4-11-22

Dear Partners in Thought,

As we are living through times reminiscent not only of the forgotten Cold War, but also of the gradual rise to WW2, it should be useful to review “Danger Zone”, the new book on the collision course of China with the West by American scholars Hal Brands (Johns Hopkins, American Enterprise Institute) and Michael Beckley (Tufts, American Enterprise Institute). 2022 has seen a return to old geopolitical ways in the middle of Europe, with Russia’s failed rapid invasion of Ukraine and, more globally, with a China, under the leadership of an increasingly Mao-like Xi Jinping, that seemed ready to assert its ambitions through old ways at a time when it is also faced with serious internal challenges. The dual threat to both the West and the world order as we knew it was surprising to many (like me and…Angela Merkel amongst others) who genuinely thought that globalisation and the “economy first” would create enough incentives to (relatively, for some) powerful autocratic states never to return to old ways of supremacy assertion. Ukraine changed everything rapidly, putting Taiwan on the map of serious potential world issues. While Russia leads an ill-fated and, so far, unsuccessful existential drive not to be relegated to what it actually is, energy and nuclear weapons aside, China is the “potential” and “eventual” world leader in the making, the question being in how many years. While the world is getting upside down due to an erratic Russia and a soul-searching China, the West is getting weaker by the year led by a Civil War-like-divided America. Even the European Union, weakened by a Brexit that that never made Britain stronger, is divided among its members on many issues and policies, the latest being the funding of its energy needs. At this stage, China may be a factor of stability or one of crisis enhancement globally, the latter being the topic covered by Brands & Beckley.

Brands & Beckley start the book with a bang in January 2025, and a Taiwan invasion at a time when a truly-divided America is arguing anew who won the 2024 presidential race, with fights in the streets in a super-January 6 mode—this time across the whole land. The USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier is also hit by a missile, while Chinese special forces target Taiwanese leaders, and cyberattacks take down Taiwan’s power grid and an amphibious assault begins. While this scenario seemed outlandish in the early to mid-2010s, the world changed as China started to assert itself more forcefully but also Russia gradually changed the game, first starting via “little green men” and local Russian nationalists in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine in 2014 and then more clearly in February 2022 with the direct invasion of its European neighbour. Brands & Beckley put forward a sound explanation for China’s potential bellicose assertiveness, that would not be driven by seeking world leadership (as often stated) but more as a result of serious internal weaknesses, like poor demographics, slow economic growth and a more autocratic leadership style—as seen with the new (life?) term of Xi Jinping. China is still relatively strong, if only due to its size and its role in the world economy, but actually not so much as seen with the inept Zero Covid policies in large urban centres, that create economic and social havoc, with no real health basis, annoying the local population, and stressing a rather incompetent Chinese political leadership. Some should question the relevance of the Chinese Communist Party in 2022 in terms of its current relevance and societal usefulness—in the same way the out-of-this-world Iranian theocratic regime and its inept policies, that could likely fall at some point as younger and even older Iranians who want to live in the real world “don’t want it anymore”. The deal between the CCP and the middle class based on “travel the world and buy Western goods” is under potential threat (hopefully not, especially for Toorbee, a start-up I am close to and which is focused on making Chinese travel the world better as well as bringing good ideas back home). According to Brands & Beckley, the key Chinese problem lies in its “peaking power” status that makes it very dangerous. One of Beijing’s problems, that could accelerate a conflict, is that it has reached a point of historical weakness in its competition with the US for world supremacy, which might trigger a more hostile stance. Insecurity would be a driver, as it may have been for Putin, arguing that his Ukraine move (once the childish Peter the Great points are cast aside) is driven by the eastern NATO expansion and the direct threat to Russia (as if the West wanted to invade it… which makes eyes roll across all Western capitals). It would seem that China’s problems may be linked to its earlier economic successes that were not skilfully managed by a CCP leadership, also going back to a Mao-like era, with Xi Jinping who drew a line over the recent past (what was to be gained from the public dismissal “for health reasons” of former Premier Hu Jintao as if to make things of a new era clearer?). Brands & Beckley point to declining economic performance, misallocation of capital on a grand scale, an oversized property sector and rising uncontrolled debt—to which could be added issues with its grand “Belt and Road Initiative” scheme of investing in developing nations, like across Africa, and suffering many financial setbacks—all reminding observers of many of the lethal pitfalls that made the former Soviet Union eventually fall. This last point opens the debate on whether autocracies can really manage the economy well and, again, whether loyalty to the leader(s) is not always accompanied by incompetence that eventually destroys the leader(s)—Russia and Iran being ongoing cases in point.

China should be engaged more forcefully—not to make it more dangerous but to remind it that its best interests are to be part of the concert of key nations in a globalised world. China should learn from Turkey’s Erdoğan who seized the Ukraine crisis to play a positive moderating world role, at a time its image had not been very positive for years. It looks like China was taken by surprise by the Ukraine invasion, right after a warm declaration of mutual friendship with Putin’s Russia a few days before the invasion. China had to be neutral and not condemn Moscow but grew increasingly concerned as months went by and Putin failed militarily (both on the battlefield, and with his ill-fated mobilisation drive, that showed more Russians leaving the motherland than joining the army) and found itself gradually isolated, only finding firm support from the likes of North Korea or Iran. It should be noted that the US is not the only party to have issues with China, as seen with the recent visit of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to Beijing, as he deals with the massive and increasingly Berlin-uncomfortable trade between the two countries. The West, as a whole, has good reasons to ensure that China stays on a globalised course and avoids Putin’s delusions that will mark Russia for generations likely after he is gone, willingly or not.

There are other books on China today that are worth mentioning, namely from Mandarin-speaking former Australian Premier Kevin Rudd’s “The Avoidable War”, which presents a more optimistic future of the challenging US/Western -China relationship. While always being attentive to the hostility of autocracies, and fighting its overt expressions like with Russia, the united West (hopefully also at home in the case of America) should always remain positive when dealing with China, as it is too big an opponent to have regardless of its many own challenges. A Western-China conflict would be a lose-lose scenario, which does not mean that the West should be too accommodating or forgetful of its founding values. The world should concentrate on stability, and sound globalisation should be its focus as a way of maintaining mutually-beneficial peace.

