Explainers

  • President Donald Trump has begun his second term with a raft of tariff threats to bolster his immigration priorities, support local industries, and compete with China. Here’s how these taxes work and how they’ve been used historically.  
  • The U.S. health agency regulates the country’s foods and drugs, among other products. With the FDA’s role in drug development and nutrition policy and its COVID-19 pandemic response driving controversy, President Donald Trump is set to shake up its leadership.  
  • An array of domestic and foreign powers are vying for influence in Lebanon, including the Lebanese Armed Forces, Hezbollah, Israel, Iran, Syria, and the United States.
  • International efforts, such as the Paris Agreement, aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But experts say countries aren’t doing enough to limit dangerous global warming.
  • Low water levels have led to a traffic jam at one of the world’s busiest maritime passages. The bottleneck demonstrates how accelerating climate change is threatening global supply chains.
  • After a decades-long cease-fire crumbled in 2020, Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front have resumed fighting over the disputed Western Sahara.
  • Presidential candidates Harris and Trump differ sharply on the benefits of immigration for the U.S. economy. What role do immigrants play?
  • Programs that allow foreign investors to buy residency or citizenship in another country are growing in popularity, but some carry economic and security risks.
  • Stanford Emerging Technology Review Faculty Council Member Mark Horowitz and CFR’s technologist-in-residence Sebastian Elbaum discuss where chip manufacturing is heading, how hardware advances are powering the new artificial intelligence (AI) era, and what the United States should prioritize in order to sustain its leadership in this crucial domain.
  • How do we connect science and engineering labs with Washington and the world of business? From the Council on Foreign Relations and the Stanford Emerging Technology Review this is The Interconnect, a new podcast discussing emerging technologies and their foreign policy implications.
  • Robert Kaplan, acclaimed journalist and author of Waste Land: A World in Permanent Crisis, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss how the world’s growing interconnectedness is likely to produce greater conflict and chaos. This episode is the sixth in a continuing TPI series on U.S. grand strategy.
  • As part of our Election 2024 initiative exploring the role of the United States in the world, how international affairs issues affect voters, and what is at stake as voters make their choices in November, CFR visited colleges and universities in four battleground states—Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, and Pennsylvania—to hold public forums with top experts on international issues and how they influence the lives of Americans. Our nonpartisan conversations, co-hosted with Arizona State University, the Georgia Institute of Technology, Grand Valley State University, and Franklin & Marshall College covered the U.S. role in the world, the trade-offs presented by different policy options both locally and globally, and context on the international issues, choices, and challenges facing the next president.
  • 2023 was a tumultuous year, marked by violent conflicts, democratic erosion, and record-high temperatures. This year, experts at the Council on Foreign Relations, along with visiting world leaders and thinkers, unpacked these issues and more. Join CFR’s director of studies, Jim Lindsay, in looking back at his list of the ten most impactful events of the year.  
  • Taiwan's relationship with the United States, China, and the rest of the world has a complex history that informs why the island is so consequential to today's geopolitics. To better understand these dynamics, David Sacks, CFR's fellow for Asia studies, answers questions about Taiwan's history and its significance to diplomacy in East Asia. For more on the relationship between the United States, China, and Taiwan, check out the Council on Foreign Relations–sponsored Independent Task Force, "U.S.-Taiwan Relations in a New Era". cfr.org/us-taiwan
  • Artificial Intelligence (AI) could transform economies, politics, and everyday life. Some experts believe this increasingly powerful technology could lead to amazing advances and prosperity. Yet, many tech and industry leaders are warning that AI poses substantial risks, and they are calling for a moratorium on AI research so that safety measures can be established. But amid mounting great-power competition, it’s unclear whether national governments will be able to coordinate on regulating this technology that offers so many economic and strategic opportunities.
  • Over the two centuries since Colombia’s independence, the relationship between Washington and Bogotá has evolved into a close economic and security partnership. But it has at times been strained by U.S. intervention, Cold War geopolitics, and the war on drugs.
  • Over the course of two hundred years, the United States and Mexico have developed rich diplomatic, economic, and cultural ties but at times clashed over borders, migration, trade, and an escalating drug war.
  • Since Fidel Castro’s ascent to power in 1959, U.S.-Cuba ties have endured a nuclear crisis, a long U.S. economic embargo, and persistent political hostilities. The diplomatic relationship thawed under President Barack Obama, but many restrictions have since been renewed.
  • Immigration has been an important element of U.S. economic and cultural vitality since the country’s founding. This interactive timeline outlines the evolution of U.S. immigration policy after World War II.