Growing Climate Pressures The frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, such as wildfires, floods, and hurricanes, have dramatically surged in recent decades. The World Meteorological Organization notes a nearly five-fold increase in climate disastersbetween 1970 and 2021, resulting in over two million deaths and US$4.3 trillion in economic losses. Such figures represent an accelerating…
Iran has often made headlines over the years due to its theocratic governance, its nuclear program, and its longstanding geopolitical tensions with the United States, Israel, and Western powers. While these issues dominate global narratives, they can obscure the lived reality of nearly 90 million people who inhabit a country with a civilization dating back millennia. Iran is home to…
On 11 July 2025 – 30th anniversary of the massacre in Srebrenica – a memory walk and protest took place in the southwestern Serbian city of Novi Pazar, located in a region bearing two names – Raška to Serbs and Sandžak to its primarily Muslim residents also known as Bosniaks since the Yugoslav wars of…
There is a dissonance between the international and national legal frameworks on the protection of the environment and the practices of political and economic groups that endorse the abuse of nature. The latter result in the devastation of huge areas through logging, mining, industrial chemical production and industrial agriculture, leading to the severe environmental problems…
As China and the European Union edge closer to a pricing mechanism for EV exports, the question is no longer whether competition exists but how to shape it responsibly. Behind the headlines of tariffs and anti-subsidy probes lies a more nuanced story of competition, collaboration, and industrial transformation. Recent remarks by Chinese and European stakeholders…
Overlapping existential questions to start with The war in Ukraine is first and foremost a response to what Russia considers as existential threat, in the face of NATO’s continued expansion on its borders. The so-called “denazification” of Ukraine remains a smokescreen with no real substance intended to justify the special military operation against its neighbour,…
Introduction As the G7 recalibrates its global priorities around economic resilience and geopolitical control, a new architecture of fragmentation is emerging, which is one that sidelines multilateral institutions. This piece examines how recent shifts in trade, security, and climate diplomacy reflect not a failure of global coordination, but a deliberate strategy of selective engagement. Drawing…
I was reading Erik Larson’s In the Garden of Beasts when I came across the line: “This isn’t America and you can’t say all the things you think,” said by an officer to a United States ambassador’s daughter in Nazi Germany. I warn against drawing too many comparisons between that time and place and our…
Introduction / Our Research Question The world is changing quickly. Generative AI and data centers are growing fast. They are meant to help with sustainability and progress. However, their energy use and material needs could actually harm global climate goals. For example, some estimates suggest that data centers in the United States could use up…
As the curtains rise on the 69th Eurovision Song Contest, the picturesque landscapes of Switzerland serve as a reminder of the contest’s origins and its enduring mission to unite Europe in harmony (pun intended). Walking through the host city Basel, Switzerland’s cultural capital, there is a buzz in the air. Eurovision brings together artists and…
