There is nothing extremely surprising here, but here are a few things their commentators mention:

• Things in Africa seem to be going in the wrong direction recently, for those who prefer peace and democracy, with a variety of military takeovers and regional conflicts in many parts of the continent. In North Africa, things are just kind of politically and economically stagnant.
• The crypto-currency hype bubble seems to have burst for the time being.
• The Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Gaza conflicts just grind on, with horrendous human consequences. It doesn’t seem crazy to think that we could hope for some sort of negotiations to start over the course of the next entire year. What will these lead towards – a demilitarized zone, semi-autonomous federalist regions of some sort, promises by NATO to table any expansion talk for a decade or so? These all seem rational to me. Biden could try to get this done before the U.S. elections. I like to think that at the situation in Gaza can’t be worse a year from now than it is this New Year’s Eve (as I write this), because it is about as awful as anything can get. It also occurs to me that this may be a particularly awful war in terms in civilian suffering, but it is also a very public and well-reported war partly because there were so many international and media organizations present in Gaza to begin with. I suspect all wars are horrible for civilians, and we just happen to be seeing more of this one up close and personal than we usually see. For example, there is a horrible conflict in Myanmar that we don’t hear much about in the U.S. media. And I think I already mentioned ugly conflicts in Africa. So let’s stop pretending there is any such thing as humanitarian war and start getting serious about peace and human rights in 2024.
• Some people think there will be a U.S.-China military throwdown over Taiwan in 2024. I sincerely hope not, and I my sense is that China is a bit too rational and long-term thinking to let this happen. The U.S.? I’m not so sure. I will expect lots of heated rhetoric, maybe some dirty election/spy tricks, and maybe some limited naval conflict which hopefully won’t turn into a world war which clearly is in nobody’s interest. Everybody will try to show that they have the biggest, hairiest balls in the room during the U.S. election season. Or could some charismatic leader emerge with a compelling peace message? I am not this hopeful.
• The U.S. election season is going to be simply looney tunes. I don’t know what else to say. Well, I will probably think of plenty to say when I get a chance to start thinking it through. There are also elections happening in other parts of the world, of course.
• Hopefully the U.S. and world economy will continue to bump along, with inflation gradually subsiding and no major recessions. Inequality will continue to increase most likely.
• The artificial intelligence hype bubble will continue to inflate in 2024. It will burst of course, but if I had to wager I would wager on this being the year it happens. A hype bubble bursting does not mean the technology will cease to progress, of course.
• Serious action on climate change will be overshadowed by all the wars and geopolitical dirty tricks going on in the world today. And the crisis will continue to build. It’s about the security of our food supply and the continued existence of our coastal cities, idiots. Leaders, where are you?