Comment: Pandemic is pushing China to the top of the global pecking order

The effects of Covid-19 on the distribution of world power remain to be seen, but signs suggest China will overtake the US. Europe must find a way to engage with the emerging superpower without submitting to it

Power play: The China-US rivalry was accelerating long before the Covid-19 crisis, but the pandemic seems to be amplifying the confrontation

The Covid-19 pandemic is arguably the first truly global crisis of the 21st century. The only modern historical parallels to the economic disruption triggered by a microscopic pathogen are to the last century’s world wars.

The start of World War I, in August 1914, not only ended a long period of peace, but also suspended an earlier epoch of economic integration and globalisation. As governments around the world pursued new protectionist agendas, economic growth collapsed ...