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The numbers are in. Humanity needs to cut global greenhouse emissions by 7.6 percent every year for the next decade to meet the 1.5 degrees Celsius target agreed upon in the 2015 Paris accord. This is just one of the alarms sounded by the 2019 Environment Emissions Gap Report recently released by the United Nations. Each year the report assesses the difference between “where we are likely to be and where we need to be” with regards to greenhouse emissions. The report also notes that, in the past decade, global emissions of greenhouse gases have increased 1.5 percent each year on average and confirms that the world has warmed more than 1 degree Celsius from what it was in pre-industrial times.
In some countries, opposing political groups figure out how to reach agreements, govern, and share power. In others, long-standing hatreds make it impossible for them to move forward. Opponents are not seen as political rivals but as illegitimate enemies with toxic agendas and unforgivable past behaviors. The mere possibility of any deal with people or groups that promote unacceptable platforms – or worse, that have been accused of crimes and abuses – becomes morally and psychologically intolerable.
Some TV enriches our lives, some TV debases us. Some television opens minds, makes us think, takes us to places we would never get to visit and brings us face to face with life’s great dilemmas. There is also television that deliberately degrades, deceives, and confuses. And of course, there is TV that simply aims to distract us. Frequently, television that seeks to educate us is unbearably boring, while the shows that try to manipulate us end up polarizing and deceiving us. In contrast, TV that only aims to entertain is politically irrelevant. Or so we thought.
Americans will not follow politicians who fit the caricature that Donald Trump and Fox News use to depict opponents of the incumbent president.
America-hating, illegal-immigrant-loving, soft-on-crime radical socialists will not do well with voters. Fortunately, these radical socialists are scarce and not very influential. Unfortunately, they are omnipresent in Trump’s speeches and tweets.
In 2011, Libya cracked into a thousand pieces. With United Nations authorization, a broad coalition attacked Libya, a mob murdered Muammar Gaddafi, his bloodthirsty regime collapsed, and the country fragmented. Eventually, two governments were formed, one based in Tripoli and another in Tobruk. Each has its own leader, armed forces, government bureaucracy and even a Central Bank that prints its own money.
In a world aflame with protest, Latin America stands out as a raging ten-alarm fire. From Bolivia to Ecuador, Haiti to Honduras, the closing months of 2019 have seen enormous, sometimes violent demonstrations prompted by a truly dizzying array of grievances, including electoral fraud, corruption, and rising fuel and public transportation prices.
International security experts often draw up lists of the most dangerous places on earth. These are not places that are just dangerous to their population, but rather places that irradiate conflict and instability to neighboring nations or even to other continents.
In recent years, the attention of energy companies, governments, investors and the media has focused on the enormous upheaval caused by new technologies which have made the exploitation of shale gas and shale oil technically and economically feasible, and these innovations have upended energy markets and traditional geopolitical structures. In particular, the United States has become not only self-sufficient in energy terms but also one of the main hydrocarbon exporters. It is not exaggeration to call the changes in the oil and gas industry revolutionary. However, this change has diverted attention from another revolution changing the world, the electrical revolution.
What do Spain, Italy, Israel, and the United Kingdom have in common? They can’t seem to form stable governments able to rule. And it’s not just these four countries where, after all, the division of powers and limits on executive power still hold. As we know, plenty of other countries are much more dysfunctional.
What do North Korea and Cuba have in common? The obvious answer is that both are dictatorships. Less obvious is that both recently held elections. On March 12, the North Koreans reported that 99.99% of their citizens had gone to the polls and that 100% of the votes were for the 687 candidates put forward by the regime. There were no others. Weeks earlier, Cubans voted in a referendum in which they were asked if they approved of a new constitution. Ninety-one percent of them said yes.
Thucydides is booming. In recent years, the ideas of this Athenian general and historian who lived around 450 BC have attracted renewed attention. He wrote on a variety of subjects, but the current interest in his work was sparked by his chronicle of the 30-year war between Sparta and Athens. Specifically, what has attracted the attention of contemporary politicians, generals and historians is his conclusion that “What made war inevitable was the growth of Athenian power and the fear which this caused in Sparta.” The prediction that worries modern-day analysts is that the ascent of a rival capable of challenging the dominance of the established power inevitably leads to war. Of course, what they have in mind is China’s ascent and America’s reactions to it. Will the current frictions between the two giant nations continue to escalate and lead to a confrontation that will change the planet or will they find a way to coexist in a tense and fractious but ultimately peaceful sharing of global power?
"I’m a capitalist, and even I think capitalism is broken,” said Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater, one of the largest private investment funds in the world. According to Forbes, Dalio ranks 60th on the list of richest people on the planet. “I believe that all good things taken to an extreme become self-destructive and that everything must evolve or die,” he said. “This is now true for capitalism.”
JIran wants peace talks in Venezuela. “Chaos and violence can, by no means, be a solution to political differences,” said Abbas Mousavi, spokesman for the Islamic republic’s Foreign Ministry. The Chinese government has also insisted that “Venezuela’s affairs should be resolved… through peaceful dialogue and political means.” These sentiments have been echoed by Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, the UN, and many other countries, agencies and political pundits.
Most animals do not eat human flesh. But some do. It’s said that once a tiger, a lion or a leopard incorporates homo sapiens into its diet, it becomes a man-eater. Some say that once they develop a taste for it, they can’t stop.
Something similar is happening in politics. Once the political system in some countries learns how to toss out a head of state, it seems to develop a taste for it, and starts doing it again and again. The act becomes a sort of ritual sacrifice that takes place within the courts, the legislature, and the media, as well as in the streets. The proliferation of these “politician-eating” beasts appears to be a worldwide phenomenon. But why?
In March 1912 the mayor of Tokyo, Yukio Ozaki, gave the city of Washington D.C. 3,020 cherry trees. The saplings adapted well to their new surroundings and, over time, spread throughout the capital and its suburbs. So, for 107 years, springtime in Washington has brought the gorgeous spectacle of the cherry blossoms.
Sometimes elections and referendums change the course of history. For example, in June 2016, Britain decided to leave the European Union in the famous Brexit referendum. Also in 2016, Donald Trump won the US election and found himself in the White House. And in December 1998, Venezuelans elected Hugo Chávez president.
“Why do they hate us?” That was the question posed on the cover of Newsweek magazine after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The headline nodded to the fact that all the perpetrators were Muslims with a deep hatred of the US and the West. The attacks provoked a massive military response from the US and its allies, as well as an intense debate about the causes of this hatred and how to confront it. The debate popularized the theory of a "clash of civilizations," suggesting that, in the new century, religion and culture – not ideologies like communism and capitalism – would be the primary sources of international conflict. This attack pitting Islam and the West was seen as evidence of this new world view.
The Gulf petrostates, led by Riyadh, have outlined strategies to adapt to a world in which their current economic and political structures are no longer sustainable. Succeeding in this venture will require overcoming significant obstacles.
One interesting modern phenomenon is the collapse in trust. According to the polls, people don’t trust the government, politicians, journalists and scientists, let alone bankers and business executives. Not even the Vatican has escaped this crisis of confidence.