Reviewed by: Venky Vembu Follow the Incredible Journey of a Single Dollar to See How the Global Economy Really Works You don’t normally look to a Hollywood musical for lessons on the effect of money supply in the economy. Yet, in the 1969 film Hello, Dolly!, the eponymous matchmaker Dolly Levi, played by a peppy Barbra Streisand, channels her late …

Over 30 years ago, President Ronald Reagan and I signed in Washington the US-Soviet Treaty on the elimination of intermediate- and shorter-range missiles. For the first time in history, two classes of nuclear weapons were to be eliminated and destroyed. This was the first step. It was followed in 1991 by the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which the Soviet …

By: Michael Spence Powerful implications of the Restructuring of the World A decade after the collapse of Lehman Brothers, the world economy is back on shaky ground. In its latest World Economic Outlook, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned that the world economy is at risk of another financial meltdown, following the failure of governments and regulators to push …

By: Andrew Korybko Towards a Strategic Partnership? Russia and Pakistan are well on their way to reaching a strategic partnership in the light of four very high-profile events that have taken place during the recent weeks, and sticking to the roadmap of “Rusi-Pakistani Yaar Yaar” (“Russians and Pakistanis are buddies”) could allow their relations to blossom to the point of …

By: conn Hallinan Trump’s Stubbornness and the Changing Face of Asia  “Boxing the compass” is an old nautical term for locating the points on a magnetic compass in order to set a course. With the erratic winds blowing out of Washington these days, countries all over Asia and the Middle East are boxing the compass and re-evaluating traditional foes and …

By: Elenoire Laudieri The best way forward to tackle Afghanistan’s never-ending plight Until the Soviet invasion in 1979, Afghanistan was little known outside Asia. In the West, it mainly attracted the interest of scholars of history and archaeologists as a landlocked country roughly coinciding with the ancient region of Central Asia called Bactria, which was invaded by Alexander the Great …

By: António Guterres  Terrorism is a persistent and evolving global menace. No country is immune. Social media, encrypted communications and the dark web are being used to spread propaganda, radicalize new recruits and plan atrocities. The threat ranges from the crude tactics of lone actors to sophisticated coordinated attacks and the horrific prospect of terrorists using chemical, biological or radioactive …

By: Anatol Lieven  The Duty of Afghanistan’s Region In the short term, the war in Afghanistan will be chiefly not a military struggle but a test of American political stamina and of the capacity of the Afghan elites to maintain a minimally consensual state in Kabul. In the long term, it will be chiefly a test of the regional great …

The fading hopes for peace in the Middle East  Israel frequently claims its ‘right’ to exist. In fact, states do not exist by right and neither do they have a right to exist. They continue to exist because they have a strong army, capable of taking land and imposing their rule on the native population. They exist because they have …

By: Michael Spence Economists like me are asked a set of recurring questions that might inform the choices of firms, individuals and institutions in areas like investment, education and jobs, as well as their policy expectations. In most cases, there is no definitive answer. But, with sufficient information, one can discern trends, in terms of economies, markets and technology, and …