The International Monetary Fund just pointed out that “South Africa’s vulnerabilities have become more pronounced.” That’s one way of putting it. A potentially prosperous and dynamic economy is on the fast track to ruin. Altering its course will take real political reform. Unemployment has risen five percentage points since 2008, to a hope-crushing 28 percent. The country’s population is expanding …

Will China ever become democratic? That question has been a staple of geopolitical discussion since the 1990s, and at times many commentators thought a democratic China was not so far away. Today, as restrictions on political speech and opposition increase, hardly anyone thinks this is a realistic scenario. Yet it’s still worth asking why China might never democratize, and what …

The reason for the stock market’s vanishing volatility may not be what many people think. It may have more to do with local community boards or town reps than the Federal Reserve. Volatility, which has slumped this year, has been a big topic of discussion among market participants, and not all of it has been positive. Low volatility is usually …