In The News

As the world becomes totally integrated, organizing principles and institutional structures have not kept up. Members of the G-20, the global group of powerful economies, continue to jockey, avoiding the tough assessments and sacrifices required to resolve pressing global issues from climate change and terrorism to economic crises. Former Singapore diplomat and author Kishore Mahbubani relies on...

Ireland’s decision in September to borrow from the European Central Bank to repay €55 billion in bonds of bankrupt Irish banks calmed markets for the time being. The outcome satisfied large European banks that held the bonds, but left the Irish government with an open-ended commitment to cover losses amounting to more than 20 percent of GDP. Writing for the Irish Times, economist Morgan Kelly...

The G20 meeting of the world’s major economies concluded in Seoul without a serious plan for coordinating macroeconomic policies. Since the first G20 meeting in November 2008, global leaders have recognized that inconsistent, poorly coordinated policies spurred the global economic crisis along. But behaving like the mercantilists of old rather than world powers in the 21st century – delivering a...