World News Insights: Opinion Articles

How do we ensure that the world has access to the Covid-19 vaccines needed to prevent more variants like the latest omicron strain from emerging? One disturbingly common response to calls from the World Health Organization and others to increase the availability of doses in emerging economies is…

David Fickling

Supposedly, US President Joe Biden’s “Summit for Democracy” — which begins Dec. 9 — would show America was back as leader of the free world. Unfortunately, the Biden administration isn’t big on either thoughtfulness before the fact, or justification after. And in many parts of the world, including…

Mihir Sharma

After years of stumbles and underperformance, Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey is finally stepping aside as chief executive. The long-awaited move creates an opportunity for the social media platform to regain its footing, but there is much to be done. On Monday, the company’s board announced that…

Tae Kim

If disappointed progressives are looking for a Democrat to blame, they should consider directing their ire toward one of their party’s founders: James Madison. Madison’s Constitution was built to thwart exactly what Democrats have been attempting: a race against time to impose vast policies with…

Greg Weiner

What outcomes are expected from the seventh round of the negotiations in Vienna aimed at reinstating the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, also known as the nuclear degree, between Iran and the P5+1? It is difficult to describe the atmosphere around the talks as encouraging, whether from the…

Sam Menassa

The emergence of a new mutation of the coronavirus was not surprising. Scientists have previously warned of this. They used this argument to try to persuade the fearful, hesitant, and lost, who consider being pushed to receive the vaccine as a violation of their freedom. The position of the…

Ghassan Charbel

Last week’s economic and Covid-related news may well resurrect a risk narrative that makes policy makers and virtually all financial markets particularly anxious: US stagflation, that awful combination of rising inflation and declining growth. How this risk plays out in the next few months,…

Mohamed El-Erian

Every few months, the world learns of a new variant of the coronavirus. While most of these variants turn out to be inconsequential, some, like the Delta variant, are immensely consequential. The latest, B.1.1.529, now known as the Omicron variant, bears very close watching because of concerns that…

Ashish Jha

Governments are making multibillion-dollar announcements to deal with the global chip shortage. That's unlikely to help at this point and only risks muddying priorities for the future. Following the US and the European Union, Japan has announced large capital investments in the semiconductor…

Anjani Trivedi

It is sectarianism. It is ethnicism or factionalism. To use a broader term, it is clannishness or the extended kinship system. We say this as though we are discovering something, and we may slap our hands together in lamentation for what we are saying. We discover this truth whenever a civil war…

Hazem Saghieh

From Los Angeles to Felixstowe, England; to Dubai, United Arab Emirates; to Shenzhen, China, the world is witnessing delays and shortages of everything from toys to turkeys. At the root of this crisis is a transport sector that is buckling under the strain of Covid-era conditions. Workers who drive…

Guy Platten

America’s international travel rules still seem prejudiced against Europeans. The US reopened its borders on Nov. 8 to vaccinated foreign nationals from Europe, ending a ban that had dragged on far too long (more than 18 months) and looked increasingly arbitrary. No similar US blockade applied…

Max Nisen