We are delighted to provide this background briefing book for the 2024 Annual Meetings of the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund.
The first edition of Daily Brief, in September 1984, contained just four shortish articles in plain text. The September 27, 2024 brief had seven longer articles and 14 shorter ones. Much has happened over our first forty years, including the end of the Cold War, collapse of the Soviet Union, the end of apartheid in South Africa, the democratisation of Brazil, Korea and other states, China’s entry to the WTO and rise to become the world’s megatrader, several wars in the Middle East, the lifting of hundreds of millions of people out of poverty, the development of the internet and growing recognition of the impact of human activity on the world’s climate.
The Daily Brief, too, has seen considerable change in these forty years. Coverage has expanded—every day, we publish analysis on every continent bar Antarctica. We have introduced graphics, at first modest but today of impressive quality. As well as countries, we cover global and transnational issues across the disciplines of economics, finance, diplomacy and technology. We now run Graphic Analysis pieces alongside our regular coverage. And the entire archive is available via the Daily Brief website.
Amid all this change, though, the core mission of the Daily Brief has not. We strive every day to help clients understand what is happening, why it is happening, and what we should expect next. Our job is to spot the events that matter and to examine them dispassionately, helping clients to build and develop a keen sense of where a country or a region stands, and where it is headed. Increasingly, that rests on the interplay of political, economic, societal and technological dynamics at the country level and internationally.
These articles, published across September 2024, demonstrate the range and depth of the Daily Brief as it stands today. It would not be possible without our core analytical staff, senior advisers and global expert network—and, of course, the clients for whom we publish.
Nick Redman,
Director of Analysis, Oxford Analytica
