Around the world with Davidson College

Here with the wonderful students of Davidson College ... it's the World in 60 Seconds!

Is ISIS achieving its aims in Europe? Sadly, yes. You see it in Brussels. You see it in France. We’re all talking about them, and it’s affecting the economy and security. All of this works for ISIS. It doesn’t work for anybody else.

Will Dilma Rousseff be impeached before the Rio Olympic Games? I think probably yes. I think she’s gone in the next 6-8 weeks. And that’s kind of surprising, but you know, this is going to be a really interesting Olympics. Not for the Brazilians.

Will China and Taiwan start a military conflict in the next 3-5 years? I’d say almost certainly not, though tensions are going to grow. Both countries really do want to focus on keeping the economics in place. It’s going to be tough with the nationalist Taiwanese government.

Will the Kurds have an independent state in the next 5 years? I think they won’t have an independent state, but they will have things that look increasingly state-like, particularly in Syria, particularly in Iraq. They won’t have a recognized independent state, but it increasingly won’t matter.

Is climate change the most serious national security issue of the 21st century? Probably not, because I think that information technology and its disruptive implications are so much bigger and so much faster, that I’d probably put that before climate.

Will China’s rising wealthy elite clash with the government in a way that generates substantive change? I think it’s already happening, and you’re seeing that substantive change. China has real constituents, even though they’re not a democracy. That’s going to be expanded dramatically by that technology I talked about as my key concern.

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