Global Economy
Economic diplomacy: Taking cover from the summit war of words
Growing pains
For a newish four-member, self-declared nimble group with an aversion for too much bureaucratisation, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue hit a telling benchmark…
A G20 presidency to build Brand India as a champion of the Global South
India is using the G20 presidency to demonstrate to the world the country’s strengths as a responsible and collaborative global actor. The message is a broad one – “One Family,…
Foreign policy China-style: beyond protocol and alcohol
There are phases in international relations when diplomacy between some countries is unfortunately reduced to protocol and alcohol. Such phases are never entirely intentional. No…
Taming international capital flows
As said of tastes in clothes or music, fashion trends always come back into vogue. So too, it seems, with conventional wisdom on international capital flows. After years allowing…
Pakistan’s gamble with Russian oil
News of the arrest of former prime minister Imran Khan has roiled Pakistan in the past day, which is the latest development in a long-winding saga. Much of the instability in the…
Malaysia’s Anwar seeks Asian Monetary Fund and “dedollarisation”
The Asian Monetary Fund was an idea that Japan first proposed in 1997 following the Asian financial crisis. At the time, Anwar Ibrahim, a rising star in Malaysian politics, firmly…
Biden’s quiet economic revolution
Senior figures of the Biden administration have given two critical speeches on US economic policy. First, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen last month set out the parameters of US…
“Play defence” in any collective response to China’s economic coercion
Many Western governments consider Beijing’s frequent use of economic sanctions a “clear and present danger” to the global economy which erodes the rules-based order. Canberra…
International debt: Time for a global restructuring framework
Just about every country has rules and practices to sort out domestic bankruptcies, dividing up the surviving assets between the creditors on an equitable basis, writing off the…
Choosing openness in the international economy
The Covid pandemic was good for isolationists and xenophobes, and bad for globalisers and internationalists. Yet since the agricultural revolution, one of the keys to prosperity…