Chris Patten
Chris Patten is a former EU Commissioner for External Relations, Chairman of the British Conservative Party, and was the last British Governor of Hong Kong. He is currently Chancellor of Oxford University and a member of the British House of Lords.
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2010-02-19
| Just last year, America’s financial difficulties and foreign entanglements, together with China’s economic ascent, led many to envisage the emergence of a sort of global condominium between the two countries. But, thanks to China's recent behavior on several issues, the idea of a G-2 that resolves major global problems has quickly lost plausibility.... read |
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2010-01-20
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Recalling Hillary Clinton’s famous Democratic primary television advertisement, Barack Obama, it turns out, is exactly the sort of president that most of us would want to have in the post for that 3 a.m. phone call about an international crisis. He is not afraid to act, but he is prepared to think first.... read |
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2009-12-29
| We should not allow our rage at the unseemly behavior of bankers to turn into an all-purpose rant against personal wealth. Sometimes its owners use it in hugely generous amounts for great public gain.... read |
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2009-11-23
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The selection of Herman van Rompuy as President of the EU’s Council of Ministers, and of Lady Catherine Ashton as its foreign policy chief, underlines the extent to which the EU's member states are in the driver’s seat. As a result, Europe is in danger of becoming politically irrelevant, a successful customs union with a Swissified foreign policy and a group of fractious, vision-free leaders.... read |
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2009-11-16
| If this year was one of continuing war in Iraq and Afghanistan, petrifying conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, the growing nuclear threat posed by Iran and North Korea, and stalled progress on climate change, could 2010 be any worse? Yes, because tensions over China's deliberately undervalued currency are likely to come to a head.... read |
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2009-10-27
| Today's pensioners, especially in the West, have little reason to grumble, given the massive social and economic progress that has been made in their lifetimes. But much of that progress has come at a huge cost in the form of climate change, for which today's children may have much to grumble about when they reach pensionable age.... read |
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2009-09-24
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Every country is shaped by its history, but countries fabricate and rewrite their histories, too. This is especially true of our flawed heroes, as we see today with the Chinese Communist Party’s treatment of Mao Zedong.... read |
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2009-08-27
| “Who are you going to believe,” Groucho Marx once asked, “me, or your own eyes?” That question sums up the contempt for reason that characterized both Communist dictatorships and today's health-care debate in the US.... read |
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2009-07-27
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Historical events are frequently used erroneously, if not tendentiously, to draw analogies to, and bolster support for, current foreign policies. But sometimes the analogies are correct, as is the case with the invocation of the Vietnam War-era "domino theory" to oppose abandoning the West's efforts in Afghanistan.... read |
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The Obama Effect
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Chris Patten 
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We often talk about the effect of economics on politics: when the economy slumps, so, too, do political incumbents' poll ratings. But in America we now see the effect of politics, in the form of a highly talented and popular president, on economic sentiment.... read
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2008-06-25
| Will anyone notice or care when Bush returns for good to Crawford, Texas? One reason we should is not what his departure will make possible, but what will remain absolutely the same.... read |
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2008-04-25
| The motto of Bill Clinton's presidential campaign in 1992 was, "It's the economy, stupid." But if all we really want is economic prosperity, we'd better get used to a world that doesn't mind Leninism with its shopping malls.... read |
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2008-07-23
| Nicolas Sarkozy deserves credit for trying to revitalize European cooperation with the mostly Arab states to the south. But if the Mediterranean Union is to achieve more than was managed in the Barcelona Process of the 1990's, Europe must get serious about several key issues, from free trade to human rights.... read |
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2008-03-28
| Tony Blair is now backing proposals to jump straight to a final deal that would establish a Palestinian state immediately. But, while there is much to recommend that idea, it cannot be realized without an agreement on borders, inclusion of Hamas, and the creation of fundamental institutions of statehood.... read |
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2008-08-21
| There are several lessons of the “Olympics War,” otherwise known as Russia’s invasion of Georgia. One is that Vladimir Putin remains very much in charge in Moscow, and another is that the West - Europe and America - are unprepared to do anything to stop him.... read |
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2008-09-25
| John McCain picked the singularly unqualified Sarah Palin as his running mate to energize the hard-line right-wingers who form the base of the Republican Party, and to appeal to white working-class voters and women. But his strategy won't work if Barack Obama keeps his campaign focused on McCain, the economy, and the meaning of genuine change.... read |
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2008-05-27
| Whatever his many other failings, President Bush has a pretty good record on aid to poor countries, and he recently announced a big increase in US food assistance. This was a faster response - and more rational - than some other countries have made to the global food crisis.... read |
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2008-10-28
| Much as some may hate to admit it, anti-Americanism has been fed and nurtured during the Bush years. But the United States remains the world’s only superpower, the only nation that matters in every part of the globe, and the only country capable of mobilizing international action to tackle global problems.... read |
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2008-11-27
| Most countries fabricate at least some of their history; or they simply whitewash the bits that do not match their heroic idea of themselves. But getting the past wrong can skew a country's strategic choices and, worse, it can distort the development of its society.... read |
2010-01-20
