Lessons to be learned from Trump’s tariff drama. The end of the rule-based order. And is democracy done for too? How Bill Gates saw the future. Have the technologies of connection and communication torn us apart?
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
ARTICLE OF THE WEEK
Jonathan Levin, Three Unsettling Lessons From Trump’s Tariff Drama
(Bloomberg, 3 February 2025)
Written before the 1-month suspension of 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, but the point remains: the recent tariff saga is proof that the markets and the business communities deluded themselves when claiming that Treasury Secretary Bessent and Commerce Secretary Lutnick would serve as a moderating force in Trump’s administration (we heard this argument a lot in Davos). In fact, Donald Trump appears to be neither listening to his own economic policy team, nor paying attention to market signals. The article doesn’t go that far, but its direction of travel is clear and troubling: moving forward, disruption, if not chaos, are a foregone conclusion. given (gifted article, 5-7 min).
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Ivo Daalder, Like it or not, the rules-based order is no more
(Politico, 5 February 2025)
The return of power politics. The former US ambassador to NATO observes that in Trump’s world, it does little good to use the language of treaties or rules or laws. He refers to the example of Denmark and to the phone conversation that took place between the US president and the Danish PM about Greenland. It revealed not only a clash of interests but a clash of realities: Denmark’s reality is the rules-based order, i.e. a world in which nations are expected to abide by treaties, rules and norms. In contrast, Trump’s reality is the world of sheer power politics, where the strong do as they will and the weak, even allied nations, do as they must (free access, 5-7 min).
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David Marchese, The Interview – Curtis Yarvin Says Democracy Is Done. Powerful Conservatives Are Listening
(The New York Times, 18 January 2025)
This is an interview with David Marchese, the theorist in chief of ‘Dark Enlightenment’ – a kind of techno-fascist movement advocating that democracy as an idea and political system is over, and that the US needs a monarch. Hail King Elon? A crazy idea maybe, but in today’s ‘new’ world, not to be dismissed out of hand (gifted article, reads in 15 min +).
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Walter Isaacson, How Bill Gates Saw the Future
(Interview Magazine, 4 February 2025)
Another interview, this time with Bill Gates about his just released memoir: “Source Code: My Beginnings”. He discusses being on the autism spectrum and what it meant as a child, the power of having a unique idea and a contrarian perspective – rebellious attitude, playing bridge and remembering, and of course the importance of AI – “kind of unbounded in terms of its actual capability” (metered paywall, reads in 6-8 min).
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Philip Ball, The Case for Kicking the Stone
(Los Angeles Review of Books, 28 January 2025)
Have the so-called modern “technologies of connection” (cell phones, personal computers, the internet, social media, AI) made the world better, or worse? The cost-benefit calculation is complicated and nuanced, requiring us to find a course between apocalyptic visions of civilizational decline and the naive utopianism of Silicon Valley. This is a review of Nicholas Carr’s “Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart”. Philip Ball finds Carr’s conclusion that these technologies are tearing us apart “disturbingly compelling” (metered paywall, 12-15min).
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