Links from 3 Feb 2021

Feb 03, 2021

From various places and sources.

The US-China stuff

Prof Wang Gungwu and David Shambaugh on America and China in Southeast Asia. NOT TO BE MISSED. https://www.hinrichfoundation.com/events/upcoming/david-shambaugh-where-great-powers-meet/?utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=109125328&_hsenc=p2ANqtz-9zH8Qz5GGX84Ssqs2eNyuiaOhm-eirGLRigt7fFovieMy4-qBI57BMQkQyD6hZxS4OoY_L-795n19yge8nB1KrIK59Zw 

Revising my view of geopolitical competition - including EU-China relations alongside US-China perspectives: https://eeas.europa.eu/headquarters/headquarters-homepage_en/34728/EU-China%20Relations%20factsheet

American thinktank - Center for New American Security, looking at an alliance of democracies in technology https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/files.cnas.org/documents/Common-Code-An-Alliance-Framework-for-Democratic-Technology-Policy-1.pdf?mtime=20201020174236&focal=none - they see a Chinese political-economic nexus in technology and want to respond to it. 

CSET - Center for Security and Emerging Technology based out of Georgetown University wants to expand the way people look at emerging technology - https://cset.georgetown.edu/research/open-source-intelligence-for-st-analysis/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axioschina&stream=china

The German Marhsall Fund of the United States looks at how to “secure democracy” from China’s efforts via the United Work Front organisations. https://securingdemocracy.gmfus.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Friends-and-Enemies-A-Framework-for-Understanding-Chinese-Political-Interference-in-Democratic-Countries.pdf - this Axios China newsletter piece: https://www.axios.com/china-tech-dominance-democracies-d60a4e60-53c7-46a6-85c6-8979ef0225cf.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axioschina&stream=china

Found this edition of the Axios China useful to look back at the plethora of strategies that have been in the news, especially with the “Longer Telegram” https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-china-02341361-5b69-4335-90b0-c39a0d276f34.html?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter_axioschina&stream=china 

Making clear what’s real and hype in China’s Military-Civil-Fusion - tldr: they were just trying to follow America’s example of how military and civilian research come together. https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/files.cnas.org/documents/Myths-and-Realities-of-China%E2%80%99s-Military-Civil-Fusion-Strategy_FINAL-min.pdf?mtime=20210127133521&focal=none 

US stuff

“No evidence of anti-conservative bias” on social media: https://www.theverge.com/2021/2/1/22260269/anti-conservative-bias-social-media-no-evidence-nyu-research?mc_cid=7fe047fe3e&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab 

How the Capitol insurrectionists “Boogaloo Bois” have miltiary training: https://www.propublica.org/article/boogaloo-bois-military-training?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits 

A “reality czar” - addressing the broken information environment in the United States. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/02/technology/biden-reality-crisis-misinformation.html?mc_cid=7fe047fe3e&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab 

China tech scene

I also subscribe to Jeff Ding's work - very good for tech scene in China: https://chinai.substack.com/

From the New York Times - disgruntlement at China’s 996 workism - from 9am to 9pm, 6 days a week - https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/business/china-technology-worker-deaths.html?mc_cid=7fe047fe3e&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab 

Different Economic Framework

Mariana Mazzucato’s latest book is “Mission Economy” about how to organise new technology research and translation, with reference to Apollo missions: https://marianamazzucato.com/books 

Long read on The Green Future Index, a Salesforce piece on how countries are progressing and committing to build a low-carbon future, from Tech Review: https://mittrinsights.s3.amazonaws.com/GFI/Report2021.pdf - interactive index here: https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/01/25/1016648/green-future-index/?mc_cid=7fe047fe3e&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab 

This Tech Review newsletter supplied the Social Progress Index and the Diana Coyle’s society wealth project: https://mailchi.mp/technologyreview/waj27h2dnx?e=0fb39b30ab 

Diana Coyle-led Build Forward - Investing in a Resilient Recovery, on societywealth: https://www.bennettinstitute.cam.ac.uk/media/uploads/files/WER_Building_Forward_Investing_in_a_resilient_recovery.pdf?mc_cid=2f5d36dc54&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab

Also from that edition: “Capitalism we can believe in” https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/what-to-do-about-declining-trust-in-us-capitalism-by-laura-tyson-and-lenny-mendonca-2021-01 

Social Progress Index: an alternative to GDP: https://www.socialprogress.org/?mc_cid=2f5d36dc54&mc_eid=0fb39b30ab

Risks

McKinsey has been looking at the landscape of risks and how to prepare for them: https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/risk/our-insights/five-fifty-the-new-landscape-of-risk?cid=fivefifty-eml-alt-mkq-mck&hlkid=e11bb5c8dfb14b79b5a2682887b333c5&hctky=11200731&hdpid=9b21b1a9-e913-4a7b-b08d-80cc05a939b4 

I subscribe to another newsletter from Marsh and McLennan, on exactly this topic. https://www.brinknews.com/

Economist’s special report on climate change and business: https://www.economist.com/special-report/2020/09/17/the-great-disrupter


Futurisms

This was a fun-read about pop futurism as a genre - how people had been looking at possible futures. 

“Now, just as in 1970, the future is made by intricate interactions of people, systems, communities, material and environmental conditions—and by the stories that influence those relationships. This new chapter of pop futurism shows its enduring appeal as a familiar dialect, even if the message it carries is now an urgently different one. It might still have the potential to illustrate new visions of the future for a healthier world, but it needs to feel as vivid and magnetic as Future Shock did 50 years ago. As Toffler and his acolytes once made the accelerated, profit-driven future dazzling, the next generation of thinkers is trying to reconcile this paradox—to conjure slower, more restorative, community-driven futures that are just as irresistible.”

https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2021/02/future-shock-pop-futurism-pandemic/617867/?utm_source=pocket&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=pockethits 


From Exponential View

From the Exponential View, a subscriber on hydrogen projects: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/12/can-we-crack-the-hydrogen-puzzle-this-time-around/

From EV - augmented collective intelligence: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5e95059565bf963c169f906a/t/6012adf8686ce87f76478fd0/1611836936772/Augmented+Collective+Intelligence+PUBLISHED.pdf 



Enjoy this post?

Buy eddiechoo/Open Source Futures a coffee

More from eddiechoo/Open Source Futures