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by ian bremmer
Last week, I had the privilege and pleasure of serving as commencement speaker for graduates of the School of Liberal Arts at Tulane University, my alma mater. And the venue was the Louisiana Superdome, a little bigger of a house than I’m used to.
It was a great day for me, and I’ll always be grateful to Tulane for the invitation. But it was a sobering experience too. It’s one thing to look out over a crowd of this year’s graduates, young women and men who are well prepared for challenges ahead but who may not yet appreciate just how messed up our world is right now. It’s quite another when you’re looking into the faces of this year’s graduates of your alma mater. The people who now sit where you sat. It makes me more aware of how just much has happened on the road from 1989 to 2025 – how much we couldn’t have imagined.
Here's the speech in full…
It’s great to be back at Tulane.
And I'm honored to be your distinguished alum.
I realize it's possible you've decided to give me this award because you neglected to look into my time here as a student.
I was 15 when I came to Tulane, a kid from the projects outside Boston. I went to an all-boys Catholic high school. This led to an unusually exciting freshman year. I lied about my age, both for drinking purposes (which I had never done before), and also for dating purposes (which I had also never done before).
I missed classes, slept through a final, had a 1.9 GPA my first term. When they put me on probation and threatened to send me home to Boston, I figured I should spend less time at the Boot and more time in my classes.
In the end, I graduated without further public controversy. For me, Tulane was a laboratory of people and personalities, of studies and learning, of theory and of facts on the ground. I have the school of liberal arts to thank that I can tell the difference.
But when I graduated, I realized that no one actually hired political scientists, and so I decided to start a company to persuade people that political science mattered. Thirty years later, I've made a career of it. I’ve made it possible for at least a few political scientists to have jobs doing just that.
I suppose that’s the reason I’m receiving Tulane's distinguished alumni award (and truly, I am honored by it). But at the same time, I am a little bummed out about it, because compared to pretty much all of the parents here, I am failing most dramatically in my broader professional efforts. It's tough to be a political scientist right now. The stuff I work on — helping understand political leaders, governments, the world order — it's all falling apart.
Back when I graduated this was not true. I was class of 1989. That's the year you want to graduate as a political scientist. The Wall came down. We won the cold war. Collective security, free trade, rule of law, democracy. For everybody.
The problem is that we were winners, but we weren't leaders. The leaders were the people that won back in World War II and that created the world order on the ashes of that destroyed world. The Marshall Plan to rebuild Europe, General MacArthur rebuilding Japan. The United Nations. The US-led global order.
Today, we've grown too comfortable as the most powerful country in that world, with the almighty dollar, the only global military, the top global businesses, and the best universities. We are in the most stable part of the world, with generally friendly neighbors (at least until we started fighting with them). Protected by both great oceans.
For generations now we have been the most privileged nation, but our own political system has become the most dysfunctional among rich democracies. Most everyone agrees on this. We even agree on who to blame. It's the “other guys.
So, what are we going to do about it? I use my voice to be speak up about it. We can't fix a problem until we identify it. I get things wrong, but I say what I truly believe in the hopes that helps other people do the same.
Because when we stand up, when law firms stand up, when universities stand up, courage is contagious. We have to show people a way.
Tulane class of 2025, what will you do about it?
First, you already have. You chose the liberal arts, which means, at some point, you made a conscious decision to pursue ideas over income – at least initially. It’s brave. It’s noble. It’s…confusing to your family.
But what you’ve been doing here matters, because while engineers are out there designing drones, you’ve been asking the more important question: who gets to decide where they fly? While business schools are simulating markets, you’ve been asking: who is this economy actually working for? While accountants are balancing the books, you've been asking: why do we pay taxes?
Let’s talk about the world you’re walking into. It’s no 1989, but it’s lively. We’ve got a climate crisis, a technology arms race, and a bunch of hot wars. We’ve got global alliances falling apart, superpowers behaving like exes who keep texting each other at 2AM, and a US domestic political environment that feels like a mad libs game with too many sazeracs.
But I’m not here to depress you. That’s what Twitter’s for.
I'm here to remind you: this is your moment. And no, not in the “you are the future” way that commencement speakers love to say before the parents applaud them. I mean you actually have an edge. You studied complexity. You learned that history doesn’t repeat, but it does plagiarize. You know that “unprecedented” really just means we didn’t study the past closely enough. You know that context is what matters, and that headlines don't tell the story. In a world of polarization, you’ve studied nuance. In a time of information overload, you’ve practiced discernment. In an age obsessed with outcomes, you’ve explored meaning.
Hopefully you have also learned along the way that -- ChatGPT notwithstanding -- hard work does pay off.
So, let me point out that all of those skills I just mentioned don’t just make for good leaders. Those skills make for good people.
Understanding complexity, believing that there is value in the truth, seeking the good in people, and looking beyond the moment right in front of you. Those are skills you need for life.
And you’re in it right now. A lot of ambitious young people set out these markers of achievement for themselves, and of course you’re sitting here on top of a big one. Having achieved one, you push for the next, and so you might think my real adult life begins when I get my first job, when I get out of grad school, when I buy my first home. Don’t do that. Your real adult life is already here. You’ll make mistakes, and you’ll have regrets. But you grow from them.
If you stay true to the skills and values that you’ve learned here, if you care about the family and friends that have moved you forward, your life will be rich, whatever path you choose.
So, what should you do with your liberal arts degree? Whatever you want.
Some of you will go into journalism, helping us understand a world spinning faster by the day. Others will work in policy, trying to keep the world from setting itself on fire – literally and metaphorically. Some will become artists, storytellers, teachers, nonprofit leaders, or the only ethics advisor at a tech company full of Stanford dropouts. That job will be important.
I’m not saying it’ll be easy. Your algorithms will try to convince you every day that nuance doesn't matter, and that more stuff and money will make you happy. Fight against that. Stay curious. Stay human. Stay weird, but the good kind of weird – the kind that doesn’t let cynicism turn into detachment.
And please, when you start running things – because trust me that day is sooner than you think – remember what you learned here: that ethics without power doesn't accomplish much, and that power without ethics is what got us here.
I'm counting on you, Tulane graduates. I’m counting on you to be as welcoming to weirdo strangers as you were to me as a 15-year-old freshman.
I’m counting on you to use new technologies, especially AI, that allow for innovation—improving your own capabilities—inconceivable when I graduated.
I’m counting on you to be curious as the world changes around us, to connect more closely with those that are different from you, and to recognize your connections with one another in spite of those differences.
I'm counting on you to be admired not because of your money and privilege but because you act the way others know they should.
I'm counting on you to be inspiring not because of your charisma and personality, but because you set the standard. I'm counting on you to be leaders again. Because if you don't, we're leaving it to the finance majors.
Tulane graduates, I believe in you. My thanks for giving me the opportunity to tell you that.
And congratulations to you on this most important day.
It’s been three and a half years since I first laid out the idea of a technopolar world: one no longer dominated solely by states, but increasingly shaped – and sometimes steered – by a handful of powerful tech companies with the newfound ability to influence economies, societies, politics, and geopolitics.
At the time, I said the power of Big Tech was poised to grow but argued governments wouldn’t go down without a fight and sketched out three potential futures, depending on how the showdown between them played out: one in which tech companies displaced governments as the principal sovereigns of a globalized digital order; one where a tech cold war took hold and states reasserted control over a fragmented cyberspace; and one in which state dominance gave way to a new order led by tech firms.
