ADAM TOOZE

As interest rates are driven up to counter inflation, as geopolitical tensions rise and commodity prices grind against each other, the world economy is in

South African coal Ahead of COP27 the most interesting climate/energy read was David Pilling’s remarkable FT report on the difficulties in implementing the decarbonization agenda

For the last twenty years the German economy has thrived on globalization. Now that formula seems under pressure from many sides. Close trading and investment

On 14 October 2022, the World Food Program issued an appeal that is unprecedented for the Western hemisphere. It concerns Haiti. According to the latest

100 years ago Mussolini’s fascists – the movement that first defined the political brand – staged their much ballyhooed “March on Rome” and completed a

This weekend I launched my new monthly column in the FT with a short piece about the idea of polycrisis. Polycrisis is a term I

The politics of inflation in 2022 are surprising. Perhaps my priors were wrong, but as price indices surge by almost 10 percent I would have

As the war in Ukraine rages on, the question on the battlefield is whether Russia resorts to nuclear escalation. In Washington the political consensus is

I fell under the sway of Bruno Latour in the early 1990s when I was a grad student at the LSE and I have remained

Iran is currently convulsed by the fourth wave of mass protests to shake the country since the student uprising of 1999 – the others being

Newsflash: bank runs can actually happen in market economies and when they do, they do real economic damage. Yup! Economists proved this to their satisfaction

Around Delhi, as Modi’s government prepares to take over the reins as G20 chair, the talk is of “India’s moment”. But what kind of moment

Did a piece for the NYT riffing on Chartbook #152 on the global anti-inflationary pivot and the attendant recession risk. As interest rates rise around

One week on from the shock announcement of the UK’s mini-budget, the pound sterling has recovered to the levels it was at before the panic.

As of this morning, sterling is hovering precariously above the historic lows it has plumbed in recent days. UK bonds continue under pressure. Meanwhile, the

I don’t normally write much about the UK – my relationship with the country and its politics will never recover from Brexit. But the current

Many of us had hoped that it would not come to this. In Sunday’s elections in Italy, triggered by the premature fall of Mario Draghi’s

In deciphering the global polycrisis it can be helpful to break down the interplay of crisis dynamics into regional systems. The EU and its neighborhood,

In response to the surge in prices that began in earnest in the summer of 2021 central banks all around the world are hiking interest

Central banks around the world are under pressure. Surging prices stoke fears of inflation. Central bankers, who commonly define themselves as guardians of price stability,

Right now German grand strategy is in the crosshairs of criticism. Germany is faulted for having appeased Putin. It is faulted for having neglected the

Though the news from the frontline may be good for Ukraine. As the summer comes to a close, its economic situation is increasingly alarming. The

In August America’s Center for Disease Control (CDC) published a set of data that ought to have brought political, economic and social debate to a

It is the weekend of the eagerly anticipated Jackson Hole monetary policy conference. You can see the agenda, the papers and notes on the discussion

It is six months since Russia launched its attack on Ukraine. Amongst the anniversary coverage two long reads by the Washington Post are in a

The headwinds acting on the Chinese economy right now are formidable, on top of collapsing housing markets and the risks of Xi’s Zero-Covid policy, add

As the combination of the energy price shock and the strong dollar ripple around the world they are putting consumers and governments everywhere under pressure.

As the title suggests, the idea for my newsletter was originally inspired by the stacks of charts – Chartbooks – with which macro analysts at

This week I did a piece for Foreign Policy on the current strength of the dollar and what it tells us about how the dollar

Last month, China posted the largest trade surplus for a 30-day period ever recorded by any country in history. As Michael Pettis summarizes it: “The

Crashing Weibo US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan briefly crashed Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, as millions in the country discussed and

Passing climate legislation in the US is an attritional business. Clinton tried and failed. Obama tried and failed. Until the last week of July it

On Thursday last week, the Build Back Better package that was to define the first term of the Biden presidency with a combination of climate

With the fight against inflation taking center stage, the talk now is of the risks involved in slowing an economy hard. It is a test

The assassination of Shinzō Abe looks to have been the act of a crazed loner. But the circumstances were not merely fortuitous. When he was

It is a delight to welcome new readers to Chartbook. Many have come by way of the very generous profile in The Atlantic by Annie