The Global Perspective

The Black Box Problem: What the Iran War Reveals About the Limits of Power Analysis Essay  ·  International Relations The Black Box Problem: What the Iran War Reveals About the Limits of Power Analysis When analysts treat states as unitary actors and ignore the people living inside them, they don't just make intellectual errors — they make moral ones. May 2026 A recent piece in The Conversation offered what has become the consensus take on the US-Israeli campaign against Iran: superior military power does not automatically produce political victory. Iran endured. Washington couldn't define what winning meant. The war revealed the limits of force in a globally interconnected economy. It was, as German Chancellor Friedrich Merz put it, a lesson in how power really works. The analysis is not wrong. But it is incomplete in a way that matters — both analytically and morally. And the gap it leaves open is precisely where more accu...

When we think of revolution, our minds often conjure images of upheaval and violence. From the guillotines of the French Revolution to the storming of the Winter Palace, history, as taught in our school years, has conditioned us to see these seismic political shifts as fundamentally violent events. The bloodshed, the battles, the chaos—these are the images that stick. But is violence the essential trait of a revolution? Or is it merely a symptom? I would argue that the driving force behind any true revolution is not violence, but something far more profound: the complete replacement of one system of governance with a new mindset, a new vision for how a political system should operate. The violence is often a tragic corollary to this radical change, not its engine. Consider the great revolutions that shaped the modern world. The Glorious Revolution in 17th-century England was a monumental shift. It challenged and ultimately replaced a system that had endured for over a millennium, wher...

Politics in Europe: Is the Traditional Left-Right Divide Crumbling? For decades, European politics has been defined by a familiar tug-of-war: the left versus the right. Socialist and progressive parties squared off against conservative and centrist forces, with the occasional liberal party (in the European sense) spicing things up. This comfortable dichotomy, a bedrock of the political landscape, is now facing an unprecedented challenge: the rise of insurrectionist, populist parties that are shaking the foundations of European democracy. The Old Model: A Tale of Two Sides (and Some Variations) Think back to the classic political battles across the continent. In many European nations, a dominant socialist or progressive party would typically face off against a major conservative party. Sometimes, this played out with multiple left-leaning parties against a constellation of centrist and conservative forces, but the basic framework remained. You had your progressives, your conservatives, ...

The 2024 U.S. election delivered a decisive victory for Donald Trump and the Republican Party, giving them control over the presidency, Congress, and the Senate. In retrospect, the reasons for this outcome seem clear. While the Democratic Party may feel dismayed, these results offer valuable lessons for future campaigns. Below, I explore the three major factors which I see as contributing to the Democrats' defeat and the Republicans’ success, and attempt to derive some lessons from the election results. 1. The Economy: A Disconnect Between Data and Perception Economic performance is often the cornerstone of electoral success, and in 2024, the perception of the U.S. economy overshadowed actual metrics. While economic indicators pointed to a thriving economy, public sentiment told a different story. As pointed out by Tim Hartford in the Financial Times (paywall), while headline data might suggest optimism, the positive results might not always be reflected in the daily lives of work...