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2 weeks ago | 
bbc.co.uk | Ben Bland |Eleanor Lawson
Image source, Getty ImagesImage caption, The manager of Touchwood shopping centre in Solihull is worried the tariffs could hit customer spendingBusiness owners in a West Midlands town say they are nervous about the impact of Donald Trump's automotive tariffs on the town's economy. The US President has placed a 10% tariff on UK goods, but 25% on all imports of cars and car parts.
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Oct 17, 2024 | 
foreignaffairs.com | Ben Bland
On October 20, Joko Widodo—universally known as Jokowi—will leave office as the most effective and admired of Indonesia’s five presidents since the country’s turn to democracy in 1998.
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Aug 24, 2024 | 
ft.com | Ben Bland
The writer is director of the Asia-Pacific Programme at Chatham House When 38-year-old Paetongtarn Shinawatra was sworn in as Thailand’s...
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Jul 12, 2024 | 
lowyinstitute.org | Ben Bland
During NATO’s 75 years, it has usually been the European member-states looking to the US to protect them. But, at the alliance’s annual summit in Washington this week, it was US President Joe Biden who hoped NATO would save him. Facing growing pressure from within the Democratic Party not to seek re-election after a disastrous TV debate against Donald Trump, Biden hoped that a strong performance at the carefully stage-managed summit would fend off his critics.
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Apr 23, 2024 | 
medium.com | Ben Bland
In just under 50 minutes, learn how to think like a philosopher, build like an entrepreneur, and do business responsibly. That’s what I hope to share in my lecture on “AI Ethics Vs The Real World”. Let’s be clear though: I am not an expert… not in Ethics, not in Artificial Intelligence, perhaps not even in Innovation. But I make all three of them my business. And while I may not be uniquely qualified, I am unusually well placed — right in the spot where these three worlds meet.
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Apr 2, 2024 | 
gmfus.org | Ben Bland
In the past decade, policy toward China has hardened on both sides of the Atlantic. Governments and publics across Europe and in the United States view Xi Jinping as implementing more repressive policies domestically and more aggressive policies abroad. The US and most capitals in Europe see Beijing as seeking to revise the international order in ways that would be disadvantageous to democracies. They agree on the need for de-risking and to preserve the status quo in the Taiwan Strait.
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Mar 18, 2024 | 
politico.eu | Ben Bland
But there were significant differences in emphasis, with U.S. officials generally much more alarmed about Beijing’s threat to Taiwan. Additionally, while U.S. and European officials have agreed to talk about “de-risking” from China rather than “de-coupling” from it in economic terms, Washington is driven by the desire to sustain U.S. technological primacy, whereas Europe is more focused on reducing dependencies.
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Feb 16, 2024 | 
almendron.com | Ben Bland
When I had lunch with Prabowo Subianto in 2013, a year before his first, failed attempt to be elected president of Indonesia, he was still honing his fiery nationalist pitch, promising to shake up the country and prevent it becoming a failed state. Eleven years later, the 72-year-old former general finally seems to have secured the presidency by reinventing himself as a continuity candidate, forming an unlikely alliance with the incredibly popular outgoing President Joko Widodo.
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Feb 15, 2024 | 
afr.com | Ben Bland
After the pair bitterly fought each other in the 2014 and 2019 elections, Jokowi made Prabowo his defence minister, neutralising a powerful opponent. Jokowi did not formally endorse his old rival in this election. But Prabowo appointed Jokowi’s 36-year-old son, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, as his vice-presidential running mate, and vowed to build on the president’s robust economic record. But when Prabowo takes office in October, he is likely to govern as his own man rather than a proxy for Jokowi.
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Feb 13, 2024 | 
foreignaffairs.com | Ben Bland |Elliott Abrams |James M. Lindsay
In 1985, the CIA pondered who could rule Indonesia after Suharto, the authoritarian president who had reigned since 1967, eventually left the stage. In an internal intelligence assessment, agency analysts identified an energetic army captain, then just 33 years old, who might emerge as a successor.
