In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, different countries adopted different strategies. While China's top-down authoritarian strategy initially seemed effective, it ultimately proved to be fatally flawed.

Now that Vladimir Putin has demolished the European peace framework and threatened nuclear war, Europeans will have to adapt by pursuing ever-closer integration as a political and defense bloc. Once again, freedom, democracy, and security on the continent cannot be taken for granted.

As this summer’s unprecedented heatwaves in both China and Europe have shown, the climate crisis will continue to amplify new geopolitical and economic crises. Whereas most crises historically have occurred within the existing system, we are now facing the end of the system itself.

By welcoming accession bids from Ukraine and Moldova, the European Union has crossed a threshold, establishing itself firmly as Russia’s adversary. Europe must come of age, recognizing that survival in a dangerous neighborhood will require it to reorder its priorities.

The European order rested on the belief that shared institutions, common markets, and other forms of integration would ensure peace on the continent. Now that Russia has unilaterally shattered that vision, the European Union will have to rethink its modus operandi.

No matter what happens next in Ukraine, there can be no return to the status quo before February 24. A dangerous new era has dawned, confronting Europeans with the urgent task of building their own defensive, technological, and nuclear deterrence capabilities.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has made Europe more united than it has ever been. The challenge now is to uphold this sense of common purpose, and build a stronger, more resilient, and more self-sufficient EU capable of advancing its geopolitical interests in a world of renewed great-power rivalry.

By invading Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin is challenging not only that country's independence but also the broader European system, which rests above all on the inviolability of borders and the law of nations. There has been no comparable event in Europe since the Hitler era.

In threatening Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin is now fully indulging his imperial impulses, hoping to erase the humiliation of Russia’s historic decline. His ambition has far-reaching implications for Europe’s place in the world – regardless of whether Europeans are willing to admit it.

Although France and Germany are more reliant on each other than ever, the two heavyweights at the heart of Europe still have vastly different ideas about defense and security policy. And, because these attitudes are deeply rooted in history, reconciling them will require perpetual compromise.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is on track to become the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong – a change that will be felt far and wide. But by abandoning the principle of collective leadership and resurrecting absolutism, the ruling Communist Party of China is increasingly out of step with the times.

While some in Europe beat the drum of “strategic autonomy” and set their sights on faraway regions, the specter of renewed nationalism and war still stalks the bloc’s immediate neighborhood. A serious EU security and foreign policy would address these nearby threats before venturing farther afield.

Although Germany's fragmented federal election result has left a cloud of uncertainty about the next government, it also left the old consensus in favor of muddling through in tatters. A new generation recognizes the need for a carefully managed fresh start to confront the challenges of the twenty-first century.

A summer featuring unprecedented climate-driven disasters and a new warning from the world’s premier climate-science body has underscored the inadequacies of the existing order. Tackling the climate crisis is fundamentally incompatible with our understanding of sovereignty.

With German Chancellor Angela Merkel on her way out, and America still vulnerable to Trumpism, Germans can neither rely on their traditional protector nor pursue outright strategic autonomy. In a world beset with risk and uncertainty, the long, complicated history of the bilateral relationship may be about to enter a new phase.

The idea of a Cold War II between the West and China has quickly evolved from a misleading analogy into a self-fulfilling prophecy. But contemporary China is nothing like the Soviet Union, and in today's world, we simply cannot afford another clash of mutually exclusive systems.