Warmest regards,

Serge

19-8-22

Dear Partners in Thought,

As I wrote about leadership-making in David Gergen’s recent book “Hearts Touched with Fire,” where leadership was deemed “good” in essence, I also stressed that some leaders were not always good in nature, often leading their countries and the world to a dangerous path. As such, I thought it would be good to do a Book Note on “The Age of the Strongman – How the Cult of the Leader threatens Democracy around the World” from the Financial Times’ Gideon Rachman. The very gifted journalist and author (one of the best columnists at the FT today) tells us about those leaders who are easily identified as strongmen—and there are many today. These men (there is no woman yet) are household names, and sadly represent a large segment of the world population, usually in the developing world or (in the case of China) as the aspiring world leader. Rachman tells us more about Vladimir Putin, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Xi Jinping, but also Narendra Modi, Jair Bolsonaro and others like daringly, Boris Johnson for whom he makes a strong case for strongmen club membership—however mild he may be in comparison to the others. He reminds us of earlier times, when many of those leaders in the developing or actually rising world, showed a more Western-like democratic flavor in their governing style (and policies) when they fully played the global cooperative game—unlike today also, in the new cold war scenarios we see unfolding.

The picture we get is worrying at two levels: i) these leaders, often representing very large countries, seem to increasingly rule the world or have a great impact on its events and ii) the democratic West is not healthy today, due to a combination of the rise of the extremes, a loss of basic values that made it, and the initially-unplanned adverse impact of tech, via truth-distorting and opinion-shaping social media: all affecting how people, and then voters, think. These leaders at both macro (country) and micro (corporates, business and investments) levels also create never-seen post-Cold War geopolitical risks, this including in parts of the West, when leadership can at times slip into practical authoritarianism in style, and increasingly in substance—as seen on a few occasions in post-Brexit Britain and in Trump’s America, even if in a mild way given the democratic context.

Vladimir Putin is emblematic of the old-fashioned strongman as seen with the invasion of Ukraine but also in the way Russia was governed since 2000, and especially since “Georgia” in 2008—not that Russia ever was a beacon of freedom and peaceful foreign policy-making. Even if George W. Bush in post-9-11 shock was able to “get a sense of his soul” in 2001. Twenty-two years is a long time in politics, though strongmen tend to stay in power forever—as shown with Xi’s plans for life ruling, or Erdoğan’s tenure in Ankara, that mirrors Putin’s. While Putin is naturally the first strongman to be addressed by Rachman, there is a large number of them that he focuses on. Rather than going into the features of each of them, I thought it was better to list them and their short chapters (about 15 pages on average) so as to let readers discover their details, while focusing on interesting aspects of the world of strongmen. The main feeling, admittedly very worrisome, arising from reading Rachman’s book, is that the West is not the world, and that the world is not democratic—also at a time when Western democracy is in peril due to its own issues today.

Rachman’s strongmen list starts with i) Putin – aptly named the archetype (2000); followed by ii) Erdoğan– from liberal reformer to authoritarian strongman (2003); iii) Xi Jinping – China and the return of the cult of personality à la Mao (2012); iv) Modi – strongman politics in the world’s largest, still-called, democracy (2014); v) Orban, Kaczynski and the rise of illiberal Europe; vi) Boris Johnson and Brexit Britain (2016); vii) Donald Trump – American strongman (2016); viii) Rodrigo Duterte and the erosion of democracy in South East Asia; ix) the rise of Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) and the Netanyahu phenomenon (2017); x) far rightist Bolsonaro, in Brazil, radical leftist “Amlo” in Mexico and the return of the Latin American caudillo (2018); xi) Abiy Ahmed and democratic disillusionment in Africa (2019); xii) lonely Merkel, Macron and Europe’s struggle against the strongmen; xiii) George Soros, Steve Bannon and the battle of ideas. The book finishes with an epilogue on President Biden in the Age of the Strongman. It is worth noting that some strongmen like Lukashenko in Belarus, Hun Sen in Cambodia or Kim Jong-un in North Korea are not addressed, not as they are gentle ones, but as they do not play a key role (so far) in changing the climate of global politics (one could disagree with the erratic Kim, but selection is key when dealing with such a large population of leaders that would give political commentator and author David Gergen a strong headache).

While the stories of these strongmen make for fascinating reading in terms of how they got to power and managed their often evolving “leaderships,” Rachman makes very useful points as to the nature of these types of leaders and their times, as follows:

• The general backdrop is clear. Over the last 20 years, liberal values like freedom of speech, independent courts, and minority rights have been under assault all over the world and especially as strongmen developed their autocratic style and/or rule.

• The West and its elites, especially political and mediatic, mistook many future strongmen like Putin, Erdoğan, Modi, Orban, and even Xi as reformers who could take their countries on a Western liberal path, that was deemed the universal way post-Cold war. These future strongmen, some who changed very quickly like MBS, also showed unusual liberal and reformist “tendencies” as they started leading their countries when compared with past leadership, this for a short time as the “Riyadh hotel jail” episode showed. The West did not see what was coming.

• The strongmen are different in nature from the unchallenged autocrats (Xi in China, MBS in Saudi Arabia) to those in the middle (Putin in Russia—this arguably— , Erdoğan in Turkey) who are subject to some increasingly-vanishing forms of democratic constraints like elections, and limited press freedom—to those who operate in democracies, but show contempt for its norms, and keep eroding them (Orbán in Hungary, clearly Trump in the US, and even Johnson in Britain, who showed perhaps the mildest, but a real strongman-case on many occasions).

• The strongman model was furthered even among clear authoritarian regimes like China or Saudi Arabia, where the likes of Xi and MBS gradually concentrated power around them, and away from a more collective leadership, either from the Communist Party or the Saudi Royal family. Today Xi is becoming a new Mao with no term limits.

• The two emerging powers of the 21st century, China and India, have both gradually adopted strongman politics, while representing an immense part of the world population that, so far, seem to accept such a political modus operandi that projects nationalism, strength, and a strong hostility to weak (Western) liberalism.

