The Intelligence from The Economist
Episodes
Girls interrupted: Afghanistan
15 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When the Taliban resumed power, there were hopes that women might not be as excluded, repressed and abused as they were previously. Those hopes have f...
Food haul: aid trickles into Tigray
14 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A ceasefire agreed weeks ago should have mitigated the suffering of starving Ethiopians caught up in war; we ask why so little aid has got through. Re...
Just fine: Boris Johnson and “partygate”
13 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Police have served Britain’s prime minister, among others, with a fine for breaching the lockdown rules he instituted. He may yet again emerge unsca...
A stretch and a run: Brazil’s ex-president returns
12 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva left office with a sky-high approval rating, having raised millions from poverty—but was then convicted of corruption. No...
Le Pen is mightier than before: France’s election
11 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
President Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen of the nationalist-populist National Rally party will advance to a run-off; in the continuation of our ser...
Laïcité, extrémité, fragilité: our French-election series in full
09 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The first round of the presidential election is on Sunday and our first-ever series has been following the race closely. This compendium of the first ...
Gota the trouble: Sri Lanka’s crises
08 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Through ineptitude and bad timing, President Gotabaya Rajapaksa—known as Gota—has driven his country toward ruin. Its people want him out. Russian...
Nasty, brutish and long? The war’s next stage
07 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Russian troops have withdrawn from suburban Kyiv to focus on the eastern Donbas region. With Western weapons for Ukraine flowing in, a grinding war of...
Zero's intolerance: Shanghai’s messy lockdown
06 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
China’s zero-covid policy is being stretched to breaking point as the virus makes its way through the city. Supplies are low, residents are angry an...
Bodies in the streets: Russian atrocities
05 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Our correspondent reports from towns around Kyiv, where Russian forces appear to have committed war crimes, including summary executions and random mu...
No-confidence interval: Pakistan’s embattled PM
04 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Prime Minister Imran Khan seems to be trying everything to avoid an ouster. The powerful military brass may simply want a new leader who is less hosti...
All opposed, say nothing: Hungary’s election
01 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Viktor Orban’s eight-year assault on the country’s institutions will help his bid for re-election. But the poll is far bigger than Hungary: it is ...
Oil and vodka: Russia’s resilient economy
31 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After Russia invaded Ukraine, Western businesses pulled out and governments imposed punishing sanctions. But Russia’s economy is proving surprisingl...
Capital outflow: Russia changes tack
30 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It appears that Russian forces are withdrawing from Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital, to focus on the eastern region of Donbas. We examine what the shifting ...
Talk in Turkey: Russia-Ukraine peace negotiations
29 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Negotiators are again meeting face-to-face, this time in Istanbul. There is little hope of reaching an agreement at this stage—and even less that it...
In the war room: our exclusive visit to Zelensky’s “fortress”
28 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Our editors traverse layers of security to reach the situation room where Ukraine’s president is so often seen addressing the world. They ask about ...
Under fire: Life in Kharkiv
25 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For the past month, one of our editors has spoken daily with a young man in Kharkiv. Today he discusses his family's decision to leave their hometown ...
What little remains: The destruction of Mariupol
24 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For weeks, Russian forces have besieged the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol. Up to 90% of its structures have been destroyed, and while thousands have...
Vlad the in-jailer: Alexei Navalny sentenced
23 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Alexei Navalny returned to Russia after being poisoned in an assassination attempt that many believe came from the Kremlin. He was immediately arreste...
Russian to judgment: Putin accused of war crimes
22 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Joe Biden, among others, has called Vladimir Putin “a war criminal.” International tribunals have tried and convicted war criminals from Rwanda an...
Blood will out: Russian mercenaries
21 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Russian forces advancing on Kyiv have stalled. Ukraine has refused the demand to surrender Mariupol. But it’s not just Russian regular troops fighti...
Mention the war: Germany awakes
18 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For decades, Germany was doctrinally pacifist: a legacy left over from the second world war. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has changed that, seemingl...
Shock and war: global prices rise
17 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has pushed global prices, which were already climbing, even higher. As America’s central bank raises its target inter...
Bear hug? China’s take on Ukraine
16 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
China appears content to let the carnage continue in Ukraine, anticipating a win for Vladimir Putin. Its real concern is avoiding an apparent win for ...
Capital accounts: on the ground in Kyiv
15 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Our correspondent finds Ukraine's capital already accustomed to an eerie war footing. People are getting married and playing music, even as medicine r...