This week, I published a follow-up in Foreign Affairs – “The Technopolar Paradox: The Frightening Fusion of Tech Power and State Power” – looking at how those predictions have aged, what’s actually happened since 2021, and where we might be heading next.
Spoiler: the trends I flagged back then have only accelerated. But reality has turned out messier, and more dangerous, than anyone could’ve imagined.
Here’s what you need to know.
Technopolarity turbocharged
Let’s rewind to early 2022. Russian tanks are bearing down on Kyiv. Ukraine’s government and military command structure is under threat as the whole country faces an imminent communications blackout.
Enter Elon Musk.
Within days, SpaceX ships Starlink terminals to Ukraine and flips on satellite internet coverage, effectively keeping the country online and in the fight. For a time, he’s hailed as a hero. But months later, when Ukraine asks him to extend that coverage to Crimea to enable a submarine drone strike on Russian naval assets, Musk refuses. He’s worried about escalation. Even the Pentagon can’t change his mind.
Think about that. An unelected billionaire with no formal role in government single-handedly altered the trajectory of a war between nation-states – not once, but multiple times. That was technopolarity in action: private tech actors wielding state-like powers with geopolitical consequences, making decisions that would normally be reserved for presidents, defense ministers, or national security councils, without public accountability.
Over the last few years, the power of tech firms has only deepened. During the pandemic, they became indispensable: for remote work, education, healthcare, and the flow of information (and disinformation). Their influence grew in every sphere – economic, social, and political. And it didn’t stop in the digital world. Tech firms now control critical infrastructure that governments rely on: cloud systems, cybersecurity platforms, data centers, satellites. They’re not just platforms. They’re utilities – with geopolitical consequences.
Governments have tried to claw back power. The EU passed the Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act. US regulators launched antitrust lawsuits and passed state-level privacy laws. Countries like India, South Africa, and Brazil cracked down on tech platforms. But none of these moves changed who writes the rules of the digital world.
And that was before AI exploded onto the scene and supercharged Big Tech’s lead over states. Suddenly, tech firms weren’t just dominant online. They were defining the frontier of innovation – and the terms of national power. Building advanced AI requires staggering amounts of data, compute, and talent. Only a few companies have these resources. And no government has the ability to move fast enough to rein them in. Even if they could build rules to constrain today’s models, those rules would be outdated by the time they were implemented. Key decisions about how AI shapes our societies, economies, and geopolitics looked bound to be made in Silicon Valley boardrooms, not parliaments or congresses.
Geopolitics strikes back
But just when technopolar consolidation seemed unstoppable, the old forces of geopolitics were making a comeback. Protectionism, economic security, and great power rivalry all returned with a vengeance – especially after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and amid growing US-China tensions. In response, governments began to take back control over economic and technological domains they had largely ceded to globalization and free markets.
Washington imposed export bans on advanced semiconductors, blacklisted Chinese firms, and poured billions into reshoring strategic supply chains. China retaliated with restrictions of its own, doubled down on self-reliance, and reined in its tech sector completely. Protectionism and industrial policy became the new global norm.
This retreat from globalization fractured the global tech ecosystem and upended the business models of “globalist” firms like Apple and Tesla, which long depended on open markets and integrated supply chains. “National champions” like Microsoft and Palantir, by contrast, are thriving, profiting off their close ties to the US government in this post-globalization, hyper-securitized, state-aligned era. Tech firms can’t just float above the fray anymore.
Rise of the techno-authoritarians
While states were busy battling for control of digital space, some of Silicon Valley’s leading lights decided they’d rather take over the US state than take orders from it (or resist it).
Back in 2021, I described folks like Musk, Peter Thiel, and Marc Andreessen as “techno-utopians”: visionaries who believed technology could transcend politics and even render governments obsolete. But in recent years, those same people pivoted from wanting to escape the state to trying to capture it.
What explains the shift from libertarian idealism to techno-authoritarian ambition? For one, today’s frontier technologies – from AI to quantum to biotech – can’t scale without state support. That’s made alignment with Washington a strategic necessity. And in an era of great power competition, the rewards of capturing public power have grown alongside the risks of being left out. But some of these tech leaders have grown ideologically hostile to democracy. Thiel has said he doesn’t believe “freedom and democracy are compatible.” Musk once called for a “modern-day Sulla,” in reference to a Roman dictator who dismantled republican institutions in the name of restoring order.
That might have started as a joke, but the governing instinct was real. Musk poured nearly $300 million into helping Trump retake power in 2024 and has since been rewarded with sweeping authority over the federal government. He’s used that perch to purge civil servants, install loyalists, and amass troves of government data – all while maintaining control of his private companies. Suddenly, the same tech overlords who control AI development, space infrastructure, and the digital public square are also shaping public policy and writing their own rules.
The risk isn’t just crony capitalism. It’s the fusion of state and tech power into a hybrid Leviathan where public institutions are reoriented to serve the strategic, commercial, and political goals of a narrow tech elite. Already, reports suggest that confidential IRS, immigration, health, financial, and Social Security data are being consolidated. For all we know, they are being fed into AI models developed by Musk’s xAI to be exploited for commercial gain or even political surveillance. We’re not talking about China’s top-down surveillance state. We’re talking about something more decentralized, more market-driven, and potentially even more dangerous – a system with just as much potential for abuse, fewer checks, and even fewer balances.
What the future looks like
So where does this leave us? Not in a fully tech-dominated world. Not in a state-dominated world. But in a messy hybrid one shaped by two poles of concentrated power.
On one side, we have an increasingly technopolar United States, where a handful of tech firms and leaders enjoy extraordinary power – wielding growing influence not just over digital space and critical infrastructure, but over US public policy and global standards. In some cases, they enjoy the implicit (or explicit) backing of the US government.
On the other side, we have a tightly state-controlled China, where tech firms serve the Chinese Communist Party’s goals.
Caught between these two poles is … everyone else. Europe aspires to digital sovereignty but lacks the homegrown tech muscle to pull it off. Much of the Global South is being pulled toward one model or the other. And global institutions that might once have brokered a balance are being sidelined or dismantled.
And here’s the kicker: though the US and Chinese systems differ in ideology, they’re starting to converge in practice. Both dominant models – American and Chinese – prioritize power, efficiency, and control over consent, accountability, and freedom. Whether authority lies with the state or the corporation, democracy and individual rights are not the default.
Therein lies the paradox of the technopolar age: technologies that were supposed to democratize access to power, information, and opportunity are now enabling more effective forms of centralized, unaccountable control, making it harder to govern democratically and easier for unaccountable elites – public or private – to tighten their grip.
In the West, we risk handing over our democracies to unelected technocrats. In China, the state already runs the show. In both cases, the result is the same: less transparency, less accountability, and more concentration of power – whether in corporate boardrooms or party headquarters.
The question is no longer whether the state can contain Big Tech. It’s whether open societies can survive the fusion of the two. Right now, the answer is very much up in the air.
Open Call is the heart of Walmart’s $350 billion commitment to US manufacturing, supporting products made, grown or assembled in America. The pitch event represents a unique opportunity for selected entrepreneurs to meet face-to-face with Walmart merchants and earn a chance to get their products on store shelves nationwide. Last year, finalists from across the country represented 48 states, with entrepreneurs from over half these states receiving deals. It’s all a part of Walmart’s investment in American jobs and communities. Learn more about Walmart’s annual Open Call.