• The strongmen are not all the same, but they are similar through four cross-cutting common features: i) the creation of a cult of personality; ii) contempt for the rule of law; iii) the claim to represent the real people against the elite a.k.a. populism, well shown with Donald Trump even today and; iv) a politics driven by fear and nationalism.

• Strongmen sell themselves as indispensable and the only ones to save the nation, making little or no distinction between the state and the leader. They stress their nationalism, cultural conservatism, little tolerance for minorities, and dissent for the interests of foreigners, however fair and valid.

• Very often, strongmen rule as a family, with Erdoğan having appointed his son-in-law as finance minister and Trump his own son-in-law to take a key role in foreign and domestic politics. Bolsonaro appointed his three sons to key official positions, including one as Ambassador to the US. Duterte’s candidate to succeed him in Manila was his daughter (but then a young Marcos also came in). Even Boris Johnson appointed his brother Jo to the cabinet and then the House of Lords, as an aside (my comment), not the most democratic or meritocratic of institutions.

• Strongmen, unlike the dictators of the 1930s, operate in a challenged but still globalized world, where international law theoretically prevails, though take advantage of the technologies of the 21st century, allowing them to connect directly with the masses and, in many ways, shape their views and/or control them. These developments can take different forms, with two extremes in motion: in the West, actual and aspiring populist strongmen rely on social media and the likes to shape and control the minds of voters, while in true autocracies like China, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube (the latter used by Alexei Navalny in Russia in earlier days to post online videos of the corruption of Putin and his inner circle) are blocked, and the internet is under strict online social control.

• Long periods of power allow strongmen to appoint loyalists in key positions, including in the courts, that have an impact on the daily life of their citizens. Duterte “restructured” the Filipino Supreme Court to his liking, while 4,000 judges were purged in Turkey during a state of post-coup emergency in 2016. Although not in the same environment, Trump (admittedly due to his timing in office and following a legal process) ensured the US Supreme Court became very conservative for some time, resulting in decisions (or no decisions) not reflecting the views of a vast majority of Americans today.

• Strongmen disdain institutions but love “the people”—this being associated with populism as still seen in 2022 with Trump and his die-hard base. Simple solutions for complex issues are put forward also, as they can be understood by the largest number, many of whom are not troubled with analytical processes. Simple messages like “Get Brexit Done” and “Build that Wall” were famously heard in recent years with great results for the strongmen.

• Legal and state institutions are often portrayed by strongmen as obfuscation tools used by the elites and a “Deep State” to protect themselves, and need to be broken when the ends justify the means. Similarly, shadowy foreigners are often portrayed by strongmen as plotting against the interests of the people, George Soros having been a case in point in Orbán’s Hungary.

• In most cases, strongmen fight for the people living in small towns and the countryside against the urban elites, often splitting the vote—when there is one—like in the US in 2016 and 2020—on educational lines. Trump lost heavily among college graduates, but gained 80% of the vote of non-college educated white men in both presidential elections. In the UK, 73% of school leavers without any qualifications voted Leave while 75% of voters with post-graduate degrees voted Remain.

• Nostalgic nationalism works also for the strongmen, hence the famous “Making America Great Again”, as they attract those poorly educated voters who have not benefitted the most, if at all, from globalization and experienced standards of living declines in recent decades. Bringing back the good times also works well in America or Britain, whatever the precise message. Similar messages are heard in Turkey, Hungary or Russia, with the Peter the Great approach about regaining territories, therefore past grandeur. Even Global Britain, that drove Brexit is linked to some nostalgia for an era when Britain was ruling the global waves, a sentiment not lost on the oldest voters even if they should remember the dreadful seventies better than a Victorian era they only read about.

To look at this week’s world, the already-disputed election of William Ruto in Kenya, a self-styled “hustler” and former chicken street farmer, also known as an African Bolsonaro, is a potential additional sign of a slide into authoritarianism and strongman ethos in Africa—even if resulting from an official democratic process. The news that former Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison took over “discreetly” five ministries during the peak of the Covid era, this whatever the rationale for doing so, is another (admittedly mild as Western-flavored) example—very unusual for Australia—of the rising strongman era, even in the democratic West.

The Age of the Strongman brings three additional remarks: i) there were many strongmen in history in recent centuries like Louis XIV or Napoléon Bonaparte. If anything, strongmen always ruled “their” world; ii) the current era may make us realize that democracy, as we used to know it even in its more natural incarnation and fullest form in the West, is a very short and thus fragile experience in world history. There were only 12 democracies in the world in 1945; and iii) while being nationalist first, strongmen can work together especially against the West and its positions, as seen with their effective support or lack of condemnation of Russia, also for tactical reasons, in the context of the Ukraine invasion. In a rather low-key though telling development, China will send troops to a Russia-led military exercise in the Russian Far East where India, Mongolia and Tajikistan will also take part.

Liberal democracy was only ascendant for 20 years following the end of the Cold War, also reflecting a unipolar US world that non-Western strongmen started to attack as they built their power at home. The financial crisis of 2008, the ill-fated Iraq war, and rapid rise of China stopped taken-for-granted Western world dominance, even if the US stayed the leading world player. The rise of the strongmen and the fragility of Western style-democracy is also why it is imperative for liberal democrats not to be weak, and defend democracy with the utmost vigor. This fight is implying a renewed Western focus on education in order to best fight against the domestic dangers of social media-driven populism and its vote-grabbing and skill-less politicians of our times.

Gideon Rachman’s book is very dense, going through all the key strongmen of the moment and their main themes, like migration, which became a central tactical focus of the far-right parties in Europe since 2015. The Age of the Strongman is a book that needs to be read thoroughly and in a focused way, so rich are its contents and consequential its essence—all the more for the West, as we would like it to be, and how it should react to stop the authoritarian tide.

