foreignpolicy--2020-05-01--How Life in Our Cities Will Look After the Coronavirus Pandemic

Hunkered down at home , rarely venturing into hauntingly empty streets , most of us are still at a loss at how urban life will look afterwards .
Will restaurants survive and jobs come back ?
Will people still travel in crowded subways ?
Do we even need office towers when everyone is on Zoom ?
Come to think of it , the idea of living on a farm seems suddenly attractive .
Cities thrive on the opportunities for work and play , and on the endless variety of available goods and services .
If fear of disease becomes the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for a bland and antiseptic future , perhaps even a dystopian one .
But if the world ’ s cities find ways to adjust , as they always have in the past , their greatest era may yet lie before them .
To help us make sense of urban life after the pandemic , Foreign Policy asked 11 leading thinkers from around the world to weigh in with their predictions .
Great cities will survive the coronavirus .
Cities have been the epicenters of infectious disease since the time of Gilgamesh , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ before .
The Black Death decimated cities in Europe during the Middle Ages , and in Asia all the way up to the start of the 20th century .
The Spanish Flu of 1918 killed as many as 50 million people worldwide , and yet New York , London , and Paris all boomed in its wake .
In fact , history shows that people often moved to cities after pandemics because of the better job opportunities and the higher wages they offered after the sudden drop in population.The crisis may provide a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cities to reset and to reenergize their creative scenes .
Some aspects of our cities and metropolitan areas will be reshaped , depending on how long the current pandemic lasts .
Fear of density , and of subways and trains in particular , plus a desire for safer , more private surroundings may pull some toward the suburbs and rural areas .
Families with children and the vulnerable , in particular , may trade their city apartments for a house with a backyard .
But other forces will push people back toward the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will continue to flock to cities in search of personal and professional opportunities .
Artists and musicians may be drawn back by lower rents , thanks to the economic fallout from the virus .
The crisis may provide a short window for our unaffordable , hypergentrified cities to reset and to reenergize their creative scenes .
Predictions of the death of cities always follow shocks like this one .
But urbanization has always been a greater force than infectious disease .
Looking Beyond the Urban Jobs Armageddon Before the coronavirus pandemic , I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ jobs to belie dystopian visions of a robotized economy .
The ability to provide pleasure by serving a latte with a smile has long provided a safe haven where the unemployed could find work .
But if pandemics become routine , then human interactions will create more fear than joy , and those jobs will vanish.If pandemics become the new normal , then tens of millions of urban service jobs will disappear .
For a blessed century , Western cities have been healthy .
We forgot that contagious disease has shaped urban fortunes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
That safe century saw jobs move from farms to factories to the service sectors that now employ 80 percent of U.S. workers .
In the United States alone , 32 million jobs are in retail , leisure , and hospitality .
They are on the front lines of the pandemic .
One recent survey found that 70 percent of smaller restaurants expect to be permanently closed if the COVID-19 crisis lasts four months or more .
If pandemics become the new normal , then tens of millions of urban service jobs will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this labor market Armageddon is to invest billions of dollars intelligently in anti-pandemic health care infrastructure so that this terrible outbreak can remain a one-time aberration .
An Opportunity to Build Back Better The coronavirus pandemic is transforming city life .
It is overwhelming hospitals , demolishing commerce , restricting access to public spaces , straining digital infrastructure , intensifying mental health challenges , and forcing people indoors .
In the absence of a vaccine , many of these disruptions could become permanent .
Cities were already facing chronic revenue shortfalls and budget @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now is to save lives , deliver essential services , and maintain law and order .
This is especially important in developing-world cities and informal settlements where rising food prices increase the risk of hunger and social unrest .
City mayors are already revisiting urban plans to prevent the next pandemic .
In the short term , many will introduce mass testing and digital contact tracing , retrofit buildings and public spaces for social distancing , and bolster health systems to deal with future threats .
The pandemic is also accelerating deeper , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the digitalization of retail , the move to a cashless economy , the shift to remote work and virtual delivery of services , and the pedestrianization of streets .
Public transit will struggle to retain ridership without social distancing adjustments .
Driverless cars and micro-mobility schemes may become increasingly vital .
The pandemic is exposing the quality of governance and scale of inequalities in our global cities .
It is also providing an opportunity for urban planners and entrepreneurs to build back better .
Some of them are exploring ways to upgrade their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ density and greener investment .
Cities are the perfect test beds for new innovations .
First movers such as Amsterdam ; Bristol , England ; and Melbourne , Australia , are already developing plans that prioritize circular economics , climate resilience , and a radical intolerance of inequality .
Hungry for the Simple Joys of City Life Cities have endured terrible pandemics throughout history , yet they flourished to grow ever larger and denser .
The feared contraction of urban life after COVID-19 will be temporary at best , even in the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Cities were often considered corrupting and immoral compared to the countryside—a creed that ultimately gave us suburbia .
Even the United States ’ first great planned city , Philadelphia , kept the hazards of Old World density at bay with its unusually large original lots .
The city ’ s founder , William Penn , had survived the plague and fire of 1660s London and wanted neither in his city .
The current pandemic is just the latest historical pivot to have pundits predicting the death of the city .
During the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , glowing targets , prompting an urban decentralization movement during the Cold War .
To futurists such as Marshall McLuhan , George Gilder , and Alvin Toffler , it was digital communications that would kill the city and lead to a return to rural life by what they called “ ultrahigh-abstraction workers ” —the very demographic that instead has flocked to San Francisco , New York , and London .
The 9/11 attacks prompted obituaries for the skyscraper and Lower Manhattan , neither of which shows any signs of going away .
What @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ?
Many of our favorite bars , restaurants , and cafes will be gone , but others will take their place .
Elders and the immunocompromised may avoid urban spaces for a time , yielding a temporarily younger , fitter , more risk-tolerant downtown population .
And the inevitable lingering fear of infection will be countered by a quarantine rebound effect : People will strain to get out from lockdown , hungry for the simple joys of being in fearless proximity with one another on a busy city street .
Cities Will Excel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over , young people have flocked to urban environments in search of work and education , opportunities to interact with others their age , and new experiences in culture and the arts .
With the ongoing transmission of the coronavirus—and given our new awareness of the risks of infectious disease—population density has suddenly become less attractive .
Shared apartments , which are an affordable launching point for newcomers to experience the breadth of cities , have become claustrophobic under quarantine .
At the same time , we have seen the urban rich , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ escape to their summer homes .
Many of them may recalculate their preferences permanently.While it is impossible to predict what the new normal will be , it may well be reverse urbanization .
Now that so many of us have created new routines working remotely via countless Zoom teleconferences , we may start to see an exodus from the city to more rural environments .
While it is impossible to predict what the new normal will be , it may well be reverse urbanization .
Yet we also fully expect that municipal leaders @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
What was once an underfunded , understaffed area of health departments will become more robust .
We will develop best practices for protecting population health in cities , which will help keep urban environments attractive .
We Can Create a Better Urban Future Where No One Is Left Behind Around 95 percent of people with COVID-19 live in urban areas .
This has brought into sharp relief some of the fundamental inequalities at the heart of our towns and cities .
COVID-19 will hit the most vulnerable the hardest , including the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s densely populated informal settlements and slums , as well as other people lacking access to adequate , affordable , and secure housing .
Without a house , it is impossible to heed the call to stay at home .
Without safe shelter and access to basic services , the order to shelter in place has no meaning.Without safe shelter and access to basic services , the order to shelter in place has no meaning .
This pandemic is already exacerbating the urban divide that has resulted from a long-term failure to address @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The post-COVID-19 response will require these failures to be addressed and all urban residents provided with basic services—especially health care and housing—to ensure everyone can live with dignity and be prepared for the next global crisis .
Local authorities will have to be the driving force in reducing inequality , supported by national government policies that increase the resilience of cities and their residents .
The eternal optimist in me aspires to , and firmly believes in , a better urban future in which no one and no place is left behind @ @ @ @ @ @ @ We ’ ve Needed All Along The road to recovery from this pandemic runs along our streets .
We can bring back cities without bringing back the traffic , the congestion , the pollution , and the 1.3 million people who die in traffic crashes every year .
We can reclaim and reset our streets to move people by foot , bike , or public transportation—and do it safely , affordably , and easily , no matter where they live in the city .
And we have an opportunity to give city residents @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for getting around and the freedom not to have to own a car.The pandemic reveals just how much cities depend on essential workers—and how much essential workers depend on public transport .
The pandemic reveals just how much cities depend on essential workers—and how much essential workers depend on public trains and buses to reach jobs at hospitals , grocery stores , and other links in the supply chain .
Our ability to endure this pandemic relies on new safety protocols to keep passengers and public transport workers safe , and on investing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ next crisis easier to manage .
This challenge we ’ re faced with isn ’ t whether cities will survive as we know them .
The question is whether we will have the imagination and vision to transform streets and bring about the safer , more accessible , and more resilient cities we ’ ve needed all along .
History teaches us that crises usually bring about new government agencies and institutions .
The United States created the Department of Homeland Security after the 9/11 attacks and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau following @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pandemic is therefore likely to drive institutional change in cities , where new capacities will have to emerge to address economic devastation .
The unprecedented collapse of small businesses , particularly those along commercial corridors in disadvantaged communities and those owned by people of color , will require new public or nonprofit intermediaries to provide services to financially impaired firms and sophisticated training to new entrepreneurs .
We already have business incubators and accelerators—what we need now are regenerators .
These should ensure access to equity-driven financial products , rather than simply providing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , public land banks and nonprofit development corporations—which allow land to be pooled and revitalization to be accelerated—will grow in significance .
Models such as Copenhagen ’ s City and Port Development Corporation or Cincinnati ’ s Center City Development Corporation , long admired but rarely replicated , will be fundamental to urban recovery .
Without radical institutional change , the inclusive recovery of cities will be a very long time in coming .
Cities will remain critical to human society , but they need to change .
The coronavirus and high-density living @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pandemic ’ s genesis in crowded , unsanitary urban China to the much higher rates of hospitalization and death in large cities around the world .
The contrast to the less dense hinterland couldn ’ t be starker , especially in the United States , where New York City has borne the brunt of the pandemic.Answers may include developing personal , autonomous transport systems instead of forcing people into crowded subways .
Answers may include allowing more growth in the periphery , which would require substantial changes in land use and zoning regulations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and developing personal , eventually autonomous transport systems instead of forcing people into crowded subways .
When cities were afflicted with pandemics in the early 20th century , society responded with de-densification .
Manhattan went from a population of nearly 2.5 million in 1920 to 1.5 million in 1970 .
A similar process occurred in central London and Paris .
As more people moved to the periphery , cities got safer and more sanitary .
A similar strategy will help us in the future .
Some dispersion of the population might also allow @ @ @ @ @ @ @ housing costs .
The next generation of suburbs , however , will have to be designed for lower emissions , more home-based work , and shorter commutes .
A Wake-Up Call for Cities to Rethink Their Economic Model The coronavirus pandemic has been a wake-up call for cities around the world to rethink urban planning with health security as a top priority .
In Singapore , the health system was already reorganized in the wake of the 2003 SARS epidemic , but this coronavirus is different .
There are many aspects to health @ @ @ @ @ @ @ city lacking a rural hinterland , especially those involving the vulnerability of medical and food supply chains.Many aspects to health security pose special challenges for cities , especially those involving the vulnerability of medical and food supply chains .
Another aspect in a city like Singapore is securing the health of the large population of migrant foreign workers who have helped build and sustain the city .
Singapore ’ s total population is 5.7 million , of which almost 1 million are semi-skilled and unskilled workers , including foreign domestic workers and roughly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ construction .
Most are housed in mega-sized dormitories .
This close communal living , as well as crowded worksites , facilitated the infection of many workers in this pandemic .
Post-coronavirus , the design of the dormitories will certainly be revisited and protocols strengthened .
And it is almost certain that the current economic model—one that relies heavily on migrant workers for growth and development—will be rethought .
The promotion of technology to increase productivity , long advocated by the government , will be stepped up with a greater urgency to reduce the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Must Restore Confidence in the Safety of Dense Living Cities will come back stronger than ever after the pandemic .
But when they do , it will be driven by a new model of growth that emphasizes inclusivity , sustainability , and economic opportunity .
Even before the crisis , urban communities around the world were demanding lower costs of living and stronger plans to tackle climate change .
Some unaffordable cities , such as New York , were even seeing residents leave town .
Reviving urban population growth after the pandemic will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ health and in the safety of dense living .
But when people do return to cities—as they always have in the past—we must leverage new policies and technologies to make urban life more affordable and sustainable for more people .
Cheaper , more flexible building methods such as tall timber construction can lower the cost of housing and dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of new buildings .
New mobility options and public transit extensions can help residents reach jobs without needing to own a car .
Energy innovations can enable all-electric neighborhoods that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that break the bank .
If we take this opportunity to build better , cities will not just recover but provide greater opportunities than they did before the coronavirus struck .

Richard Florida, Edward Glaeser, Maimunah Mohd Sharif, Thomas J. Campanella, Chan Heng Chee, Dan Doctoroff, Bruce Katz, Rebecca Katz, Joel Kotkin, Robert Muggah and Janette Sadik-Khan

Cities are at the center of this pandemic, as they have been during so many plagues in history. The virus originated in a crowded city in central China. It spread between cities and has taken the most lives in cities. New York has become the world’s saddest, most dismal viral hotspot.
Cities are at the center of this pandemic, as they have been during so many plagues in history. The virus originated in a crowded city in central China. It spread between cities and has taken the most lives in cities. New York has become the world’s saddest, most dismal viral hotspot.
Hunkered down at home, rarely venturing into hauntingly empty streets, most of us are still at a loss at how urban life will look afterwards. Will restaurants survive and jobs come back? Will people still travel in crowded subways? Do we even need office towers when everyone is on Zoom? Come to think of it, the idea of living on a farm seems suddenly attractive.
Cities thrive on the opportunities for work and play, and on the endless variety of available goods and services. If fear of disease becomes the new normal, cities could be in for a bland and antiseptic future, perhaps even a dystopian one. But if the world’s cities find ways to adjust, as they always have in the past, their greatest era may yet lie before them.
To help us make sense of urban life after the pandemic, Foreign Policy asked 12 leading thinkers from around the world to weigh in with their predictions.—Stefan Theil, deputy editor
Cities Will Survive the Coronavirus
by Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, a fellow at New York University, a co-founder of CityLab, and the author of The Rise of the Creative Class and The New Urban Crisis.
Great cities will survive the coronavirus. Cities have been the epicenters of infectious disease since the time of Gilgamesh, and they have always bounced back—often stronger than before. The Black Death decimated cities in Europe during the Middle Ages, and in Asia all the way up to the start of the 20th century. The Spanish Flu of 1918 killed as many as 50 million people worldwide, and yet New York, London, and Paris all boomed in its wake. In fact, history shows that people often moved to cities after pandemics because of the better job opportunities and the higher wages they offered after the sudden drop in population.The crisis may provide a short window for our unaffordable, hypergentrified cities to reset and to reenergize their creative scenes.
Some aspects of our cities and metropolitan areas will be reshaped, depending on how long the current pandemic lasts. Fear of density, and of subways and trains in particular, plus a desire for safer, more private surroundings may pull some toward the suburbs and rural areas. Families with children and the vulnerable, in particular, may trade their city apartments for a house with a backyard. But other forces will push people back toward the great urban centers. Ambitious young people will continue to flock to cities in search of personal and professional opportunities. Artists and musicians may be drawn back by lower rents, thanks to the economic fallout from the virus. The crisis may provide a short window for our unaffordable, hypergentrified cities to reset and to reenergize their creative scenes.
Predictions of the death of cities always follow shocks like this one. But urbanization has always been a greater force than infectious disease.
Looking Beyond the Urban Jobs Armageddon
by Edward Glaeser, a professor of economics at Harvard University and the author of Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier, and Happier.
Before the coronavirus pandemic, I trusted urban entrepreneurs to create enough service jobs to belie dystopian visions of a robotized economy. The ability to provide pleasure by serving a latte with a smile has long provided a safe haven where the unemployed could find work. But if pandemics become routine, then human interactions will create more fear than joy, and those jobs will vanish.If pandemics become the new normal, then tens of millions of urban service jobs will disappear.
For a blessed century, Western cities have been healthy. We forgot that contagious disease has shaped urban fortunes since the plague of Athens slew Pericles. That safe century saw jobs move from farms to factories to the service sectors that now employ 80 percent of U.S. workers.
In the United States alone, 32 million jobs are in retail, leisure, and hospitality. They are on the front lines of the pandemic. One recent survey found that 70 percent of smaller restaurants expect to be permanently closed if the COVID-19 crisis lasts four months or more. If pandemics become the new normal, then tens of millions of urban service jobs will disappear. The only chance to prevent this labor market Armageddon is to invest billions of dollars intelligently in anti-pandemic health care infrastructure so that this terrible outbreak can remain a one-time aberration.
An Opportunity to Build Back Better
by Robert Muggah, founder of the Igarapé Institute and SecDev Group. He is the author (with Ian Goldin) of Terra Incognita: 100 Maps to Survive the Next 100 Years, to be published in August 2020 by Penguin.
The coronavirus pandemic is transforming city life. It is overwhelming hospitals, demolishing commerce, restricting access to public spaces, straining digital infrastructure, intensifying mental health challenges, and forcing people indoors. In the absence of a vaccine, many of these disruptions could become permanent. Cities were already facing chronic revenue shortfalls and budget deficits before the pandemic. The priority now is to save lives, deliver essential services, and maintain law and order. This is especially important in developing-world cities and informal settlements where rising food prices increase the risk of hunger and social unrest.
City mayors are already revisiting urban plans to prevent the next pandemic. In the short term, many will introduce mass testing and digital contact tracing, retrofit buildings and public spaces for social distancing, and bolster health systems to deal with future threats. The pandemic is also accelerating deeper, longer-term trends affecting cities, such as the digitalization of retail, the move to a cashless economy, the shift to remote work and virtual delivery of services, and the pedestrianization of streets. Public transit will struggle to retain ridership without social distancing adjustments. Driverless cars and micro-mobility schemes may become increasingly vital.