Viktor Orbán watching his party leave him behind.
For the past fifteen years, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has coasted from one election victory to another. Since returning to power in 2010, the self-proclaimed defender of “illiberal democracy” has transformed his country into an “electoral autocracy” – reshaping institutions, rewriting election laws, muzzling independent media, and stacking the courts – where elections are technically free but heavily tilted in his favor, the media landscape is dominated by government allies, and the ruling party – Fidesz – uses the machinery of the state to reward supporters and punish dissent.
All the while, Orbán has proudly cast himself as Europe’s chief populist troublemaker – a pro-Russian crusader against liberalism, immigration, and Brussels bureaucrats, Donald Trump’s man across the Atlantic, and a guy who relishes nothing more than jamming up the European Union’s gears.
His nationalist-populist model inspired imitators and admirers across the West. Where many right-wing populists have flamed out, Orbán has endured, winning elections (four in a row, to be precise) and accumulating more power along the way.
But now, Orbán’s veneer of invincibility is cracking. Suddenly, the world’s most durable populist and Trump’s best friend in Europe looks more vulnerable than ever.
Cracks in the crown
At home, the Hungarian prime minister is facing a newly energized political opposition led by a former protégé-turned-rival named Peter Magyar, who’s managed to do what no other challenger has: unite Hungary’s fragmented anti-Orbán forces. Recent polls show Magyar's center-right Tisza Party holding a commanding double-digit lead over Orbán’s Fidesz among committed voters. Whether or not it’ll hold until the elections in early 2026, that’s no small advantage in a country where the ruling party has rewritten the electoral rules in its favor.
Magyar’s appeal lies in his hybrid message: anti-corruption and pro-transparency, but also nationalist and socially conservative enough to peel away disillusioned Fidesz voters. His rise has upended Orbán’s usual playbook, which relied on a splintered opposition and a monopoly on patriotic rhetoric.
Now, for the first time in years, Orbán is worried, and he’s throwing every goodie he can think of at voters – tax breaks for mothers, higher allowances for families, VAT refunds for retirees, price caps on groceries – in a bid to shore up support and stem Magyar’s rise.
But while these giveaways may buy him some political breathing room, they are also blowing a hole in Hungary’s budget just as the economy is faltering. Growth has been stalled since the end of 2022, the budget deficit is ballooning at 4.9% of GDP, and Orbán’s long-running feud with Brussels means billions in EU recovery funds are likely to remain frozen this year.
Then there’s the Trump factor. Orbán likes to boast about his closeness with the US president. He was the first European leader to endorse Trump in 2016 and again in 2024. But that friendship is becoming less useful.
Unless the EU manages to negotiate a trade deal with Washington, Trump’s punitive new tariffs would hit Hungary’s growth engine especially hard, affecting demand from Europe (particularly Germany) and products ranging from lithium-ion batteries (which make up almost 20% of the country's US exports) to electronic, manufactured goods, and even high-quality wines. Orbán has downplayed the damage, insisting Trump’s tariffs are no big deal – and even floating the fantasy that he could leverage his closeness with Trump to strike his own bilateral deal … despite the tiny issue that EU countries have no capacity to bypass the bloc’s common trade policy.
The White House has also made it clear it’s not inclined to give its pal a pass, especially given the growing suspicion with which defense and trade hawks within the administration view Orbán’s pro-China orientation. In fact, Washington is pushing Budapest to ramp up defense spending to 5% of GDP, buy more weapons and LNG from the US, and distance itself from Beijing at a time when economic conditions are making Hungary more financially dependent on China.
And so, Viktor Orbán is boxed in: squeezed by a surging domestic challenger, trapped by an overextended fiscal policy, cut off from EU funds, and now caught in the undertow of his ally’s protectionist turn in Washington.
Don’t call it a comeback
You might think this spells good news for Europe. Facing his most difficult year since first coming to power, the bloc’s preeminent internal antagonist will have a more limited ability to hijack the EU agenda or undermine European unity on Russia sanctions and Ukraine support in concert with Trump. Sure, if you’re laying odds, it’s still Orbán’s election to lose … but Hungary’s at least in play now. It’s welcome news for Brussels.
Some have gone further, though, pointing to recent centrist electoral wins against right-wing populists with explicitly Trumpian politics in Canada and Australia as evidence of a broader anti-Trump effect being in full swing. If Trump’s disruptive return to the spotlight is causing voters to “rally around the flag” of stability, then perhaps Orbán’s troubles are a sign that Europe is finally sobering up from its populist binge – that the chaos and corruption of his and Trump’s style has worn thin, and European voters are turning back toward sanity and moderation.
But that reading overlooks the fact that the anti-Trump bump isn't holding in Europe. If anything, the tide of right-wing populism on the continent is accelerating.
Take Romania. George Simion, an ultranationalist firebrand with a MAGA streak, is now the favorite to beat Bucharest’s pro-Western centrist mayor, Nicușor Dan, in the May 18 presidential runoff election following the collapse of the country’s pro-EU governing coalition yesterday. Simion outperformed expectations in the first-round vote last Sunday after openly embracing Trump-style politics, railing against the EU, and even welcoming American CPAC chair Matt Schlapp to the campaign trail. He is campaigning alongside Calin Georgescu, another far-right candidate whose first-round presidential election win last November was annulled by Romania’s top court due to likely Russian interference. (A massive online influence campaign tied to the Kremlin seems to have helped Simion, too.)
Across the English Channel, Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party delivered a political gut-punch to the mainstream last Friday, flipping a historically safe Labor parliamentary seat in a by-election and racking up wins in local council elections. The Labor-Tory duopoly that’s dominated British politics for over a century suddenly looks wobbly – and Farage, a leading Brexit advocate and perennial Trump ally, is at the center of the storm.
Even in places where centrists are supposed to be on solid ground, the far right is gaining. In Poland, the ruling Law and Justice party is leaning into its Trump ties to boost its presidential hopeful, Karol Nawrocki. Recent polling shows Nawrocki closing in on centrist opponent Rafał Trzaskowski ahead of elections on May 18. He flew to Washington last week to meet with Trump-affiliated figures, hoping to ride the same anti-establishment wave to victory.
Meanwhile, in Germany, center-right leader Friedrich Merz squeaked into the chancellorship on a second vote after an embarrassing initial flop yesterday. With the hard-right, MAGA-endorsed Alternative für Deutschland continuing to rise, the conservative chancellor once viewed as the establishment’s answer to the populist surge now leads a wounded and weakened “grand coalition” that feels anything but grand.
All of which is to say: Orbán may be stumbling, but his current woes are less a sign of waning populism or an anti-Trump backlash across Europe than a story of one populist’s bad bets coming due. We could be entering a world where Budapest becomes less of a thorn in Brussels’ side than before. But if European centrists think that’ll be the end of their troubles, they’re in for a rude awakening. Far-right European populism is not going anywhere.
How Trump fails, nuclearization, geopolitics on AI, and more: Your questions, answered
This is the third and last mailbag of the spring season. Check out the previous two here and here. I will resume the newsletter’s regularly scheduled programming next week, but I hope you’ve found this detour from long-form columns valuable and that I’ve covered some of the things that might have been on your mind.
Here we go (as always, questions lightly edited for clarity).
Gun to your head, what Democrat stands the best chance of becoming president in 2028?
Given how much the country – and the world – will change in the next couple of years, I suspect it'll be someone that nobody has on their shortlist right now. Or did you put money on “The Apprentice” host changing the course of history back in 2013?
