The Power of Crisis Quotes

“Hard as it was to work toward nuclear reductions, it will be much tougher and more complicated to create a new global public health system, reinvent the way energy is produced and delivered, manage the massive fallout from climate change, and ensure that new technologies don’t destroy our common future.”
― Ian Bremmer, The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats – and Our Response – Will Change the World

“In the introduction, I wrote that COVID had started a war, and nobody won. Let me amend that. Technology won, specifically, the makers of disruptive new technologies and all those who benefit from them. Before the pandemic, American politicians were shaking their fists at the country’s leading tech companies. Republicans insisted that new media was as hopelessly biased against them as traditional media, and they demanded action. Democrats warned that tech giants like Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Alphabet, and Netflix had amassed too much market (and therefore political) power, that citizens had lost control of how these companies use the data they generate, and that the companies should therefore be broken into smaller, less dangerous pieces. European governments led a so-called techlash against the American tech powerhouses, which they accused of violating their customers’ privacy.

COVID didn’t put an end to any of these criticisms, but it reminded policymakers and citizens alike just how indispensable digital technologies have become. Companies survived the pandemic only by allowing wired workers to log in from home. Consumers avoided possible infection by shopping online. Specially made drones helped deliver lifesaving medicine in rich and poor countries alike. Advances in telemedicine helped scientists and doctors understand and fight the virus. Artificial intelligence helped hospitals predict how many beds and ventilators they would need at any one time. A spike in Google searches using phrases that included specific symptoms helped health officials detect outbreaks in places where doctors and hospitals are few and far between. AI played a crucial role in vaccine development by absorbing all available medical literature to identify links between the genetic properties of the virus and the chemical composition and effects of existing drugs.”
― Ian Bremmer, The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats – and Our Response – Will Change the World

“America’s broken politics and the intensifying US-China rivalry imperil our ability to build the international trust needed to meet the great crises of our time.”
― Ian Bremmer, The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats – and Our Response – Will Change the World

“One, domestic politics inside the United States, still the world’s sole superpower, is broken. Two, the relationship between the United States and China, which will matter more than any other for the world’s collective future, is headed in the wrong direction. Both”
― Ian Bremmer, The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats – and Our Response – Will Change the World