The pandemic is exposing the quality of governance and scale of inequalities in our global cities. It is also providing an opportunity for urban planners and entrepreneurs to build back better. Some of them are exploring ways to upgrade their zoning and procurement policies to promote smart density and greener investment. Cities are the perfect test beds for new innovations. First movers such as Amsterdam; Bristol, England; and Melbourne, Australia, are already developing plans that prioritize circular economics, climate resilience, and a radical intolerance of inequality.
Hungry for the Simple Joys of City Life
by Thomas J. Campanella, an associate professor of city planning and the director of the Urban and Regional Studies Program at Cornell University. He is the author of Brooklyn: The Once and Future City.
Cities have endured terrible pandemics throughout history, yet they flourished to grow ever larger and denser. The feared contraction of urban life after COVID-19 will be temporary at best, even in the United States with its long tradition of anti-urbanism. Cities were often considered corrupting and immoral compared to the countryside—a creed that ultimately gave us suburbia. Even the United States’ first great planned city, Philadelphia, kept the hazards of Old World density at bay with its unusually large original lots. The city’s founder, William Penn, had survived the plague and fire of 1660s London and wanted neither in his city.
The current pandemic is just the latest historical pivot to have pundits predicting the death of the city. During the atomic age, cities suddenly became hot, glowing targets, prompting an urban decentralization movement during the Cold War. To futurists such as Marshall McLuhan, George Gilder, and Alvin Toffler, it was digital communications that would kill the city and lead to a return to rural life by what they called “ultrahigh-abstraction workers”—the very demographic that instead has flocked to San Francisco, New York, and London. The 9/11 attacks prompted obituaries for the skyscraper and Lower Manhattan, neither of which shows any signs of going away.
What will our cities look like after COVID-19? Many of our favorite bars, restaurants, and cafes will be gone, but others will take their place. Elders and the immunocompromised may avoid urban spaces for a time, yielding a temporarily younger, fitter, more risk-tolerant downtown population. And the inevitable lingering fear of infection will be countered by a quarantine rebound effect: People will strain to get out from lockdown, hungry for the simple joys of being in fearless proximity with one another on a busy city street.
Cities Will Excel at Disease Prevention and Response
by Rebecca Katz, a professor at Georgetown University Medical Center, where she directs the Center for Global Health Science and Security.
The world over, young people have flocked to urban environments in search of work and education, opportunities to interact with others their age, and new experiences in culture and the arts. With the ongoing transmission of the coronavirus—and given our new awareness of the risks of infectious disease—population density has suddenly become less attractive. Shared apartments, which are an affordable launching point for newcomers to experience the breadth of cities, have become claustrophobic under quarantine. At the same time, we have seen the urban rich, who have gentrified city after city, escape to their summer homes. Many of them may recalculate their preferences permanently.While it is impossible to predict what the new normal will be, it may well be reverse urbanization.
Now that so many of us have created new routines working remotely via countless Zoom teleconferences, we may start to see an exodus from the city to more rural environments. While it is impossible to predict what the new normal will be, it may well be reverse urbanization.
Yet we also fully expect that municipal leaders will excel at disease preparedness and response. What was once an underfunded, understaffed area of health departments will become more robust. We will develop best practices for protecting population health in cities, which will help keep urban environments attractive.
We Can Create a Better Urban Future Where No One Is Left Behind
by Maimunah Mohd Sharif, the executive director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme.
Around 95 percent of people with COVID-19 live in urban areas. This has brought into sharp relief some of the fundamental inequalities at the heart of our towns and cities. COVID-19 will hit the most vulnerable the hardest, including the 1 billion residents of the world’s densely populated informal settlements and slums, as well as other people lacking access to adequate, affordable, and secure housing. Without a house, it is impossible to heed the call to stay at home. Without safe shelter and access to basic services, the order to shelter in place has no meaning.Without safe shelter and access to basic services, the order to shelter in place has no meaning.
This pandemic is already exacerbating the urban divide that has resulted from a long-term failure to address fundamental inequalities and guarantee basic human rights. The post-COVID-19 response will require these failures to be addressed and all urban residents provided with basic services—especially health care and housing—to ensure everyone can live with dignity and be prepared for the next global crisis. Local authorities will have to be the driving force in reducing inequality, supported by national government policies that increase the resilience of cities and their residents. The eternal optimist in me aspires to, and firmly believes in, a better urban future in which no one and no place is left behind.
India’s Cities Will Slow Down, Becoming Cleaner and Less Crowded
by Kiran Bedi, the lieutenant governor of Puducherry, India. She was the first woman in the Indian Police Service and served as an inspector general of the Delhi prisons.
Cities will get less crowded and slow down their pace. Rapid migration from rural to urban areas, like what we have seen in India, cannot continue at the same speed. People may start reconsidering agriculture.
Cities will lose part of their variety and public social life. There will be less eating out, more home delivery, and lower consumption of luxuries. Public cinemas will turn into home cinemas. Gyms and hair salons will not be in demand for quite some time, unless good practices of social distancing and hygiene are maintained. Commercial sex will be out of business.
Urban transportation will have to be more personal for reasons of social distancing. Travel will diminish everywhere, and international city-to-city travel will become far more expensive.
The way we work in cities will change. Working from home will be an option, supported by teleconferencing and cloud-based sharing—including in government administration. Office space will come at a much lower rate.
The urban air will be much cleaner, and urban life less expensive.
Create the Safe and Resilient City We’ve Needed All Along
by Janette Sadik-Khan, a principal at Bloomberg Associates. From 2007 to 2013, she was the commissioner of the New York City Department of Transportation.
The road to recovery from this pandemic runs along our streets. We can bring back cities without bringing back the traffic, the congestion, the pollution, and the 1.3 million people who die in traffic crashes every year. We can reclaim and reset our streets to move people by foot, bike, or public transportation—and do it safely, affordably, and easily, no matter where they live in the city. And we have an opportunity to give city residents around the world true transportation independence—real choices for getting around and the freedom not to have to own a car.The pandemic reveals just how much cities depend on essential workers—and how much essential workers depend on public transport.
The pandemic reveals just how much cities depend on essential workers—and how much essential workers depend on public trains and buses to reach jobs at hospitals, grocery stores, and other links in the supply chain. Our ability to endure this pandemic relies on new safety protocols to keep passengers and public transport workers safe, and on investing in extensive service expansions to make the next crisis easier to manage.
This challenge we’re faced with isn’t whether cities will survive as we know them. The question is whether we will have the imagination and vision to transform streets and bring about the safer, more accessible, and more resilient cities we’ve needed all along.
New Institutions Will Bring Back Cities
by Bruce Katz, founding director of the Nowak Metro Finance Lab at Drexel University.
History teaches us that crises usually bring about new government agencies and institutions. The United States created the Department of Homeland Security after the 9/11 attacks and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau following the 2008-2009 housing crash. The coronavirus pandemic is therefore likely to drive institutional change in cities, where new capacities will have to emerge to address economic devastation.
The unprecedented collapse of small businesses, particularly those along commercial corridors in disadvantaged communities and those owned by people of color, will require new public or nonprofit intermediaries to provide services to financially impaired firms and sophisticated training to new entrepreneurs. We already have business incubators and accelerators—what we need now are regenerators. These should ensure access to equity-driven financial products, rather than simply providing more debt. At the same time, public land banks and nonprofit development corporations—which allow land to be pooled and revitalization to be accelerated—will grow in significance. Models such as Copenhagen’s City and Port Development Corporation or Cincinnati’s Center City Development Corporation, long admired but rarely replicated, will be fundamental to urban recovery. Without radical institutional change, the inclusive recovery of cities will be a very long time in coming.
Urban Housing Will Get Cheaper
by Joel Kotkin, a fellow at Chapman University, the executive director of the Urban Reform Institute, and the author of The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class.
Cities will remain critical to human society, but they need to change. The coronavirus and high-density living have gone together from the start—from the pandemic’s genesis in crowded, unsanitary urban China to the much higher rates of hospitalization and death in large cities around the world. The contrast to the less dense hinterland couldn’t be starker, especially in the United States, where New York City has borne the brunt of the pandemic.Answers may include developing personal, autonomous transport systems instead of forcing people into crowded subways.
Answers may include allowing more growth in the periphery, which would require substantial changes in land use and zoning regulations; encouraging remote work where possible; and developing personal, eventually autonomous transport systems instead of forcing people into crowded subways. When cities were afflicted with pandemics in the early 20th century, society responded with de-densification. Manhattan went from a population of nearly 2.5 million in 1920 to 1.5 million in 1970. A similar process occurred in central London and Paris. As more people moved to the periphery, cities got safer and more sanitary. A similar strategy will help us in the future. Some dispersion of the population might also allow jobs to spread out and reduce urban housing costs. The next generation of suburbs, however, will have to be designed for lower emissions, more home-based work, and shorter commutes.
A Wake-Up Call for Cities to Rethink Their Economic Model
by Chan Heng Chee, a professor at Singapore University of Technology and Design and the chair of the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities.
