Multipolarity Multipolarity

This week, a special edition.
Two relatively short term scenarios, with very long term implications. Presented in audio essay form, by our two hosts.

In Part One, Philip Pilkington outlines his take on what could happen after the US election. An extended sketch on the possibilty of violent Trussification. He thinks that bond market bullying of the incoming Trump administration could in turn set off a chain of events, that demand a new wave of de-dollarisation.

In Part Two, Andrew Collingwood flips the perspective from West to East, and from currency wars, to trade wars.
He’ll be looking at the world from China’s point of view, in the light of this week’s US trade tariffs on Chinese goods - including a one hundred percent tariff on Chinese electric vehicles.
The Chinese have studied how nations rise, and they’ve come up with a plan to leapfrog US in the technological pecking order. As the low tariff liberal Washington order slips away, what becomes of a world where China is no longer content with low and medium-value manufacturing, but is instead actively targetting the crowning heights that America has long claimed as its unique domain?
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For more on the Chinese plan, be sure to subscribe to Multipolarity’s new Substack, where Andrew will be putting down some extended thoughts.

This week, we also have an introductory essay - called What Is Multipolarity?

And from next week, every Thursday we’ll have the Multipolarity Briefing - a series of links and brief thoughts to keep you up to date on the latest multipolar developments.

Simply search for Multipolarity on Substack.com

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Be excellent to each other, and -
Get us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/multipolarpod
On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/multipolarity
Or on our Substack: https://substack.com/@multipolaritypod

Belgrade. Budapest. It’s not the classic tourist itinerary – but by his very footprints, Xi Jinping’s historic state visit is redrawing the power map of Europe. What does the continent look like once he’s done stomping about? 
Meanwhile, the Pound is in deep trouble - the Egyptian Pound, that is. 

As the land of the pharaohs takes a 45 % haircut on its currency, Egypt is spreading its multipolar tentacles. They’ve announced that they’re going to be settling their trade debts in currencies other than the US dollar. 

Egypt is the world’s biggest importer of grain. Russia is the world’s biggest exporter of grain. You do the math. 

Per capita GDP should be the default way to understand whether we’re all getting richer. 

But for years, Europe’s treasuries have been juicing their growth numbers simply by adding more people.

Now, with 13 countries in per capita recession, the migration-driven growth model is coming under the microscope as never before. 

Is Human Quantitative Easing about to unwind? 

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Be excellent to each other, and -
Get us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/multipolarpod
On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/multipolarity
Or on our Substack: https://substack.com/@multipolaritypod

This week, as advertised on Twitter dot com, the lads are answering your questions.
Among other topics, they cover:

Rent-seeking behaviour in the West. Airbus. The German elite. The Mexican-American standoffBook recommendations. The life-changing magic of JM KeynesAnd memes.

Of course, this is also a premium week. 

So  to get the full two hour show, you’ll have to be signed up on Patreon. 

Sign up is easy. 

Go to https://www.Patreon.com/multipolarity. 

It’s five Dollars, Pounds, or Euros a month.

You can cancel any time.  

Like Germany hiding in the Euro, China have long played the game of keeping their currency soft, to juice their exports.  
But now, with the accelerator still jammed to the floor on US inflation, it seems that the powers in Beijing might be looking to devalue the Rimimbi even further.  
      
Everyone plays currency games - the trick is not to get caught. And the problem for China might be that they’re on the brink of embarrassing their adversaries. 

Meanwhile, what happens when a miracle becomes a conjuring trick? 
 
After forty years of weaving economic magic, the South Koreans now have the world’s lowest birth rate — and GDP slumping back towards developed economy norms. Are they about to become an early Eastern front runner of  the social problems of the west? And can they afford that - given their tough geopolitical neighbourhood?  

Exorbitant privilege is what they call the US ability to print the global reserve currency. 

So what if the privilege was revoked? 

Plenty of apocalyptic fiction has been written about that moment. But this week we’ve done the modelling to put a number on the dent in US living standards. 

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Be excellent to each other, and -

Get us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/multipolarpod

On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/multipolarity

Or on our Substack: https://substack.com/@multipolaritypod

A diplomatic incident in Latin America has somehow become the focal point for an ever-expanding range of stories - from the Venezuelan elections, to US energy policy to Ecuadorian banana exports to Russia. 
Leading even coolheaded observers to ponder the question: are we approaching the Latin American embassy incident singularity? 

Meanwhile, there are always good tariffs and bad tariffs - and in announcing his new shipbuilding policies, this week Joe Biden’s giving us both a plate of cheese and a plate of chalk.

Finally, Arch-Eurocrat Mario Draghi has made a big speech about European competitiveness. Its 20 years of failure - and its hope for the future. 

Is this the first sign of a continent about to flex its soon to be enviable muscles? Or is it the first twitchings of an arthritic bodybuilder about to pop a hernia? 

Little Rocket Man has a new toy.
This month, Kim Jong Un unveiled a Bond-villain-like missile with an extending tip.

On that tip was what looks to be a hypersonic glide vehicle. 

A hypersonic glide vehicle is the real deal. They're extremely fast. They can manoeuvre at those high speeds. And we don’t yet know if it’s possible to shoot them down. 

On paper, this means that North Korea has more advanced potentially-nuclear missiles than the West. 

On paper, this is bad news. 

But the story gets worse.

It was almost certainly given to them by the Chinese or the Russians. 

Why?

Could North Korea be the vehicle to do for the East China Sea what the Houthis have done for the Red Sea? Undermining US power, and leaving America’s regional allies - in this case Japan and South Korea - scrambling for new, more multipolar patterns of allegiances. 

Malcom Kyeyune is a columnist for Compact Magazine, a regular writer UnHerd, an expert on modern warfare, and a friend of the show. 

In this week’s Special Episode, he’ll be laying out a broad range of potential futures for the region.

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Be excellent to each other, and -
Get us on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/multipolarpod
On Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/multipolarity
Or on our Substack: https://substack.com/@multipolaritypod