Sessions at the Council of Councils conference were held on global change and world order, managing the global risk of nuclear weapons, the challenges of rapid urbanization, the future of freedom, and managing the conflict in Yemen.

Illicit financial flows are one of the most important features of globalization’s dark side. However, unlike other illicit or dangerous cross-border flows, these flows bear almost no markers in and of themselves.

Overview Corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards, which require automakers to achieve government-mandated targets for the efficiency of the vehicles they sell each year, can reduce U.S. re…

Introduction An oil-exporting country’s “fiscal breakeven” oil price is the minimum price per barrel that the country needs in order to meet its expected spending needs while balancing its budget …

Overview How much Iranian nuclear capability is too much? The simplest answer is that any amount is unacceptable. But it is far from clear that zero enrichment is a realistic goal. To help illumin…

Overview What is energy security? On April 12–13, the Council on Foreign Relations convened academics, policymakers, and industry experts to assess the security implications of the way the world p…

Overview How would the Arab states of the Middle East react if Iran were to acquire a nuclear weapons capability? In this Working Paper, sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York, Michael …

Overview U.S. policymakers who worry about the impact of energy developments on geopolitics typically think of high oil prices as bad news and low prices as an unalloyed good. But a sustained drop…

Overview Despite an extended period of economic difficulty, Pew Research Center pollsters Andrew Kohut and Michael Dimock show that Americans' core values and beliefs about economic opportunity, a…

Overview Economists have long argued that taxing oil consumption would be the most efficient way to address U.S. vulnerability to overpriced and unreliable oil supplies. Yet energy taxes are a thi…