As the US presidential election draws near, many are wondering what it will mean for American foreign policy. The answer is wrapped in uncertainty. First, who will win the election? At the beginning of the …
Articles by: "Joseph S. Nye"
Humans are a tool-making species, but can we control the tools we make? When Robert Oppenheimer and other physicists developed the first nuclear fission weapon in the 1940s, they worried that their invention might destroy …
Avril Haines, the US director of national intelligence, warned in March that ‘Russia’s need for support in the context of Ukraine has forced it to grant some long-sought concessions to China, North Korea and Iran …
Two years ago, I outlined eight lessons from the Ukraine War. Though I warned that it was too early to be confident about any predictions, they have held up reasonably well. When Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered …
When US Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited Beijing last month in an effort to stabilise relations with China, many of the issues that he discussed with Chinese President Xi Jinping were highly contentious. For …
Might China try to attack Taiwan by 2027? The outgoing chief of the US Indo-Pacific Command, Philip Davidson, thought so in 2021, and he recently reaffirmed his assessment. But whether the United States and China …
Preparations are already underway at the United Nations for the 2026 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which was originally signed in 1968. Many expect a …
When Chinese President Xi Jinping met with US President Joe Biden last November, some interpreted it as a return to engagement. In fact, it heralded only a minor détente, not a major change in policy. …
As the 2024 presidential election approaches, three broad camps are visible in America’s debate over how the United States should relate to the rest of the world: the liberal internationalists who have dominated since World …
The term ‘global south’ is in constant use nowadays. For example, some commentators warn that Israel’s incursion into Gaza is ‘alienating the global south’, and we often hear that the ‘global south’ wants a ceasefire …
The great-power competition between the United States and China is a defining feature of the first part of this century, but there’s little agreement on how it should be characterised. Some call it an ‘enduring …
The first debate between the Republican Party’s candidates for next year’s US presidential election revealed major schisms over foreign policy. While former US Vice President Mike Pence and former US ambassador to the United Nations …