School taught us the Founding Fathers created a government of checks and balances, yet I don't see Congress stepping in to curb a dictator-type president. Why?
The system of checks and balances the framers designed in 1787 is resilient, but it has never been failproof. After all, the Constitution is a piece of paper – it isn’t self-enforcing. Ben Franklin’s “a republic, if you can keep it” shows the Founding Fathers recognized as much. One of the things the system needs to work is vigorous conflict between the branches. In other words, elected officials (looking at you, lawmakers) need to be willing to put duty to their office and their country above loyalty to their party.
But the modern American political system, with nationalized parties facing nationalized interests, nationalized polarization, and nationalized partisan media, has no ambition “to counteract ambition” as James Madison intended. This is especially true in Donald Trump’s GOP, which is cowed by the president’s political hold over the Republican voter base and media ecosystem. There’s also a big collective action problem – no one wants to be the first to stick their neck out, at least not until the crisis gets “big enough” to merit losing their jobs.
Given that virtually all of Trump’s actions are via executive orders and, therefore, can be overturned by the next administration, how big of a long-term effect do you think he will have?
Quite big. He’s setting precedents with the destruction of democratic norms, politicization of institutions, erosion of the rule of law, and expansion of executive authority that the next president will be able to build on if they so choose. As my colleagues and I flagged in this year’s Top Risk #2, Rule of Don, “Once precedents are broken by one party, the other tends to follow suit more easily.”
And let’s keep in mind there’s a decent chance the next president is someone Trump effectively anoints, which – presuming he’s still around after 2028 – could mean he’d still have a lot of direct influence. This assumes that free and fair elections are not materially disrupted through the weaponization of the “power ministries” (Justice Department, FBI, IRS). It’s far from my base case given state and local administration of elections, but still, a fatter tail risk than I’m comfortable with.
What’s the most likely way Trump can fail?
After hubris comes nemesis. The pattern is relatively familiar: Trump overplays his hand by picking more and bigger fights than he can win, gets kicked in the head by reality, and is either forced to backtrack or suffers a decline in the polls that threatens to splinter off Republicans in Congress and constrains his ability to implement his agenda.
Whether it’s China responding forcefully to the tariffs, markets revolting against attacks on Fed chair Jay Powell, or Harvard defending its academic independence, we’re already seeing meaningful snapback functions limiting the president. Not from traditional institutions, the courts, or multilateral treaties, but from powerful forces domestically and internationally that are refusing to take it on the chin. When you want to live by the law of the jungle and claim the title of apex predator, you have to win the big fights.
Will Trump’s dramatic “you are on your own” security messaging drive more countries to acquire their own nuclear weapons?
Absolutely, it’s a rational thing to consider in a G-Zero world. I doubt any of them will go nuclear over the next four years, but America’s unreliability already has a number of US allies and partners searching for alternatives to the US umbrella. Germany is likely to work out some form of nuclear-sharing with France and the United Kingdom, whose umbrella could extend across Europe and cover Poland as well. The Poles are also openly contemplating developing independent capabilities. South Korea and Japan are more likely to get their own nukes as a deterrent to Chinese aggression. The big open question is the Middle East, where Saudi Arabia (and maybe Turkey?) could also go down this path if Iran negotiations fail. Bottom line, we’re headed for an era of nuclear proliferation.
What did you think the G-Zero meant? Vibes? Papers? Essays?
How should Canada manage the small but important risk of invasion from the US?
By continuing to make clear that the threat is unacceptable – a view shared by a large majority of Americans, too. As Canadians just did by electing Mark Carney as prime minister, something that was unthinkable only a couple of months ago when his Liberal Party was dead in the water. That should tell Trump (who, by the way, had already ruled out direct military intervention) everything he needs to know about Canadians’ reaction function to foreign aggression.
Can American power be used to stop the bloodshed in Gaza and broker any kind of durable Israeli-Palestinian peace? Should it?
Should it? Of course. Can it? Not in any way that seems politically plausible. After all, Trump is even more pro-Israel than Biden was, and that was a high bar to clear already after what we saw last year. He doesn’t care about the well-being of the Palestinian population. And beyond Biden and Trump, most American voters don’t care enough about foreign lives to change their leaders’ calculus.
Absent heavy political pressure from Washington that isn’t coming, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has little reason to ease the pressure on Gaza, let alone to enter a broader peace process that could end his political career and maybe even land him in prison. Not only does he need to keep the far-right faction of his coalition onside, but most Israeli citizens now support the continuation of the fighting … and no longer support a two-state solution.
How do you think it will end between Ukraine and Russia? Will the Ukrainians be able to get their lands back?
Ukraine will be de facto partitioned, as we said in last year’s Top Risks report. That may be uncontroversial now, but it wasn’t a popular call to make in January 2024, when most of the West (to say nothing of the Ukrainians) was still demanding that Ukraine get all its land back. It wasn’t going to happen then, and it isn’t going to happen now. That would still be true if Kamala Harris had won the US presidency. Even Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky acknowledges that Ukraine is militarily incapable of retaking all its territory, while Russia won’t agree to a voluntary return. The question is how much each side will lose – and how much leverage each will gain – by the time they decide enough’s enough. That time just hasn’t arrived yet.
How do you think AI will impact geopolitics by 2040?
I expect we will not recognize our geopolitical order. International relations presume a state-based system with major powers cooperating and competing in the diplomatic, economic, and security realms. Artificial intelligence will blow that premise out of the water. As the digital realm becomes the dominant geopolitical arena, we will shift to a hybrid order where technology companies and governments compete for influence.
States will either completely integrate AI into their systems of governance and decision-making or they’ll be left behind by non-state actors that are growing increasingly sovereign not just in the digital space but in society, the economy, and national security. Closed political systems will have an evolutionary advantage, as power will lie with whoever controls the most data. Open systems will increasingly move toward more centralization, lest they become marginalized in global influence.
In the long run, would you bet against the US? Is it still the land of opportunity?
I’d bet against all national governments in the long run. They are too slow-moving to adapt to what’s coming. Many people living in today’s United States may well continue to thrive in this future. But it will increasingly be up to us – not governments – to make ourselves fit for purpose.
If 75% of the world’s economy and 95% of the world’s population keep globalizing, especially its fastest-growing parts, is it accurate to talk about deglobalization?
No, you’re right, the world as a whole is not deglobalizing. Certainly not digitally, less so once the AI revolution goes truly global. But it is accurate to talk about the United States actively deglobalizing and the US-China relationship decoupling. Both of which have massive structural, long-term implications.
How can we return to a state where facts are less strongly disputed? Can social media ever recover from having become a manipulation-friendly propaganda machine?
Two small but useful, pro-social ideas to start. First, only verify actual people, not bots. Second, make platforms legally responsible for the content created and shared by large accounts that they algorithmically promote. The goal is not to constrain free speech – which, to be clear, should be protected according to our constitution and laws – but to weaken the present incentives to intentionally engineer and maximize outrage and anger to drive user engagement at the expense of our societies and democracies.
Why should I care so much about what’s going on in the world? It feels like it’s more of a headache than anything else. I am doing nothing with all the information that I absorb except complain, get angry, stand in disbelief, and of course, enjoy a lot of memes. But it weighs on me, and sometimes I wonder what the point is.