The coronavirus pandemic has been a wake-up call for cities around the world to rethink urban planning with health security as a top priority. In Singapore, the health system was already reorganized in the wake of the 2003 SARS epidemic, but this coronavirus is different. There are many aspects to health security that pose special challenges for a city lacking a rural hinterland, especially those involving the vulnerability of medical and food supply chains.Many aspects to health security pose special challenges for cities, especially those involving the vulnerability of medical and food supply chains.
Another aspect in a city like Singapore is securing the health of the large population of migrant foreign workers who have helped build and sustain the city. Singapore’s total population is 5.7 million, of which almost 1 million are semi-skilled and unskilled workers, including foreign domestic workers and roughly 300,000 migrant workers, mostly working in construction. Most are housed in mega-sized dormitories. This close communal living, as well as crowded worksites, facilitated the infection of many workers in this pandemic. Post-coronavirus, the design of the dormitories will certainly be revisited and protocols strengthened.
And it is almost certain that the current economic model—one that relies heavily on migrant workers for growth and development—will be rethought. The promotion of technology to increase productivity, long advocated by the government, will be stepped up with a greater urgency to reduce the reliance on manpower for productivity.
We Must Restore Confidence in the Safety of Dense Living
by Dan Doctoroff, the CEO of Sidewalk Labs and a former deputy mayor for economic development and rebuilding of New York City.
Cities will come back stronger than ever after the pandemic. But when they do, it will be driven by a new model of growth that emphasizes inclusivity, sustainability, and economic opportunity. Even before the crisis, urban communities around the world were demanding lower costs of living and stronger plans to tackle climate change. Some unaffordable cities, such as New York, were even seeing residents leave town.
Reviving urban population growth after the pandemic will start with restoring confidence in urban public health and in the safety of dense living. But when people do return to cities—as they always have in the past—we must leverage new policies and technologies to make urban life more affordable and sustainable for more people.
Cheaper, more flexible building methods such as tall timber construction can lower the cost of housing and dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of new buildings. New mobility options and public transit extensions can help residents reach jobs without needing to own a car. Energy innovations can enable all-electric neighborhoods that reduce their climate impact without utility bills that break the bank.
If we take this opportunity to build better, cities will not just recover but provide greater opportunities than they did before the coronavirus struck.


foreignpolicy--2020-05-01--U.S. Military’s Hub in Africa Fights to Keep the Coronavirus Out

U.S. Military ’ s Hub in Africa Fights to Keep the Coronavirus Out The coronavirus has cropped up again among personnel at the only permanent U.S. military base in Africa , Foreign Policy has learned , underscoring the difficulty of containing the pandemic ’ s spread even as the U.S. Department of Defense attempts to put in place strict social distancing measures for its troops deployed across the continent .
A contractor who works at Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti and lives nearby—who was preparing to move onto the base in line with a Pentagon request—tested positive for the virus this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ declared a public health emergency on base last week , according to a statement , a move that gave commanders the authority to repurpose facilities for medical uses and better control the flow of American troops and contractors on and off the base .
This is the second known case at Camp Lemonnier , after another contractor working at the base tested positive for the virus in March , according to the New York Times .
The contractor who tested positive this week is asymptomatic and has been placed in isolation under restricted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Djibouti is crammed next to French , Italian , Chinese , and Japanese bases , reflecting the geopolitical importance of the tiny East African nation that sits at the mouth of the Red Sea , a key international shipping lane .
The base is a launchpad for counterterrorism strikes and anti-piracy operations .
The cases in Camp Lemonnier represent the latest example of the global pandemic ’ s knock-on impacts on U.S. military posture and operations .
The U.S. military has canceled or pared down major military exercises in Europe aimed at deterring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus has left one U.S. aircraft carrier deployed to the Pacific pierside in Guam and rerouted an American destroyer bound to join President Donald Trump ’ s counterdrug mission in the Caribbean back to the West Coast .
U.S. Africa Command also scuttled the massive 9,300-troop , three-nation “ African Lion ” exercise in March as the Pentagon began to put in place social distancing guidelines for U.S. forces .
Officials and experts fear that terrorist groups in Africa will take advantage of the havoc wreaked by the global pandemic to gain more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The U.S. military has about 4,400 troops stationed in East Africa , mostly in Djibouti , to advise regional counterterrorism efforts against the Somalia-based al-Shabab terrorist group .
Under the Trump administration , strikes against al-Shabab have surged as the al Qaeda-allied group has openly stated desires to strike the U.S. homeland and installations , raising concerns among military officials .
In 2017 , the Trump administration declared all of war-torn Somalia an area of hostilities , giving the Pentagon greater authority to call in airstrikes .
The changes have resulted in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ defensive strikes to decimate the militant group ’ s contingent of rank-and-file fighters instead of focusing on the high-value terrorism suspects targeted by the Obama administration , experts say , but it hasn ’ t stopped the group from launching successful attacks , such as the gunfight with al-Shabab that killed three Americans in Manda Bay , Kenya , in January .
“ The bottom line is that U.S. military actions have failed to blunt al-Shabaab ’ s ability to attack Somalis and international personnel using a combination of asymmetric tactics—including ambushes , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more conventional assaults on forward-operating bases , ” Paul Williams , a professor at George Washington University who has long studied the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Somalia , writes in a forthcoming report for the Chatham House think tank seen by Foreign Policy .
The new infections could have overarching effects on operations that have skyrocketed in recent years .
U.S. Africa Command recorded 61 strikes in Somalia last year , the highest yearly total during Trump and former President Barack Obama ’ s administrations .
A former Special Operations Command official @ @ @ @ @ @ @ condition of anonymity suggested that the immediate impacts of the declaration would include stemming the flow of supplies onto the base , causing slower rates of resupply , and delaying local contracts in the area .
But other officials said that the public health emergency would not get in the way of the delivery of supplies , such as fuel and food , which will continue uninterrupted .
Djibouti has had the highest number of confirmed coronavirus cases in East Africa—1,100—and two confirmed deaths , according to data from the Africa Centers for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ closed-off police state , has a highly urbanized population and limited health care infrastructure , making it particularly vulnerable to the pandemic .
U.S. officials have urged contractors at Camp Lemonnier—located on the other side of a civilian airport in Djibouti City—to move onto the base full-time for safety precautions .
The capital city is home to more than half of the country ’ s 921,804 people .
But in spite of the fast spread of the pandemic among Djibouti ’ s surrounding civilian population , no American service members at the base @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a spokesman for the U.S.-led task force fighting in the Horn of Africa told Foreign Policy , and officials disputed claims that the base was on lockdown .
“ Camp Lemonnier is not on ‘ lockdown , ’ but beginning Monday , contractors who have not moved onto Camp will be restricted from coming onto Camp for work , ” said Capt .
Scott Rye , a spokesman for the coalition .
“ This is a preventive action taken as a force health protection measure.
” About a third of contractors on base @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to return in a memo from Maj. Gen. Michael D. Turello , the commander of Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa and Capt .
Kenneth Crowe , the Camp Lemonnier commanding officer .
The two officers have set a deadline for contractors to move back onto base by May 4 .
Yet even with the preventive measures in place and U.S. troops more spread out than on aircraft carriers and Navy ships such as the coronavirus-wracked USS Theodore Roosevelt , commanders on the base will still have to balance keeping their troops at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the Pentagon ’ s demands to keep up the pressure on Somali militants .
“ The installation itself is fairly sprawling , but they still live in quarters together , so there ’ s only so much spreading out they can do , because it ’ s really hot there , ” said Alice Hunt Friend , a former Pentagon official and now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington .
“ There ’ s only so much time you can spend outdoors .
Cubicle life @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ”

The coronavirus has cropped up again among personnel at the only permanent U.S. military base in Africa, Foreign Policy has learned, underscoring the difficulty of containing the pandemic’s spread even as the U.S. Department of Defense attempts to put in place strict social distancing measures for its troops deployed across the continent.
The coronavirus has cropped up again among personnel at the only permanent U.S. military base in Africa, Foreign Policy has learned, underscoring the difficulty of containing the pandemic’s spread even as the U.S. Department of Defense attempts to put in place strict social distancing measures for its troops deployed across the continent.
A contractor who works at Camp Lemonnier in Djibouti and lives nearby—who was preparing to move onto the base in line with a Pentagon request—tested positive for the virus this week. This comes after U.S. forces declared a public health emergency on base last week, according to a statement, a move that gave commanders the authority to repurpose facilities for medical uses and better control the flow of American troops and contractors on and off the base.
This is the second known case at Camp Lemonnier, after another contractor working at the base tested positive for the virus in March, according to the New York Times. The contractor who tested positive this week is asymptomatic and has been placed in isolation under restricted movement.
The U.S. military base in Djibouti is crammed next to French, Italian, Chinese, and Japanese bases, reflecting the geopolitical importance of the tiny East African nation that sits at the mouth of the Red Sea, a key international shipping lane. The base is a launchpad for counterterrorism strikes and anti-piracy operations.
[Mapping the Coronavirus Outbreak: Get daily updates on the pandemic.]