Warmest regards,

Serge

04-08-22

Dear Partners in Thought,

Ian Bremmer, founder and CEO of Eurasia Group—a New York-based global research and consulting firm—and G-Zero—a media company providing coverage on international affairs via its Signal newsletter—wrote a new book (from a “measured” American vantage point) on the three threats facing the world. The three global threats are i) deadly viruses similar to Covid-19 as experienced globally since early 2020; ii) climate change and; iii) the unexpected impact of new disruptive technologies (seen as the greatest threat of all as they impact mind and behavior. This is, incidentally, a threat that I wrote about in previous Interludes as a source of self-harm today in Western society. In doing so, and perhaps due to the timing of his publishing that coincided with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Ian Bremmer is not listing among major threats the large traditional wars, all the more within or close to the West, that belonged to a forgone era—before Putin’s Russia brought them back into the limelight. He does mention, however, this tragic example of a return to old times in an Addendum. Incidentally, Bremmer likes the number three, as shown with his 2015 “Superpower” opus, where he stresses the three choices America could make for its role in the world

While having identified the three threats, Ian Bremmer emphasizes the poor level of preparedness to fight them due to two key factors. One is the state of domestic politics in America where consensus has disappeared and he rightly calls (with a degree of irony) a state of “uncivil war” that weakens the still-sole-superpower’s ability today to manage key problems for itself and the world. It is for Bremmer the only nation able to project multi-faceted power into every region of the world, while being at war with itself through a lack of unity on essential socio-political themes. All worsened by hardened partisan politics, and a rise of extremism, vividly seen among elected officials since the Trump era. Bremmer also sees America as a nation of contradictions, with Texans at times struggling without electricity, while NASA is landing on Mars. He provides a sound review of what is wrong with America today, and how it goes against its own interests and that of the West—and to a great extent the world. The key domestic dysfunctional drivers, at times combined, would be according to Bremmer i) the widening wealth gap; ii) the veneration of the private sector, leading to the neglect of American workers, this enhanced by; iii) the importance of money in politics, and the dependence trap of elected officials given the expected returns on investment of donors (see with the NRA); iv) the discredited societally-dividing formal and social media; and v) the embedded structural racism still pervading society (this, I would humbly add, in spite of much visible progress in many walks of American public and private life). He could have added more starkly, mass-shootings and politicized Supreme court disconnections with American society. Ever the pragmatic one, Bremmer then comes up with solutions to fix the American dysfunctionality, many of which may seem hard to reach today—or any time soon.

The other factor is the gradually-rising “new cold war,” far worse than the first one, between the US and China—two powers that should be rationally inter-dependent in our globalized set-up, which could eventually hamper the world’s collective future. Bremmer actually sees it as a more guaranteed way to the MAD scenario (Mutually Assured Destruction) of old. As of 2017 in Davos, Xi Jinping made it clear that China’s time had come to change history, following his plans for China’s global supremacy in AI, quantum computing, robotics and other tech segments—an initiative led by the state, and thus communist party, (whatever the latter means today in relation to its roots)—all in a globalized, inter-dependent world. Nine months later, Xi switched his official message from being a member and co-reformer of the international system, to leading it in providing the “Chinese solution” to the world’s problems. China has since then wanted to expand its control of the South China Sea, controlled Hong Kong further, and pushed Taiwan to “rejoin” (when not demonstrating aggressive military strength when top US officials visit the island nation). Beijing became externally more assertive in creating the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank that invests globally, and developed its (now struggling) Belt and Road Initiative further with more ports, roads and bridges—especially in Africa and Asia. All while Americans increasingly want the White House to focus on domestic problems, as gas price at the pump and inflation are rising today. As a key side-show, Covid-19 created more opportunities for Beijing to develop authoritarian solutions to control the disease, such as recently seen in Shanghai with its strange Zero-Covid policy, potentially and unexpectedly bearing the roots of key domestic middle-class dissent.

Bremmer’s G-Zero, a third issue of a permanent nature the world deals with, is rooted in a world once run by the G7 from 1975 to 2009. At that time of the global financial crisis the US, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Canada, who shared political values, led the world economy. By 2005 other countries like China, India, South Korea, Brazil, Turkey, Indonesia and Mexico started rising to more preeminence and independence from the West. This led to the G20 that regrouped key players with different views on democracy and free market economics. They all worked during the financial crisis (as they did post-9-11) to defeat the common enemy, but did not agree on much afterwards—hence Bremmer’s quasi-humorous G-Zero as the world entered an era of “geopolitical recession” which is ongoing, if not worsening. The Trump presidency had a major role in making the US more inward-looking and less globally-focused, with doubts about key organizations like NATO or the withdrawals from trade agreements, climate accords and the World Trade Organization. This G-Zero geopolitical recession in turn emboldened populist leaders (Gideon Rachman’s “Strongmen”) who were focused on easy answers to complex issues with a narrow nationalist focus. Bremmer therefore argues that global crises should enhance global cooperation in their fight and de facto that we actually need them for the world to work “together” in spite of rivalries, and to reset a failing world governance. Bremmer sees the hard-won nuclear reductions of the past as having been much easier to reach collectively, than creating a new “global public health system”, managing climate change fallout, or dealing with the destructive aspects of disruptive new technologies. Global cooperation will be all the harder in wealthy countries, as the non-college educated struggle to be part of a secure middle class, while in poorer countries the many have-nots now have a clearer and frustrating view of those who are more fortunate at home and globally. And a return to an “America First” in 2024 with Trump or one of his copycats would kill global cooperation. Bremmer however favors cooperation between rivals, even enemies.

Bremmer stresses that the US dysfunctionality and confrontation with China hurt the world’s response to Covid-19, a type of virus which was not only predictable but was indeed predicted by George W. Bush (2005), Barack Obama (2014) or Bill Gates, who actively led his foundation to focus on this matter. Both the dysfunctional US and autocratic China harmed the global response to Covid-19, that grew from one Chinese death to one million infections globally in three months. China, in particular, initially tried to silence doctors who wanted to share information on the virus, or avoided smooth global cooperation on finding its origins. This in turn leading to a more authoritarian stance on Chinese activism, more control on Hong Kong, and stronger views on Taiwan. Bremmer goes through the few real successes in global cooperation, and the many failures to be learned from, as Covid-19 (still persisting even if in a milder form after two-and-a-half years) should be one of many such threats arising in the future. Investing and cooperating early are the two simple recipes that are hard to achieve in a cold war environment among the two world leaders (all the more today, in the new context resulting from the invasion of Ukraine and its multiple impacts). Successful efforts against future pandemics will demand investment, moral imagination and political will in the context of a “Global Covax” in a cooperative context, involving rivals that will stay politically different.