Because it involves your fellow humans. They’re just like you, only slightly more irritating. And they’re all we have. They’re worth caring about, even if you, your family, and your friends are all doing just fine. Because those people suffering in lands near and far could be you, your family, or your friends. That they aren’t is just an accident, luck of the draw. As John Donne wrote, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.” If you hear a bell tolling … it may well be tolling for you, my friend.
With all of the chaos unfolding in the US, do you ever wish that you were back in Antarctica?
Not in the slightest. It’s way too cold, and there’s nothing much interesting happening there. Though the whole no Wi-Fi thing would be occasionally welcome.
Does Moose profit from your use of his name, image, and likeness? If not, can I offer him some pro bono legal assistance?
Moose is in it for the art, not the money. Plus, he’s family. He gets two, sometimes three, meals a day – even on days when his content doesn’t perform very well.
Trump’s 4D checkers, China’s opportunity, climate hopes, and more: Your questions, answered
Welcome to another edition of my mailbag, where I attempt to make sense of our increasingly chaotic world, one reader question at a time. If you have a burning question for me before I go back to full-length columns, ask it here and I’ll answer as many as I can in next week’s newsletter.
Let’s dive in (with questions lightly edited for clarity).
Is the US currently a kleptocracy?
The United States is the most structurally kleptocratic of any advanced industrial democracy, with public policy increasingly captured by monied special interests and the rules of the marketplace determined by the highest bidder. The wealthiest Americans not only can fund political campaigns but also buy favorable regulatory and legal treatment and lobby for policies that perpetuate their economic interests. This system is two-tiered alright, but it doesn’t see red and blue – only green.
President Donald Trump is a beneficiary and an accelerant of this disease, but it long predates him. Which is why Trump faced so little pushback from the business world both times he was elected. After all, a system where the connected can buy their preferred policy outcomes is a system much of the private sector is both used to and comfortable with.
Has Trump done to brand USA what Musk did to Tesla?
He’s working on it. The long-term damage to America’s reputational capital has been incalculable (though it hasn’t been as great as the >50% in value Tesla has lost since its mid-December peak). Sometimes you have a personal relationship and someone does something that can’t be unseen. That’s what has happened particularly with Canadians and Europeans of late. I think that damage is permanent. And we are not even 100 days in …
How do other nations view America in light of Trump’s aggressive tariffs, threats, and general disdain for allies?
They all see the United States as the principal driver of geopolitical uncertainty. In the near term, most countries – especially smaller, poorer ones – will look to cut trade deals with Trump relatively quickly because the alternative, direct confrontation with the world’s sole superpower, is too costly to bear. We’re seeing that already with the Japanese, the South Koreans, and many other delegations coming to Washington to try to do everything they can to secure at least functional relations with the US.
At the same time, every country recognizes the longer-term need to hedge away and “de-risk” from the United States as much and as fast as possible to reduce their exposure to Trump-driven disruption. Even those that manage to come away with deals know the president could change his mind. After spending the last decade focusing on the dangers of having too much exposure to Beijing’s opaque, arbitrary, and personalistic decision-making, policymakers, businesses, and investors all over the world now suddenly see de-risking from the US as the more urgent priority. That’s an extraordinary shift when you stop to think about it.
Granted, de-risking from the US is a tall order given America’s asymmetric power advantages and the global embeddedness of so many of the things it provides – defense, advanced technologies, finance – that are hard to substitute (read: to break free from). But many US allies see no choice but to start seriously looking for alternatives. We’re already seeing the European Union and Latin America speed up their conversations to fast-track approval of the EU-Mercosur trade deal. Trump-aligned India is likewise moving to improve its trade relations with the EU, the United Kingdom, Australia, and others. Canada is trying to engage much more closely with the Europeans. Even Vietnam, which has long harbored deep mistrust of China, signed 45 new economic cooperation agreements with Beijing days after Trump trade czar Peter Navarro rebuffed its offer to lower its tariffs on US goods to zero.
Can China capitalize on Trump’s global trade war to peel off US allies?
Xi Jinping just wrapped up a Southeast Asian charm offensive to try to do exactly that. For the first time since the Vietnam War, most Vietnamese are now more well-disposed toward China than the US. That’s not true everywhere (e.g., the Philippines is still about 80% pro-American), but the trend line is clear. China sees the moment as a historic opportunity to move economically closer to many countries and portray itself as a champion of globalization and a force for stability.
But that doesn’t necessarily mean America’s loss will be China’s gain everywhere. The Europeans don’t suddenly trust the Chinese more just because they now trust the Americans less. They still have big issues with Chinese dumping, overcapacity exports (especially in the auto industry), data surveillance, and other beggar-thy-neighbor practices that have not gone away. Europe’s de-risking will be less about tilting to China and more about strengthening its own capabilities and hedging with pretty much everybody else. Plus, as I mentioned above, while Trump has worked hard to alienate US allies, America remains the only game in town for most Western countries in many strategic sectors and critical networks. Going cold turkey is unthinkable.
If everyone thinks tariffs are a bad idea even for the American economy, why is Trump persisting? Do you see a way the US can win on this?
As much as I’d like to believe so, I just can't see any way the US comes out ahead on this. Myself and others have written extensively about why the tariffs (and the massive ongoing uncertainty surrounding US policy) are an economic lose-lose, not only for America’s trade partners but for American consumers and businesses, and not just in the short term but also in the long run. Rather than boost domestic manufacturing, they will accelerate the country’s deindustrialization. And if the administration had really intended to use the tariffs as a cudgel to forge a united front against China (as Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and others have claimed), it wouldn’t have slapped punishing duties on friendly countries already inclined to join this alliance before asking for their help. I’m afraid there’s no “4D chess” strategy or master plan.
It’d be one thing if the Trump team were only picking this one fight. But it’s going to be much harder to convince the world not to hedge away from the United States when at the same time as they’re hitting everyone with tariffs, they’re also picking all sorts of fights on other fronts. They are directly and indirectly threatening other countries’ sovereignty and territoriality, whether it’s Greenland and Denmark, Panama, Canada, or Ukraine. They are exporting algorithms and disinformation that undermine democracies around the world. They are destroying the transatlantic alliance. They are aligning with Russia over longstanding allies at the United Nations and the G7. They are driving away foreign tourists and international students. And they’re picking fights domestically, trying to weaken checks and balances, undermine the rule of law, and erode state capacity in ways that will make the US a worse place to live, invest, and do business.
I'd love to be proven wrong, but this policy set looks hands down like the most extraordinary geopolitical own goal I’ve ever witnessed.
Is it possible that Trump is purposely upsetting the economy in an effort to lower interest rates, reduce the US government’s debt servicing costs, and shrink the federal deficit?
Nope. That’s another one of those 4D chess stories flying around, and it’s nonsense. It’s true that a tariff-and-uncertainty-induced US recession can make existing US government debt (and mortgages, car loans, credit card debt, etc.) cheaper to refinance by bringing down long-term interest rates. But if long rates decline because the real economy has deteriorated to the point where the Fed has to cut short-term rates to boost aggregate demand, the money saved on debt interest payments probably will be offset by the lower tax revenue collected and the higher unemployment benefits paid out during the recession. The overall deficit will likely be higher than if said recession hadn’t been engineered in the first place – destroying trillions in economic value and hurting millions of real Americans in the process.
