Young Africans are flocking to Confucius Institutes to learn Chinese and throw in their lot with the Asian superpower. The “Chinese Dream” is leaving the American Dream in tatters in much of the developing world. Many developing countries see partnerships with China as the route to their future success, especially in an era in which the United States has turned inward and is apparently a less generous and reliable partner. However, anti-Chinese sentiment is also intensifying. Chinese loans and investment are welcome, but recipients are also unsure about the environmental and social implications of partnering with such an untested player.

Seventy-three percent of women and girls receiving aid at one food program in Uganda reported being afraid during at least one point in the distribution process, said Hope Harriet, Empowered Aid Research Manager. Harriet spoke at the launch event for Empowered Aid’s Toolkit for Planning and Monitoring Safer Aid Distributions. Empowered Aid is a participatory action research project focused on addressing sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) in humanitarian settings and aid distribution. The project is led by the Global Women’s Institute (GWI) in partnership with CARE, the Union of Relief and Development Associations, the International Rescue Committee, and World Vision.

“There is little doubt that tens of millions of people will be displaced over the next two to three decades due in large measure by disaster and other environmental changes affected by climate, with the majority displaced within the borders of their own countries. The United States has a special responsibility to lead on issues of climate change, migration, and displacement,” said Eric Schwartz, President of Refugees International, at a recent event presenting a Blue-Ribbon Task Force report on climate change and migration.

“We see women playing a critical role in water resource management and decision-making at the family level as well as the community level. However, they’re very often absent from high level water-related negotiations and agreements,” said Merissa Khurma, director of the Wilson Center’s Middle East Program (MEP), introducing a Wilson Center event on the inclusion of women in water leadership and diplomacy in the Middle East, co-hosted by the Environmental Change and Security Program, MEP, and EcoPeace Middle East.

In China’s campaign to get its population of 1.4 billion vaccinated against COVID-19, the magic number is 77.6 percent. Government agencies all over the country, from Inner Mongolia to Jiangsu, uniformly pledge to get this exact percentage of their populations vaccinated. A rural township in Harbin boasts that it’s fully vaccinated 11,025 of its population of 14,198, 0.05 percentage point above the sacred target of 77.6 percent. So, just what is the significance of 77.6?

The population of unpaid family caregivers is shifting, and the pandemic has accelerated that change. One in five carers became caregivers for the first time during the pandemic, according to the Embracing Carers Global Carer Well Being Index®. A disproportionate share of these new carers were Gen Z or millennial (less than 38 years old). And 25 percent were caring for children and a sick/aging parent or grandparent.

“This COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us, albeit in a devastating way, of the interconnected nature of things, most particularly between economies, the environment, human and wildlife health and welfare,” said John Scanlon AO, the former Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) and Chair of the Global Initiative to End Wildlife Crime, at a recent Wilson Center event on wildlife crime’s connection to human health and security. Despite its serious implications for a broad swath of issue areas, wildlife crime and trafficking remain under-studied and under-regulated. At the event, experts from diverse fields in defense, global health, and conservation highlighted the need for international cooperation to mitigate wildlife crime’s impact on environmental degradation, the spread of zoonotic disease, and transnational security threats.