Carney's speech signals end of Western illusionsWhen the late playwright Tom Stoppard's Rock 'n' Roll first opened 20 years ago, it was deeply personal for me as a student at Cambridge studying film in Prague. Two decades later, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney's recent speech in Davos felt like the sequel. Mr Carney's reference to Havel was not some quaint historical aside. Mr Carney's speech highlights that we all must reject nostalgia for a rules-based system that never fully delivered on its promises. What all tyrannical systems share, Mr Carney reminds us, is "the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false".

Source: Bangkok Post February 26, 2026 23:41 UTC