The world this week

Politics
Business
KAL’s cartoon
This week’s covers
Leaders


The missing quarter of a million
Britain has endured a decade of early deaths. Why?
The mystery of 250,000 dead Britons

America, China and Taiwan
How to avoid war over Taiwan
A superpower conflict would shake the world

Too fast to land
A stubbornly strong economy complicates the fight against inflation
Higher interest rates are not sufficiently slowing global growth

Macron’s troubles
Strikes at home and war in Ukraine test the French president
It is a critical moment for Emmanuel Macron

Testing fail
American universities are pursuing fairness the wrong way
Drop legacy admissions—not standardised exams

Letters

On medical research, fertility in the OECD, soldiers’ mental health, energy firms, the car
Letters to the editor
By Invitation


Russia and Ukraine
Britain’s most recent defence attaché in Moscow on the failings of Valery Gerasimov
Briefing


Storm warning
America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan
It would spread far across the region, with devastating consequences for the world
Asia


Free trade in Asia
How Donald Trump damaged America’s interests in Asia
Gay watching for straight women
Are Thailand’s gay TV dramas the next K-pop?
East Asian Relations
South Korea has a plan to end its forced-labour feud with Japan
Banyan
The rift in Singapore’s first family turns even nastier
China


Wolf worriers
Tough language from Xi Jinping belies his anxiety
Credibility over confidence
Interpreting China’s unambitious growth target
Learning skills, not values
Many of China’s top politicians were educated in the West
Chaguan
What party control means in China
United States


Say it ain’t Joe
What if Joe Biden decided against running for re-election?
(De)trans litigation
Legal action may change transgender care in America
O beautiful for spacious highs
Cannabis and anaesthesia do not mix
Closing down schools in America
America’s schools are heading for a crunch
Republicans and voter fraud
Three Republican states pull out of voter-fraud prevention scheme
Composting humans
Quite a few young Americans plan to end their days as compost
Lexington
America’s government has not been “weaponised”

Middle East & Africa


The incredible shrinking state
As they cut back on hiring, Arab bureaucracies are spending more to get less
Time’s up—whatever the time is
Fiddling with Egypt’s clocks
Beyond the megacity
The growth of Africa’s towns and small cities is transforming the continent
The Americas


Deals not done
Argentina is wasting the vast opportunities China offers it
Europe


Lock and load
Ukraine is building up its forces for an offensive
The street v the president
France is in a stand-off against Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform
Turning the tables
Turkey’s opposition has picked its man
The centre can hold
Ukraine’s most committed backer wins a huge election victory in Estonia
Russian demography
Russia’s population nightmare is going to get even worse
Charlemagne
Germany is letting a domestic squabble pollute Europe’s green ambitions
Britain


A decade of death
Why did 250,000 Britons die sooner than expected?
Discovery process
Can an AI be an inventor?
Channel crossings
Britain’s new plan to “stop the boats”
Her pulse quickened
Sales of romance novels are rising in Britain
Bagehot
Thatcher, Sunak and the politics of the supermarket
International


French diplomacy
Emmanuel Macron’s vision of a more muscular Europe is coming true
Special report


Taiwan
Taiwan is a vital island that is under serious threat
The past
How Taiwan is shaped by its history and identity
The economy
It is time to divert Taiwan’s trade and investment from China
Semiconductors
Taiwan’s dominance of the chip industry makes it more important
The home front
The battle with China is psychological as much as physical
Defence
Taiwan needs a new defence strategy to deal with China
Politics
Taiwanese politics faces a crucial election in early 2024
What Taiwan needs
Taiwan desperately needs support from the world
Taiwan
Sources and acknowledgments
Business


Seizing the moment
How China Inc is tackling the TikTok problem
Where are all the robots?
Don’t fear an AI-induced jobs apocalypse just yet
The glass-ceiling index
After years in decline, is the gender pay gap opening up?
Bartleby
The small consolations of office irritations
Schumpeter
How to stop the commoditisation of container shipping
Finance & economics


Tokyo grift
Can the West’s perplexing employment miracle continue?
Qiang Ker-ching
How to measure China’s true economic growth
An anti-party party
China’s Communist Party takes aim at hedonistic bankers
Financial competition
New York’s stockmarkets are thrashing Hong Kong and London
A techy tug-of-war
Lessons from finance’s experience with artificial intelligence
Buttonwood
Why commodities shine in a time of stagflation
Free exchange
Emerging-market central-bank experiments risk reigniting inflation
Science & technology


The Human Cell Atlas
A cartography of human histology is in the making
The ocean and climate change
The ocean is as important to the climate as the atmosphere
Chromosomal deletions and neurology
Studying broken chromosomes can illuminate neuroscience
Silver and democracy
Newfangled coins and mercenaries may have brought about democracy
Culture


Covid-19 in China
Two brave books tell the story of lockdown in Wuhan
Nature and nurture
Peter Frankopan looks at the past differently in “The Earth Transformed”
Back Story
It’s war at this year’s Oscars
World in a dish
Singapore’s unique dining style comes to Manhattan
Hollywood moguls
Sumner Redstone and the battle for Paramount
Fiction from New Zealand
In “Birnam Wood”, Eleanor Catton returns with a thriller
Economic & financial indicators

Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
Graphic detail


No good options
Retail investors are losing billions buying stock options
The Economist explains


The Economist explains
Why a new UN treaty to safeguard the “high seas” matters
The Economist explains
Who blew up the Nord Stream pipelines?
Obituary


The King of Sting
Justin Schmidt made a lifetime study of insects that attack us