The managing director of Global Torchlight, a geopolitical risk advisory firm, discusses the various reasons for the supply chain disruption and what we may expect in the future. Among the eclectic items I have collected over the years – my curated clutter – there sits an innocuous chunk of rather poor quality concrete that crumbles a bit more with each passing year. It is a piece of the Berlin Wall. I hacked it off myself from the section immediately in front of the Brandenburg Gate using a borrowed hammer when I and about 20 classmates found ourselves on a high school trip to Europe as the Wall opened and the Cold War came to an end over 30 years ago.

It’s hard to overstate how positive things seemed at that time. The Cold War’s end generated tremendous optimism in our geopolitics. Meanwhile, as the Iron Curtain fell, governments also eliminated barriers to trade and investment through free trade agreements and closer multinational cooperation. Of course, there were still major upheavals including the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the financial shocks of the Great Recession. However, things always seemed to return to a steady state of cautious optimism about the longer-term direction of international politics and economics. More recent events, however, make it hard to stay optimistic. In the latter part of the last decade, we were already contending with trade wars, populism and a shifting geopolitical balance of power. However, COVID-19 and the horrific war in Ukraine are presenting us with a stark new reality that very few contemplated a few years ago. Disorder is the new normal in international affairs. 

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