And all this assumes that long rates will in fact go down when the US enters a tariff-and-uncertainty-induced recession, which financial markets are currently telling us is not guaranteed in light of growing inflation and default risks. Thus far, Trump’s stagflationary policy mix and erratic policymaking style have made the world’s safe-haven assets relatively less attractive, prompted investors to sell US bonds, and caused long rates to rise rather than fall.
Will Trump succeed in brokering a ceasefire in Ukraine like he promised on the campaign trail?
Only if he’s willing to effectively use both carrots and sticks on Russia and Ukraine alike. So far he hasn’t, deploying mostly sticks (suspending military aid and intelligence sharing) to force the Ukrainians to come to terms and principally only carrots (the promise of sanctions nonenforcement and relief, and even full normalization of relations) to get the Russians to back off their maximalist demands.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said last week the administration is giving the talks “a matter of days” to make progress or else they’ll walk away from the peace effort altogether. The problem is that Vladimir Putin continues to be uninterested in a durable ceasefire, at least not unless the so-called “root causes” of the conflict are addressed through a permanent settlement. He started this war to change the facts on the ground and is convinced he still has what it takes to win it. What’s more, he’s betting that if he can keep slow rolling the peace talks and convince Trump that it was Kyiv’s intransigence that tanked them, Russia could plausibly get a US rapprochement while it continues to wage war against a Ukraine deprived of US assistance. I’m not a betting man, but at this point, it’s a reasonable wager for Putin to make.
What do you expect from incoming German Chancellor Friedrich Merz?
Less capacity to spend and lead than many people hope, despite having managed to pass a historic fiscal package through the Bundestag lifting the country’s “debt brake” for defense spending and creating a 500 billion euro special fund for infrastructure investments. The incoming coalition is serious but relatively unpopular and divided, facing a stronger-than-ever far-right Alternative for Germany leading the opposition in the new parliament.
This political weakness, combined with the sheer scale of the challenges it faces, will water down the government’s ambitions. Germany is undergoing a severe, decade-long economic crisis. Merz will be under considerable pressure to jumpstart growth quickly amid global trade wars and under tight budget conditions. Just a few weeks ago, he was well-disposed to take on a European leadership role. Now that talk is no longer cheap, his constraints and risk tolerance will change. And if the Germans won’t step up, who in Europe can?
Is climate action possible in a disintegrating world? Have the odds of avoiding catastrophic climate change worsened in the past three months?
I’m more optimistic here. We’ve already broken the back of the most catastrophic climate change scenarios. Economic self-interest – not ideology or idealism – is driving the clean energy revolution as technological innovation and steep learning curves have dramatically reduced the price tag of clean power technologies, making them the cheapest and most profitable option in a lot of markets regardless of politics. Deep-red Texas and Florida lead the US in solar and wind power deployment. China is set to hit its emissions peak several years ahead of schedule. Europe sees renewables as an energy security imperative. Emerging markets from India to Indonesia and Pakistan are eager to develop using cheaper and cleaner domestic energy sources than high-volatility, dirty imported fuels.
I don’t want to be glib. The planet is still heating up faster than we’d like, and the present state of geopolitics – from Trump’s “drill, baby, drill” to the G-Zero vacuum of global climate leadership – will slow the pace of decarbonization. With every fraction of a degree of warming causing bigger and more frequent disasters, lower growth, and more deaths, that’s not good news. But for every environmental regulation repealed, clean energy policy revoked, fossil fuel project approved, and international commitment abandoned, there’s another, much more structural force pulling even harder in the opposite direction. As my colleagues and I put it in Eurasia Group’s 2025 Top Risks report, the global energy transition “has reached escape velocity.”
Would you ride Moose like a jockey if given the opportunity?
I’d train him with a well-disposed toddler first. That would be must-see television. Any volunteers?
American backsliding, Trump-Xi standoff, Iran bombing, and more: Your questions, answered
Collage of Ian Bremmer, Donald Trump, and other world leaders.
If you feel like you're drowning in the 24-hour news tsunami lately, you're not alone. Headlines are moving at the speed of light, massively consequential policies are being announced (then rolled back) via social media, and longstanding global alliances seem to shift with each passing day. It's hard enough just trying to keep up, let alone separate the signal from the noise.
Because a weekly long-form column often can't do justice to everything happening simultaneously across our increasingly chaotic world, I invited readers to ask their most pressing questions on all things political and geopolitical. You wanted to know about everything from the contents of Donald Trump’s heart to the risk of a Taiwan invasion to the future of the dollar and, yes, whether I'd ride Moose like a moose jockey given the opportunity.
Below is the first batch of answers, with questions lightly edited for clarity. If you have something you’d like to ask me, submit your questions here and I’ll take as many as I can in the upcoming weeks.
Let's dive in.
How well do you think the outside world truly understands the goals and motivations of the Trump administration?
Not particularly well, since it's unclear for people in the United States, too. President Trump individually concentrates so much more decision-making authority than any other president in modern US history, which is why the on-again-off-again tariff policy has been so chaotic. Past administrations have not necessarily been more transparent – Trump certainly speaks his mind constantly – but they have been far more process and consensus-driven.
Still, there is an underlying driver helping explain Trump’s actions: the use and abuse of power to bring about the president’s favored outcomes in one-on-one settings and, relatedly, to eliminate any checks on his authority domestically (vis-à-vis Congress and the courts) and internationally (multilateral frameworks, standards, commitments, treaties, agreements, etc.). That – Trump’s will to power – more than any concrete policy agenda is the unifying thread. Remember, Trump was a Democrat before he was a Republican. Ultimately, he’s driven not by ideology but by the search for maximum leverage he can use to crush opponents and score “wins.”
Are you concerned at all about the possibility of regime change in the US? On a daily basis, the Trump administration is doing stuff right out of a totalitarian playbook, and everybody seems to be folding their cards because they either don't understand the stakes or they hope it's somehow going to pass. As a scared European from a country with a totalitarian past, I personally doubt it will.
I’m less concerned than some because of the decentralized nature of America’s federal government (with many critical functions, including election administration, delegated to state and local authorities) as well as our professionalized, independent military. Trump’s authoritarian impulses also remain constrained by the president’s own lack of discipline and interest in the business of governance. This was the case during his first term and is still true now, as both Signalgate and Liberation Day made clear.
On the other hand, President Trump is far less constrained politically than last time, having consolidated control of the GOP, surrounded himself with yes men who encourage his most destructive whims, and asserted absolute power over the entire federal government. He’s also less constrained by markets/the private sector and the reelection imperative, and he faces a Democratic Party in absolute disarray.
The upshot is Trump won’t be as effective as many fear in undoing checks and balances, largely because his authoritarianism will continue to be tempered by his policymaking incompetence. But I admit that the risk of serious, structural damage to the US rule of law and democratic institutions is growing. I’m more concerned about this than I thought I’d be three months ago.
While globalization has been a boon for the US consumer, it has assisted in the relative decline of US manufacturing over the past 40 years. What policies would you recommend, if any, to (re)grow US manufacturing?
Not Trump’s present tariff policy, which will hurt rather than help US manufacturing. A majority of America’s goods imports are intermediate inputs, capital equipment, and raw materials that US manufacturers rely on to produce other goods, both for domestic consumption and for export. By making these imports more expensive, tariffs harm US producers and exporters (in addition to consumers via higher prices). Add to that the massive uncertainty about what tariff changes tomorrow may bring, and there are also no incentives for companies to build new factories in America.
