The world this week

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


BritGPT
How Britain can become an AI superpower
Rishi Sunak’s enthusiasm is welcome. But his plans for Britain fall short

America’s new best friend
Joe Biden and Narendra Modi are drawing their countries closer
India does not love the West, but it is indispensable to America

Secrets and fries
The real injustice would have been not to indict Donald Trump
The former president must be subject to due process

Undoing business in China
The crackdown on foreign firms will deter global business—and undermine China’s own interests
Bosses are scrambling to ensure that they do not fall foul of data-security laws

Recklessly red
Fiscal policy in the rich world is mind-bogglingly reckless
High inflation and low unemployment require tighter budgets not looser ones

Letters

On the English language, oil prices, Pakistan, digital payments, productivity, Henry Kissinger, Monty Python, pronouncing Erdogan
Letters to the editor
By Invitation


War in Ukraine
Sir Richard Barrons on the broader security considerations around Ukraine’s counter-offensive
Global taxation
Finding the money to fix the world requires a rethink on tax, says Jayati Ghosh
Asia


The elephant in a boom
America is courting India in part for its growing economic clout
Non-alignment non-negotiable
India’s foreign minister on ties with America, China and Russia
Too good to refuse
On defence, America and India edge closer together
Banyan
Narendra Modi is the world’s most popular leader
China


Not another crisis
America and China try to move past a new bump in relations
Mazu and the motherland
China hopes Mazu, a sea goddess, can help it win over Taiwan
The affair of the pink dress
China’s tolerance for public oversight is limited
Chaguan
Xi Jinping reaches into China’s ancient history for a new claim to rule
United States


Southern shift
The South is fast becoming America’s industrial heartland
Teacher’s pet
How ChatGPT could help teachers and lower the cost of college
Pride/prejudice
How LA’s drag nuns took centre stage in the culture wars
Going bus
American states are bailing out public transport
Invasive species in America
Attack of the feral parakeets in New York
The chain
How the Pentagon thinks about America’s strategy in the Pacific
Lexington
North Carolina may be the hottest political battleground of 2024
Middle East & Africa


Ten hard years
Egyptians are disgruntled with President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi
Betting on boats
Why wretched Lebanese are fleeing across the sea
Breaking a taboo
Saudi Arabia may accept normal relations with Israel
The Great Carbon Valley
Why Kenya could take the lead in carbon removal
Pastures new
Rural Africans are finding work beyond their farms

The Americas


Unsustainable
Lula’s ambitious plans to save the Amazon clash with reality
Comrades across continents
What does China want from Latin America and the Caribbean?
Burning bright
Canada’s wildfires have burnt an area 16 times larger than normal
Europe


Going into hell
Ukraine’s counter-offensive is making mixed progress
After Berlusconi
The death of Silvio Berlusconi creates uncertainty for his party
Big words
Germany’s new national security strategy is strong on goals, less so on means
Left hanging
The problems ailing Western Europe’s left are not just cyclical
Charlemagne
Why Europe’s asylum policy desperately needs rebooting
Britain


Britain’s AI future
How to make Britain’s AI dreams reality
Costing an arm and a leg
How much is a human head?
Britain’s economy
Wage growth, inflation and more place Britain’s central bank in a spot
Bagehot
Reading the death certificate on Boris Johnson’s political career
International


Making it as migrants
India’s diaspora is bigger and more influential than any in history
Business


Spooked
Is doing business in China becoming impossible for foreigners?
Ahead in the clouds
Oracle is making Larry Ellison the world’s third-richest man
The Magdeburg gambit
It is make or break for Intel’s giant bet on Germany
Bartleby
The upside of workplace jargon
Ball is life
Which sport is the best business?
Unit economics
Why self-storage is turning into hot property
Summer holidays
How long will the travel boom last?
Schumpeter
What Tesla and other carmakers can learn from Ford
Finance & economics


The great escape
Is the global housing slump over?
Graftbusters
A new super-regulator takes aim at rampant corruption in Chinese finance
Buttonwood
Sooner or later, America’s financial system could seize up
Boy cries wolf
AI is not yet killing jobs
The great steeplechase
America is losing ground in Asian trade
Lost and won
South Korea has had enough of being called an emerging market
Free exchange
Wage-price spirals are far scarier in theory than in practice
Science & technology


You are legion
The idea of “holobionts” represents a paradigm shift in biology
Don’t have kittens
There’s more than one way to spay a cat
Culture


African political cartoons
For the boldest commentary on African politics, look to cartoonists
European history
The eastern half of Europe is united by its diversity
American bards
Cormac McCarthy was the great novelist of the American West
World in a dish
A potato can have no finer fate than ending up as an Irish crisp
American cults
Meant to be liberating, the Sullivanian community became a nightmare
Back Story
“The Full Monty” gang are back
The Economist reads


From partition to pierogi
What to read to understand modern Poland
Economic & financial indicators

Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
Graphic detail


And then there were three
England may soon become the world’s best cricket team
The Economist explains


The Economist explains
How are people appointed to Britain’s House of Lords?
The Economist explains
Are cryptocurrencies securities?
Obituary


The great seducer
Silvio Berlusconi duped Italians for years