The cases in Camp Lemonnier represent the latest example of the global pandemic’s knock-on impacts on U.S. military posture and operations. The U.S. military has canceled or pared down major military exercises in Europe aimed at deterring Russia, and an outbreak of the coronavirus has left one U.S. aircraft carrier deployed to the Pacific pierside in Guam and rerouted an American destroyer bound to join President Donald Trump’s counterdrug mission in the Caribbean back to the West Coast. U.S. Africa Command also scuttled the massive 9,300-troop, three-nation “African Lion” exercise in March as the Pentagon began to put in place social distancing guidelines for U.S. forces.
Officials and experts fear that terrorist groups in Africa will take advantage of the havoc wreaked by the global pandemic to gain more territory and carry out more attacks. The U.S. military has about 4,400 troops stationed in East Africa, mostly in Djibouti, to advise regional counterterrorism efforts against the Somalia-based al-Shabab terrorist group.
Under the Trump administration, strikes against al-Shabab have surged as the al Qaeda-allied group has openly stated desires to strike the U.S. homeland and installations, raising concerns among military officials. In 2017, the Trump administration declared all of war-torn Somalia an area of hostilities, giving the Pentagon greater authority to call in airstrikes.
The changes have resulted in the Trump administration using a higher volume of defensive strikes to decimate the militant group’s contingent of rank-and-file fighters instead of focusing on the high-value terrorism suspects targeted by the Obama administration, experts say, but it hasn’t stopped the group from launching successful attacks, such as the gunfight with al-Shabab that killed three Americans in Manda Bay, Kenya, in January.
Read More Smoke billows following an airstrike by the US-led international coalition forces targeting Islamic State (IS) group in Mosul, Iraq, on July 9, 2017. Smoke billows following an airstrike by the US-led international coalition forces targeting Islamic State (IS) group in Mosul, Iraq, on July 9, 2017. Pentagon Asks for More Cash to Cut Down Civilian Deaths Under fire from human rights groups, the Pentagon is asking lawmakers for funding to improve its ability to track civilian casualties in the ongoing fight against the Islamic State and other terrorist groups, Foreign Policy has learned. Exclusive | Jack Detsch U.S. President Donald Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi U.S. President Donald Trump and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi After Death of U.S. Citizen, State Department Floats Slashing Egypt Aid The United States continues sending military aid to Egypt despite its worsening human rights situation. Could the death of a detained American change that? Exclusive | Jack Detsch, Robbie Gramer, Colum Lynch China's President Xi Jinping (L) and US President Donald Trump attend a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on November 9, 2017. China's President Xi Jinping (L) and US President Donald Trump attend a welcome ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on November 9, 2017. Trump Fixates on China as Nuclear Arms Pact Nears Expiration The administration insists any future START treaty has to include Beijing as well as Moscow, but experts say there is almost no chance China will agree. Report | Robbie Gramer, Jack Detsch
“The bottom line is that U.S. military actions have failed to blunt al-Shabaab’s ability to attack Somalis and international personnel using a combination of asymmetric tactics—including ambushes, IEDs, suicide commando raids, assassinations—and more conventional assaults on forward-operating bases,” Paul Williams, a professor at George Washington University who has long studied the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Somalia, writes in a forthcoming report for the Chatham House think tank seen by Foreign Policy.
The new infections could have overarching effects on operations that have skyrocketed in recent years. U.S. Africa Command recorded 61 strikes in Somalia last year, the highest yearly total during Trump and former President Barack Obama’s administrations. A former Special Operations Command official who spoke with Foreign Policy on the condition of anonymity suggested that the immediate impacts of the declaration would include stemming the flow of supplies onto the base, causing slower rates of resupply, and delaying local contracts in the area. But other officials said that the public health emergency would not get in the way of the delivery of supplies, such as fuel and food, which will continue uninterrupted.
Djibouti has had the highest number of confirmed coronavirus cases in East Africa—1,100—and two confirmed deaths, according to data from the Africa Centers for Disease Control. Djibouti, a relatively closed-off police state, has a highly urbanized population and limited health care infrastructure, making it particularly vulnerable to the pandemic. U.S. officials have urged contractors at Camp Lemonnier—located on the other side of a civilian airport in Djibouti City—to move onto the base full-time for safety precautions. The capital city is home to more than half of the country’s 921,804 people.
But in spite of the fast spread of the pandemic among Djibouti’s surrounding civilian population, no American service members at the base have tested positive for the virus, a spokesman for the U.S.-led task force fighting in the Horn of Africa told Foreign Policy, and officials disputed claims that the base was on lockdown.
“Camp Lemonnier is not on ‘lockdown,’ but beginning Monday, contractors who have not moved onto Camp will be restricted from coming onto Camp for work,” said Capt. Scott Rye, a spokesman for the coalition. “This is a preventive action taken as a force health protection measure.”
About a third of contractors on base have complied with an April 17 order to return in a memo from Maj. Gen. Michael D. Turello, the commander of Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa and Capt. Kenneth Crowe, the Camp Lemonnier commanding officer. The two officers have set a deadline for contractors to move back onto base by May 4.
Yet even with the preventive measures in place and U.S. troops more spread out than on aircraft carriers and Navy ships such as the coronavirus-wracked USS Theodore Roosevelt, commanders on the base will still have to balance keeping their troops at arm’s length with each other with the Pentagon’s demands to keep up the pressure on Somali militants.
“The installation itself is fairly sprawling, but they still live in quarters together, so there’s only so much spreading out they can do, because it’s really hot there,” said Alice Hunt Friend, a former Pentagon official and now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “There’s only so much time you can spend outdoors. Cubicle life is not great for social distancing.”


foreignpolicy--2020-05-01--Pompeo Emerges as Point Man in War of Words With China

Pompeo Emerges as Point Man in War of Words With China In recent weeks , U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has emerged as the face of the administration ’ s hard-line China strategy , relying on the conservative media landscape to spread its message on Beijing ’ s blame for the coronavirus pandemic with a raft of hits on Fox News and conservative radio talk shows .
“ We ’ ve been very clear to the Chinese Communist Party they have a special responsibility , ” Pompeo told Dan “ Ox ” Ochsner , one of four conservative radio @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Thursday alone .
“ This virus originated in Wuhan .
They have a special responsibility to share with the world the data , the information , the need to be transparent.
” To outsiders and former diplomats , Pompeo ’ s media blitz in the conservative bubble appears designed to rally U.S. President Donald Trump ’ s base around what could be a key 2020 election issue as the pandemic lockdown draws the global economy to a standstill and fuels a surge in unemployment across the United States .
Critics have knocked Pompeo @ @ @ @ @ @ @ attack dog rather than coordinating a global response to the pandemic , a charge his supporters dismiss as partisan spin .
China has shot back at Pompeo , with its state-run media machine targeting him in a barrage of unusually personal attacks in the past week as it tries to deflect U.S. criticisms that it mishandled the initial outbreak of the virus , contributing to its global spread .
“ Politicians like Pompeo have only prejudice , hatred , and private interests in their minds , ” read one editorial in the People @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the Chinese Communist Party .
“ Pompeo has made people wonder if he believes he can ‘ make America great again ’ just by bullying and talking nonsense.
” In April alone , Pompeo had more than 90 interviews with U.S. news outlets and international press roundtables—a stark shift from the early months of the pandemic .
He has also held semiregular press briefings at the State Department in the past month , where a group of reporters from a variety of national outlets can question him .
Additionally , the department @ @ @ @ @ @ @ other State Department officials on the department ’ s response to the pandemic and other issues .
Still , some former diplomats have criticized Trump ’ s top diplomat for focusing too much on a select domestic audience with a political bent—many of his recent one-on-one interviews were with conservative outlets and talk shows .
( The State Department publishes transcripts of Pompeo ’ s interviews on its website for public availability . )
Several former diplomats told Foreign Policy that Pompeo sticking to Trump-friendly outlets allows him to skirt tough lines of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ so at the expense of more interviews with foreign media outlets where he can better convey America ’ s foreign policies to an international audience .
“ He ’ s spending a heck of a lot less time communicating to the world about why the Trump administration is doing what it ’ s doing .
The other effect is he ’ s made the role of secretary of state much more partisan , and historically they were supposed to stay above the fray , ” said Brett Bruen , a former career diplomat @ @ @ @ @ @ @ White House under President Barack Obama .
“ While I may disagree with the policies , I would be the first to advocate that a secretary of state needs to be out in front in the international media explaining the rationale for what we ’ re doing.
” Others point out that Pompeo ’ s focus on domestic outlets was due to the State Department ’ s unprecedented task of repatriating tens of thousands of Americans trapped abroad , after the pandemic grounded international air travel and led to a wave of travel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and consulates abroad have helped bring more than 70,000 Americans home since the end of January through organizing commercial or charter flights , according to State Department officials .
Pompeo ’ s media blitz fits into the Trump administration ’ s broader strategy of pushing for independent probes into whether China mishandled its outbreak response and pressuring China to open its virology labs to international inspectors amid questions about the origins of the virus .
The administration has also blamed the World Health Organization ( WHO ) for its role in the pandemic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of bowing to Chinese pressure .
