By Nilanjan Ghosh, Ramanath Jha, Oommen C. Kurian, Soma Sarkar, and Shoba Suri
A distinctive feature of the year 2026 is the convergence of several transitions: food systems are being reshaped by regenerative practices and digital technologies, health governance is undergoing reform within a post-pandemic framework, and cities are simultaneously sites of vulnerability and centers of innovation.
By Katherine Salinas
As AI rapidly transforms the landscape of research and knowledge production, think tanks face an existential question: what is their role when AI agents can conduct research at speeds no human could match?
By Mannat Jaspal, Parul Bakshi, Cauvery Ganapathy, Lydia Powell, and Piyush Verma
As we enter 2026, climate and energy policies are being shaped not only by decarbonization imperatives. Geopolitical upheaval, technological competition, economic transformation, supply chain resilience, and national security concerns are exerting influence over the future of energy and climate policies worldwide.
By Anirban Sarma with Sauradeep Bag, Anulekha Nandi, Prateek Tripathi, and Siddharth Yadav
The year 2025 saw several disruptive and emerging technologies advance from rhetoric, and experimentation, into ongoing expansion, to an accelerated phase of growth. At the same time, there emerged a rising sense of urgency about the need for digital sovereignty. Taken together, AI, quantum computing, digital currencies, and nanotechnology represent a frontier where technology, power, and the political economy increasingly converge.
By Anit Mukherjee with Dhruba Purkayastha, Arya Roy Bardhan, Srijan Shukla, and Jhanvi Tripathi
The “reciprocal tariffs” announced by the United States in early April disrupted the global trade flows and unsettled the multilateral system built over several decades. As a result, global players are adjusting to this new reality and altering their behavior beyond tariff measures to safeguard their own interests.
By Marta Bengoa
The India-EU free trade agreement will connect over two billion people across a market representing nearly a quarter of global GDP. But the real story isn't about size. It's about timing. After seventeen years of false starts and negotiations, both parties finally grasped what's at stake: in a world fragmenting between Washington's capricious tariffs and Beijing's economic coercion, this deal is economic insurance.
By Marta Bengoa
Speaking at Davos, Trump first ruled out using military force to acquire Greenland (after weeks of refusing to do so), then hours later announced what he called a "framework of a future deal" with NATO on Arctic security. Whether the framework leads to substantive Arctic security cooperation or remains another example of Trump declaring victory without achieving objectives, the damage to transatlantic economic relations has been done.
By Marta Bengoa
Rather than reviving American manufacturing and boosting employment, the data from Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs tell a story of job losses in manufacturing, stagnant productivity in that sector, higher inflation across the economy, and economic uncertainty on a scale not seen in decades.
By Marta Bengoa
The current situation demands acknowledgment that trade and monetary policy operate as interconnected systems, not isolated levers that can be pulled independently. A coherent approach would acknowledge that the United States’ economic strength derives from its integration into global supply chains, not isolation from them.
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