Leaders
Unruly response
Xi Jinping’s assault on tech will change China’s trajectory
It is likely to prove self-defeating
Open up
Most covid-19 travel restrictions should be scrapped
The rules are ineffective, illiberal and often useless
Not all about the carbon
Why curbing methane emissions will help fight climate change
It's a more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, and should be easier to control
The race to replace Angela Merkel
German voters deserve a more serious election campaign
A milquetoast contest fails to confront the hard choices facing Europe’s biggest economy
Letters
On risk and vaccines, science fiction, climate change, lending, beer, rainfall
Letters to the editor
Briefing
Automatic for the people
China’s future economic potential hinges on its productivity
Can the government boost it?
Europe
1789 and all that
Why so many French people fear dictatorship and civil war
Unwelcome Discovery
Poland’s proposed media rules threaten press freedom
Swish in Sardinia
On Italy’s Costa Smeralda, the megayachts are back
Knocking on the 27’s door
Six Balkan nations keep trying to join the European Union
Charlemagne
Two flights explain EU asylum policy
Britain
In trouble with the law
Britain’s courts are in a mess
Parks and recriminations
The battle for north London’s public space
On the wrong track
HS2’s extension and the paradox of infrastructure investment
International trade
Brexit Britain wants to liberalise trade with poor countries
Nothing too gruesome
Britain’s economy: less scarred by covid-19 than had been feared
The petrol party
Boris Johnson’s strained love affair with the motorist
Middle East & Africa
Crude business
Ghana plans to buy back oil licences no one wants
Jihadists on all sides
Mohamed Bazoum, Niger’s new president, asks for help
Crime and government
A fraudster’s confession rebounds on Nigeria’s top cop
Of coups and jabs
A flood of vaccines for Tunisia as foreigners vie for influence
United States
Bridge and tunnel
Joe Biden’s splurge on infrastructure moves a step closer
Delta dawns
Vaccine mandates are spreading
Lexington
Green and black
The Americas
One city, two worlds
Rio de Janeiro asks why its cops kill so many black people
A small step away from socialism
Cuba’s government approves small and medium-sized enterprises
Asia
Making the best of a bad situation
Afghanistan’s neighbours are preparing for life with the Taliban
Pro-God, anti-Taliban
Big-city Afghans are defiant in the face of advancing jihadists
The ties that bind
The release from prison of Samsung’s de facto boss raises eyebrows
A pretty good racquet
How Indonesia became the home of badminton
China
Production-line poets
How Chinese factory-workers express their views on life
International
Getting off the ground
Travel chaos will last well beyond summer
Business
Pharmaceuticals
American biotechnology is booming
Chinese capitalism
What tech does China want?
Loser takes all
The Olympics is a ratings flop. Advertisers don’t care
Wiping the slate
One way to make Europe more like Silicon Valley
Finance & economics
A curse on both your houses
Will the rich world’s worker deficit last?
Beatable prices
America’s inflation scare becomes less menacing
Bygones are bygones
India consigns its tax time-machine to the past
SPACs and the City
Britain’s regulator makes a play for SPAC listings
Schools brief
Biology brief
How organisms are organised
Science & technology
It that cannot be named
Geoengineering is conspicuously absent from the IPCC’s report
Culture
Buy the ticket, take the ride
“Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” still bites, 50 years on
Mental illness, art and the Nazis
A doctor recognised his psychiatric patients’ art. Hitler disagreed
Women in sport
Billie Jean King was a champion on and off the court
Psychological fiction
A tricksy tale of paranoia and suspicion
Economic & financial indicators
Graphic detail
Obituary
Puccini with lunch-trays