The West's financial crisis
Western governments have recently taken exceptional measures to prevent the disintegration of their financial systems following a collapse in banking confidence. Whether these will be sufficient to quell extreme turbulence in money and stock markets is not yet clear. Predictions that the crisis will herald the end of American-style capitalism seem exaggerated. However, signs of a major economic downturn resulting from the financial crisis are already evident.
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Climate change and the US election
While dealing with one of the worst economic crises in decades, the next United States administration will also face an early foreign-policy test over the moves it makes – or does not make – towards a new international treaty on measures to combat global warming. Both main presidential candidates, Republican Senator John McCain and Democratic Senator Barack Obama, have taken much stronger positions on climate change than the current administration, so the US will almost certainly be a more positive force in negotiations at the 2009 UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.
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Spiralling drug violence in Mexico
Mexico has been on major drug-trafficking routes into the United States since the mid 1980s, but the violence associated with this illegal trade has escalated alarmingly in the past few years. Since President Felipe Calderón took office at the end of 2006, drug-related violence has claimed nearly 5,000 lives ¬– more than 3,200 of them in 2008. An army crackdown by Calderón has provoked an increasingly militarised response from the country's drug cartels, and the government's attention is finally turning to the police and judicial reforms that many observers believe are central to solving the crisis.
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The normalisation of Indonesia
For years, Indonesia grappled with the legacy of more than 30 years of dictatorship under former President Suharto, as well as with the challenges posed by its subsequent democratic transition. It was dogged by a fragile economy, weak government, provincial secessionism, inter-communal violence, Islamic extremism and the threat of military coups. Today, however, the country has made a remarkable turnaround under more effective leadership. As it prepares for parliamentary and presidential elections in 2009, Southeast Asia's largest and most populous state is more peaceful, cohesive and stable than would have seemed possible just eight years ago.
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Uganda's elusive peace deal
Talks to end the 20-year-old civil war in northern Uganda are verging on collapse. Since 2006, rebels of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) have been engaged in promising peace negotiations with the government in Kampala, but after a final deal was agreed, the LRA's enigmatic leader, Joseph Kony twice failed to appear at a signing ceremony and is now evading international mediators. There have always been doubts about the LRA's commitment to peace talks. Now calls are growing for military action against the rebels – which would carry its own risks.
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