Critics say the administration is deflecting blame for its own slow domestic response to the pandemic , which has infected more than 1.1 million Americans and killed some 65,000 .
The Trump administration announced that it would temporarily cut funding to WHO in order to undergo a review of whether the international health body submitted too much to Chinese pressure .
Democratic lawmakers criticized such measures , saying that WHO , despite its flaws , needed continued U.S. support .
“ The inherent complexity of responding to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ leadership to coordinate an international response , ” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer ; Sen. Bob Menendez , the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee ; and others wrote in a letter to Pompeo on April 20 .
“ The solution to countering Chinese influence at the WHO is American leadership and engagement , not [ American ] absenteeism.
” “ We ’ re the biggest contributor to the World Health Organization .
It failed in its mission here , and so we ’ re conducting a review to figure out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to deliver real outcomes , ” Pompeo said in a press conference on Wednesday .
“ We shouldn ’ t pretend that because some organization has ‘ health ’ in its title that it ’ s actually capable of delivering the outcomes that we need .
”

In recent weeks, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has emerged as the face of the administration’s hard-line China strategy, relying on the conservative media landscape to spread its message on Beijing’s blame for the coronavirus pandemic with a raft of hits on Fox News and conservative radio talk shows.
In recent weeks, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has emerged as the face of the administration’s hard-line China strategy, relying on the conservative media landscape to spread its message on Beijing’s blame for the coronavirus pandemic with a raft of hits on Fox News and conservative radio talk shows.
“We’ve been very clear to the Chinese Communist Party they have a special responsibility,” Pompeo told Dan “Ox” Ochsner, one of four conservative radio talk show hosts he spoke to on Thursday alone. “This virus originated in Wuhan. They have a special responsibility to share with the world the data, the information, the need to be transparent.”
To outsiders and former diplomats, Pompeo’s media blitz in the conservative bubble appears designed to rally U.S. President Donald Trump’s base around what could be a key 2020 election issue as the pandemic lockdown draws the global economy to a standstill and fuels a surge in unemployment across the United States. Critics have knocked Pompeo for serving as the administration’s attack dog rather than coordinating a global response to the pandemic, a charge his supporters dismiss as partisan spin.
China has shot back at Pompeo, with its state-run media machine targeting him in a barrage of unusually personal attacks in the past week as it tries to deflect U.S. criticisms that it mishandled the initial outbreak of the virus, contributing to its global spread. “Politicians like Pompeo have only prejudice, hatred, and private interests in their minds,” read one editorial in the People’s Daily, the official newspaper of the Chinese Communist Party. “Pompeo has made people wonder if he believes he can ‘make America great again’ just by bullying and talking nonsense.”
In April alone, Pompeo had more than 90 interviews with U.S. news outlets and international press roundtables—a stark shift from the early months of the pandemic. He has also held semiregular press briefings at the State Department in the past month, where a group of reporters from a variety of national outlets can question him. Additionally, the department has organized almost daily phone briefings with other State Department officials on the department’s response to the pandemic and other issues.
Still, some former diplomats have criticized Trump’s top diplomat for focusing too much on a select domestic audience with a political bent—many of his recent one-on-one interviews were with conservative outlets and talk shows. (The State Department publishes transcripts of Pompeo’s interviews on its website for public availability.) Several former diplomats told Foreign Policy that Pompeo sticking to Trump-friendly outlets allows him to skirt tough lines of questioning, and he’s doing so at the expense of more interviews with foreign media outlets where he can better convey America’s foreign policies to an international audience.
“He’s spending a heck of a lot less time communicating to the world about why the Trump administration is doing what it’s doing. The other effect is he’s made the role of secretary of state much more partisan, and historically they were supposed to stay above the fray,” said Brett Bruen, a former career diplomat and director of global engagement at the White House under President Barack Obama. “While I may disagree with the policies, I would be the first to advocate that a secretary of state needs to be out in front in the international media explaining the rationale for what we’re doing.”
Others point out that Pompeo’s focus on domestic outlets was due to the State Department’s unprecedented task of repatriating tens of thousands of Americans trapped abroad, after the pandemic grounded international air travel and led to a wave of travel bans in foreign countries. U.S. embassies and consulates abroad have helped bring more than 70,000 Americans home since the end of January through organizing commercial or charter flights, according to State Department officials.
Pompeo’s media blitz fits into the Trump administration’s broader strategy of pushing for independent probes into whether China mishandled its outbreak response and pressuring China to open its virology labs to international inspectors amid questions about the origins of the virus. The administration has also blamed the World Health Organization (WHO) for its role in the pandemic response, accusing the international health body of bowing to Chinese pressure. Critics say the administration is deflecting blame for its own slow domestic response to the pandemic, which has infected more than 1.1 million Americans and killed some 65,000.
The Trump administration announced that it would temporarily cut funding to WHO in order to undergo a review of whether the international health body submitted too much to Chinese pressure.
Democratic lawmakers criticized such measures, saying that WHO, despite its flaws, needed continued U.S. support. “The inherent complexity of responding to and containing a pandemic demands greater U.S. leadership to coordinate an international response,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer; Sen. Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; and others wrote in a letter to Pompeo on April 20. “The solution to countering Chinese influence at the WHO is American leadership and engagement, not [American] absenteeism.”
“We’re the biggest contributor to the World Health Organization. It failed in its mission here, and so we’re conducting a review to figure out how best to use American taxpayer money to deliver real outcomes,” Pompeo said in a press conference on Wednesday. “We shouldn’t pretend that because some organization has ‘health’ in its title that it’s actually capable of delivering the outcomes that we need.”


foreignpolicy--2020-05-01--What Would North Korea’s Collapse Mean for U.S. Security?

What Would North Korea ’ s Collapse Mean for U.S. Security ?
Emma Ashford : Hey , Matt !
How ’ s it going ?
It ’ s been another utterly insane couple of weeks here in the U.S. : The president suggesting we all inject Lysol to cure the coronavirus , sexual assault allegations against Joe Biden , and growing protests to reopen the economy .
It seems like every day could be a new verse of “ We Didn ’ t Start The Fire.
” Matthew Kroenig : Yes .
I ’ m glad we are asked to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , as I never aspired to be a tabloid writer .
These salacious headlines have been drowning out some interesting developments that we should discuss .
EA : Not quite !
Actually , the tabloids are surprisingly relevant to foreign policy this week .
TMZ—yes , that TMZ—reported sources in Pyongyang as saying that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was dead .
What do you make of this ?
Should we be sending Dennis Rodman to check on him ?
MK : At first I was skeptical , because it was TMZ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ didn ’ t attend his grandfather ’ s birthday celebration , and each day that passes without an appearance just adds to my suspicion that something is wrong .
This could have big implications for North Korea and U.S. interests in Asia .
EA : Hasn ’ t Kim done this before , though ?
The whole country is so secretive .
Perhaps he ’ s just engaged in social distancing and waiting for the coronavirus crisis to blow over .
MK : It ’ s possible .
But if I were him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appearance to put the speculation to rest .
And some have said that we should stop the guessing games and wait for more facts , but , given that the possible scenarios include North Korean regime implosion , U.S. government officials need to be thinking about the possible implications and appropriate responses .
You are less worried ?
EA : Perhaps it ’ s that my first academic love was Soviet politics .
North Korea watchers are much like Kremlinologists , drawing a lot of inference from almost no data .
It leads @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But I do think you ’ re right that we need to consider the possibility .
The rumors are that he ’ s dead or in a vegetative state after heart surgery , and it ’ s certainly plausible .
Despite being roughly the same age as us , Kim is not a healthy man .
You can see it in photos and videos .
So let ’ s assume for the sake of argument that he ’ s dead .
I think it ’ s probable that someone else—perhaps his sister , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ implosion seems unlikely .
The sister in particular seems interesting : She has the Kim name , and she ’ s been taking a bigger role in diplomacy lately , even meeting Mike Pence at the Winter Olympics.A North Korean civil conflict or regime collapse could mean loose nukes , a major war on the Korean Peninsula , and more .
MK : Maybe he is just at a spa trying to get his health under control .
If he ’ s dead , I think you are right , a transition to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ likely .
But we can not rule out regime collapse .
This is the Achilles ’ heel of autocratic regimes .
There is no institutionalized process for succession , and there is nothing preventing a clique supporting the senior general from taking up arms against a faction supporting the sister .
A North Korean civil conflict or regime collapse could mean loose nukes , a major war on the Korean Peninsula , and more .
EA : I find it personally pretty depressing that the sister isn ’ t viewed as an obvious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ too , you know !
More seriously , I ’ m less worried about nuclear weapons than I am about U.S.-China tensions in the event of regime collapse .
We have experience with collecting nuclear material , as we did with Project Sapphire at the end of the Cold War , which removed poorly secured enriched uranium from Kazakhstan .
But a North Korean collapse could put U.S. troops and Chinese troops within shooting distance of each other .
U.S. troops have been on the Korean Peninsula since the Korean War entered its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are currently approximately 28,000 of them—but any collapse or potential reunification of Korea raises for Beijing the worrying possibility of U.S. forces closer to the Chinese border .
It raises tensions and is a good reason a future administration should consider removing these troops .
