Us vs. Them Quotes

“In American and European politics, “them” is often an immigrant hoping to come inside—the Mexican or Central American migrant hoping to enter the United States or the Middle Eastern/North African Muslim refugee hoping to live in Germany, France, Britain, or Sweden. In poorer countries, especially those with borders drawn by colonizers, “them” is often the ethnic, religious, or sectarian minorities with roots that are older than the borders themselves. Think of Muslims in India, in western China, or in the Caucasus region of Russia. Sunni Muslims in Iraq or Shia Muslims in Saudi Arabia. Think of Christians in Egypt or Kurds in Turkey. Think of Chinese and other ethnic minorities in Indonesia and Malaysia. There are many more examples. These groups become easy targets when times are hard and a politician looks to make a name for himself at their expense.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“Russia, like all other countries not named China, faces an uphill battle to establish the degree of content dominance that an autocrat might want.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“China has some obvious advantages. It’s the one government that, at least for now, can afford to spend huge amounts of money to create unnecessary jobs to avoid political unrest. China’s historic successes suggest this might be the one country that can find a way to adjust, and the aging of its population could be a plus as the country needs fewer jobs in coming years than rival India. We all better hope so, because, month by month, the entire global economy is becoming more dependent on China’s continued stability and growth.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“There are many reasons why the tech revolution will hit the emerging world much harder than it will hit Europe and the United States. In developed countries, children are more likely to grow up with digital technologies as toys and then to encounter them in school. Governments in these countries have money to invest in educational systems that prepare workers, both blue and white collar, for change. Their universities have much greater access to state-of-the-art technologies. Their companies produce the innovations that drive tech change in the first place. This creates a dynamic in which high-wage countries are more likely than low-wage ones to dominate the skill-intensive industries that will generate twenty-first-century growth, leaving behind large numbers of those billion-plus people who only recently emerged from age-old deprivation. The wealth in developed countries helps them maintain much stronger social safety nets than in poorer countries to help citizens who lose their jobs, fall ill, or need to care for sick children or aging parents. In short, wealthier countries are both more adaptable and more resilient than developing ones.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“many developing countries, governments are becoming victims of their own success. Those who have joined the new middle class don’t just want better government; they expect it. They demand it. This is the natural result of a larger international success story that is now visible even to those who haven’t fully shared in it.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“2015 study conducted by Ball State University found that automation and related factors, not trade, accounted for 88 percent of lost U.S. manufacturing jobs between 2006 and 2013.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“In 2018, it’s still too soon to know whether the tech revolution will kill more jobs than it creates.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“Pollution, corruption, economic problems—there would be enough reason to fear for developing countries even if the coming tech disruption weren’t expected.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“Around the world, tougher economic times make governments less popular. In response, political leaders then spend too much money, including on subsidies.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“The social credit system is a tool the state can use to decide whether it can trust you. If it trusts you, your horizons are limitless. If the state cannot trust you, you’re not going anywhere.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“As job creation becomes a more sensitive subject in years to come, we can expect controversies over immigration even in developing countries, just as the flow of people from crisis-plagued Venezuela has already raised this issue even in Latin America.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“There is the “Great Firewall,” which blocks access to tens of thousands of websites the Chinese government doesn’t want citizens to see. The “Golden Shield” is an online surveillance system that uses keywords and other tools to shut down attempts to access content that the state considers politically sensitive. There is an ever expanding list of words and phrases that trigger denial messages online. More recently, China has moved on offense by introducing the “Great Cannon,” which can alter content accessed online and attack websites that the state considers dangerous to China’s security via a “dedicated denial of service” attack that can overwhelm servers to knock them offline.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“Over time, a lower oil price will push Russia’s military spending still lower. But attacks in cyberspace are much less expensive and not nearly as dangerous as conventional attacks, because it isn’t always clear who is responsible. That’s why we can expect a lot more of them—and for their sophistication and scale to grow.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“Another factor that’s likely to exacerbate inequality: next-generation automation. The technological revolution in the workplace has only just begun. A 2017 study published by the Institute for Spatial Economic Analysis found that nearly every major American city will see half of its current jobs replaced by robots by 2035.”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism

“When Donald Trump became president, he asked Congress to increase U.S. defense spending by $54 billion, an incremental increase that tops the entire 2017 Russian defense budget”
― Ian Bremmer, Us vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism