Senior Fellow, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies Foreign Policy Institute
Afshin Molavi is a senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies Foreign Policy Institute, where he writes broadly on emerging markets, particularly on themes related to “The New Silk Road,” South-South trade, global hub cities, new emerging market multinationals, global aviation, the geopolitics of energy, and the intersection of Middle East states and the global economy. Molavi is the co-founder of emerge85 Lab, an initiative dedicated to exploring change in the emerging world and its global impact. He was a senior research fellow at the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan think tank, and a former director of the World Economic Roundtable. He is also the founder and editor of the New Silk Road Monitor, a site that examines the markets, societies, cultures, and politics of countries across Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and beyond. Molavi was a journalist with postings in Dubai, Riyadh, Jeddah, and Tehran; his dispatches from the Middle East and essays have been published in The New York Times, Foreign Policy, The Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Newsweek, Businessweek, The Journal of Commerce, National Geographic, and dozens of academic and specialty publications. He is also a contributing writer to The Washington Post Global Opinions section and, most recently, to Newsweek Japan.
After a disastrous year for airlines worldwide, Gulf Arab carriers – both symbols and drivers of the air travel revolution of the past decade – must be agile to survive and thrive in a highly uncertain environment.
In the year that saw the passing of Sultan Qaboos bin Said, an award-winning Omani novel catches fire in book clubs as it explores the tensions and hopes beneath the surface of the extraordinary changes that the sultan brought to the country.
The coronavirus-induced slowdown in Gulf Arab states will further stress the already reeling economies of South Asia.
