Across Latin America, a number of left-wing governments have recently lost elections to staunchly right-wing candidates. These candidates aim to roll back hard-won social gains. However, their approaches vary from country to country and they do not share a single recipe for success. In the following article, based on a German-language contribution to the journal Welt-sichten, PRIF’s Jonas Wolff reviews key characteristics and dynamics associated with the rise of the radical right across Latin…

On October 27, 2026, Israel will hold a critical election – the first since Hamas’ terror attack on October 7, 2023 and the subsequent war in Gaza. Seeking reelection is Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has split Israel’s politics into two main blocs. Netanyahu’s opposition is united in curbing Jewish terrorism in the West Bank and investigating the failures in the lead-up to October 7. Still, no bloc supports a two-state solution with Palestinians. German policymakers should present…

On September 4, 2026 the United Nations adopted Resolution A/80/L.104 #CorrectTheMap, with an overwhelming global consensus. The resolution recognizes the distortions inherent in the Mercator projection and encourages member states to use area-preserving maps, specifically referring to the Equal Earth projection.

Why is the Russia-Ukraine war continuing even though both war parties say they want peace? What would bring about a robust ceasefire? And what can other states do to help? Answers to these questions can be found in a key approach in peace and conflict studies known as ripeness theory.

On 3 January 2026, US forces captured Nicolás Maduro, but the conflict over who is excluded from political power did not disappear with him. Almost six months later, two earthquakes exposed a state hollowed out by corruption, mismanagement and years of confrontation. The damage was not merely physical, since the conflict is also kept alive by each side denying the other a legitimate place in the nation, and because removing those in power is not the same as transforming the conflict. Europe now…

From June 6 to July 25, 2026, India witnessed the world’s largest Gen-Z protest movement. Led by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and student organizations, it mobilized tens of thousands of people of different class, caste and religious backgrounds onto the streets of the country. Independent journalists and media collectives, women and Gen-Z meme culture quickly became the face of the protest. The peaceful movement, calling for accountability from the national government after leaked exam…

Following the G7 meeting in France in June, US President Donald Trump claimed that Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni “begged” to take a picture with him during the summit. Such a public rebuke is only one of a string of episodes evidencing a serious rift between the two leaders. The outcome is surprising given that the political and personal relationship between Meloni and Trump has, until recently, appeared to be rather idyllic. Placing the issue within the broader context of Italy’s…

Global child rights and child labour regulation aim to protect children from exploitation and abuse and to empower them to claim their rights. Yet organisations designed to help children, especially working children, often treat them as the passive beneficiaries of protective interventions that may alleviate hardship in the short-term but reinforce disempowerment in the long-term. Evidence from organised working children’s movements in the Global South challenges this assumption. These…

Why do some extremists deradicalise when confronted with counter-narratives or positive intergroup contact, while others entrench even deeper into their beliefs? While the external factors that pull people away from radical milieus are well documented, the internal psychological defences used to resist doubt are frequently overlooked. Drawing on interviews with former extremists, this Spotlight describes the unconscious defence strategies that allow radicalised individuals to reduce cognitive…

What happens when digital systems outgrow the Earth that sustains them? Computing has always consumed energy and water, but the growing ambitions of the AI industry are pushing demand to an unprecedented scale. As pressures mount, data centers in orbit around the Earth have been pitched as a solution. But space is no escape, and what is framed as a technical fix risks entrenching digital dependence in an increasingly militarized, fragile, and crisis-prone environment. Orbital data centers…