The people versus the police
[2011-11-01 17:27]Across the country, police, acting under orders from local officials, are breaking up protest encampments set up by supporters of the Occupy Wall Street movement – sometimes with shocking and utterly gratuitous violence.
America's economic stalemate
[2011-11-01 17:24]The US appears trapped in a dangerous economic stalemate, as Republicans and Democrats harden their positions ahead of the 2012 congressional and presidential elections.
The Arab spring and Europe's chance
[2011-10-28 09:20]If Europe does not want to be politically marginalized in international affairs, it must quickly develop a strategic response to the Arab spring, based on a vision of the future of the Arab world.
A French election American-style
[2011-10-28 09:14]In fact, at a time of widespread alienation from the institutions of representative democracy, direct citizen participation in nominating candidates is probably an irreversible trend.
Britain's path of denial
[2011-10-28 09:12]The worse the British economy tanks, the more fervently Prime Minister David Cameron’s ministers and Tory economists insist that draconian spending cuts are good for economic growth.
Socialist democracy milestone
[2011-10-28 08:04]The Information Office of the State Council on Thursday published a white paper on the Socialist System of Laws with Chinese Characteristics.
Italy's capital flight
[2011-10-28 09:08]As Italy's monthly current-account deficit approximates only €3-4 billion, the Target credit must have compensated primarily for capital flight.
Coco for Europe
[2011-10-13 09:45]Contingent convertible bonds, or "cocos," have been proposed as a solution to this problem. When a bank's capital falls below a pre-specified limit, its cocos automatically convert from debt to equity at a fraction of their previous price.
Milton Friedman's magical thinking
[2011-10-13 09:31]Free-market enthusiasts’ place in the history of economic thought will remain secure. But thinkers like Milton Friedman leave an ambiguous and puzzling legacy, because it is the interventionists who have succeeded in economic history, where it really matters.
The Steve Jobs factor
[2011-10-10 17:11]Openness is great, and a strategy I normally applaud: no single vendor is likely to be the best, so openness allows a broad range of suppliers to compete and differentiate so the best can emerge. That is what Steve was.
Bleed the foreigner
[2011-10-09 16:51]The economists’ commonplace that a monetary union demands a fiscal union is only part of a much deeper truth about debt and obligation. Debt is rarely sustainable if there is not some sense of communal or collective responsibility.
A gender divided
[2011-10-09 16:31]When the poorest countries – most of them in Africa or with Muslim majorities – choose to sustain and even devise new policies that oppress women, we have to be willing to say that, in some measure, they are choosing the economic misfortune that follows.
