Left in the cold: Foreign bidders find themselves out of favour

Rich countries are increasingly prepared to forbid overseas investors from buying into assets deemed to be strategic – a category that is expanding
Is the era of free markets fading away? We explore the notion of rising state capitalism and its implications for business and democracy
Across Asia, Russia and the Middle East, governments are using their rising economic power in new ways.
Sovereign wealth funds from the Gulf, Asia and elsewhere are buying stakes in ailing Wall Street investment banks; natural resources are falling under the control of the state; and in Russia and China there is an emphasis on economic nationalism.
To some, these developments are a sign that the era of free markets, privatisation and deregulation unleashed in the 1980s is giving way to a world in which governments use their economic strength to buy strategic assets or exert global influence.
Here we explore the forces behind the rise of ‘state capitalism’ – and how it might change the world economy
You can always find some analogy or other from the past that can be said to illuminate the here and now. Yet upheavals in the global system since 1989 – the most profound for at least a century – are not susceptible to neatness, writes Philip Stephens
Governments have to deal with less democratic economies that use market mechanisms for political ends, say Jean-Louis Beffa and Xavier Ragot
Governments backed by huge reserves have found they have enormous clout in global markets. That is especially true in downturns, writes Jeffrey Garten
The belief that reform of communist economies would inevitably produce freedom has been shaken as Moscow and Beijing pursue alternatives to the western model

Rich countries are increasingly prepared to forbid overseas investors from buying into assets deemed to be strategic – a category that is expanding
Private equity giants are still deciding whether to love or fear the flow of cash from sovereign wealth funds into developed economies

The Arab and Asian state investment arms that have bought into Wall Street could turn out to be too passive for the banks’ good, and might need to speak out
The challenge posed by sovereign wealth funds to the global financial system can no longer be ignored, says Jeffrey Garten

The way to deal with medium-term shortages is through higher taxes, fuel economy standards and alternative technologies, says Pierre Noël

Chinalco’s tilt and the state bodies involved represent a diversity of players with potentially diverging interests, writes Richard McGregor

The US should jettison its habit of making financial policy as if it were cocksure of what it is doing, says Jeffrey Garten

Few bankers or policymakers under 50 have any experience of nationalisation. So they are hastily turning to the history books for guidance, writes John Willman

News that Industrial and Commercial Bank of China is acquiring 20 per cent of Standard Bank Group of South Africa may for once live up to the hype that surrounds such deals
A decade or so ago, Russian companies – Gazprom excepted – were almost invisible abroad. Since then, they have been growing fast, with the pace of foreign expansion accelerating

Hunger – that most traditional threat to ruling elites – is returning to many countries that have embraced globalisation, writes Gideon Rachman. Along with other mounting pressures, it could come to undermine the free-trade consensus built up over the past 30 years
The government is using technology to censor the internet, overturning past assumptions that the web will inevitably undermine party rule

Western Europe has so far avoided the appropriation of organisations by personalities, but the trend may be creeping in, writes John Kay

The irony is that Vladimir Putin’s sky-high popularity means United Russia could almost certainly win free elections subjected to full scrutiny, says Neil Buckley

A voluntary banking code is almost certainly not worth the paper it is written on. If regulation is to be effective, it must cover all relevant institutions and the entire balance sheet and, not least, it must make finance less pro-cyclical, writes Martin Wolf

A fundamental question begs to be asked, writes Paul Amery. What is the point of all these organisations and their rulebooks?

Ofcom must remember its principles and return to its deregulatory best, say Martin Le Jeune and Russ Taylor
All parties should promise to reduce new legislation and concentrate on making existing legislation work, writes Christopher Haskins