Climate change does not care about borders and political tribes. It threatens the collective future of humanity on a larger and longer scale than pandemics, while affecting countries at all levels. Such a mega-threat requires cooperation on climate policy among direct competitors facing a direct enemy (in a wink to that scenario, Bremmer tells us of Reagan, a sci-fi movie lover, asking Gorbachev the first time they met in 1985 whether the US and the Soviet Union would cooperate if the earth was attacked by someone from outer-space. The quick answer was yes, perhaps paving the way for another world). Climate change has created famines that played roles in unrests and civil wars that led to displacements of populations, leading to backlashes as seen in Europe in the mid-2010s, with consequences favoring unforeseen political developments like Brexit. The section on climate change provides a very useful way for readers to understand its stakes and how to fight it, again in a global cooperation mode. Bremmer proposes a “Green Marshall Plan,” taken from the original post-WWII American design that involved rebuilding Europe—not the US—and was only enabled due to the Soviet threat in Europe. The American population had not been keen on it initially, preferring focusing back on domestic matters after years of fighting in Europe and Asia. Bremmer’s “Green Marshall Plan” would involve multinational investment in renewable energy and green jobs, and a global agreement to help resettle people displaced by climate change.

Tech has been front and center of news in the West via Big Tech, as the US (and more so the EU) have tried to regulate it as it gradually became omnipresent and thus increasingly powerful. Tech, like Aesop’s tongue, has been the best and the worst of things. The threat of rapid and disruptive technology is not new, and was always there in history. It is just far more rapid and more disruptive than ever, even if not always unleashing bad outcomes for mankind—far from it. Covid-19 started a war nobody won, but tech and the makers of disruptive tech were among those benefitting from it. Covid-19 showed that tech, in spite of having a chaotic virus to deal with, enabled a better management of the crisis through a better monitoring of the virus evolution, a vaccine development and, crucially, efficient remote working. The rapid, and the biggest threat of all—according to Bremmer—is, however, very real and deep when looking at the impact, not all positive, of lethal autonomous drones, cyberwarfare, biotechnology, Artificial Intelligence or the algorithms that replace people with machines in the workplace. These technologies have been rapidly shifting the relationship of individuals between themselves and with institutions in the West, while China gradually controlled the internet at home. In stark contrast to the message of 20 years ago, that the internet revolution would empower individuals and spread democracy, the reliance from too many on tech-based social media, often hate dissemination conduits of fake news, conspiracy theories and tools of oppression and violence, has been heavily damaging societally. These new media pushing clear agendas have curtailed independent thinking from individuals primarily seeking confirmation of their opinions, and have been highly damaging behaviorally also (my take) when combined with what seems a parallel declining focus on the quality of basic formal educational standards in the West. Lastly, communications tech, even “neutral” in nature, gave more exposure of inequalities to the have-nots globally, giving rise to massive anger and social disruption with direct attacks on institutions and their leaders. This section also gives us a very useful exposure to the race between China and the US to dominate quantum computing, which is another source of conflict, even if it should lead to more cooperation. Bremmer stresses the need to work together and set up the right framework, and indeed entity, to deal with the key issues related to tech.

Bremmer uses a quote from French scientist Louis Pasteur summarizing what is needed going forward and why: “Chance favors the prepared mind” or as Napoleon said and I like: “To govern is to foresee.” This, of course, is a rather basic fact, though not easy to implement in the context of a conflictual world, both domestically and globally. While we live in times of extraordinary opportunities, built over the last 50 years, when billions have comforts and opportunities far beyond the reach of medieval kings, we also face rising catastrophes in a context where world leaders fail to work together on common threats. Bremmer advocates “practical cooperation” among democracies and dictatorships, rich and poor countries that share common aspirations like security, dignity and prosperity, and need to work together on managing global threats. Bremmer offers several paths forward (ideally combined) like a “Global Covax”, a “Green Marshall Plan” and a “World Data Organization” all with roots in the then post-1945 UN-driven “new world in the making,” and based on the concept of international cooperation. Bremmer is also keen on not only outsourcing human crisis management to the private sector and ensuring governments also directly help those less fortunate in their countries, with the likes of strengthened social safety nets and guaranteed basic income.

In his short Addendum at publishing time, Bremmer touches upon the Russian “imperial” invasion of Ukraine in the context of the three threats and feels that, in spite of tragedies on the battlefield, and harm globally due to sanctions, and food and energy shortages, it helped unify the West, without creating too strong a Russia-China axis—whatever tactical approach is taken by the latter. Bremmer even thinks that Xi might restrain Putin’s imperial efforts and globalization destroying features, as not being to the advantage of a China that still needs clear borders, a behaving neighbor, and even more so globalization. This new cold war is also not like the old one, as Russia does not have the clout of the Soviet Union globally, even if the nuclear factor saving it from military irrelevance, in case of a wider conflict, is real. Bremmer, admittedly optimistic, feels that this type of conflict from another age, while “complicating things” and disrupting a world with less efficiency and more impunity at play, should not substantially derail the collective ability to manage global responses to the three key global threats he focused on —assuming the right steps are taken. He may indeed be too optimistic.

While “The Power of Crisis” is focused on key issues, threats and solutions, it is also a book full of details and nuances as to what is happening today and why, as well as how the world could fix problems that a Book Note could not give credit for. “The Power of Crisis” is certainly a book looking forward with hope, that is worth reading and reflecting upon.

Warmest regards,

Serge

17.07.22

Dear Partners in Thought,

As we live again in challenging geopolitical and economic times, where people cross-generations now seem lost in a compass-less world, led by too many social media that changed their minds, I thought it was useful to go back to basics and review what was and should be a key matter for us: Leadership.