MK : I ’ m sure America ’ s enemies in Pyongyang and Beijing would like to see fewer U.S. forces in Asia , but I don ’ t see how it advances U.S. interests .
And , while a collapse creates risks , there are opportunities as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ regime is the most viable path to a denuclearized Korean Peninsula , and it is possible that the United States and China could agree to a new arrangement that satisfies both of their interests short of armed conflict .
EA : The last time the United States tried to use regime collapse as an opportunity it ended up with a 15-year Iraqi insurgency and a destabilized Middle East .
The ship has sailed on North Korea ’ s nuclear program .
And while it ’ s not great to have another nuclear power @ @ @ @ @ @ @ still much rather have a bomb than a failed state in North Korea .
MK : If the North collapses and the country is unified under Seoul ’ s leadership , the new government would almost certainly dismantle the nuclear program , so the ship has not yet sailed .
The list of rogue states pursuing nuclear weapons in the 1990s and 2000s included Iraq , Iran , North Korea , Libya , Syria , and arguably others .
Regime collapse or instability has helped eliminate nuclear programs in all of those but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are problematic , but not as problematic as nuclear-armed rogues .
EA : It ’ s telling that the list of states you mention , except North Korea , all stopped working on nuclear weapons voluntarily prior to civil wars or U.S. intervention .
That doesn ’ t suggest that the instability was helpful .
To paraphrase the Nobel laureate Tom Schelling , the biggest driver of nuclear proliferation has been U.S. policies like the invasion of Iraq .
But I know we ’ re never going to agree on this , especially @ @ @ @ @ @ @ presence in South Korea is a good idea .
It ’ s not 1953 anymore ; South Korea is rich , developed , and capable of defending itself against North Korea .
All U.S. troops at the DMZ achieve is to ratchet up tensions with China.The United States has been the world ’ s greatest force for nonproliferation , especially its policy of extended nuclear deterrence to allies .
MK : Agree to disagree .
As the Duelfer report found , Saddam Hussein never gave up his weapons ambitions and planned to reconstitute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an Israeli military strike crippled Syria ’ s nuclear program so that the country was unable to develop such a weapon before it fell into chaos in 2011 .
Schelling was brilliant , but the United States has been the world ’ s greatest force for nonproliferation , especially its policy of extended nuclear deterrence to allies , supported by our troops in South Korea .
EA : Shall we move on to another hot spot of the week ?
China has started to crack down on Hong Kong again .
It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , with some small protests starting to pop up and the Chinese government arresting activists .
MK : I see this as a broader pattern of the autocrats trying to get away with things while the rest of the world is distracted .
China mostly stood by during big protests last year and now suddenly they are trying to do away with the long-standing “ one country , two systems ” arrangement for Hong Kong .
EA : They ’ ve been trying for a while .
But it seems that the people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to let them .
We ’ ve only seen small-scale protests so far , but none of the underlying issues has been resolved .
There isn ’ t much Washington can do about it , but it would be nice to see the Trump administration criticize it , at least .
I ’ m not sure I ’ d expect that from a president who openly praised the Tiananmen crackdown .
MK : Mike Pompeo has been the administration ’ s most powerful voice on these issues , and the secretary of state @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But , unfortunately , you are right .
The United States doesn ’ t have many good policy options for Hong Kong .
It does demonstrate the importance of not making similar mistakes and ceding Beijing greater influence over Taiwan or other parts of Asia .
EA : The Hong Kong situation is fairly unique .
It may have been a mistake for Britain to return Hong Kong to China in 1997 , but it ’ s just not comparable with Taiwan , which is independent , self-governing , and extremely capable of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Taiwan is extremely capable , but it will only be able to defend itself with help from an improved U.S. defense strategy in the region .
And it ’ s not just China that is running amok .
Did you see the story about the Russian plot in the Czech Republic against Prague ’ s mayor ?
EA : I did .
Seems like another good fit for the tabloids .
The mayor says he ’ s under protection from the police after Russian agents tried to assassinate him with the chemical ricin @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Russians are more than capable of doing this and probably willing to do so , but I just don ’ t see what they get out of assassinating a minor political figure in a midsize Eastern European country .
MK : Kill the chickens to scare the monkeys , as the Chinese say .
Zdenek Hrib , Prague ’ s mayor , had been thwarting Russian preferences on a variety of issues , so by killing him , the Russians could show others that it does not pay to cross Moscow .
A @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s other recent assassination attempts on European soil , such as its poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the U.K. in 2018 , might have helped to discourage them from attempting this one .
EA : Right , but the best explanation that the BBC could come up with was that Hrib had pushed to rename the square outside the Russian Embassy after Boris Nemtsov .
That ’ s hardly “ thwarting Moscow.
” By that standard , they ’ ll be coming for the D.C. Council @ @ @ @ @ @ @ year .
You ’ re right about one thing , though : The lackluster response by British and American governments after the attempted Skripal assassination in England in 2018 is part of the problem .
The Russians used a chemical weapon on British soil—and Donald Trump ’ s response was to question the evidence !
The British government ’ s response wasn ’ t much better , with confused statements from Boris Johnson about whether Russia was responsible or not.China mostly stood by during big protests last year and now suddenly they are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ one country , two systems ” arrangement for Hong Kong .
MK : Speaking of conflict between the United States and its great-power rivals , do you think we are going to war ?
Many ( including me ) think the risks are growing in the coronavirus era , but Barry Posen published a widely read piece this week in Foreign Affairs that was more skeptical .
Basically , he argues that pandemics promote peace .
EA : You know , I was talking with a bunch of students yesterday , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ re living in a rerun of the 1910s ( globalization , arms races , and eventual war ) , the 1930s ( depression , nationalism , and another war ) , or the Cold War ( bipolar ideological conflict and proxy wars ) .
It ’ s depressing , because the assumption in each case was that we ’ re headed for a war or Cold War .
Posen is making the opposite argument : that the coronavirus could tamp down conflict because it affects everyone equally .
I ’ m not 100 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be honest .
MK : We might actually end up agreeing on something .
Posen is a realist who should know that relative gains matter .
He is right that every country is suffering , but if some are suffering less—or think they are suffering less—they might see an opportunity .
After all , China is overplaying its hand in its diplomatic response to COVID-19 ( engaging in a war of words with Australia , for example ) , so why would it show better judgment in the military domain ?
EA : @ @ @ @ @ @ @ but for different reasons .
My objection is to the economic argument .
He claims that reduced trade and poor economic outlooks after the pandemic will reduce the desire for conflict .
That flies directly in the face of a whole bunch of theories about interdependence and war .
It ’ s not just liberal internationalists who think trade or trade expectations are important for avoiding conflict—many realists do , too .
But I guess the big question he raises is this : Is it true that no country will come out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : No .
Of course some countries will do better than others .
On trade and peace , I ’ ve always wondered about the chicken and the egg .
With the U.S.-China trade war , it ’ s not so much declining trade that is causing poor relations , but poor relations that are reducing trade .
I am sure this will be a major issue heading into this election .
And on the subjects of chicken and avoiding bad relations , I am on the hook to help my wife with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ weeks ?
EA : Of course !
But if you ’ re right—and poor relations cause a decline in trade—then the current situation may be more analogous to the 1910s than anything else .
Then we ’ re talking about a declining relationship with China and the potential for conflict .
I hope you ’ re wrong—and that your cooking skills are good enough to avoid a descent into war .

Emma Ashford is a research fellow at the Cato Institute.
Matthew Kroenig is deputy director of the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center. They debate foreign policy and the 2020 election.
Emma Ashford: Hey, Matt! How’s it going? It’s been another utterly insane couple of weeks here in the U.S.: The president suggesting we all inject Lysol to cure the coronavirus, sexual assault allegations against Joe Biden, and growing protests to reopen the economy. It seems like every day could be a new verse of “We Didn’t Start The Fire.”
Matthew Kroenig: Yes. I’m glad we are asked to cover the foreign-policy dimension of the campaign, as I never aspired to be a tabloid writer. These salacious headlines have been drowning out some interesting developments that we should discuss.
EA: Not quite! Actually, the tabloids are surprisingly relevant to foreign policy this week. TMZ—yes, that TMZ—reported sources in Pyongyang as saying that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was dead. What do you make of this? Should we be sending Dennis Rodman to check on him?
MK: At first I was skeptical, because it was TMZ. But it is puzzling that Kim didn’t attend his grandfather’s birthday celebration, and each day that passes without an appearance just adds to my suspicion that something is wrong. This could have big implications for North Korea and U.S. interests in Asia.
EA: Hasn’t Kim done this before, though? The whole country is so secretive. Perhaps he’s just engaged in social distancing and waiting for the coronavirus crisis to blow over.
MK: It’s possible. But if I were him, I would want to make an appearance to put the speculation to rest. And some have said that we should stop the guessing games and wait for more facts, but, given that the possible scenarios include North Korean regime implosion, U.S. government officials need to be thinking about the possible implications and appropriate responses. You are less worried?
EA: Perhaps it’s that my first academic love was Soviet politics. North Korea watchers are much like Kremlinologists, drawing a lot of inference from almost no data. It leads to a lot of false positives.
