Articles

09.02.19 Publication: Mainichi Shimbun

We British used to talk proudly about how pragmatic, reasonable and logical we are, by comparison with what we have liked to see as our impractical,...

03.02.19 Publication: La Stampa

The trade war between the United States and China risks getting nastier, lasting for years and damaging all our economies. Negotiations in Washington, DC, on...

12.01.19 Publication: Nikkei

It is one of the pure coincidences that history sometimes produces. But the unusual point about the dawn of the Heisei era in 1989-90 is that at exactly the...

03.01.19 Publication: Project Syndicate

DUBLIN – The March 29, 2019, deadline for the United Kingdom to leave the European Union is fast approaching, yet it remains far from clear how the departure...

17.11.18 Publication: Spectator

When Japan hosts the Rugby Union World Cup next year, and still more so the summer Olympics in 2020, all eyes will be on its omotenashi (hospitality), perhaps...

04.08.18 Publication: Mainichi Shimbun

What has emerged from the summits with Kim Jong-Un and Vladimir Putin is a mixture of the psychological and the geopolitical. The psychological element is not...

08.07.18 Publication: Prospect

The greatest issue of our time in political economy is how to reconcile societies to the process we now call globalisation, with all the inequality and...

22.06.18 Publication: Mainichi Shimbun

A common saying among military men is that a country should never send troops into battle without having an exit strategy, a plan for how to end the conflict...

02.06.18 Publication: Vanity Fair

No one knows how to label the new government. Calling it “populist” seems bizarre given that Italian politics has been dominated for two decades by the...

31.05.18 Publication: La Stampa

Let’s face it: the typical view in the outside world about Italian political crises is that they are dramatic but not serious. That may be why so little...

26.05.18 Publication: La Stampa

All politicians need luck, especially in their early months in office. So the lucky star has certainly shone on Japan’s new prime minister,...

25.05.18 Publication: Project Syndicate

President Donald Trump’s abrupt decision to cancel the June 12 summit with Kim Jong-un represents a great diplomatic coup for the young North Korean leader....

19.05.18 Publication: Nikkei Business

During President Donald Trump’s first year in the White House, an English saying was often invoked when analysing the gap between what he said and what he...

13.05.18 Publication: La Stampa

What do Donald Trump, Five Star, the Lega, Vladimir Putin and Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orban have in common? The answer is that they all favour closed...

10.05.18 Publication: La Stampa

Europe faces a severe test of its resilience, its coherence, its self-sufficiency -- the toughest, in fact, since 1945. Deserted and attacked by its closest...

10.05.18 Publication: Mainichi Shimbun

The key question to ask oneself while we wait for the historic summit between Kim Jong-un, North Korea’s leader, and President Donald Trump of the United...

08.05.18 Publication: La Stampa

Perplexed. Baffled. Disdainful. Pitying. But in the end, not really interested. Those are sort of the words and phrases that came to my mind as I asked...

27.04.18 Publication: La Stampa

It made great television, for the place where the leaders of North and South Korea met on April 27th, the so-called De-Militarized Zone on the border between...

08.04.18 Publication: Project Syndicate

We are about to witness a historic test of the wills and self-confidence of two superpowers, China and America, and of two leaders who see themselves as...

06.04.18 Publication: La Stampa

Across Europe, left-wing, social-democratic parties are in disarray, unable to find a coherent answer to the global financial crisis and to high public debts...

30.03.18 Publication: Mainichi Shimbun

How do you deal with a neighbour like Russia, which seems to enjoy breaking all sorts of rules, both legal ones and ethical ones? By economic sanctions? By...

01.02.18 Publication: Nikkei Business

What is Japan’s biggest economic problem, or at least weakness, as we look ahead towards the 2020s and 2030s? A lot of people have favourite answers to...

13.01.18 Publication: La Stampa

In every national election, there is a choice of emphasis: policies, political parties or personalities. While winner-takes-all electoral systems in the US,...

17.11.17 Publication: Nikkei Business

We all make mistakes. That simple statement is as true of companies as it is of human beings, and should be kept in mind when we try to assess the impact of...