“Hearts touched with fire” is the new book by David Gergen who deals with the many aspects of the making of leadership across the ages. The author, now 80, known for his gentle demeanor and crisp insights, has been a key fixture of CNN, where he has commented on political matters, notably American elections, for the last 20 years. Before this, he was a seasoned public official having served as a White House advisor to four American Presidents including Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton, and is still leading the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. The “Hearts touched with fire” quote was borrowed from Oliver Wendell Holmes, one of the most memorable US Supreme Court Justices, from his 1884 Memorial Day speech referring to the civil war that had shaped him into the man and indeed, while he did not stress it then, the leader he would become. While this book is focused on the American experience of leadership, it borrows from other leading examples in the world as well. It also brings us back to an America we thoroughly miss today, as David Gergen would agree. If there is one possible reservation, the book, while very rich, may also be very dense with at times too many great features to absorb, though it should be read as a novel, depicting a multi-facetted journey into history as a guide to a better future, and perhaps not just as a mere leadership guide.

Gergen makes some useful preliminaries about the “three pillars” of leadership, notably leaders, followers and context, using interesting examples to illustrate them. As Ronald Reagan defined it “a great leader is one that gets people to do the greatest things.” As such, for leaders to achieve their goals, they need followers. While the American revolution was a success and led to greater things, the French revolution died early simply as the French were not ready for it at the time as they had been living under monarchic rule for too long and did not make an effective revolutionary transition (even if some would dare to say that Napoleon brought many advancements to French society, and not only on the battlefield). Context is also key regardless of the leader: In 1939 Winston Churchill was a washed-up politician whom the war two years later transformed into the essential leader—not only for Britain but for Western democracy. Gergen offers a fourth natural pillar of leadership with “goals,” quoting the very able Reagan closest adviser, James A. Baker III, who had defined a hierarchy of goals for his President to ensure that the main ones were reached.

Gergen selects three charismatic leadership figures coming from very different walks of life — with different upbringings, politics, backgrounds and goals — indeed as leading examples at the start of his book: John Lewis, the impoverished young leader of the Civil Rights movement, Selma Bridge hero of the 1960s and Democratic leader in Congress for 33 years; Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the societal record-breaking individual with a deeply struggling childhood, who then became the Supreme Court Justice known for always fighting for women’s rights; and John McCain, the son of a top naval Admiral, rebellious character, who became a military hero in Vietnam and could have been American president in 2008. He finds common features in their intersecting journeys as: i) each felt called to the public arena; ii) each began their leadership journey early; iii) each had to summon inner courage; iv) each stumbled but came back stronger; v) each began sorting out and embracing core values early on and ; vi) each found a true north; and vii) each was an idealist to their core.

David Gergen then takes us into his own journey when he interns for a North Carolinian politician in civil rights times, trying to bridge the white and African American communities in the South. One of his memorable experiences will be to go to a Ku Klux Klan meeting with two friends and barely escape, at a time when other young people following the same track would be caught, tortured and die. His early involvement in these society-changing events will teach him that he wanted to act in the public arena. In his own words, he did not know what he wanted to be but he knew where he wanted to be. Borrowing from Peter Drucker’s 1999 essay on “Managing oneself,” he stresses self-awareness as a key element of leadership creation. The main facets of self-awareness according to Drucker are i) knowing one’s strengths and weaknesses; ii) knowing how to learn by reading or listening; iii) knowing one’s place on the introvert/extrovert scale; iv) knowing how to respond to stress; and v) defining if one is a good number one or a better number two. We learn about Jefferson, Lincoln and notably Theodore Roosevelt having been avid book readers in order to shape their thinking — TR read one book a day — while Reagan (as I remember too) would not deal with briefing notes beyond one page — all while all of them were great leaders in their own times. We learn great stories about Michael Jordan who had not been selected in his high school basketball team, Winston Churchill’s dedication in his speech rehearsals or Bill Bradley, the basketball star who became US Senator. We learn about General Marshall who had decided that General Patton was at his best commanding an army but not the Army. Then, beyond self-awareness, comes self-mastery, via focusing on one’s strengths, improving constantly one’s performance, eventually leading to game-changing events like the miraculous landing of his plane on the Hudson by captain “Sully” Sullenberger, or the instant shooting by three Navy Seals of three Somali pirates as they were about to execute Captain Richard Phillips (incidentally two stories Hollywood made into movies with Tom Hanks).

David Gergen, applying a chronological approach to this main theme, focuses on the “gathering years,” when young leaders-to-be launch their careers. He has again a structured way to stress what matters at that stage: i) take time-outs; ii) choose jobs that align your passion and values; iii) perform every task — no matter how small — with excellence; iv) look for stretch jobs; v) understand your value to an organization; vi) spot those with high promises and join forces; vii) accept that you will make big mistakes early on; and viii) keep a parachute in the closet. He then goes on with the crucial necessity of finding mentors, coaches and role models. We learn how diverse personalities like Eisenhower, Henry David Thoreau and Alexandra Ocasio Cortes were mentored. We also learn about the role of sponsors in the making of future leaders. We then cover the importance of pinning down core values and principles and constructing a moral compass, all with examples of people who left their mark in American history, the latter being the author’s natural focus.

In the “Surviving the Flaming Crucible” chapter, Gergen gives us more in-depth illustrations of extraordinary leadership roads taken with FDR, a once 39-year old who could not walk one morning, having been struck by polio, but would become a game-changing American President. Another example is Malala, the young Afghan girl who was shot three times in the head by the Taliban, survived, led the fight for girls’ education around the world and, at 17, became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. In “The Keys to Resilience” chapter, Gergen goes though the reasons why some crumble at times of crucibles while others come successfully to grips and grow. He stresses the importance of a sunny temperament, adaptability, hardiness and stoicism as the four qualities needed to conquer crucibles with inner resilience. Turning adversity into purpose is also a recipe that was taught to John Quincy Adams, the future President, by his mother during the darkest days of the American Revolution. In focusing on this key feature, Gergen provides the fighting examples of the stories of Harvey Milk, the champion of the gay cause and Katherine Graham, who would end up leading The Washington Post, both illustrating the necessity of moral purpose, a key leadership ingredient.

