WORLD ROUNDUPBRICS Faces a Reckoning | Dictators Are Learning from Each Other | Worries About China’s Cloud Computing Firms, and more
· Dictators Are Learning from Each Other — and Holding on to Power
In the past decade or so, dictators have forged transnational bonds that are stronger than ever
· China’s Cloud Computing Firms Raise Concern for U.S.
The Biden administration is exploring whether it can mount a campaign against Chinese tech giants like Alibaba and Huawei, potentially fueling tensions with Beijing
· America’s Asian Allies Are Quietly Joining Forces to Confront China
U.S. in an unprecedented effort to create a regional coalition to contain China
· A Basement of Horrors in Seoul, Where Past and Present Collide
A building where South Korean dissidents were interrogated and tortured by a powerful government agency is now home to a popular youth hostel
· BRICS Faces a Reckoning
Enlargement would be a sign not of the group’s strength, but of China’s growing influence
· America Cannot Afford to Be like Europe in Regulating Artificial Intelligence
Strict rules around new applications for AI systems, imposed regardless of concrete, provable harms, are likely to strangle commercial innovation
Dictators Are Learning from Each Other — and Holding on to Power (Editorial Board, Washington Post)
Russia, China, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Egypt, Nicaragua — how did so many countries come to do the same thing in the same decade? The answers are difficult to find — dictatorships are shrouded in secrecy. But Stephen G. F. Hall, a professor at the University of Bath, in Britain, uncovered evidence that the dictators copy, share and learn from one another. His new book, The Authoritarian International, looks at how this works.
According to Mr. Hall, authoritarian regimes must constantly maintain the illusion of steadfast control. Relax for a minute, and the illusion could vanish. “Protest is like a run on the bank,” Mr. Hall told us. “The protesters only have to get it right once.” For autocracies, protest and dissent are an existential threat.
Mr. Hall says much “authoritarian learning” is indirect, diffused through like-minded networks and emulation. When he began his research, he thought he might find an actual school of dictatorship, with Mr. Putin or other despots as “either star pupils or teachers telling other autocrats how to establish best survival practices.” But Mr. Hall did not find contemporary evidence of such a school. “I think it is primarily a case of trial and error,” he said, with the dictators more like “mad scientists” who run experiments and then share the results. which are passed around in the shadows, through security services and old-boy networks.
China’s Cloud Computing Firms Raise Concern for U.S. (David McCabe, New York Times)
In the digital cold war between the United States and China, American officials are increasingly turning their attention to a new target: Chinese cloud computing giants.
Over the last 18 months, the Biden administration and members of Congress have ramped up their exploration of what can be done to address security concerns about the cloud computing divisions of Chinese tech behemoths like Alibaba and Huawei, five people with knowledge of the matter said.
By focusing on the Chinese cloud companies, U.S. officials are potentially widening the scope of the technological tensions between Washington and Beijing. In recent years, the United States has choked China’s access to crucial technologies while trying to limit the reach of Chinese tech and telecommunication companies abroad.
