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In any city in the world, an extremist could explode your subway car, yet surveillance and security are more advanced than ever. Ebola ravaged thousands for months and now Zika continues its creep around the globe, yet life expectancy and healthcare are more advanced than at any other time in human history. A slowing Chinese economy and falling oil prices warn of a global...

Authoritarian populists are gaining power from Ankara to Athens, from Warsaw to Washington. Meanwhile, popular support for democratic values is sliding in many countries around the world. Is our political system in existential danger? And what can we do to save it?

In 2018, economic activity was accelerating in almost all regions of the world. One year later, much has changed. The escalation of US-China trade tensions, credit tightening in China, and macroeconomic stress in key G20 economies have all contributed to a weakened global expansion. As the US trade war with China deepens, what are the biggest risks at this delicate moment?...

The public optimism that came with the launch of social media a decade ago has settled into a wariness that we might instead face a long, grueling daily fight for truth and facts in the face of unrelenting, automated disinformation online. As the 2020 elections gear up, how should our country face the threat from Twitter bots and Facebook trolls? What responsibility should...

Pick your issue: academic achievement, drug use, female empowerment, race relations, obesity, mental health, medical costs. Engaging young people in sports can help communities tackle all of these, and many more. What’s more, it can yield benefits like community cohesion, citizen engagement, economic productivity, urban development, and help foster social-emotional skills...

Historically, globalization has been characterized by cross-border flows of resources and products. Financial exchanges follow, allowing for direct investment at home and abroad. In the digital economy, we see massive flows of information and data, which are perhaps even more critical to economic growth, crossing borders everywhere. In an era of anti-globalism, can the pac...

Just because robots can do jobs that humans otherwise do, does that mean that they should? This question becomes especially difficult when we task a robot with applying lethal force. At an alarming rate, militaries from around the globe are employing AI to optimize operations and build weapons systems (i.e. robots) to take on more and more roles and tasks previously undert...

After decades with no significant geopolitical rivals, the United States now faces the emergence of China as a major adversary. How will this change the landscape of the emerging world order? What new forms of geopolitical conflict will arise, and what new forms of cooperation are necessary?

US-Russian relations have reached one of their lowest points since the end of the Cold War. Michael McFaul, former ambassador to Russia and author of such books as Russia’s Unfinished Revolution, will shed light on the tenuous relationship between Moscow and Washington. As Russia and the US face off over Ukraine, can they continue to cooperate on Syria and Iran?

Following all-but-unopposed reelections this year, China’s Xi Jinping and Russia’s Vladimir Putin both appear to be settling in as presidents for life. But while they’ve been consolidating power at the same moment, their two countries face vastly different trajectories and futures. Join two experts with unique insights into each leader for a discussion about the rise of th...

Among the things that keep former CIA director and retired General David H. Petraeus up at night: the rise of ISIS, the rise of robots, and a country straying from its basic principles of inclusiveness. Join Petraeus and security expert Jane Harman, a former congresswoman who heads the Woodrow Wilson Center, for a wide-ranging conversation about the threats we face at home...

Some suggest we are well into a fourth industrial revolution — a time of significant and fundamental shifts in the ways we create, manufacture, and consume goods and services. Serious questions abound regarding the degree to which artificial intelligence, automation, and online economies will level considerable and long-term dislocations to the global economy. Given the pa...

US officials have cited North Korea as the hardest intelligence collection target in the world; the problem of understanding its opaque leadership has challenged two generations of policymakers. Today, the rambunctiousness of its nuclear program belies a bleak, troubled economy, where millions face starvation and the regime faces such cash and technology shortfalls that it...

In an age of cyber warfare, where weapons are simply Internet-connected devices, are we prepared to face the evolving threat posed by state and non-state actors who would do us harm? As a recent attack in Ukraine has shown, hackers can and will cripple critical infrastructure by accessing control systems inside utilities. And we’ve seen time and again what happens when int...

What is trust? “A firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something.” (We googled it). How much, not to mention who, we should trust is more complex now, given the technological tools we have at our disposal and the crafty creatives who might push the world’s next great product, or the next fake story, or — far worse — the hackers who can...

China is the world’s biggest energy consumer and carbon emitter. It needs more energy, and it wants it cleaner. So it’s pursuing the biggest push for low-carbon energy the world has ever seen. But China’s green drive is messy and uncertain – full of geopolitical fighting, technological uncertainty, and investor risk. What’s happening? Who’s profiting? And will it do much f...

President Trump says he does not want a major war in the Middle East. But many allies and observers worry that hardlinders in the US and Iran are on a collision course toward conflict. The US exit from the Iran deal and the “maximum pressure” campaign have escalated tensions between Washington and Tehran in recent months. Iran has called the announced deployment of US troo...