国連英検受験者は要チェック。毎年恒例のトップ10リスク

Every Nation for Itself: Winners and Losers in a G-Zero World (2012/05/03) Ian Bremmer 商品詳細を見る

数年前に国際関係のリーダーシップのなくなったGゼロという言葉を生み出したユーラシアグループの年初恒例の国際情勢のトップ10リスクを確認しておきます。チャリーローズ出演時に大体のリスクについて話してくれています。



大きな枠組みを押さえておくと、日々のニュースが立体的に感じることができるようになるでしょう。国連英検などに取り組まれている方は一つの指標になると思います。

THE RISKS
1 America's troubled alliances
2 Diverging markets
3 The new China
4 Iran
5 Petrostates
6 Strategic data
7 Al Qaeda 2.0
8 The Middle East's expanding unrest
9 The capricious Kremlin
10 Turkey
* Red Herrings

下記が概要部分ですが、リーマンショック以来の経済危機のリスクは過ぎ、地政学リスクが高まっているとみているようです。中国や韓国との緊張関係を考えると日本にも十分当てはまる分析ですね。

Since 2008, the world’s biggest risks have been economic. None of the feared crises was as likely to take place as expected (because of underlying political stability!), but from eurozone meltdown to fears of Chinese soft/medium/hard landings to the US debt crisis, analysts have spent the past five years worrying about how to stave off financial implosion.

That’s over. In 2014, big-picture economics are stable if not yet comforting. The EU has clawed its way out of recession. Japan has, improbably, discovered economic leadership. The economic performance of China’s new government is strong. And the US re- bound is sufficiently robust for the markets to shrug off New Year’s tapering resolutions.

But geopolitics is very much in play. The realities of a G-Zero order, a world of geo- political creative destruction without global leadership, are evident. There are tensions between China and Japan in the East China Sea, elite-level executions in North Korea, Russia flexing its muscles in neighboring Ukraine and beyond, and everyone fighting with everyone else in the Middle East (some things don’t change). All of which is changing the geopolitical map quite aside from the role of the world’s only superpower.

Above all, we foresee two essential questions about the world’s two largest economies this year. For the US, it’s externally focused: How will policymakers (re)define the role that the US should play in the world. For the “international community,” a term that has well outlived its use, much depends on the answer. For China, the challenge is internal: How will the country change now that real reforms are at hand? Superpower status isn’t on the table, but for the first time in decades, political leadership is altering the way the Chinese system functions. That will affect political risk in China, as well as Beijing’s behavior both domestically and internationally.

The other big focus this year is emerging—or more aptly diverging—markets. A healthy percentage of the major emerging markets that could have elections will hold them this year (China doesn’t, and Russia doesn’t count): Brazil, Colombia, India, Indonesia, South Africa, and Turkey. Not one of those countries enters its electoral cycle with strong, popular leadership. Then add empowered middle classes that demand greater accountability from their governments. The stakes are rising, and some of the world’s key economies are in for a rough ride.

It’s another troubled year for the Middle East and beyond, though the impact of the war in Syria is receding. After years of sanctions vs nuclear buildup, it’s the moment of truth in the Iranian nuclear talks, with either a deal or a collapse in negotiations that will have far-reaching regional implications. None of the hotspots in the extended region—North Africa, the Gulf, the Horn of Africa, Afghanistan/Pakistan—will avoid major conflict. Radicalism (Al Qaeda, in particular) is changing. It poses a less direct threat to the US but ignites more instability across the region. And to add fuel to the fire: In past decades, geopolitical conflict has pushed oil prices higher; this year, lower oil prices will put the squeeze on regional producers and others further afield.

Beyond that, the implications of the fight over cyber-security and the fallout from the broad, deep, and ongoing National Security Agency (NSA) scandal are making strategic data a core global political risk. The last two risks involve Russia and Turkey, and their leaders’ increasingly capricious behavior.

日本という言葉を含んでいたリスクは1 - America’s troubled alliances、3 - The new China、? - North Koreaでしたので、まずはこれらから読むのがいいのかもしれません。日米関係が新たな局面を迎えているように感じることがありますが、どうやら1 - America’s troubled alliancesを読むと日本だけではく、米国の同盟国全般に共通する傾向のようです。

英語学習的な観点からは6 - Strategic dataにあるon the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog.を取り上げたいと思います。前のブログでも取り上げたことがある有名なフレーズなので、It’s said thatという前置きがあるのでしょう。

6 - Strategic data
（前略）
That’s why the internet and its governance are shifting suddenly and dramatically from being a bottom-up open source sector to a top-down strategic sector. The internet will fragment even more in 2014, national champions will become more dominant actors in data-driven sectors in many of the world’s key economies, and costs of doing business for competitors that are, or hope to be, global will increase. As cyber-security becomes a bigger vulnerability, and cyber-mastery a greater economic opportunity, these inefficiencies are set to grow.

It’s said that on the internet, nobody knows you’re a dog. Governments now know what kind of dog you are, when you go for a walk, and your favorite kibble. Strategic data in the G-Zero is a dog- eat-dog world.

雑誌ニューヨーカーには毎週一コマ漫画がいくつか収載されていますが、その一作品だったようですね。



（Wikipedia）
"On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog" is an adage which began as the caption of a cartoon by Peter Steiner published by The New Yorker on July 5, 1993.[1][2] The cartoon features two dogs: one sitting on a chair in front of a computer, speaking the caption to a second dog sitting on the floor.[2][3] As of 2011, the panel was the most reproduced cartoon from The New Yorker, and Steiner has earned over US $50,000 from its reprinting.

ユーラシアグループでは、これを踏まえながらも政府の監視によって匿名性はすでに崩れていると警鐘をならしています。

有名なフレーズというのは結構限られていますので、多読をしていくと勘がついてきます。ジャンルにこだわらずたくさんのものに触れていきたいですね。