The World Is Winning—and Losing—the Vaccine Race
Immunization to COVID-19 is supposed to solve our problems—but it’s starting to trigger even bigger ones. Faced with a pandemic that paralyzed the world, a vaccine has always seemed like the obvious solution. A natural challenge demands a scientific fix. Unlike social distancing and lockdowns, a vaccine seems simple and uncontentious. Fire up the labs, pump up the bioreactors, and distribute billions of doses. In the coming weeks, we expect the first news of the decisive Phase III trials of the most promising COVID-19 vaccine candidates. The hope is that a successful vaccine would be a black box: a functional device that no one need second guess or closely inspect so long as it works. But as it turns out, constructing and distributing a vaccine
The Sociologist Who Could Save Us From Coronavirus
We all know the Chernobyl script. A badly designed reactor suffered a meltdown. The decrepit Soviet regime tried to hide the disaster. Millions of citizens were put at risk. And the truth came out. The regime paid the price. Its legitimacy was in tatters. Collapse followed. For liberals it is a pleasing morality tale. Dictatorship fails when faced with the challenges of modernity. Sunlight is the best disinfectant. When COVID-19 struck, we wondered whether it might be Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Chernobyl. But after initial prevarication driven by Wuhan’s local politics, China’s national leadership reasserted its grip. The worst moment was Feb. 7, when hundreds of millions of Chinese took to the Internet to protest the treatment of whistleblowing doctor Li Wenliang, who had died
Daniel Yergin’s New Map
Review of: The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of NationsBy Daniel Yergin In the 1990s Daniel Yergin emerged as one of the great chroniclers of our day. Both “The Prize,” his epic history of oil (which won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize in general nonfiction), and “The Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy,” written with Joseph Stanislaw, were turned into blockbuster television series. “The New Map” is Yergin’s effort to chart the world of 2020. The challenge is enormous. Familiar schemes for understanding international politics and power are in flux. Even before Covid, market-driven globalization, under the sign of Western hegemony, was in question. Read the full review at The New York Times
World Order, Then and Now with the ChinaTalk Podcast
In this conversation: What we can learn from the diplomatic and economic modes of 1920s and 30s Why Nazi legal theory resonates so well in China today How modes of
The politics of currencies
Adam Tooze argues that worrying about the euro exchange rate and a non-existent inflation enemy in Europe must give way to fiscal and monetary demand boosts. On September 10th, as
The Prospect Interview #145: The Covid-19 economic crisis
The pandemic has shattered economies all over the globe. What can be done about it? Discussion with the Prospect Interview to talk about how the impending recession compares to past
The world’s central banks are starting to experiment. But what comes next?
Are we seeing the end of the supremacy of the US dollar? With soaring government spending and gaping deficits are we on the cusp of a great surge of inflation?
How Much Should We Fear Post-Crisis Debt or Inflation? With The Breakdown podcast.
How Much Should We Fear Post-Crisis Debt or Inflation? My conversation with Nathaniel Whittemore (@nlw) at The Breakdown covers historical analogies for our present moment, Federal Reserve policy and independence,
Look out for Adam’s next books, Lockdown: The Economic History of the COVID Crisis coming to print in 2021, and Carbon, out in 2023.
WEF 2020: Why Protests Are An Integral Part Of Democracy
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer – Is a 2nd Great Depression Coming?
WHIPLASH with Shoma Chaudhury – How Covid will change psyche of Global Leadership.
Crashed to Corona 7: Responding to the global epidemic
The World Is Winning—and Losing—the Vaccine Race
Immunization to COVID-19 is supposed to solve our problems—but it’s starting to trigger even bigger
Daniel Yergin’s New Map
Review of: The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of NationsBy Daniel Yergin In
The Sociologist Who Could Save Us From Coronavirus
We all know the Chernobyl script. A badly designed reactor suffered a meltdown. The decrepit
World Order, Then and Now with the ChinaTalk Podcast
In this conversation: What we can learn from the diplomatic and economic modes of 1920s
The politics of currencies
Adam Tooze argues that worrying about the euro exchange rate and a non-existent inflation enemy
The Prospect Interview #145: The Covid-19 economic crisis
The pandemic has shattered economies all over the globe. What can be done about it?
Look out for Adam’s next books, Lockdown: The Economic History of the COVID Crisis coming to print in 2021, and Carbon, out in 2023.
WEF 2020: Why Protests Are An Integral Part Of Democracy
GZERO World with Ian Bremmer – Is a 2nd Great Depression Coming?
WHIPLASH with Shoma Chaudhury – How Covid will change psyche of Global Leadership.
Crashed to Corona 7: Responding to the global epidemic
"a majestic narrative tracing the prehistory and destructive path of the crisis across the planet"
– Yanis Varoufakis, The Guardian
“The prose is clear. The scholarship remarkable.”
– Martin Wolf, Financial Times
“But whatever happens next, Crashed is likely to stand the test of time as the best history of 2008 written in the decade afterwards.”
– Duncan Weldon, Resolution Group