Comment

The big matter of uncertainty is Italy. Its political future is in the air and its fragile banking system can bring instability any time. Plus: The country is just too big to fail. A column by Fabrizio Zilibotti.

France needs Germany to serve as a model of a social market economy, capable of creating new non-governmental jobs. Germany needs France in order to assert its own place in the world. A column by Harold James.

Persuading Putin to get on the «right» side in Syria will require the Trump administration to present a real solution – which it has not shown itself to have. A column by Nina L. Khrushcheva.

Populism remains a wildcard, and only if growth picks up fast enough is it likely to be kept out of play. A column by Kenneth Rogoff.

The EU's policymakers should ignore the protectionist noises coming from Trump, and concentrate on defending the current global trading system and the liberal international order. A column by Daniel Gros.

Trump will have to learn that consensus building is frustrating and that such solutions are neither clear nor simple. The EU, for its part, realized this in the 1950’s. A column by Harold James.

The centenary will allow Putin to strengthen his preferred narrative: that Russia is now returning to greatness, thanks to the power Putin himself has consolidated. A column by Andrei Kolesnikov.

While Germany’s external surplus, at 8% of GDP, is big – too big – it is not the result of currency manipulation by Germany. A column by Hans-Werner Sinn.

Near-term resilience and an inward-looking US appear to offer a tantalizing opportunity for China. But China should resist the temptations of global power projection. A column by Stephen S. Roach.

Trump’s domestic agenda is a response to a world in which a principle of openness – to foreign goods, capital, and people – coexists with a complex system for regulating these flows. A column by Harold James.

Decision makers ought to know that a country is likely to conduct more trade with big countries that have strong domestic demand, rather than with smaller countries that have weak demand. A column by Jim O’Neill.

Unless the Trump administration can translate market-motivating intentions into well-calibrated actions, the lagging hard data risks dragging down confidence. A column by Mohamed A. El-Erian.