RON DERBY: As Trump tries to make America great again, will SA pay the price?
For as long as the world's leading nations shied away from electing populists, or indeed choosing populist paths, there was a measure of certainty in the global economy. "End of the world" thoughts never arose when peripheral countries or former giants such as Italy chose leaders such as Silvio Berlusconi, because they were rather inconsequential to our fate. That all changed this week when the US had its Berlusconi moment in the election of Donald Trump. It came less than six months after Britain shocked the global system - and proved the opinion polls wrong - by choosing to exit the European family of nations. These choices may seem irrational, an adjective the Western world has so often used to deride counterintuitive political choices in the developing world, and Africa in particular. The US economy appears - on the surface at least - to be faring better than those of its Western peers, and also outpacing many becalmed emerging markets. The world's largest economy no longer face...
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