The bilateral relationship between Italy and China is back in the spotlight one year after the signature of the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on China’s Belt and Road Initiative. To date, Italy is the second hardest hit country by COVID-19 pandemic after China. Despite strict measures in place to limit the crisis, numbers keep rising, placing the national health care system under severe strain.
Topic:
Health, Bilateral Relations, Foreign Aid, and Propaganda
The Italian armed forces need to adjust to a changing operational environment, whereby threat levels are on the rise and the United States is more reluctant to lead military operations than in the past.
Topic:
International Relations, NATO, Armed Forces, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:
Europe, Italy, North America, and United States of America
China’s 2018 import ban on mixed “recyclable” plastic waste revealed deep-rooted problems in the global recycling system and uncovered the wasteful and harmful nature of the recycling trade. Repercussions have been global. In April 2019, Greenpeace East Asia took a closer look at the top plastic waste importers and exporters globally.
This data details the 21 top exporters and 21 top importers of plastic waste from January 2016 to November 2018, measuring the breadth of the plastics crisis and the global industry’s response to import bans. Two core trends emerged from China’s ban and the Greenpeace analysis.
One of the key priorities of the new European Commission is to enhance the EU’s geopolitical credentials and “learn to use the language of power”, as stated by the incoming EU High Representative Josep Borrell.
The EU’s ambition is two-fold: to increase the Union’s ability to project power and influence at the global level, including through increased integration and coordination among member states, and secondly to enhance the EU’s strategic autonomy from the US in the political, military and economic domains.
Both objectives, ambitious in the best of circumstances, are today under severe strain by the COVID-19 crisis. Implications will be long-lasting and multidimensional, and for Europe, its impact will have a direct bearing on its ambition for strategic autonomy, touching each of the three pillars outlined above.
Topic:
Regional Cooperation, Geopolitics, Economy, Autonomy, and Coronavirus
Oil markets are facing a perfect storm.
The scissors of supply and demand
are moving against one another,
generating increasing pain on the oil
industry and the political and financial
stability of oil-producing countries.
Global oil demand is dropping due to
the recession induced by the COVID-19
shut down of economic activity and
transport in the most industrialized
countries. Goldman Sachs predicts that
global demand could drop from 100
million barrels per day (mdb) in 2019 to
nearly 80 mdb in 2020.1
If confirmed,
this would be single biggest demand
shock since petroleum started its race
to become the most important energy
source in the world.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Oil, Global Markets, and Economy
The COVID-19 pandemic will
negatively affect the defence field from
a budgetary, industrial and politicostrategic point of view, particularly in
Europe. Depending on the pandemic’s
duration, its economic consequences
and national and EU responses, effects
may range from contained damages to
a much wider European security crisis.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, Crisis Management, and Coronavirus
The United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development stands at a crossroads. While Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) have progressively entered the political discourse and agendas of numerous states, without long-term financial investments, building a more just and sustainable future will remain little more than a rhetorical embellishment.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, United Nations, and Sustainable Development Goals
As the Coronavirus pandemic expands,
and peak contagion remains uncertain,
policy responses are gradually
emerging, being implemented in a
number of domains.
The crisis has several important
implications, but two are currently
dominating the headlines: individual
health and the sustainability of national
healthcare systems, and the economic
fallout from the pandemic.
Topic:
International Cooperation, Finance, International Development, Development Aid, and Coronavirus
The coronavirus crisis deeply challenges the assumption that we human beings can dominate nature. Contraposing the new European Commission Green Deal and geopolitical language with critical/green thought, this paper aims to provoke reflections on a re-imagination of the European Union as part of a larger regional and global community that lives together within a green and diverse planet.
Topic:
International Relations, Climate Change, Environment, and Coronavirus
Resilience has recently emerged as a possible solution to address the increasing dysfunctionality of national and global governance, strengthening its ability to deal with the frequenting crises and the adversity of VUCA – the more vulnerable, uncertain, complex and ambiguous – world around us.
Topic:
Politics, International Relations Theory, Institutions, Coronavirus, and Resilience