Economic Power: Arsenal of Democracy or Feeble Weapon?

This episode features a conversation between Barry Eichengreen, the George C. and Helen N. Pardee Professor of Economics and Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley, and Rui Esteves, Professor of International History and Politics at the Geneva Graduate Institute. The dramatic economic and financial measures taken by the United States and its allies in response to Russia’s attack on Ukraine point up the potency but also the limits of economic power. The International Monetary Fund forecasts that Russia will cause the country’s economy to contract by 9 percent in 2022. Yet there are no visible signs of this intervention inducing the Kremlin to halt its war on Ukraine or even to modify its prosecution of the war. Have Western sanctions failed? More globally, what is the future of international liberalism and economic integration given the current geopolitical context?