International trade policies and new technologies facilitate the flow of people, information, and products across national borders, in turn encouraging the integration of regional economies, societies, and cultures. RAND research has investigated how globalization affects and has been affected by policymaking throughout the world.
It's fashionable among academics and pundits to proclaim that the U.S. is in decline and no longer No. 1 in the world. The declinists say they are realists. In fact, their alarm is unrealistic, writes Charles Wolf, Jr.
What is significant about China's acquisitions over the past few years is the change they represent from the negligible amounts in the past, writes Charles Wolf, Jr.
When the Berlin Wall fell 20 years ago, those raised in the shadow of possible nuclear holocaust felt disbelief, followed by relief and hope that the end of the Cold War would bring lasting peace, and the end of conflict. And in Europe, at least, it mostly did – but not everywhere, writes Christopher S. Chivvis.
The increasing importance of the G-20 summits is testimony to the growing role emerging states now play in managing the international economy. But integrating these newcomers into the global community is unlikely to be straightforward or simple, writes Lowell H. Schwartz.
The damage done by the financial crisis now seems to require not a refurbishing job but an extreme makeover. While soul-searching and even self-loathing are inevitable during a crisis, this is no time for America to shy away from a capitalist system that has produced decades of economic growth, writes Krishna Kumar.
Alabama has made significant economic progress in recent decades, attracting car manufacturers and new industrial development. The state now has an opportunity to address some systemic challenges in education, health care, and workforce development to be competitive in a global economy, writes Melissa Flournoy.
In the future, the EU will inevitably have to adjust its system of rules to cope with the evolving uses of personal data, globalization and international data flows, write Neil Robinson and Lorenzo Valeri.
A select few Americans will ever see the president's daily brief -- a digest of the intelligence community's most closely guarded secrets. But trust me, Barack Obama is going to need much more useful information than he is getting now, writes Gregory F. Treverton.
If the nation is to emerge from a recession in a position of strength, we should chart our course carefully now. The government bailout of the banking sector could yield a substantial payout one day—and now is the time to earmark that money for our knowledge sector, writes Jonathan Grant.
Since the end of the Cold War, many observers have feared the United States is losing its leadership in science and technology, but RAND research shows that the U.S. has more than kept pace with its peers by several measures, write Titus Galama and James Hosek.
Despite its authoritarian political system, Russia is in many ways increasingly open. Its people are part of a consumer society that models its consumption habits after Western Europe, says Lowell Schwartz.
To reduce the bilateral imbalances between China and the U.S. requires more carefully crafted policies than revaluation of the yuan, else the results could be perverse, writes Charles Wolf Jr.
Published commentary by RAND staff: CWhich Economy Will Run Into Trouble First: The US or China?, in Policy and Markets Magazine.
Published commentary by RAND staff: Globalization's Unequal Discontents, in Washingtonpost.com.
Published commentary by RAND staff: Regulatory Reform on Both Sides of the Atlantic, in Washingtonpost.com.
Published commentary by RAND staff.
Published commentary by RAND staff.
Published commentary by RAND staff.
Published commentary by RAND staff.
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