Megacities Becoming The World’s Dominant Social And Economic Structures
April 21st, 2016
Courtesy of Quartz, a look at how cities have become the world’s dominant demographic and economic clusters: As the sociologist Christopher Chase-Dunn has pointed out, it is not population or territorial size that drives world-city status, but economic weight, proximity to zones of growth, political stability, and attractiveness for foreign capital. In other words, connectivity […]
Read more »From K-Pop to Kimchi: North Korea’s Cultural Exports
April 21st, 2016
Courtesy of the Wall Street Journal, a look at North Korea’s cultural exports: North Korea, a notoriously closed country, operates businesses beyond its borders that provide the country with much-needed revenue to prop up its cash-strapped regime. These aren’t typical foreign ventures. From a chain of restaurants to colossal monument-building projects, North Korea’s revenue sources […]
Read more »Silk Rail: Connecting Central Asia To China By Railway
April 14th, 2016
Via The Economist, a look at Iran’s planned railroad upgrades: THE 10,500km (6,500 mile) journey from Yiwu City in eastern China through Kazakhstan, Kyrghyzstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan was sluggish. But when the first Chinese train pulled into Tehran station after a 14-day haul, Iranian officials hailed a great leap forward. “We’re becoming the global hub […]
Read more »In Iraqi Kurdistan, Momentum Builds for an Iranian Pipeline
April 14th, 2016
Courtesy of STRATFOR (subscription required), interesting analysis of the potential for a pipeline to take Kurdish oil to market through Iran: For years, Iraqi Kurdistan and Iran have been in talks to construct a pipeline that would transport Kurdish oil to the Iranian market. Until now, the negotiations have lagged as the Kurdistan Regional Government […]
Read more »One Belt, One Road
April 13th, 2016
Via Eurasia Review, an interesting article on Singapore’s involvement in China’s One Belt, One Road initiative: Main routes of the Silk Road. In the 14th century, Mongol dominance in Asia resulted in the Pax Mongolica, a framework of peaceful trading relationships straddling the Maritime and Overland Silk Roads, allowing the Kingdom of Singapura to flourish into […]
Read more »Kurdistan: Promise And Peril
April 10th, 2016
Two interesting articles on Kurdistan. The first, via Geopolitical Monitor, is a detailed examination of Iraqi Kurdistan’s rise as an independent energy player . The second, courtesy of Daily Beast, looks at threat that Kurdistan’s weakening economy may have upon the region: Iraqi Kurdistan and the governing Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) is in the midst […]
Read more »Focusing primarily on The New Seven Sisters - the largely state owned petroleum companies from the emerging world that have become key players in the oil & gas industry as identified by Carola Hoyos, Chief Energy Correspondent for The Financial Times - but spanning other nascent opportunities around the globe that may hold potential in the years ahead, Wildcats & Black Sheep is a place for the adventurous to contemplate & evaluate the emerging markets of tomorrow.