OPINION

The Pandemic Stress Test

CHICAGO – The coronavirus pandemic has taken the world by surprise and will now expose underlying economic weaknesses wherever they lie. But the crisis also reminds us that we live in a deeply interconnected world. If the pandemic has any silver lining, it is the possibility of a much-needed reset …

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Preparing Africa for COVID-19

NEW ORLEANS – Six years ago, the Ebola virus ravaged West Africa. While Ebola is deadly and highly contagious, the economic and human costs could have been far lower if the international community had provided the needed support without delay. In the face of a new, fast-spreading virus, COVID-19, governments …

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Animals Deserve GNH

As my wife and I cheerfully ascended up the storied path to the Tiger’s Nest temple complex, inspired by Bhutan’s program of Gross National Happiness (GNH), our own happiness was dimmed by the sight of horses being forced to carry heavy luggage up the mountain. This stark contrast between our …

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Cambodia Is Criminalizing Democracy

PARIS – The sham trial of Kem Sokha, the leader of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), is underway in Phnom Penh. How the international community responds will send a powerful signal to Hun Sen, the world’s longest-serving prime minister, about his ability to continue to trample on Cambodia’s democracy …

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America’s Dangerous Iran Obsession

NEW YORK – US President Donald Trump’s order to assassinate Iran’s General Qassem Suleimani while on an official mission to Iraq was widely hailed in Trump’s jingoistic Republican Party. Government-sanctioned murders of foreign officials, clerics, and journalists are commonplace nowadays. Yet there is something special about America’s bloodlust against Iran. …

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A Low, Dishonest Decade

MUMBAI – I write this not as a professional economist, nor as a policymaker, but as a citizen of a tiny planet that is spinning through a vast universe that we barely understand. I write this “As the clever hopes expire / Of a low dishonest decade,” and as “Waves …

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Narendra Modi’s Second Partition of India

NEW DELHI – At a time when India’s major national priority ought to be creating economic growth, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has instead plunged the country into a new political crisis of its own making. With its penchant for shock-and-awe tactics, the government pushed through parliament a controversial Citizenship …

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Eight Norms for Stability in Cyberspace

CAMBRIDGE – In little more than a generation, the Internet has become a vital substrate for economic, social, and political interactions, and it has unlocked enormous gains. Along with greater interdependence, however, come vulnerability and conflict. Attacks by states and non-state actors have increased, threatening the stability of cyberspace. In …

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The Patriot versus the President

NEW YORK – It was an extraordinary spectacle: Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, a US military officer in full dress uniform decorated with a Purple Heart, testifying in the House Intelligence Committee’s impeachment hearings on November 19. Knowing that his testimony might well wreck his military career, Vindman believed it was …

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