The world this week

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


Getting growing
Britain’s Labour Party must be bolder about growth
Even if the economy peps up, taxes will have to rise

The Modi Raj
A triumph for Indian democracy
The shock election result will change the country—ultimately for the better

Don’t do it
America’s billionaires should resist the urge to support Donald Trump
A Trump victory would reward them. But not enough to justify the risks

Single-party politics
Morena’s landslide win threatens to take Mexico down a dangerous path
The country’s newly elected president will need to show political courage

From chatbots to robots
Three reasons why it’s good news that robots are getting smarter
They are becoming more capable, easier to program and better at explaining themselves

The humiliation of the ANC
South Africa stands on the brink of salvation—or catastrophe
To prevent a coalition of chaos, Cyril Ramaphosa and the Democratic Alliance must do a deal

Letters

On Somalia, democracy in America, Shirley Conran, large language models, Beethoven’s ninth, TV comedy
Letters to the editor
Briefing


Electoral rebuke
Narendra Modi could respond to disappointment in two different ways
He could become more moderate and focus on the economy, or double down on Hindu nationalism

Anatomy of a dressing-down
The people and places that turned away from the BJP
The heartland, and especially lower-caste voters, have soured on Narendra Modi
Asia


Two wars on want
Will India’s new government turbocharge the fight against poverty?
Old ghosts, new nightmare
Rohingya are being forced to fight in Myanmar’s civil war
Banyan
How the Philippines is turning the water-cannon on China
China


The bright side of China
Watch out Beijing, China’s second-tier cities are on the up
Scoring political points
Changes to China’s gaokao exam are about politics, not fairness
Low altitude, high ambitions
It’s a bird, it’s a plane…it’s a Chinese flying car
Chaguan
China unites America and Europe in alarm
United States


Motive and intent
What Donald Trump’s 34 convictions mean for the presidential election
Jam today
Why New York scrapped congestion charging
A border order
Biden’s border order: impractical policy, pragmatic politics
Fields of dreams
A new wave of stadium-building is busting budgets in America
Home, at last
Black baseball players of yore get their due, at last
Hung up
American parents want their children to have phones in schools
Lexington
Grown up in the USA
Middle East & Africa


Long talk to freedom
South Africa’s future is in the hands of a divided ANC
Shooting for the hoops
The National Basketball Association is making a big bet on Africa
Avocado paradise
Why avocados are driving another sort of green economy in Kenya
An Israeli ceasefire proposal
Joe Biden leaked Israel’s first plan to end the war in Gaza
One step closer
Talk of war between Israel and Lebanon is growing
The lure of the Great Satan
The children of Iran’s revolution still want to go West

The Americas


Mexico’s new president
Claudia Sheinbaum’s landslide victory is a danger for Mexico
Going for gold
A battle royal over deep-sea archaeology in the Caribbean
Climate migration
As seas rise, the relocation of Caribbean islanders has begun
Europe


The war in the south
In Crimea, Ukraine is beating Russia
Après le déluge
Russia’s explosion of a huge Ukrainian dam had surprising effects
Bulking up the Bundeswehr
Germany is thinking about bringing back conscription
Normalising the radicals
The Dutch are getting a half-populist, half-pragmatist government
D-Day 80 years on
Remembering the Normandy landings
Charlemagne
Peak Europe turns 25: why June 1999 marked the continent’s zenith
Britain


Slow growing
Can Britain’s economy grow as fast as it needs to?
Building blocks
Labour’s growth ambitions demand more radicalism on planning
Tables turned
The SNP feels the heat in Scotland’s election campaign
Give me votes but not too many
What is the point of the Lib Dems?
A seaside tradition
The return of the Farage ratchet
Bagehot
Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer fight for a poundshop presidency
Business


Beyond petroleum
How Saudi Aramco plans to win the oil endgame
More than a token effort
G42, an Emirati AI hopeful, has big plans
The taste of things to come
Chinese fast-food insurgents are beating McDonald’s and KFC
Premium carmaker
Elon Musk could earn more at Tesla than other company bosses
Castles made of silicon
Should the world fear China’s chipmaking binge?
Bartleby
Is it better to be an early bird or a night owl?
Schumpeter
Lessons in capitalism from Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s
Finance & economics


Red dawn
China’s economic model retains a dangerous allure
No returns
Is America’s economy heading for a consumer crunch?
Equities in Dallas
Want to avoid woke stockmarket rules? List in Texas
Rouble-rousers
European banks are making heady profits in Russia
Buttonwood
Should you buy expensive stocks?
Free exchange
Why global GDP might be $7trn bigger than everyone thought
Science & technology


Robotics
Robots are suddenly getting cleverer. What’s changed?
Two legs good
The quest to build robots that look and behave like humans
On thin ice
Zany ideas to slow polar melting are gathering momentum
Culture


Less Bond, more boffin
How to hire a spy
Forgoing the single life
Pop stars are all about albums
Your land is my land
What the left and right get wrong about imperialism
Not so Jolly Rogers
Forget Jack Sparrow and Captain Hook. Piracy is far more fearsome
Battle lines
Chigozie Obioma’s visceral novel explores Nigeria’s civil war
Back Story
Romeo and Richard III are enlisted in the casting wars
The Economist reads


The Economist reads
Six non-fiction books you can read in a day
Economic & financial indicators

Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
The Economist explains


The Economist explains
How lab-grown meat became part of America’s culture wars
The Economist explains
How powerful is the European Parliament?
Obituary


Unearthing ancient mysteries
Barry Kemp spent his career digging up Akhenaten’s abandoned city