by Evan Freely, WTW
H1 2024
In the UK risk management association Airmic’s recent report on Political Risk in the Year of Elections, the top geopolitical trend of concern to respondents was the “weakening of Western influence on global agendas.”
That concern might seem abstract, but as the research in this edition of the WTW Political Risk Index shows, it is a trend with concrete impacts for globalized businesses. Our research indicates that the weakening of Western influence is one of the factors contributing to declines in global average levels of economic freedom, protection of investor rights, protection of intellectual property rights, and even democracy.
In this report, in addition to covering the risks of political violence, expropriation and inconvertibility – which have risen sharply in recent years – the Oxford Analytica experts who produce the country profiles look at each country’s relationship with the so-called ‘global rules-based order’ or ‘liberal international order.’
While – even at its peak – the rules-based order had many flaws, it also underpinned economic globalization that transformed the lives of hundreds of millions for the better.
As this order declines, globalized companies will face many challenges. With this research, we hope to illuminate some of these challenges as businesses attempt to navigate a more volatile geopolitical future.
We hope you find this research useful, and we welcome your suggestions on improvement for future editions of this Index.
Evan FreelyGlobal Head of Financial SolutionsWTW
