logo
episode-header-image
Oct 2024
24m 48s

Shoal searching: the South China sea sim...

The Economist
About this episode

A constellation of islands, reefs and rock-piles has been the source of disputes for decades. As a new phase in the conflict begins, how to calm things down? In the first of a series of first-person dispatches, we speak to a student in Gaza (09:50). And after a conservation success story, Europe’s wolves are again villains in the popular imagination (18:19). 


Get a world of insights by subscribing to Economist Podcasts+. For more information about how to access Economist Podcasts+, please visit our FAQs page or watch our video explaining how to link your account.

Up next
Today
The Weekend Intelligence: The trial of Yevgenia Berkovich
In May 2024, Yevgenia Berkovich and Svetlana Petrichuk, the director and writer of an experimental play, became the first Russian artists since Soviet times to be put on trial for the content of their work. It was a show trial. Like all show trials its outcome was preordained. Bu ... Show More
43m 54s
Yesterday
Dune raider: Saudi is a video-game superpower
Mohammed bin Salman, Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, is a huge video-game fan. Now his hobby is becoming a multi-billion-dollar industry for the kingdom, which is acquiring some of the world’s biggest gaming firms. How Finnish icebreakers became a focus for polar power politics. And ... Show More
19m 57s
Oct 9
Finally, a deal: the fragile peace in Gaza
Donald Trump has brokered an agreement between Israel’s government and Hamas. It’s a momentous breakthrough. Our correspondent analyses what comes next. We launch “The Economist Insider”, our new TV show for subscribers, where senior editors debate the news. And, do red-light mas ... Show More
23m 25s
Recommended Episodes
Oct 2024
Shoal searching: the South China sea simmers
A constellation of islands, reefs and rock-piles has been the source of disputes for decades. As a new phase in the conflict begins, how to calm things down? In the first of a series of first-person dispatches, we speak to a student in Gaza (09:50). And after a conservation succe ... Show More
24m 48s
Oct 6
One peace at a time: hopeful Gaza talks
As negotiators gather in Egypt, appetite for a short-term peace seems high on all sides. But there is much ambiguity surrounding a lasting accord. In New York, renters fear being evicted far less than they once did—but pity flat-hunters. And remembering Kim Seong Min, a North Kor ... Show More
22m 54s
Oct 2
Space invaders: Russia’s NATO nose-thumbing
Russia’s dark-fleet maritime operations and brazen incursions into NATO airspace appear to be precision-engineered to test Western resolve. We ask how this new phase of aggression may end. Our correspondent reports from Madagascar, where young people are leading unprecedented ant ... Show More
24m 45s
Feb 2025
Get your Strait facts: China’s quiet Taiwan push
We investigate China’s under-the-radar push to get other countries to change their official language on Taiwan’s independence. Would it make a difference in a bid to reunify by force? The case of a nurse jailed for killing babies exposes deep problems with British justice (10:10) ... Show More
22m 41s
Sep 23
States of disarray: the UN at 80
Coffers running low and an increasingly absent principal member: the United Nations has never looked so precarious. We discuss its future amid uncertain geopolitics. The generative-AI explosion has mostly been driven by so-called large language models—but small ones look ever mor ... Show More
25m 13s
Sep 16
Honey, we shrunk the kids: population fall
Falling fertility makes a global decline in population inevitable. That will change the shape and make up of societies. But it may not make us poorer. Are large language models really woke? And reading is on the wane – and why that matters. Listen to what matters most, from globa ... Show More
23m 46s
Oct 7
Renewable energy now world's biggest power source
Solar and wind power have overtaken coal as the world’s leading source of electricity for the first time on record. Record solar expansion and steady wind growth is driving the shift, with China and India among the countries leading the clean energy charge. On the second annivers ... Show More
29m 44s
Oct 3
Chainsaw out of gas? Milei’s experiment wobbles
A telling local-election loss, persistent allegations of scandal and an American pledge to prop up the peso: much is chipping away at the experiment of Argentina’s President Javier Milei. Long after the twin troubles of a pandemic and interest-rate rises, America’s commercial-pro ... Show More
25m 43s
Sep 1
Indonesia ablaze: Riots test Prabowo
For the past week in Indonesia, protesters have taken to the streets and cities have burned. President Prabowo is still popular – now he faces a big test. Climate change threatens the collapse of an Atlantic current that helps make Europe habitable. And facekinis become a fashion ... Show More
22m 42s
Sep 2024
Beyond the bullets: we go to Ukraine
We take a look at the grim conditions in and prospects for the frontlines in the country’s east and north. But not all of the fighting is military in nature. We examine a far wider cultural revival going on (10:59), in music and fashion and long-forgotten ingredients and methods ... Show More
27m 30s