Media Interventions

Pour la première fois depuis 1872, les États-Unis ne sont plus, en 2014, la première puissance économique mondiale. La Chine les a dépassé et représente aujourd'hui 16,5 % de l'économie mondiale, en terme de pouvoir d'achat réel, devant les 16,3 % américains. Mais que signifient ces chiffres ? Induisent-ils la fin de près de deux siècles de suprématie économique américaine ? Surtout, ce rapport de force est-il parti pour durer ?

The weekend meeting between the French and Russian presidents has given France a chance to become "the new Germany" for Russia, which lost its last Western ally after a falling-out with official Berlin, analysts say.

French mediation "is aimed at preventing Russia-EU relations from going to the dogs," said Tatiana Kastueva-Jean of the French Institute of International Relations (IFRI) in Paris.

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Oil’s decline is proving to be the worst since the collapse of the financial system in 2008 and threatening to have the same global impact of falling prices three decades ago that led to the Mexican debt crisis and the end of the Soviet Union.

We all wanted to believe that Barack Obama's dazzling election in 2008 would accelerate history's forward trajectory in a good way for once.  Barack Obama, would lead the United States into a post-racial era and serve as an example for all democracies. Six years later we see that we were wrong: the American president did not perform any of the expected miracles. 

Last August in Missouri, a white police officer shot Michael Brown, a young African-American male. After courts found the officer not guilty, riots broke out in Ferguson and a number of large American cities. This anger demonstrates that 50 years after civil rights legislation race continues to deeply divide the United States. Are events in Ferguson emblematic of a larger problem? What impact will racial tensions have on American politics just two years from the next presidential election?

Audrey Pulvar welcomed Laurence Nardon to I-télé on "On ne va pas se mentir" to discuss this year's midterm elections in the United States. 

Laurence Nardon, head of the United States Program at Ifri, joined Eric Mauban, this Tuesday, November 4th at 7:20 AM on Radio Classique.

Rebel commander Alexander Zakharchenko smiled only slightly on hearing that he had won this weekend's elections in Donetsk, Ukraine (pictured). The results were never in doubt: Mr Zakharchenko's nominal opponents openly supported him, and his face was the only one on campaign billboards. Nonetheless, eastern Ukraine's separatist republics went through the motions of democracy, including inviting international election observers. Those proved hard to find: while Russia has said it will respect the vote, America, the European Union, and the United Nations have all condemned it.

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The issues from the United States midterm elections explained by Laurence Nardon on Fabrice Lundy's TV show "Les décodeurs de l'éco" on BFM Business.