I have been called the “bearer of bad news” far too often for me not to be on my guard about risks and opportunities. That being said, I am convinced that opportunities can only be seized once risks have been…
Does the election of a pope offer useful lessons for democratic institutions? At first glance, none: the secret election, during a conclave, after an indefinite number of rounds of voting, of a man, who must be unmarried, by 133 others,…
There are subjects that we don’t dare to broach because they make us feel too guilty. We prefer not to talk about them and let a complicit silence settle in, until at some point it becomes unbearable. And it is…
The rise of populism and the emergence of fragmented capitalism, both exacerbated by the election of a US president who embraces all their principles, should make us reflect on some fundamental issues. In particular, we should consider the place that…
For a long time, I thought that China would never succeed in becoming the world’s dominant superpower. There were plenty of reasons to believe this: its demographic evolution, which condemns it to grow old before it grows rich; its real…
Among all the knowledge accumulated by humans over millennia, there is some that people forget and whose importance they relearn at their expense, with each generation. Among this knowledge, there is one that is essential: No one can survive in…
At a time when huge threats are unfolding all over the world, threatening the very survival of humanity and calling for very large-scale collective responses, we hear writers, journalists and politicians everywhere advocating withdrawal into oneself and denouncing “the system”…
Those who have been reading me here or elsewhere for a long time know that I have often explained that the major technological, economic, ideological, cultural and political changes in our societies are generally preceded by very large-scale disruptions in…
More than 30 years ago, I explained that if Russia were humiliated as Weimar Germany had been, a dictator would take over in Moscow and, like Hitler, threaten to invade us. That is what happened: the West refused to help…
Nothing is more important today than creating a Europe of defense at a forced march. This will require Europeans to have total autonomy in their security resources, with many more weapons designed and built in Europe, and with absolute coordination…