Globalization is not principally responsible for the decline of US manufacturing over the past half-century. Productivity improvements and automation have reduced the need for manufacturing workers everywhere (even China is now seeing deindustrialization!). In fact, as a very rich country at the productivity frontier, America produces more value-added in manufacturing output today than ever before; it just takes fewer workers than it did after World War 2 to do that. That’s obviously sad for the individuals and communities that have lost jobs. In the aggregate, though, the decline in US manufacturing employment has been offset by an increase in higher-paying service-sector jobs (the average service worker gets paid more than the average manufacturing worker). If you wanted to increase manufacturing jobs, you’d have to either shift people out of those better-paying (often more comfortable) service jobs or grow the population (tough given the administration’s crackdown on immigration).
Now, there are strategic and national security reasons to protect and reshore select industries like semiconductors or batteries. But if you want to boost manufacturing in these core industries, the way to do it is through smart industrial policy: targeted subsidies, tax credits, state and local incentives, direct investments … like the Biden administration’s bipartisan CHIPS Act, which was followed by a manufacturing investment boom.
So maybe start by not undermining good programs for political reasons. Don't beat up on friends and adversaries simultaneously when what you need is to coordinate and trade more with allies. And focus on the broader ecosystem needed to foster investment and build a domestic manufacturing base. That means bolstering the scientific, research, and educational institutions that have made the US a magnet for world-class talent and innovation. Building better infrastructure to increase manufacturing productivity. And ensuring a stable, predictable business environment anchored in the rule of law.
Who blinks first, Xi or Trump? How could they de-escalate their trade tiff given their personal distaste for losing face?
Trump already has, with the unilateral exemption granted to electronic products like semiconductors and smartphones (even if it turns out to be temporary). The question is how many times he needs to blink before there's a climbdown. As they say, a wink is as good as a nod to a blind man, and at least since Covid, Xi has been convinced that China is facing a bipartisan strategy of containment from a hardline United States. Even with the latest exclusions, Trump’s tariffs are so high as to essentially amount to a trade embargo. Combine that with the concerted US efforts to crush Chinese tariff circumvention through third countries, and we’re already seeing the unmanaged decoupling of the most important geopolitical relationship in the world.
Given the deep structural mistrust between the two sides and Beijing’s political ability to “fight until the end,” I don’t see how you can put the toothpaste back in the tube. At most you can get a truce, and only as a result of a direct meeting between Xi and Trump. But Xi has little interest in negotiating directly with Trump at this stage, as it would be a sign of weakness and he doesn’t see the US president as a credible interlocutor.
In the current context, what is keeping China from invading Taiwan? What conditions are they waiting to have in place before "pulling the trigger," so to speak?
I see this scenario as extremely unlikely in the near term. Sure, Trump has basically broadcast that he doesn’t care about territorial integrity, and you could plausibly extend his treatment of Ukraine to Taiwan. But his cabinet is also full of China hawks, and if there’s one US ally every Republican in Washington wants to defend, it’s Taiwan against China. Beijing knows a full-scale invasion would risk direct war with the United States, which would be incredibly destructive to the Chinese economy at a time when they can hardly afford it.
Radical uncertainty about Trump’s response function makes Chinese leaders even more cautious than they normally would be. Beijing would rather wait to invade until the military balance more decisively favors China, its economy is on more solid footing, and the US is led by a more predictable president. But expect them to test US resolve and probe Trump’s response with incremental escalations across the board, none of which should be big enough to lead to a crisis on their own. The risk, however, is that as the US-China relationship breaks down, any accident or miscalculation could escalate into a military crisis given the lack of any conflict resolution channels.
Isn't it possible that Trump's creepy Russia obsession has to do with trying to get Russia as an ally against China?
In part, though there are plenty of other explanations (from his affinity for strongmen, transactional nature, and dislike for Vladimir Putin’s European and “woke” enemies, to his belief that the US shouldn’t waste resources on a war that isn’t core to American interests and Ukraine can’t win). At times, Trump seems more interested in cutting deals with both Putin and Xi Jinping to carve the world into spheres of influence.
But in any case, it’s unrealistic to think Trump could pull off a “reverse Nixon” given Russia and China’s shared interest in a post-American international order and deep commercial, energy, and technological ties. These are not the same countries that Henry Kissinger drove a wedge between 50 years ago (nor are they likely to change anytime soon). There’s nothing that the president of a democratic United States, even one as weakly constrained and authoritarian-minded as Trump, can credibly offer Putin that remotely competes with the kind of long-term strategic alignment he shares with Xi.
In fact, a Trump-brokered ceasefire in Ukraine and/or a US normalization of relations with Russia might actually strengthen Sino-Russian ties by allowing Beijing to fully embrace its “no limits” friendship with Moscow without risking US sanctions or jeopardizing its relations with Europe.
Given Trump's historically aggressive approach towards Iran and desire to distract from the tariff disaster, how high are your odds that the US and/or Israel will bomb Iran within the next 6 weeks?
Reasonably low since Trump doesn't want a war and is fully committed to trying engagement first, despite Israeli opposition. The difference in the American and Israeli positions is interesting: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently demanded a verifiable end to Iran’s entire nuclear program, whereas Trump seems to have lowered the bar to no weaponization. This is a condition that the Iranians, who have always maintained they have no intention to build a bomb, could potentially live with given their present historical weakness. The odds of an agreement are higher than they have been in a decade.
The Israelis might try to derail the negotiation effort diplomatically and even engage in some low-level provocations to spoil the Iranians’ mood, but they won't directly launch major strikes that could blow back in their face. Publicly sabotaging Trump would be far too risky.
What is the likelihood of the dollar losing its reserve currency status?
Dollar dominance is being eroded by Trump’s unpredictability and policy mix, which have caused a loss of confidence in the US government – and, accordingly, prompted investors to reprice the safety premium commanded by dollar assets.
But losing reserve currency status? That doesn't look imminent given the lack of viable alternatives. The yuan is not, in fact, convertible; China has to resort to draconian capital controls to prevent capital flight, and the country lacks the investor protections, institutional quality, and business environment required to internationalize its currency. The euro is the currency of a still-too-fragmented economic area mired in slow growth and high debt, with shallow capital markets and no banking, fiscal, or political union, where nativist parties could well gain power in the next five years and destabilize domestic politics. And cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are highly volatile, speculative assets with zero intrinsic or legislated value (unlike, say, the dollar, which is backed by America’s current and future wealth – and by the US government’s ability to tax it).
You can’t replace something with nothing, so the dollar’s special status is safe … for now. But Trump’s destruction of America’s reputational capital will cost the country dearly in the years to come. After all, every reserve currency that came before the dollar was dominant until it wasn’t. Investors have historically wanted to hold greenbacks because America’s economic, political, and institutional fundamentals inspired trust. Lose those fundamentals and you lose that trust.
Do you find that your Boston accent helps you come across as authentic?
It’s the first time I've ever considered that. I’d like to think it’s mostly down to being honest with people and not taking myself too seriously. But sure, why not? Can’t hurt.
What is Moose's favorite toy? And was it made in China?
Presently, a squeaky watermelon (it used to be a small bouncy orange ball, but he can't see as well as he used to so he's adapted). No idea where it was made.
Globalization helped make the United States the most prosperous nation in history. But many Americans feel they haven’t benefited from free trade and voted for Donald Trump to “liberate” them from the system the United States built over the past 80 years. He is delivering.
