Angering China, Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou announced yesterday that the Dalai Lama will visit southern Taiwan next week. Beijing is always irritated when the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, travels abroad and the government often issues strong rebukes to foreign hosts. Last November Mr. Ma stopped the Dalai Lama from coming, but Mr. Ma […]
On Tuesday, South Korea launched its first rocket but failed to put the satellite in its planned orbit. Russia helped build the rocket after the United States refused due to worries that a regional arms race could take off. “With all its neighbors – China, Japan and North Korea – pursuing space programs, South Korea […]
Back in 2007, Niall Ferguson and Moritz Schularick wrote about “Chimerica” or the “symbiotic economic relationship” developing between China and the United States in International Finance. “Not only has plentiful Chinese and Asian labor increased global returns to capital; Chinese excess savings have also depressed US and global interest rates.” China did the saving and […]
America’s decline is a false prophecy. Writing in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs and yesterday’s International Herald Tribune, Josef Joffe, co-editor of Die Zeit and a fellow at the Hoover Institution, argues that even though it is fashionable again to speak of America’s fall and the rise of others, the United States will remain […]
The question is: Was it the right for the United States to announce its withdrawal from Iraq in order to focus on the war in Afghanistan? See this link for a video on the bomb attacks in Iraq. Attacks in Iraq. Source: NYTimes Arguments on both sides of the issue are convincing. Obama got elected […]
Cheng Li, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, details the growing importance of think tanks in China in the China Leadership Monitor. Think tanks and so-called “super think tanks” are organizing conversations and international exchanges to better understand the global challenges that China will face in the coming years. But he also notes that “in […]
Fitch Ratings, one of the three global rating agencies, published reports this week on the state of play in Russia. The government of Russia’s BBB rating was affirmed, but the Outlook for the rating (i.e., where the rating is likely to go in the next two years) remains negative. Russia has been more negatively affected by […]
Dilma Rousseff, the less-than-glamorous heir-apparent to Brazil’s leftist President Lula, is being accused of exerting pressure on a government official to whitewash an investigation into a political ally. See FT article on the subject. These corruption investigations snarl Brazil’s Congress all the time, and some blow over, while others balloon. What will happen to this one could affect […]
The FT reports today that China is extending a much-needed $1 billion loan to the government of Ecuador, one of the worst-run countries on the planet, as a downpayment on oil deliveries to the Asian juggernaut. Ecuador has oil, as well as other assets, including in tourism (for example, the Galapagos Islands, the Andes, and […]
Are the Democrats hypocrites on Colombia and on Free Trade? With Obama in tow, last year they killed the Colombia FTA legislation promoted by President George W. Bush (I know you don’t like him), who really got it right on hemispheric free trade and on U.S. ally Colombia. The Dems whined about abuses by the government […]
Brazil’s persistent economic weakness over the years has been its external balance sheet — heavy indebtedness to foreigners, weak foreign trade sector, and low external liquidity (e.g. low fx reserves). This was in addition to a heavy government debt burden (government borrowing abroad in fact drove the fragile balance of payments), a poor business climate (a huge tax […]
What would President Monroe say? An Economist article discusses the growing presence of Great Powers, especially China, in Latin America, flouting nearly two centuries of U.S. dominance in the region, since the articulation of the Monroe Doctrine in the early 1820s. In the near term, this worry is overdone. Longer-term, if the U.S. continues to […]
The economic news out of Asia just keeps getting better. With GDP figures for the second quarter rolling in, it is now predicted that emerging Asia will grow by more than five percent this year, compared to a contraction of 3.5 percent in the Group of Seven rich countries. So much for Asia waiting for […]
While India is rapidly developing and modernizing, the police force is abusive and failing. Last week, Human Rights Watch released a report that “documents the failings of state police forces that operate outside the law, lack sufficient ethical and professional standards, are overstretched and outmatched by criminal elements and unable to cope with increasing demands […]
The Economist has been publishing a series of articles and videographics on how the world’s largest economies – including the United States, China, Germany and an analysis of Japan next week – must change to ensure future global growth. “A rebalanced global economy requires America to consume less and save more. That means the world’s […]