Abject lesson: the siege of Mariupol
14 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
To the west, strikes near Poland have rattled NATO partners. But look to the south-east to see what Russia intends for the Ukrainian cities it encircl...
Defog of war: your questions answered
11 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We tackle some of the many questions on the war in Ukraine that listeners sent in this week—why no-fly zones are a perilous idea, how weapons are ma...
A non-member states: Finland’s ex-PM on NATO
10 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Perched at Russia’s north-western corner, the country has plenty of history dealing with neighbourly aggression. We speak with Alexander Stubb, a fo...
Strikes, fear: an update from Kharkiv
09 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After failing to take Ukraine’s second city, Russian forces continue to pummel it with air, artillery and missile strikes. We speak again with an in...
War stories: the view from Russia
08 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
With the propaganda machine at fever pitch, not everyone in Russia agrees on—much less agrees with—what is going on in Ukraine. Dissent is being m...
Bear trapped: the sanctions on Russia
07 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The West’s co-ordinated financial weaponry is starting to bite, opening a new age of economic conflict; once-unthinkable oil embargoes seem now to b...
Rushing from Russians: Ukraine’s refugees
04 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has triggered a refugee crisis in Europe. More than a million people have left; millions more could follow. Turkey’s ...
Climate of fear: the IPCC’s new report
03 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A new report shows that climate change is already causing widespread, tangible damage, and argues that adaptation is now as important as mitigation. A...
All that Xi wants: China’s Ukraine dilemma
02 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After backing Russia’s grievances against NATO, China now finds itself treading a very fine line on Ukraine. There are often reasons to be suspiciou...
Square in their sights: Kharkiv under siege
01 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The levelling of Freedom Square in Ukraine’s second city is powerfully symbolic. One resident has been speaking to us daily since the invasion began...
The battlefield broadens: Ukraine resists
28 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On the ground, Ukrainian resistance is holding—so far—and Vladimir Putin’s nuclear posturing reveals a crumbling of his plans. Meanwhile the int...
Capital offence: the battle for Ukraine
25 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As promised, Ukraine’s forces are fighting back tenaciously against a Russian invasion on multiple fronts—but Kyiv, the capital, is now squarely i...
It begins: Russia invades Ukraine
24 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Ukrainians woke to the sound of sirens. Volleys of cruise missiles, artillery, widespread reports of explosions: a large-scale invasion appears to be ...
Given choice: Colombia’s abortion-law change
23 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In little more than a year, three of Latin America’s four most populous countries have expanded access to abortion. We ask what is driving that chan...
Putting his first boot forward: Russian troops move
22 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
President Vladimir Putin has declared the independence of the two Ukrainian provinces of Donbas—and sent in "peacekeepers". We ask what is next. The...
Trial run: genocide claims against Myanmar
21 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Gambia’s first-of-its-kind case at the International Court of Justice might bring a rebuke and shine light on Myanmar’s brutal tactics. It mig...
On the brinkmanship: a special episode on Ukraine and Russia
18 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
We unpick the week’s torrent of headlines; an invasion may yet come but either way President Vladimir Putin has already harmed Russia. The country’...
Sharpest tools, in a box: miniature vaccine factories
17 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
BioNTech, the German firm behind the first licensed coronavirus jab, reveals its attempts to stuff its technology into shipping containers—to be use...
Judge, jury and executive: another power-grab in Tunisia
16 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Last summer President Kais Saied nobbled the legislature; now he has abolished the judiciary. We ask where the country is headed, and why there is so ...
Yen here before: Japan’s “new capitalism”
15 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s figures showing the first annual economic growth in three years may seem promising. But the grand plans of Prime Minister Kishida Fumio rese...
Not trucking around: Canada’s protests spread
14 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
It has become much more than a fight against proof-of-vaccination strictures. The anti-government mood has spread in Canada and abroad. What happens n...
Withdrawal symptoms: Afghanistan goes hungry
11 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Since American forces left, pessimism has skyrocketed—and with good reason. Starvation is driving Afghans to sell their organs and even their childr...
Which way UP: India’s bellwether election
10 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The state-legislature poll in Uttar Pradesh is in effect a vote on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s increasingly stringent Hindu-national agenda—and...
The quiet man of Europe: Olaf Scholz
09 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
So far Germany’s new chancellor has been all but invisible at home and on the international stage. We examine the motives behind his reticence—and...
FAANGer danger: big tech takes a beating
08 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
For years, the big tech firms Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google were seen as a collective good bet; investors will soon judge them eac...