“Now it is our turn to prosper,” President Trump proclaimed on April 2 as he announced sweeping tariffs on almost every US trading partner (plus a few uninhabited territories), ranging from 10% to 50%, that came into full force earlier today. Overnight, the US average effective tariff rate shot up to over 22% (from one of the world’s lowest at the beginning of the year), the highest since the turn of the previous century – higher even than the infamous 1930 Smoot-Hawley tariffs, which are widely blamed for starting a global trade war and deepening the Great Depression.
Facing a hit to their economies, many of America’s trade partners have been tempted to respond in kind. Most also recognize that trade wars are a losing game, adding the risk of an escalatory spiral to the economic self-harm of tariffs. They have accordingly been playing defense and trying to offer Trump deals in the hopes of securing concessions. The notable exception was China, the one country with the leverage to hit back, which responded with tit-for-tat tariffs on US imports.
Then, in a sudden shift just a few hours ago under massive financial pressure, Trump announced he would immediately bring down tariffs on most countries to a universal 10% for the next 90 days, ostensibly as a reward for not retaliating – but really to stop markets from spiraling out of control. At the same time, he raised tariffs on Chinese exports to 125% after Beijing retaliated twice with duties on US goods totaling 84%. This effectively severs much of the remaining trade between the world's two largest economies, accelerating the decoupling process and forcing global supply chains to reorganize even faster than anticipated.
Faulty math, faulty logic
Trump had described the “liberation day” tariffs as “reciprocal,” saying that the United States is only doing onto other countries as they do to the US. But the formula the administration ended up using doesn’t consider the tariff rates and nontrade barriers other countries impose on US exports at all. Instead, the calculation assumes that bilateral goods trade deficits are necessarily and entirely “unfair,” representing “the sum of all cheating.”
This is a gross misunderstanding of how trade works. There’s no linear correlation between a country’s protectionism and its bilateral trade balances. Bilateral surpluses and deficits reflect all sorts of factors unrelated to trade policy – from population size and wealth to differences in resource endowments and comparative advantages, all the way to idiosyncratic preferences for certain products over others. That’s why there’s nothing inherently bad or unsustainable about bilateral deficits.
But Trump has believed otherwise for as long as he’s been a public person. In his view, if a country spends less on goods from America than Americans spend on its goods, the US is necessarily getting “ripped off.” The problem is that by targeting all bilateral trade deficits, his new tariffs punish the world’s smallest, poorest nations like Lesotho and Madagascar with crippling duties for being unable to spend as much on Tesla Cybertrucks and Boeing jets as 340 million fantastically wealthier Americans spend on their diamonds and vanilla. Yet the core reason these countries have trade deficits with America is not because they protect or discriminate against US exports but because they’re poor – something Trump’s punitive tariffs will make worse.
Trump’s tariffs were never about reciprocity or unfair trade practices. Nor are they intended to force other countries to lower their trade barriers and ultimately lead to freer trade, as some Trump allies insist. Otherwise, Trump wouldn’t have levied a 10% duty on countries with which the US has balanced trade and even bilateral surpluses. Trump’s tariffs also entirely ignore the growing trade in services, where the United States is the world’s export powerhouse to the tune of over $1 trillion a year and runs persistent surpluses with much of the world – $295 billion in 2024. If other countries applied Trump’s same “fairness” standard to the US services trade surplus, the “reciprocal” tariffs levied on American services would average 13%.
Decoupling by design
The conclusion is inescapable: The president is committed to walling America off from the world in order to reduce bilateral trade deficits dramatically while using tariff revenue to fund his tax cuts and spending plans. As Vice President JD Vance explained, Trump “believes in economic self-sufficiency.”
The White House hopes the tariffs will incentivize consumers to “buy American” and companies to build factories in the United States. But tariffs could only succeed at reshoring manufacturing over the long term, and only by making imported goods and inputs permanently more expensive for US households and producers. And are there really many Americans willing to forgo relatively well-paid, air-conditioned jobs to sew sneakers and t-shirts in garment factories? If not, what’s the point of tariffs against poorer countries like Bangladesh that specialize in low-value-added industries? The same goes for tariffs on countries that export things that the US can’t make more of at home – think coffee beans, tropical fruits, critical minerals, gemstones, and the like.
History is littered with failed import substitution attempts. Broad-based tariffs are likelier to raise prices, reduce product variety, and hurt US businesses than to lead to a “golden age” of American manufacturing. If the administration expected tariffs to reshore industrial production, it couldn’t anticipate raising the trillions of dollars in tariff revenue its fiscal plans rely on.
The cost of ‘America alone’
There’s no sugarcoating it: Even if he has rolled it back partially, Trump’s pursuit of autarky (aka economic self-sufficiency) is the most destructive economic own goal in recent history, akin to what the British did with Brexit but on a global scale. My friend Larry Summers told me on GZERO Worldthat it’s the “worst, most consequential self-inflicted wound in US economic policy” since World War II.
Global supply chains will be disrupted. Americans will be forced to pay more for their goods, eroding their purchasing power. Businesses’ costs will increase, too, reducing their productivity and driving up prices further. As sticker shock depresses consumer spending, business activity, and exports, unemployment and bankruptcies will rise, and the US may tip into recession – especially if other countries retaliate with tariffs of their own. And that’s before you get to the high, persistent uncertainty about both the path and the end-state of policy inherent to the Trump administration, which will weigh on long-term investment and growth whether or not the 90-day tariff pause is extended.
Dug in
Many will see today’s pause as evidence that Trump is sensitive to political and economic fallout and imagine he’ll back off the remainder of the tariff wall once the pain grows intolerable. After all, launching the largest tax hike in modern US history is a risky bet, and polls already show that very few Americans favor the move. As tariffs increase prices and slow the economy, voters will blame Trump for making them worse off, and Republicans will suffer in the 2026 midterm elections.
But Trump’s political pain tolerance is higher than most think. Unlike eight years ago, he can’t run for president again (despite what he may claim). At 78, he cares largely about using whatever time he has left to cement his legacy. Having overcome defeat in 2020, two impeachments, multiple criminal convictions, and near assassination to win both the popular vote and the electoral college, Trump is convinced he has a revolutionary mandate to do everything he wants at home and abroad. “He’s at the peak of just not giving a f--- anymore,” a White House official told the Washington Post. “Bad news stories? Doesn’t give a f---. He’s going to do what he’s going to do.”
Trump also faces far fewer constraints than during his first term. Not only has the president consolidated full control over the Republican Party, but he has surrounded himself with people whose main qualification is unconditional loyalty. The Signalgate scandal confirmed that Trump’s cabinet members and senior staffers are unprepared to give him their honest advice or check his most disruptive impulses. With policymaking feedback loops broken and long-standing checks and guardrails on executive power being eroded, he may well double down on his failed policies rather than pivot.
Faced with the prospect of sustained American protectionism, most countries will intensify their efforts to “de-risk” from the United States (though it will be as hard as it sounds) and diversify their economic ties with the rest of the world. While in the near term many will put up protectionist measures against Chinese goods escaping US tariffs and flooding their markets, even strategic US allies in Europe and Asia will be pushed to start reluctantly hedging toward Beijing in the medium to long term. American interests and global influence will be damaged accordingly.
The historian Arnold Toynbee famously observed that civilizations die by suicide, not murder. Trump’s “liberation” of America from the greatest engine of peace and prosperity the world has ever seen – globalization, not to be confused with globalism – is the kind of self-destruction Toynbee warned about.