GZERO's 2024 Game Changers


2024 was a year of dramatic reversals. Some came at the ballot box, where long-ruling parties took a beating, anti-establishment figures stormed into power, or strongmen managed to see off what looked like fatal challenges. Some came on battlefields, where deadlocked conflicts began to break in one direction or another. And some came in how we think about politics and geopolitics more broadly.

This week, as we hurtle toward 2025, another year that promises to be pivotal in global affairs, we profile 10 people, who, for better or worse, flipped the script, beat the odds, turned the tables, or otherwise changed the game in 2024. As we count down to No. 1 on Friday, check out today's GZERO Daily for our No. 10 and No. 9 picks for Game Changer of the Year.

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Magyar, leader of the opposition Tisza Party, speaks during a press conference a day after the parliamentary election, in which Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban conceded defeat, Budapest, Hungary, April 13, 2026.
REUTERS/Marton Monus/File Photo

At first glance, Hungary’s Prime Minister-elect Péter Magyar may appear to be the antithesis of the man he defeated in the April 12 election, Viktor Orbán. Yet the pair might be closer than you think – both on policy and politics.