Fission creep: Iran nuclear talks resume
07 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
After protracted negotiations, at last a conclusion appears nigh—but depending on whom you ask, a breakthrough is as likely as a breakdown. The regi...
Skin in the Games: Beijing’s nervy Olympics
04 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Our correspondent describes the fraught effort to attend the opening ceremony. It is a pageant highlighting a divided world, with party leaders a...
A model result: our French-election series begins
03 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In the first instalment of the series, we unveil our forecast model and visit one of the quiet suburbs where the vote’s outcome will probably be dec...
Action pact: NATO’s Ukraine role
02 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Our correspondent speaks with Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary-general, who says the alliance’s involvement in de-escalating Russia tensions is ...
Do as I say, except at my dos: Boris Johnson’s parties
01 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A long-awaited report confirms rumours that have consumed Boris Johnson’s premiership. He may be weakened, but early signs suggest he will not fall....
Sunshine statement: Ron DeSantis’s Florida
31 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Talk of a presidential run for the governor is growing. We examine the state’s rightward lurch as a bellwether of his intent and his political stren...
Insecurities in securities: why markets are sliding
28 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Huge swings and downward trends: markets are forward-looking, and it is clear they do not see much to look forward to in 2022. Warnings about infectio...
On the edge of his seat: Stephen Breyer
27 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The departure of one of America’s Supreme Court justices is an opportunity for President Joe Biden to choose a replacement, but the clock is ticking...
Twist of faith: religious hatred in India
26 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As the country celebrates its secular constitution, we examine the rising bigotry of Hindu nationalists—at best tolerated and at worst encouraged by...
What’s it good for? Putin’s Ukraine calculus
25 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
More Russian troops piling in. Embassy staff pulling out. American forces on alert and sober diplomacy still on the docket. We examine Vladimir Putin'...
Prime mover? Mario Draghi and the Italian presidency
24 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This week’s secretive votes will determine the next president and the current prime minister looks to be a favourite. But that move would be bad for...
Unsustainable envelopment goals: China’s zero-covid fight
21 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The Omicron variant is destined to test the limits of a policy that has already proved costly: consumption, growth and confidence are all flagging. Th...
Heavyweight-price fight: how to beat global inflation
20 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Shoppers across the developed world face sharply rising prices, and leaders are reaching for all manner of remedies—but that’s what central banks ...
Drilling into the numbers: ExxonMobil
19 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
America’s biggest oil firm has long been recalcitrant on climate matters, so its new net-zero targets may seem surprising. We examine the substance ...
Through deny of a needle: vaccine mandates
18 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Austria is set to enact a bold policy of levying fines on the unvaccinated. We look at what is driving governments to such measures, and whether they ...
But who’s counting? Voting rights in America
17 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Democrats will spend the week battling for a tightening of laws on casting votes; that will overshadow Republicans’ worrying push into how those vot...
His royal minus: Prince Andrew
14 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The queen’s second son has been stripped of his titles—an apparent bid to insulate the crown from his legal troubles. But dangers to the prince an...
In vino, veritas: Boris Johnson under fire
13 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
While Britons followed covid strictures, the prime minister’s residence hosted boozy gatherings; widespread fury hints that his prevarications this ...
Not in the same class: America and schools
12 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The country’s children have missed more in-person learning than those in most of the rich world—to their cost. We ask why battles about schooling ...
Talking out his asks: Putin’s NATO demands
11 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
This week’s flurry of diplomacy aims to address what Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president, says he wants. He cannot get it. Does an invasion of Ukra...
Hope for the crest: an Omicron wave hits India
10 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The country has the world’s worst estimated covid-death total—but as another variant takes hold there are reasons for optimism. Mexico’s preside...
Fuel to the flames: uprising in Kazakhstan
07 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What started as a fuel-price skirmish has engulfed the entire country; now Russian-led troops have been summoned to help. How did things escalate so q...
Capitol crimes: one year after America’s insurrection
06 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The insurrection’s horrors might have marked a turning point for Donald Trump’s supporters and enablers. Not so; the people and the politics remai...
Stop the presses! Hong Kong’s media crackdown
05 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The closure of two independent, Chinese-language media outlets all but completes the push to silence pro-democracy press; we ask what is next for the ...
Holmes stretch: Theranos’s founder convicted
04 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Elizabeth Holmes has been found guilty of fraud. We ask what lessons her downfall holds for Theranos’s high-profile backers—and for a startup cult...
