipments and assisted shaky autocrats with election strategies" and both doubled its weapons exports since 2012 and upped its trade 26% in 2017. | | | | | | |
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