David Gergen then focuses on “Learning to Lead Up,” something we should do in our twenties and thirties, having gone through the “gathering years.” One of the funny aspects of this learning curve is to know how to “manage your boss” so you know them and play to their strengths. All while keeping one eye on today and the other on tomorrow. Speaking conscience to power, while arguing your case, and then getting on board and being emotionally supportive. One of his personal examples of having “an iron fist in a velvet glove” is again James Baker, the close adviser to President Reagan whom David Gergen actually worked with in the White House. Those who know of James Baker, still with us at 92, will remember a highly decent and professional individual focused on public service.

“Leading your Team” is a natural chapter so often addressed by leadership experts (read the game-changing “Team of Teams” by General Stanley McChrystal and also his most recent “Leaders”) driving David Gergen to tell us about the key basics of building a good team, well-defining mutually acceptable responsibilities, and building strong enabling structures and a compelling direction. The key thing would then be to turn a good team into a great one with getting the right individuals on the bus, while getting the wrong ones off it. David Gergen offers us a roll calls of great coups in team-building from different spheres of society such as Steve Jobs at Apple, Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center; Lockheed Martin’s “Skunk Works” team or the Bauhaus Movement. In doing so he helps us understand what distinguishes great teams. He finally covers the legacy of croup-centered leaderships, notably seen in the civil rights movements and its organizations.

One key tool of leadership for Gergen is the art of public persuasion. Leaders need to be heard to have an impact, and he lists a few requirements, such as finding your own voice and ensuring the basics of public speaking are well covered. Key tools should be: i) know your purpose; ii) have a clear message; iii) pay attention to the key elements of a speech; iv) have great stories to tell; and v) master the elements of eloquence. Very usefully, and showing he is aware of a changing world, Gergen goes through these pre-requisites in our digital world, stressing both its good and bad aspects, as eloquence may be used and perceived differently in our times.

As David Gergen addressed the inner and outer journeys into leadership-making, he then goes into the convergence of these two or their integration in ways that also turned into serving others. In doing so, he goes into the existential journey of Robert Kennedy after his brother was assassinated, the assent and transformational impact of Susan Berresford as the first female CEO of the Ford foundation (today the second largest foundation in America) and the national rise, through her elector registration work in Georgia, of Stacey Abrams, an obscure Democratic State House Representative back in 2010. In a personal touch, Gergen then gives us his own experience in the White House with four Presidents, stressing what he felt had been especially key, like hitting the ground running (due to the usual “first hundred days”), keeping an eye out for young talents among the staff (telling us about a young Nixon intern, John, who became a partner and then a friend of 50 years) and, first and foremost, not surprisingly, remembering common sense. On the latter, we learn that while Reagan had not read the briefing note for a G8 meeting he was hosting in colonial Williamsburg in 1985, as he had watched instead The Sound of Music, a favorite movie of his, he was still able the following day to rise above all the details and spend time with each leader on the big picture issues.

Leaders are not without failure and may also lose their way. The common failures and their antidotes are provided starting with i) hubris vs. humility, ii) narcissism vs. empathy; iii) greed vs. modesty; iv) obstinacy vs. resolution; v) imprudence vs. wise judgment; vi) basic dishonesty vs. straight shooting; and vii) distrust vs. openness. Many examples are provided, like for basic dishonesty the chronic lies of President Trump — 30, 753 cases even before the astounding findings of the January 6 House committee hearings. David Gergen also tells us about the self-derailment of Rajat Gupta, a former CEO and partner of strategy consultancy McKinsey until 2008. Gupta, closely associated with the Harvard Business School and a role model for business leadership, was charged with three counts of insider trading having benefited Raj Rajaratnam, following instant disclosure by Gupta of a USD 5bn investment Warren Buffett was making in Goldman Sachs, on which board the ex-McKinsey CEO was a member. He spent 19 months in jail. Gergen’s view, corroborated by his friends at McKinsey and Goldman Sachs, was that while Gupta was dealing with his top corporate CEO clients as equals, he could not stand in retirement that they had billions and he merely tens of millions, hence the self-derailment. Other examples abound with Elisabeth Holmes and Jeremy Falwell Jr. (both hubris “victims” one of investor fraud and the other of sexual predatory practices) or Don Regan (a former Merrill Lynch CEO, Reagan’s chief of staff in his second term, and a clear narcissist who finally got fired as Nancy had had enough).

Leadership is often best seen at times of crises. In a rare departure from leading American examples, David Gergen tells us about Nelson Mandela and his fight in South Africa in the 1960s and later when all seemed lost for his cause. He then stresses qualities leaders should deploy at crisis times, such as a great carelessness of self, prudent judgment, instinctive feeling or intuitive flair and coolness under fire. Leaders often better revealed at times of crisis should heed the following advice: i) head off crises that are preventable; ii) prepare for the worst; iii) when it hits, reassure the public and then solve the problem; and iv) when it subsides, write an after-action report.

David Gergen finally mentions additional traits that leaders should have to be full, such as having a good reading of history, humor (that can create the best environment for any team) and naturally, an integrated life, as leaders are also men and women usually with families. On the humorous point, Gergen gives the story of JFK and Pierre Salinger, his press secretary (incidentally I met once on a flight 30 years ago — a good man) asking him if he could secure 1,000 Havana cigars by 11:00 am the following morning. A perplexed but cigar-loving Salinger did his best to accomplish the somewhat challenging mission only to discover that JFK announced a trade embargo against Cuba at 11:00 that following day. Similarly, when Reagan got shot two months after he took office, by a Jodie Foster-obsessed John Hinckley, and while going into surgery at Walter Reed Hospital, he turned around in his gurney, looked at his doctors and said: “I hope you’re all Republicans.”

