In July 1945, at the close of World War II, the leaders of the U.S., Great Britain and the Soviet Union gathered at a Prussian royal palace in Potsdam outside the conquered German capital to hammer out the new global order. The seeds were sown for the Cold War. As visitors in face masks ponder the consequences of those decisions at a new exhibition to mark the 75th anniversary of the conference, the geopolitical map of the world is again being redrawn. This time, it’s a result of the coronavirus, which German Chancellor Angela Merkel has described as the biggest challenge of the postwar era.
Half-way into a year dominated by the pandemic, governments are confronting a health crisis, an economic crisis and a crisis of institutional legitimacy, all at a time of heightening geopolitical rivalry. How those tectonic shifts crystallize over the next six months will go a long way to determining the post-virus era. Trends that were already discernible pre-Covid-19 have intensified and accelerated. As a fast rising power, China is growing more assertive and jostling with countries from Canada to Australia. The U.S., the one superpower that has remained at the top table since Potsdam, is increasingly self-absorbed as the virus rips through its population and economy ahead of November’s presidential election.