The Long Brief

Geopolitical conflicts have a habit of affecting important sea chokepoints and disrupting global trade routes. Recent developments have made the consequences of this painfully real. During Israel’s war against Hamas, the Suez Canal was a dangerous ground for trade ships for a prolonged period of time, disrupting trade flows and economic growth worldwide.

This July Fourth marked the United States’ Semiquincentennial celebration, commemorating the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. We asked Tamas Magyarics, Hungarian historian, former ambassador, and research fellow, about what are the possibilities of another American Century, and how the country’s foreign policy changed under Donald Trump. Last but not least, we discussed the declining attractiveness of the “American Dream”.

Agnes Urban (AU): My reassessment started before the election, prompted by a 444 podcast which argued that election results can be predicted from economic data, and the propaganda machine does not influence this all that much. I have to say these predictions turned out pretty well. It may be, after all, that we overestimated the role of the propaganda media a bit. We always focused on those reached by propaganda, whose thinking it shaped.

Our study of agri-food systems suggests that the most powerful resilience levers are not found inside single firms, but in the supply chain’s ability to adapt, collaborate, and move quickly as a network. Europe’s food system is entering an era of permanent stress. Climate change is already disrupting the food chain, from farms to storage, processing, and distribution.

The Catholic Church is undergoing a historic shift as its epicenter moves from the Global North to Africa, which is now the primary source of the religion’s growth and human capital. Africa currently accounts for approximately 280 million Catholics, representing roughly 20 percent of the global congregation. While membership stagnates in Europe and the Americas, it has grown by over 30 percent in Africa over the last decade.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s declaration of a national energy emergency on his first day back in office framed fossil fuel production as a geopolitical weapon. “Energy dominance” — flooding global markets with American oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) — would reassert American power, undercut China’s clean-technology leverage and discipline allies into dependence. Eighteen months on, the doctrine is revealing some of its contradictions, and nowhere more acutely than in Taiwan.

The war in Ukraine has now exceeded the first world war in duration. And while the comparison between these two conflicts is imperfect, it is becoming difficult to ignore. Some of the similarities are obvious. At the tactical level, the conflict in Ukraine has witnessed the return of artillery as the dominant arm of battle. During much of the first year of the war, artillery was responsible for the vast majority of casualties.

Albertans are heading to the polls in October to express their opinion on whether they should remain a member state of the Canadian Federation. Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a trade war against Canada and is showing maps of the country with an American flag draped over it.

Russia uses “soft power” tools – such as the media, culture, education, and religion – to advance its own geopolitical goals and spread disinformation. The most recent manifestation of this, Russia’s return to one of Europe’s most prestigious cultural platforms, the Venice Biennale, has sparked debate about how far the freedom of speech may go.

In May 2026, while Donald Trump prepared for his visit to Beijing, many expected tense discussions about tariffs, Taiwan, military deterrence, and trade imbalances. However, another issue had quietly become just as significant: artificial intelligence. For years, the U.S.-China technological rivalry was considered mostly as a semiconductor war.