A Race for Global Influence the US Risks Losing

A Chinese yuan banknote and US dollars.

Photographer: Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images

A global contest for influence is gathering pace.

It’s at the root of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s trip to Kenya and Ethiopia this week in a continuation of his tour of the “Global South.” He’s made the rise of a multipolar world a theme of his chancellorship and is reaching out to nations he sees as important swing states.