The world this week

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


The sense of an ending
The rights and wrongs of assisted dying
Britain’s next great social reform is coming. Here’s how it should work

A $25trn hit
Global warming is coming for your home
Who will pay for the damage?

Four-leafed voters
True swing voters are extraordinarily rare in America
We have found some

The Cass Review
America should follow England’s lead on transgender care for kids
Its approach is neither as harsh as in red states nor as lax as in blue states

War in Gaza
The short-sighted Israeli army
Force alone cannot bring security

What’s in a name
In praise of Peter Higgs
The particle named after him became a selling point. For the man, it was a bit of a pain

Letters

On management consultants, Hong Kong, Jonathan Haidt, underpants, describing X, three-letter acronyms
Letters to the editor
By Invitation


Abortion and crime
Steven Levitt and John Donohue defend a finding made famous by “Freakonomics”
Erdogan humbled
Ekrem Imamoglu on Turkey’s renewed faith in democracy
A Chinese view of Russia
Russia is sure to lose in Ukraine, reckons a Chinese expert on Russia
Briefing


Risk of subsidence
Homeowners face a $25trn bill from climate change
Property, the world’s biggest asset class, is also its most vulnerable
Asia


Indo-Pacific statecraft
America’s Asian allies are trying to Trump-proof their policies
Usefully oleaginous
How India’s imports of Russian oil have lubricated global markets
After the fight, then what?
Myanmar’s junta is losing ever more ground
Banyan
Some Australians are increasingly sceptical of AUKUS
China


An ageing autocracy
China’s high-stakes struggle to defy demographic disaster
A relationship under fire
Will China’s ties with Israel survive the Gaza war?
Chaguan
What Ramadan is like in Xinjiang
United States


The parent trap
Who are the swing voters in America?
Mud slinging
Mike Johnson may have to choose between Ukraine aid and his job
Surf City goes MAGA
How one California beach town became Gavin Newsom’s nemesis
Jersey unsure
New Jersey’s electoral process just got upended
Conservatives on campus
A challenge to leftist bias moves into America’s public universities

Middle East & Africa


An assessment of the IDF in Gaza
The IDF is accused of military and moral failures in Gaza
AI and Gaza
Israel’s use of AI in Gaza is coming under closer scrutiny
Israel v Hamas
America, Israel and Hamas are trapped in a dangerous impasse
Death threats
Congo brings back the death penalty
Slavery at sea
China’s fishing fleet is causing havoc off Africa’s coasts
Opposition rising
Is South Africa ready for a change in government?
The Americas


The great green rivalry
Chinese green technologies are pouring into Latin America
The first small steps
Haiti’s transitional government must take office amid gang warfare
Falling felling
Brazil and Colombia are curbing destruction of Amazon rainforest
Europe


20km from the enemy
The Kremlin wants to make Ukraine’s second city unliveable
Cheap and nasty
Russia’s ferocious glide-bomb campaign
Missing in Ukraine
Russia is struggling to find its missing soldiers
Herbert Kickl
Austria’s accidental hard-right leader
The continent’s narco-ports
Criminal networks are well ahead in the fight over Europe’s ports
Charlemagne
What happens if Ukraine loses?
Britain


All things must pass
Britain is moving towards assisted dying
A landmark judgment
The Cass Review damns England’s youth-gender services
Playtime’s over
Primary schools in Britain are beginning to close
Pipe dreams
How not to run a water utility
A Tale of Two Kitties
A story of Scottish wildcats
Je regrette quite a lot
Why most people regret Brexit
Bagehot
Bootlicking: a guide to pre-election British politics
International


On the rise
Who’s the big boss of the global south?
1843 magazine


Election 2024
Robert F. Kennedy junior doesn’t care if he condemns America to Trump
Business


Unplugged
Think Tesla is in trouble? Pity even more its wannabe EV rivals
Strategy and stockpiles
Who wields the power in the world’s supply chains?
Bartleby
Productivity gurus through time: a match-up
No-sun seekers
Airbnb bookings for the solar eclipse reach astronomical levels
Raising Arizona
TSMC’s American chipmaking plans grow $25bn more ambitious
Schumpeter
Generative AI has a clean-energy problem
Finance & economics


Fantasy economics
The rich world faces a brutal spending crunch
Behind enemy lines
Ukrainian drone strikes are hurting Russia’s oil industry
Put the axe away
When will Americans see those interest-rate cuts?
Xi’s healthy appetite
China’s state is eating the private property market
Beyond GDP
How fast is India’s economy really growing?
Buttonwood
What China’s central bank and Costco shoppers have in common
Free exchange
What will humans do if technology solves everything?
Science & technology


AI at war
How Ukraine is using AI to fight Russia
Prisoners’ health
The first week after prison is the deadliest for ex-inmates
Conservation
New technology can keep whales safe from speeding ships
Hive minds
Bees, like humans, can preserve cultural traditions
Culture


Return to Gettysburg
Americans are turning to stories of civil war, real and imagined
Johnson
How to protect an endangered language
Sailing close to the wind
An enthralling account of Captain Cook’s final, fatal voyage
Barely gettin’ by
Adelle Waldman’s new novel follows workers in a big-box store
World in a dish
Flat whites are Australia’s greatest culinary export
All by myself
The drawbacks—and benefits—of solitude
The Economist reads


The Economist reads
What to read about golf
Economic & financial indicators

Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
Obituary


The militant debutante
Rose Dugdale went from debutante to IRA bombmaker