Separate weighs: Brexit, one year on
03 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Trade is down, red tape is up, details of regulatory harmony are still being hammered out. Britain may be less divided about it, but the benefits of t...
All she wrote: our obituaries editor reflects on 2021
30 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
From Prince Philip to Desmond Tutu, from an anti-racism campaigner and member of the Auschwitz Girls’ Orchestra to a war surgeon focused on civilian...
A few bright spots: our country of the year
29 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Each year The Economist selects its country of the year: a place that has improved the most. Improvement, though, was damnably rare in 2021. We run th...
You bet your dollar-bottomed: Erdogan’s next gambit
28 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s idea for saving the lira by backing deposits with dollars means the Turkish taxpayer will end up bailing out the Tu...
Beginning of the endemic? Omicron’s spread
27 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The lightning-fast spread of a seemingly milder coronavirus variant may represent a shift from pandemic to endemic; we ask how that would change globa...
No safety in numbers: security in Haiti
23 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The security situation is hopeless, following violent unrest and a presidential assassination—as one family’s epic and ultimately failed attempt t...
Relocation, relocation, relocation: America’s internal migration
22 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The flood of people out of cities is unlike anything since the suburbanisation of the 1950s; we examine the inevitable economic and political conseque...
All about that base: Japan’s security policy
21 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
In recent years the country has found itself in a sharply different geopolitical environment, responding by building bases and security-partner ties a...
Back to the USSR: Russia and Ukraine
20 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As border tensions continue to build, our Russia editor looks back to the fall of the Soviet Union to explain why Russia has never accepted Ukraine’...
Centre of no attention: Chile’s presidential election
17 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As the vote’s second round has neared, the candidates have shifted, a bit, from their positions at opposite ends of the political spectrum. Which ra...
Money printer slow brrr: the Fed turns down the taps
16 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
America’s central bank plans to pinch off its massive bond-buying programme much faster in a bid to stall inflation; our correspondent says it is pe...
In full swing: Ethiopia’s shifting civil war
15 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
More than a year after a rebellion Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed promised to put down in weeks, the balance of power keeps swinging—and neighbouring sta...
Twister of fate? Tornadoes and climate change
14 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Many have been quick to link the tornado catastrophe in America’s Upland South to climate change; we ask why that is a tricky connection to draw. Ci...
Protein shake-up: getting to know Omicron
13 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The latest “variant of concern” has spread far—and fast. We examine what has been learned about it at equally striking speed, and ask what to lo...
Unsafe as houses? Evergrande and China’s big plans
10 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The wildly indebted property firm has defaulted at last. That poses big risks as China’s leadership works to refashion financial markets and draw in...
Ain’t no party: scandals hobble Britain’s government
09 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
At two years into Boris Johnson’s premiership, yet more scandal ensures attention will still stray from the sweeping agenda of change he promised. A...
CDU later: Angela Merkel’s successor
08 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
For the first time in 16 years Mrs Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union is out of Germany’s government. We ask what to expect from Olaf Scholz, the...
Off the warpath: America 80 years after Pearl Harbour
07 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The Japanese attack set America on a course toward military hegemony; recent administrations have walked it back. We ask what the country would fight ...
The first sentence of the story: Aung San Suu Kyi
06 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Myanmar’s ousted leader has been sentenced to four years in prison; more guilty verdicts are expected soon. That will only fuel unrest that has not ...
Taiwan thing after another: the Solomon Islands
03 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The archipelago’s diplomatic pivot to China has added an international dimension to the latest flare-up of domestic tensions. We ask how this tiny s...
Roe blow? SCOTUS weighs abortion rights
02 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The conservative supermajority on America’s Supreme Court looks likely to strip back rights enshrined since the Roe v Wade ruling in 1973. Beset by ...
The house that Jack built: Twitter’s founder departs
01 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Jack Dorsey’s departure from the social-media giant reflects the growing primacy of engineering talent, and the waning mythology of the big-tech fou...
Centrifugal forces: Iran nuclear talks resume
30 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Things were all smiles after negotiations resumed—but it is difficult to see how a middle ground can be reached in Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Apple...
Priority letter: the Omicron variant
29 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Governments’ rapid responses to a new coronavirus strain were wise. But much is still to be learned about the Omicron variant before longer-term pol...
A cut-rate theory: Turkey’s currency spiral
26 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As President Recep Tayyip Erdogan keeps pushing his upside-down economic ideas, the currency plummets and an immiserated population grows restless. Su...