| | | | Fareed: Populists Are Attacking Central Banks | | "Elected leaders—from President Trump to Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan to India's Narendra Modi—have been steadily attacking the independence of their nations' central banks," Fareed writes in his latest Washington Post column. "This could end very badly."
Central banks have been independent since the 1970s, when leaders would nudge them to help the economy before elections, Fareed writes. That trend toward independence is now in reverse, and it means that "when the next crisis hits, we will all wish we had institutions that could weather the storm." | | If the Mueller report is to have foreign-policy implications, we might look to the US-Russia relationship—and whether it will get closer, now that the investigation has ended. As former US ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul points out in a Foreign Policy interview, the Trump administration has often taken a hard line on Russia, but the president himself hasn't seemed to agree with it.
"The question I have is, will he try now to be more bold in cutting against the grain of his team?" McFaul asks, wondering if the Mueller report will "liberate" Trump to pursue warmer relations, while Russian President Vladimir Putin will look for an opening to reengage. | | Election Leaves Indonesia Divided | | Indonesia's election was a logistical feat, and incumbent President Joko Widodo won, in part, due to his "sensible" policies, The Economist writes. But Widodo tacked right, both toward conservative Islam and by getting closer to the military, the magazine points out.
As a result, the world's fourth most populous country is left "more divided along religious lines," as Widodo's opponent successfully revived Islamism and forced religion "to the top of the campaign agenda," Michael Vatikiotis writes at the Nikkei Asian Review. A "bitter form of religion-based identity politics" has taken hold in Indonesia, Ben Bland has written at the Lowy Institute, predicting the new dynamic will prevent needed reforms. | | Where Populism Comes From—and How to Fix It | | It's no secret that immigration and social liberalization have helped feed populist grievances, but Francis Fukuyama gives the issue some thoughtful treatment in a Eurozine essay: It's about a white working-class demand for dignity, he writes, resulting from a conservative adoption of identity politics and an "understanding of victimization that has travelled from left to right."
What to do about it isn't an easy question, but Fukuyama argues diagnosing the problem is the first step—specifically, doing so with "a little bit of sympathy" in understanding grievances and recognizing the "snobbery" of the elite. | | Ukraine's 'Unenviable Choice' | | That's what Euan MacDonald of the Kyiv Post calls Ukrainians' presidential contest, the final round of which will be held Sunday, between incumbent Petro Poroshenko and comedian Volodymyr Zelensky. The latter is almost certain to win, observers seem to agree, but MacDonald writes that Zelensky's rise mostly reveals the failure of Ukraine's political system to offer a new set of viable choices, beyond the old oligarchy, after the EuroMaidan protests.
Risky as it may seem to elect a comedian in a time of war, the Atlantic Council's Melinda Haring advises not to worry: Ukraine's president only controls foreign policy, while its prime minister will have more bearing on the economy—at a time when the country has become the poorest in Europe. | | | | | | |
