DEC 11TH 2021
What would America fight for?

The world this week

Politics
Business
KAL’s cartoon
Leaders

Geopolitics
What would America fight for?
If the United States pulls back, the world will become more dangerous

The Federal Reserve
Wind down the money printer
Why America’s economy needs tighter monetary policy

Adapting for the future
What the world can learn from Japan
The country is not an outlier—it is a harbinger

Global finance
Asymmetric decoupling
China seeks globalisation, on its own terms

Charging electric cars
Plugging the gap
Tens of millions of electric cars will soon need charging. Here’s how to do it

Letters

Letters to the editor
On the size of government, nuclear power, chess, Afghanistan, past tenses
Asia


Drugs in South-East Asia
On a high
Social media and the law
Accounting for algorithms
Married life in North Korea
Sunflower state
India’s chief of defence staff
Tragedy in the Nilgiris
Banyan
What the generals wreak
China


China in Africa
Harbouring no malice?
Gambling in Macau
No dice for vice
Chaguan
Spoil-sports
United States


Defence spending
Money for something
The media
SPAC-handed
Religious schools
Following the money in Maine
The climate
Man it does show signs of stopping
Budgetary gymnastics
House of the rising sunset
Housing
To rent or not to rent
Lexington
Stone-cold killer
Middle East & Africa


Citizenship in the Gulf
A narrow path
The Muslim Brotherhood
Fratricidal tendencies
Congo
All the president’s promises
Global governance
Africans at the top
The Americas


Climate change
A salt and batteries
Bello
Between hope and experience
Briefing

Joe Biden’s foreign policy
A weary superpower
The world that the West built after the attack on Pearl Harbour is cracking, not least because America is lukewarm about preserving it

Europe


Germany’s new chancellor
Enter the quiet man
French politics
Dame de fer
Ukraine
Diplomacy with menaces
Dutch government
Poldering on
Charlemagne
The invisible European
Britain


Politics
The revolution stalls
Ride-hailing in London
Cost drivers
Covid-19
Underlying issues
London Stock Exchange
Dual carriageway
Red telephone boxes
Bigger inside
Logistics
Santa’s little helpers
Bagehot
On the frontier
International


Transport
Car wars
Special report


Japan
The new era
Foreign and security policy
Into the world
Climate policy
A chequered record
Tokyo
The big city
Demography
The old country
The economy
Stronger than many realise
Immigration
Letting them in
Looking ahead
The future
Sources and acknowledgments
Business


Charging electric vehicles
Current situation
Bartleby
The shortcuts to Theranos
China Inc
The great reallocation
Digital health
Psyber boom
The gig economy
How can we be heroes?
Schumpeter
Big labour v big business
Finance & economics


Worker power
All mouth and no trousers
Work and the pandemic
Only disconnect
Monetary policy (1)
Is China easing?
Monetary policy (2)
Emergency exit
South-East Asia
On the rails
Nominal sums
America is seeing both fast growth and high inflation
Buttonwood
Top dollar
Digital assets
Crypto’s crew
Free exchange
Family matters
Science & technology


Animal research
New Model Army
Plant breeding
Chick-please
Mechanical engineering
Liquid engineering
Crowd behaviour
Of architects and bull-running
Books & arts


The best books of 2021
Read all over
Staff books of 2021
Out-of-office politics
Economic & financial indicators

Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
Graphic detail


The Omicron variant
Mixed signals
Obituary


Bob Dole
Climbing that hill