David Gergen rightly reminds us of WW2 being the defining experience in shaping leadership for a generation. All Presidents, from JFK to George H.W. Bush, fought in it (incidentally one having his famed “PT 109” boat sliced by a Japanese destroyer, while the other’s Avenger aircraft got shot down over the South Pacific) — but for Jimmy Carter who was at the Naval Academy when the war ended — making what television anchor Tom Brokaw famously nicknamed “the greatest generation.” The war created leaders especially in America that was left as the strongest country in the world — economically, militarily, scientifically and culturally. While born in 1960, I felt this hard-to-describe reality which made so many of us worldwide want to be part of the story. This greatest generation wanted also to “serve,” creating a noble basis for the deployment of their hard-won leadership. While America was far from being perfect and racism, sexism and other forces were eating away at its undergirding, most Americans were proud of their democracy and whom they were, also as a result of WW2 and its societal impacts. These leaders sent America to the moon, created many international institutions, passed many legislations to advance the causes of women and communities of color, enhanced social security, developed world-class higher education and pushed science and technology further. This was made through collective and individual leadership often born in the ashes of a world war. As America is now faced with threats to its republic in forgotten ways since 1865, David Gergen wonders if new leaders will rise to the challenges and answer “the clarion call for unity and action.” He still bets on the young — the millennials and Gen Zers with a focus on both progressives and mainstream moderates — to lead the fight in an environment marked by rising global temperature and the insanity of those who refuse the Covid vaccine, putting their own families at risk. He could have added the insanity of mass shootings like recently at Uvalde and in suburban Chicago, not to mention the astounding US Supreme Court decisions we saw last June.

It is worth noting David Gergen, in spite of his advanced age, is definitely in touch with our times and often very vocal in his defense of movements that he sees as expressions of leadership, but which some would find controversial — if not in their essence, at least in the exercise of their agendas, such as BLM or Black Lives Matter that, while grounded in well-known tragedies, also led at times to violent demonstrations triggering destruction and property theft in recent years. He also found leadership in footballer Colin Kaepernick disrespectfully kneeling down at the time of the national anthem, as a sign of protest and demand for racial justice, that indeed became followed by many. Personally, while I can understand the historical roots and current societal triggers of such activism, I am equally not keen on statues brutally going down — not a sign of great leadership in action — as I believe that we should live with and learn from our history, trying to improve the future without erasing the past, which is also who we are, or allowing uncontrolled violence on the altar of demand for any type of justice. However, he also stresses similar milestones that most, if not all, would welcome, such as the election of Michelle Wu, the first Asian American female mayor of Boston. It is clear that he sees the rise of movements like BLM and others as a response to the toxic atmosphere created by the presidency (leadership?) of Donald Trump, a man who paradoxically may have unwittingly “woken up” activism. He also sees the current nature of those movements, not all aggressive in their expressions but certainly forceful, as reflecting the current times we know and the engagement of the younger generations. Some of the new and very young leaders, like the often odd, but powerful, Greta Thunberg or the figureheads of the Parkland School student survivors, while determined in their message, be it on climate change or mass shootings — both sadly ever topical matters — fight the good fights also in remarkable ways that go beyond their years. He sees them, borrowing from Steve Jobs, making “a dent in the universe” in five ways: leading social movements; becoming elected officials; being social entrepreneurs; joining the national service; and/or simply but crucially being voices of change. His main advice is to start “now” and “throw yourself in the arena,” an expression he borrows from Theodore Roosevelt’s memorable speech, often referred to these days, on “Citizenship in a Republic” at the Sorbonne after his presidency in April 1910.

One theme David Gergen does not address in his book is that there can also be bad leaders, as history showed with Adolf Hitler or Josef Stalin, who caused massive death and misery to millions in Europe, including in their own countries. While they led their countries to their massive losses, or eventually later disappearance, were they “leaders” according to David Gergen’s rule book? Can leadership be achieved for the wrong reasons and against most of the values and principles shown in his book? Are the leaders of China and especially Russia today to be considered leaders according to David Gergen? All while Vladimir Putin benefits — as far as we know — from the support of a majority of Russians, his “followers,” in a strange “Stockholm syndrome” way, even after the unprecedented and tragic Ukraine invasion that must be hard to conceal or show in the best light, even if the Kremlin is the greatest domestic sales organization and controller of news on earth. And would President Trump, while having achieved the top role in the land, be considered a true leader knowing the blows, at times of a long-term nature, he delivered to America leading to the state of quasi-civil war and institutional demise seen across its entire society? Some of the greatest examples of the Trump legacy can be seen today in the US Supreme Court, now time and time again politicizing its decisions — overturning 49-year old Roe V. Wade, 100-year old New York gun concealment legislation, EPA’s ability to curb carbon emissions — under the veneer of legal review, or an overstated focus on historical and legal form over substance — all against a clear and massive majority opinion of Americans against these court moves, and the pleasure of some largely unrepresentative political, religious and business lobbies.

In his Executive Summary, David Gergen gives us a nine page “20 key takeaways,” perhaps as a recognition that in 2022 the attention span has been reduced via current means like social media and our tech world, resulting in people reading far fewer books (a sad thought that hopefully is still unproven). Again, his main audience is American, explaining his natural focus, though his takeaways are rather universal. Each would deserve to be read in full.

1. Our country needs a serious course correction
2. Prepare now to pass the torch to new generations
3. Leadership, always hard, has become harder
4. Leadership comes from within
5. Have three objectives early
6. Find your true north
7. Focus on your strengths
8. Extend your leadership journey outside yourself
9. Try hard things, fail, move on
10. You are never too young to lead
11. Devote a year to national service
12. Secure your finance
13. Embrace crucible moments
14. Learn to manage your boss
15. Mobilize others through persuasion
16. Your greatest enemy might be you
17. Learn from new models of leadership
18. Seek guidance from the past and present
19. Friends and networks still matter
20. Maintain a celestial spark

“Hearts touched with fire” is a great book of the journey type into the soul of people who have made a difference around them, while usually impacting society. It is definitely a summer read for those who may want to go back to basics and seek more sanity in our challenging world.

On a personal note, it might be a sign of wise and forward-thinking leadership for David Gergen to send a copy of his book to Vladimir Putin (as long as sanctions are not infringed of course).

Warmest regards,

Serge