The backlash against globalisation is becoming more pronounced every day in the US. We see it in rising nationalism and protectionism, which are feeding anti-immigrant sentiments. It is manifest in the eruptions in Congress against a Chinese company buying American oil assets, or in the virulent response to a proposal for an Arabic group to invest in US harbours. Economic openness – which served America and the free world so well for years – is today too frequently perceived as a threat to national security. But populism’s deeper roots are domestic and its causes should be examined, discussed and defused.

Recent events in the US reflect increasing inequalities that endanger the fundamental aspiration of this country – a land of opportunity for all. The images of poverty in a New Orleans devastated by Hurricane Katrina, or of immigrants demonstrating by their hundreds of thousands all over the country, have made it clear that prosperity does not necessarily go hand in hand with fairness.