King's Think Tank

What are the major arguments in the abortion debate?

November 22, 2022November 22, 2022Leave a comment

Thomas Fuller

Earlier this year the United States Supreme Court reversed their 1973 decision on Roe v Wade, removing the federal right to abortion. There are a variety of opinion on the subject. However, many of the arguments put forth by pro-choice activist often reside in the practical applications of the prohibition of abortion, arguing that a prohibition of abortion does not stop abortions, but rather makes them less safe. The argument rests in the legality of abortion, rather than the morality of the action itself. So, I thought it prudent to recap some of the formal arguments put forth by ethical thinkers, focusing on the consideration of whether a foetus has an alienable right to life.

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The Dangers of the British Government’s Immigration Rhetoric

November 14, 2022Leave a comment

Megan Baker

On 31 October 2022, British Home Secretary Suella Braverman told MPs in the House of Commons that ‘the British people deserve to know which party is serious about stopping the invasion on our southern coast and which is not. Let’s stop pretending they are all refugees in distress. The whole country knows this is not true.’ Campaigners, including the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants and Care4Calais have condemned her comments, calling her language ‘dehumanising’ and ‘indefensible’. According to Politico, around 40,000 migrants have crossed the English Channel this year, which is more than in 2021 and 2020 combined. These migrants have primarily come from Albania, Afghanistan and Iran.

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The Dilemma of Deepfake

November 14, 2022Leave a comment

Oli Tate

Widespread distrust, confusion and hysteria are just a few of the words used to describe the impact deepfakes could have on society if they are left unchecked and allowed to become more advanced. Deepfake is the use of a type of AI called “deep learning” to produce images of fake events, mostly by imposing someone’s face on another’s body or making someone say something they never did. The implications of this technology undoubtedly hold significant importance for truth, democracy and trust.

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Nuclear Brinkmanship Today: What is at Stake and What to Do?

November 7, 2022November 7, 2022Leave a comment

Alessia Mazuelos

Ever since the Cuban Missile Crisis sixty years ago in 1962, when the United States faced off with the Soviet Union during the Cold War and brought the world to the brink of nuclear war, fears and tensions of nuclear conflict appeared to be long gone. Today, the Russian invasion of Ukraine began the biggest war in Europe since the Second World War, and with Russia’s nuclear capabilities at the tip of President Vladimir Putin’s fingers, the West and the international community are increasingly anxious about the possibility of the war becoming nuclear. After all, up until February 24th 2022, “many people have forgotten that we continue to live in a MAD — mutually assured destruction — world”.

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Crisis Simulation: Navigating Sino-Australian Rivalry in the South China Sea

April 8, 2022April 8, 2022Leave a comment

A collection of policy briefs by the Defence and Diplomacy Policy Centre

The following report compiles the work delivered by a group of seven undergraduate and postgraduate students from King’s College London (KCL) during a crisis simulation event curated by the King’s Think Tank’s (KTT) Defence & Diplomacy Policy Centre, in collaboration with the KCL Geopolitical Risk Society on 9th March 2022.

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Lithuania-Taiwan and the EU’s hesitation in supporting its Member States

March 30, 2022March 30, 2022Leave a comment

Marius Buga

On July 20th, 2021, the Representative of the Taipei Mission in Latvia, Eric Huang, together with Lithuanian MP and Chairman of the Lithuanian Parliamentary Group for Relations with Taiwan, Matas Maldeikis, announced that a new representative office will open in Lithuania. Crucially, the office in Vilnius would be named ‘Taiwanese Representative Office’, a sharp departure from the traditionally used ‘Taipei Mission’. This deepening of ties between Lithuania and Taiwan was met with widespread support in Washington, but Brussels’ reaction has been more timid. Foreign analysts were reasonably concerned that the People’s Republic of China would retaliate, yet Lithuanian officials were cautiously optimistic. According to an analysis by the Bank of Lithuania, as Lithuania has not developed significant economic ties with China, cutting off trade with China would not be particularly harmful and only reduce GDP by 0.3% over three years. Hence, the government of Lithuania has continued to deepen its ties with Taiwan, despite warnings from Beijing.

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Tackling Digital Inequality in the United Kingdom

March 30, 2022Leave a comment

Ishita Uppadhayay

The national lockdowns and associated mobility restrictions resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a substantial shift in the digital sphere. Consumers and businesses going digital, online education, and telemedicine have seen an unprecedented growth globally. Prior to this U-turn, digitalisation has already transformed society by powering rapid changes in economic activities and employment opportunities as digital access has become essential to using public services or participating as an active agent in the economy.

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Sino-US Financial Decoupling: a series of bad decisions?

March 23, 2022Leave a comment

Shresth Goel

Over the last decade, the involvement of Chinese enterprises in American primary markets has aggregated to a combined market capitalisation of $2.1tn. In light of this, the ongoing financial decoupling measures being taken by both countries calls into question the fate of capital movement across the two biggest economies in the world.

These concerns have become more pressing following the decision of the Chinese group Didi Chuxing (second-biggest IPO – $4.4bn – by a Chinese company in New York since Alibaba in 2014) to delist from the New York Stock Exchange and go public in Hong Kong. Although the decision may seem coerced due to intense pressure from Chinese cyber security watchdogs, it opens up the possibility of more companies following suit to avoid legal troubles with the Chinese government. On the other hand, Chinese state-run telecom groups (namely China Telecom, China Mobile, and China Unicorn) were booted from the New York Stock Exchange in early 2021 due to an executive order from the Trump administration that prohibited American investments in businesses with alleged ties to the Chinese military.

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Are we living in a world of de-globalisation?

March 23, 2022March 23, 2022Leave a comment

Alainah Amer

Recent trends are expecting the global economy to move away from interdependence between nations to weaker interconnectivity, localised policies, and enhanced border controls, a phenomenon also referred to as ‘de-globalisation’. With the catastrophic impact of the global financial crisis, the rise of protectionism, exemplified by the US and China engaging in a trade war, and the implementation of Brexit, there are widespread concerns amongst economists that de-globalisation is a force that is here to stay. COVID-19 has further exacerbated these concerns. The ongoing pandemic has uncovered the vulnerable roots of globalisation illustrated by a sharp fall in global GDP, plunging levels in international trade, the decline of foreign direct investment, the vast disruptions of global value chains and lastly, higher unemployment rates. These trajectories seem to prove that globalisation comes with severe risks – which have the tendency to spread like wildfire. This begs the question of whether globalisation might actually be a ‘bad’ thing.

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The Cyber Dimension in the Russia-Ukraine War

March 9, 2022March 15, 2022Leave a comment

Maria Makurat

The crisis between Ukraine and Russia has been showing us actively how a hybrid war is taking place in Europe. Since Thursday, the 24^th of February 2022, we have been hearing daily reports of the invasion as well as an increased activity in the cyber domain. Government officials as well as private actors are increasingly engaging in cyberspace. Anonymous, the international hacker group, has launched multiple cyberattacks on the Kremlin’s official websites and state media in an effort to disrupt Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and raise awareness of its implications among the Russian public.

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