But I do think you’re right that we need to consider the possibility. The rumors are that he’s dead or in a vegetative state after heart surgery, and it’s certainly plausible. Despite being roughly the same age as us, Kim is not a healthy man. You can see it in photos and videos.
So let’s assume for the sake of argument that he’s dead. I think it’s probable that someone else—perhaps his sister, perhaps a senior general—takes over. Regime implosion seems unlikely. The sister in particular seems interesting: She has the Kim name, and she’s been taking a bigger role in diplomacy lately, even meeting Mike Pence at the Winter Olympics.A North Korean civil conflict or regime collapse could mean loose nukes, a major war on the Korean Peninsula, and more.
MK: Maybe he is just at a spa trying to get his health under control. If he’s dead, I think you are right, a transition to someone in his inner circle is most likely. But we cannot rule out regime collapse. This is the Achilles’ heel of autocratic regimes. There is no institutionalized process for succession, and there is nothing preventing a clique supporting the senior general from taking up arms against a faction supporting the sister. A North Korean civil conflict or regime collapse could mean loose nukes, a major war on the Korean Peninsula, and more.
EA: I find it personally pretty depressing that the sister isn’t viewed as an obvious successor. Women can be ruthless dictators too, you know!
More seriously, I’m less worried about nuclear weapons than I am about U.S.-China tensions in the event of regime collapse. We have experience with collecting nuclear material, as we did with Project Sapphire at the end of the Cold War, which removed poorly secured enriched uranium from Kazakhstan.
But a North Korean collapse could put U.S. troops and Chinese troops within shooting distance of each other. U.S. troops have been on the Korean Peninsula since the Korean War entered its cease-fire phase in 1953, and there are currently approximately 28,000 of them—but any collapse or potential reunification of Korea raises for Beijing the worrying possibility of U.S. forces closer to the Chinese border. It raises tensions and is a good reason a future administration should consider removing these troops.
MK: I’m sure America’s enemies in Pyongyang and Beijing would like to see fewer U.S. forces in Asia, but I don’t see how it advances U.S. interests. And, while a collapse creates risks, there are opportunities as well. The end of the Kim regime is the most viable path to a denuclearized Korean Peninsula, and it is possible that the United States and China could agree to a new arrangement that satisfies both of their interests short of armed conflict.
EA: The last time the United States tried to use regime collapse as an opportunity it ended up with a 15-year Iraqi insurgency and a destabilized Middle East.
The ship has sailed on North Korea’s nuclear program. And while it’s not great to have another nuclear power in the world, I’d still much rather have a bomb than a failed state in North Korea.
MK: If the North collapses and the country is unified under Seoul’s leadership, the new government would almost certainly dismantle the nuclear program, so the ship has not yet sailed.
The list of rogue states pursuing nuclear weapons in the 1990s and 2000s included Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Libya, Syria, and arguably others. Regime collapse or instability has helped eliminate nuclear programs in all of those but Iran and North Korea. Failed states are problematic, but not as problematic as nuclear-armed rogues.
EA: It’s telling that the list of states you mention, except North Korea, all stopped working on nuclear weapons voluntarily prior to civil wars or U.S. intervention. That doesn’t suggest that the instability was helpful. To paraphrase the Nobel laureate Tom Schelling, the biggest driver of nuclear proliferation has been U.S. policies like the invasion of Iraq.
But I know we’re never going to agree on this, especially if you think the huge U.S. troop presence in South Korea is a good idea. It’s not 1953 anymore; South Korea is rich, developed, and capable of defending itself against North Korea. All U.S. troops at the DMZ achieve is to ratchet up tensions with China.The United States has been the world’s greatest force for nonproliferation, especially its policy of extended nuclear deterrence to allies.
MK: Agree to disagree. As the Duelfer report found, Saddam Hussein never gave up his weapons ambitions and planned to reconstitute the program in Iraq. Meanwhile, an Israeli military strike crippled Syria’s nuclear program so that the country was unable to develop such a weapon before it fell into chaos in 2011.
Schelling was brilliant, but the United States has been the world’s greatest force for nonproliferation, especially its policy of extended nuclear deterrence to allies, supported by our troops in South Korea.
EA: Shall we move on to another hot spot of the week? China has started to crack down on Hong Kong again. It’s almost like the coronavirus changed nothing, with some small protests starting to pop up and the Chinese government arresting activists.
MK: I see this as a broader pattern of the autocrats trying to get away with things while the rest of the world is distracted. China mostly stood by during big protests last year and now suddenly they are trying to do away with the long-standing “one country, two systems” arrangement for Hong Kong.
EA: They’ve been trying for a while. But it seems that the people of Hong Kong don’t want to let them. We’ve only seen small-scale protests so far, but none of the underlying issues has been resolved. There isn’t much Washington can do about it, but it would be nice to see the Trump administration criticize it, at least. I’m not sure I’d expect that from a president who openly praised the Tiananmen crackdown.
MK: Mike Pompeo has been the administration’s most powerful voice on these issues, and the secretary of state had some tough words for Beijing. But, unfortunately, you are right. The United States doesn’t have many good policy options for Hong Kong. It does demonstrate the importance of not making similar mistakes and ceding Beijing greater influence over Taiwan or other parts of Asia.
EA: The Hong Kong situation is fairly unique. It may have been a mistake for Britain to return Hong Kong to China in 1997, but it’s just not comparable with Taiwan, which is independent, self-governing, and extremely capable of defending itself against China.
MK: Taiwan is extremely capable, but it will only be able to defend itself with help from an improved U.S. defense strategy in the region. And it’s not just China that is running amok. Did you see the story about the Russian plot in the Czech Republic against Prague’s mayor?
EA: I did. Seems like another good fit for the tabloids. The mayor says he’s under protection from the police after Russian agents tried to assassinate him with the chemical ricin.
I don’t doubt the Russians are more than capable of doing this and probably willing to do so, but I just don’t see what they get out of assassinating a minor political figure in a midsize Eastern European country.
MK: Kill the chickens to scare the monkeys, as the Chinese say. Zdenek Hrib, Prague’s mayor, had been thwarting Russian preferences on a variety of issues, so by killing him, the Russians could show others that it does not pay to cross Moscow. A stronger U.S. and international response to Russia’s other recent assassination attempts on European soil, such as its poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the U.K. in 2018, might have helped to discourage them from attempting this one.
EA: Right, but the best explanation that the BBC could come up with was that Hrib had pushed to rename the square outside the Russian Embassy after Boris Nemtsov. That’s hardly “thwarting Moscow.” By that standard, they’ll be coming for the D.C. Council, which did the same thing last year.
You’re right about one thing, though: The lackluster response by British and American governments after the attempted Skripal assassination in England in 2018 is part of the problem. The Russians used a chemical weapon on British soil—and Donald Trump’s response was to question the evidence! The British government’s response wasn’t much better, with confused statements from Boris Johnson about whether Russia was responsible or not.China mostly stood by during big protests last year and now suddenly they are trying to do away with the long-standing “one country, two systems” arrangement for Hong Kong.
MK: Speaking of conflict between the United States and its great-power rivals, do you think we are going to war? Many (including me) think the risks are growing in the coronavirus era, but Barry Posen published a widely read piece this week in Foreign Affairs that was more skeptical. Basically, he argues that pandemics promote peace.
EA: You know, I was talking with a bunch of students yesterday, and the discussion revolved around whether we’re living in a rerun of the 1910s (globalization, arms races, and eventual war), the 1930s (depression, nationalism, and another war), or the Cold War (bipolar ideological conflict and proxy wars). It’s depressing, because the assumption in each case was that we’re headed for a war or Cold War.
Posen is making the opposite argument: that the coronavirus could tamp down conflict because it affects everyone equally. I’m not 100 percent sure I buy it, to be honest.
MK: We might actually end up agreeing on something. Posen is a realist who should know that relative gains matter. He is right that every country is suffering, but if some are suffering less—or think they are suffering less—they might see an opportunity. After all, China is overplaying its hand in its diplomatic response to COVID-19 (engaging in a war of words with Australia, for example), so why would it show better judgment in the military domain?
EA: I think we disagree with Posen, but for different reasons. My objection is to the economic argument. He claims that reduced trade and poor economic outlooks after the pandemic will reduce the desire for conflict. That flies directly in the face of a whole bunch of theories about interdependence and war. It’s not just liberal internationalists who think trade or trade expectations are important for avoiding conflict—many realists do, too.
But I guess the big question he raises is this: Is it true that no country will come out of the coronavirus with an advantage?
MK: No. Of course some countries will do better than others. On trade and peace, I’ve always wondered about the chicken and the egg. With the U.S.-China trade war, it’s not so much declining trade that is causing poor relations, but poor relations that are reducing trade. I am sure this will be a major issue heading into this election. And on the subjects of chicken and avoiding bad relations, I am on the hook to help my wife with dinner. Can we resume in two weeks?
EA: Of course! But if you’re right—and poor relations cause a decline in trade—then the current situation may be more analogous to the 1910s than anything else. Then we’re talking about a declining relationship with China and the potential for conflict. I hope you’re wrong—and that your cooking skills are good enough to avoid a descent into war.