Three domains where technology, power, and human values collide.
Who controls the chips, the cloud, the models. What happens when compute becomes a lever of state power. Semiconductor supply chains run through a handful of chokepoints. Cloud infrastructure concentrates in ways that make governments dependent on a few companies. Foundation models cost enough to build that only certain actors can afford them — and that fact alone is reshaping foreign policy faster than anyone expected.
Alliances reorganizing around supply chains and security dependencies. The logic driving it is increasingly technological. The post-Cold War order assumed that economic integration would prevent conflict. That assumption is being tested. Export controls and technology transfer restrictions are redrawing the map of who cooperates with whom — and on what terms.
Whether the systems we build to survive catastrophe are worth living inside. Pandemic preparedness, climate adaptation, AI safety governance — each demands coordination that can slide toward surveillance or control. The hard question isn't whether to build these systems. It's how to build them without hollowing out what they're supposed to protect.