No. of Recommendations: 7
When the free world started to get more intertwined with the Chinese economy 10-15 years ago, I expected the free world to become less free within a decade or so. When you have to compete with a country as large and powerful as China that can move enormous resources here or there without much debate, it changes the playing field for the entire world, making it more desirable to become "a little like China" for everybody: more agile, more aggressive, less lengthy democratic debates.
In most of us living in democracies, there is the more or less hidden desire for a "good and friendly dictator" that does exactly the right thing quickly.
We can see this playing out in many places currently. The mistake being obviously that the dictator doesn't owe anything to his voters. He acts in his own interest and being usually an egomaniac narcissist, his first moves will usually aim at being more appreciated (which can do well for investors - see first Trump term). But over the long term the tolerance for anybody acting against the narcissist will become tinier and tinier, leading to destructive actions.
Where to hide and diversify away from such risk?
My personal approach has been to identify those places in the free world that have been culturally and traditionally the most idiosyncratic ones: Think Japan, UK. They already have a (friendly) King or Emperor and they love it. Actually, having some element of autocracy in their government acts as a backstop against real dictatorship.
Democracies are more vulnerable.
