Insights, analysis and must reads from CNN's Fareed Zakaria and the Global Public Square team, compiled by Global Briefing editor Chris Good Seeing this newsletter as a forward? Subscribe here. January 5, 2022 The Trends to Watch in 2022 Last year defied many predictions, but that hasn't stopped analysts from offering them for 2022. After a brief hiatus and a change of the calendar, the Global Briefing brings you some of their top forecasts.
The world will face a slew of risks this year, Ian Bremmer writes for Time, first and foremost Covid-19's journey from pandemic to endemic, as China's zero-Covid strategy in particular "will fail." Big tech will continue to dominate life, and regulators in the US, EU, and China will want to do more about it, Bremmer writes, while US congressional elections could set the stage for an American constitutional crisis in 2024, should former President Donald Trump choose to run again. Looking at US foreign policy, Frida Ghitis writes for the World Politics Review that Russian President Vladimir Putin's belligerence, China's continued assertiveness, Iran's uranium enrichment, and migration from Central America will all test President Joe Biden.
As for the global economy, Morgan Stanley's Ruchir Sharma writes for the Financial Times that a series of trends could define 2022, for instance: Birth rates have declined faster during the pandemic; China isn't accounting for as much global economic growth as in years past; countries the world over have loaded up on debt; and home-bound workers seem to be putting in longer hours with less to show for it, despite predictions of a productivity revolution. "Bubblets" like crypto appear to be deflating, a green-energy conversion has seen commodity prices balloon, and individual stock buyers' "mania" could fade.
As for the more-immediate future of the economy, The New Yorker's John Cassidy writes that America's ended 2021 on a high note despite the Omicron variant, but much Covid-related uncertainty remains, and if the Fed raises interest rates aggressively, that "could lead to a big correction in the frothy markets" in 2022, "or even a crash." Bearing the Weight of Omicron No one knows how long Covid-19's Omicron surge will last, but even as intensive-care units fill up in the US, some think it could recede sooner than later. At The Spectator, Fraser Nelson sees encouraging signs in English data on infections, hospital admissions, and ventilator-bed usage. In South Africa, where Omicron was discovered, a top health official says confidently that the wave has crested, and the country has eased restrictions.
But for however long it pervades, Omicron threatens to impose a sagging economic weight, Gaby Hinsliff writes for The Guardian. "The novel threat this time is not death on the biblical scale forecast during the first wave … but knock-on chaos and disruption caused by the potential mass infection of key workers, leaving them unable to do their work," Hinsliff writes. Hoping the problem will be "mercifully brief," Hinsliff argues that the lesson of Omicron is nonetheless the same one Covid-19 has offered from the start: that societies and economies need safety nets to build in resilience for when health crises hit. Who Knows What Putin Is Thinking About Ukraine? Though Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Joe Biden have been in communication, Anne Applebaum writes for The Atlantic that some residents of Kyiv expect Russia will invade their country again, sooner or later. It's time to wake up to Putin's revanchist goals and realize that a prosperous, democratic Ukraine would seriously undermine his global aims and domestic legitimacy, Applebaum argues.
At Bloomberg, Niall Ferguson suggests talks could just be a prelude to war, of one kind or another. (In recent years, Russia's incursions in its neighborhood have been "stepwise," Ferguson writes, noting that Putin could besiege Ukraine with cyberattacks, a missile campaign, or something else short of a full-scale ground invasion.) To the historian Ferguson, Putin's goals are less about returning to Stalin than about reviving the conquests of Peter the Great, who secured a decisive victory over Sweden (northern Europe's power of the day, in the early 18th century) in what is now Ukraine—yet another sign, to Ferguson, that Ukraine means a lot to Russia's current leader. The Vanguard of Latin America's Leftward Swing Latin America's politics were tilting leftward even before Covid-19 arrived, Ernesto Londoño, Julie Turkewitz, and Flávia Milhoarance write for The New York Times, citing dissatisfaction with right-leaning incumbents. Pandemic mismanagement and the appeal of government support (including in the form of cash) have supercharged that trend as elections approach in Brazil and Colombia, they write.
At the vanguard of this leftward swing is Chile's 35-year-old President-elect Gabriel Boric, who will face a tricky balancing act after his election last month (and after trading t-shirts for suits before that), Brian Winter writes for Americas Quarterly. Chile's younger voters want to live in a country more akin to Sweden or France, Winter writes, and Boric will have to deliver socialist-style reforms without driving away the business that could pay for them. |
