Why It Seems Like So Many Countries Are Falling Apart

Plain English with Derek Thompson

The Ringer

News Commentary, News

4.7 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 22 July 2022

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The world is kind of a mess right now. There is a big, bloody, awful war between Russia and Ukraine, which has hugely disrupted global trade, especially in commodities like oil, wheat, and natural gas. Europe is on fire, and the euro is crashing. Boris Johnson is out as the U.K.’s prime minister, and Mario Draghi has resigned as Italy’s prime minister. There are tremors in China, as the world’s second-largest economy fumbles through a ridiculous COVID-Zero policy. In Sri Lanka, crowds stormed the presidential palace after an economic crisis. In Japan, a former prime minister was assassinated. In Turkey and El Salvador, inflation and kooky economic policy has led these countries to the brink. Is this just random chaos, or is there a deeper story to tell? Today’s guest is Ian Bremmer. Ian is a political scientist and the founder of Eurasia Group and GZero media. He is also the author of several books, including his latest: The New York Times bestseller 'The Power of Crisis.' He takes me on a geopolitical catastrophe tour. In the end, we consider the meaning of this moment in history—and why this feels like the end of an era and the beginning of something new. Host: Derek Thompson Guest: Ian Bremmer Producer: Devon Manze Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:46.1	Today we begin with a letter from a listener. This is Samantha from Vermont.
0:53.1	Quote, I think I have an idea for your show. It seems like a lot of countries are falling apart.
0:59.7	Recently, England, Italy, and Sri Lanka have just gotten messy and unstable politically.
1:05.2	Is there something going on other than all the obvious the world is just a mess?
1:09.6	Hope this helps. Good luck. Samantha. End quote. Folks, Samantha is really onto something here.
1:18.5	Actually, if anything, she was downplaying the messy state of the world in that letter.
1:22.9	We can start with the obvious, there is a big, bloody, awful war between Russia and Ukraine,
1:27.2	which has hugely disrupted global trade, especially in commodities like wheat, oil, natural gas.
1:33.7	It's fed a global inflationary crisis. Then you get the slightly less obvious, which is that it's
1:39.3	caused an energy crisis throughout Europe, which could certainly use electricity to power air
1:44.0	conditioning, considering that the southern half of that continent is on fire, and the northern
1:48.4	half of the continent is basically one giant swath of 100 degrees temperatures this week.
1:53.0	And this energy and climate crisis has compounded all sorts of political chaos.
	...

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