The United States should not over-react to news that North Korea is a nuclear power. “While Kim [Jong Un] is clearly cruel, he is not crazy,” writes Walter Hatch for the Seattle Times. “What we often forget is that North Korea is also a cornered state, one without any real allies in the world. This...
Middle-class families increasingly depend on domestic help for cooking and cleaning services, eldercare and childcare. Almost 70 million domestic workers, most women, toil around the globe. The global supply of labor for work deemed unskilled is huge. Wages are low, and private homes are the...
Maid to work: A foreign domestic helper multi-tasks in Singapore, and domestic workers in Hong Kong protest work conditions and regulations that favor employers over workers
NEW HAVEN: The 67 million domestic workers worldwide are the unsung...
The Brazilian government is developing closer ties to Iran, even as Iran faces stringent economic sanctions for its nuclear program. By exporting ethanol, President Lula da Silva’s government seeks to help Iran, a major oil exporter that lacks refinery capacity, lessen its dependence on foreign...
Click here for the article in Foreign Policy.
The world confronts unsustainable population growth. Some researchers suggest that a population based on two people per arable hectare is sustainable, and with 1.6 million arable hectares, the planet can support 3.2 billion people, less than half the current population. The planet's population...
A good life: The world is on track for more than 10 billion people by the century’s end even as fertility slows – Iran halved fertility within 10 years, left, while Africa will represent half of the world’s population growth by 2050 (Source: Reuters...
Today's business climate has spawned a globally mobile workforce. Instead of organizing around geographic regions, multinationals are structured around business units run by teams of globe-trotting executives. And as offshoring and cross-border joint-ventures grow in popularity, executives...
Click here for the original article on The Economist's website.
今天，全世界的物质、思想、机构以及人员的交流在成指数增长，这个现象只是一个长期历史趋势的一部分。在人类历史上，人们对更为美好事物的追求一直激励着全球范围内的人口流动、贸易往来和思想文化的交流。
1962年，“全球化” 第一次出现在我们的词汇中，而现在，这个词语已经从一个那时的专门术语变成了今天的一个口头禅。《经济学人》杂志 （The Economist） 已经把它称之为“21世纪被滥用词语之最”。在我们最近的记忆里，没有哪个词语能够像“全球化”一样对不同的人群有如此不同的含义...
French President Jacques Chirac has admitted to a "profound malaise" in the country that led to the recent rioting, but French policy on farm subsidy is emerging as another source of malaise within the European Community. Policymakers all over the world are calling for great reductions in...
Roadblock to free trade: French farmers ride their tractors from the EU headquarters to Paris, protesting proposed changes to the Common Agricultural Policy
WASHINGTON: In recent weeks, the eyes of the world have been on...
Sections of metropolitan Manila, the capital city of the Philippines, suffer from a severe water shortage with service disruptions anticipated until rain arrives. The rainy season does not begin for another three months, and authorities are rationing water. “The water agency said all of its...
