The IR & Markets Think Tank
GLOBAL AFFAIRS IN A VOLATILE WORLD
The IR & Markets Think Tank is the independent research arm of the IR & Markets Collective, serving as a dedicated space for rigorous analysis at the intersection of global power and economic systems. Central to its mission is a distributed network of independent scholars and practitioners whose diverse expertise underlies the Think Tank’s research. By hosting contributors from across the professional and academic landscape, it maintains analytical credibility and intellectual independence through a breadth of perspectives. Our research seeks to engage directly with complex international questions by examining the structural shifts reshaping the global landscape. Guided by a commitment to integrity, our work synthesizes independent insights to examine the interaction between statecraft, security dynamics and financial innovation in shaping the evolving global order.
THE ANATOMY OF MANAGED SILENCE: Institutional Preservation in Comparative Perspective
Research Paper Executive Summary This analysis examines three geographically distinct but structurally convergent phenomena: the cluster of disappearances and deaths among U.S. defense-linked scientists and engineers between 2024 and 2026; the deaths of seven Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) candidates in the weeks preceding North Rhine-Westphalia’s local elections in September 2025 and the sweeping purge of…
Deterrence Beyond Defense: Japan’s Emerging Strike Capability in the Indo-Pacific
Japan has undergone a decisive strategic transformation — from a pacifist state constrained by constitutional limitations to a forward-leaning security actor projecting credible deterrence across the Indo-Pacific and beyond. Driven by China’s military assertiveness, North Korea’s nuclear brinkmanship, Russia’s revisionism, and shifting U.S. commitments under the Trump administration’s second term, Tokyo has embraced counter-strike capabilities,…
The Cost of Contingency: The Greenland Crisis
The geopolitical shockwaves that began with the United States apprehension of Nicolás Maduro on 3 January 2026, have moved rapidly from the tropics to the high Arctic, signaling the decisive unravelling of the established security order. What is currently unfolding in Greenland is not a mere territorial dispute; it is the inaugural application of what…