World Politics News   Articles for World Politics Course

Chrystia Freeland is a member of the Canadian Parliament and one of the most perceptive observers of world politics in the world today.  She has written an essay with a particularly grim view of the state of the world entitled “The Disintegration of the World.”  Interestingly, Freeland emphasizes the role of geopolitics, one of the more traditional approaches to the study of world politics.  The underlying source of the pessimism is the stubborn refusal of the global economy to revive itself after the Great Recession.

There has been an incredible controversy in the US in the last few months over the number of people killed by police.  Most of us, however, have no basis for assessing whether the number is large or small, although the reported incidents seem especially egregious.  When one compares the US to other developed countries, the numbers are simply staggering.  We do not have an accurate data base for fatalities caused by police action, but it is possible to make a very rough comparison.  The numbers work out this way:  in the US, police kill 35.5 people for every one million residents.  In comparable countries the numbers are as follows:

• Denmark: 11 people — number of people killed per one million residents: .187 people
• Sweden: 13 people — .133 people
• Norway: 3 people — .060 people
• Finland: 2 people — .034 people
• Germany: 81 people — .089 people
• The Netherlands: 24 people — .137 people
• England/Wales: 25 people — .042 people

Tensions in the Baltic Sea between NATO and Russian forces have been growing for some time.  The number of military incursions and activities in the region are the highest since the height of the Cold War.  There really are no issues at stake in the region, but Russian and NATO forces continue to play cat and mouse games as a way of testing both strength and resolve.   Military spending has also been growing dramatically among the countries in the region.