Risk and Opportunities, 2018, Part 2

Outlook

Two of the world’s three superpowers go to the polls in 2018, with voters in Russia and the United States being asked, in different ways, to pass judgement on their presidents.

There is little doubt that Vladimir Putin will be re-elected to his office, but achieving a target of a 70% vote share on 70% turnout will be critical to the legitimacy he seeks to orchestrate the succession to what will be his last term.

November’s US midterm elections are for the legislature, not the presidency, but will just as surely be a plebiscite on President Donald Trump and his unique stamp on US politics.

Impacts

• High levels of disdain for political elites make the outcome of elections in Mexico and Brazil unusually uncertain.
• Italian voters will show whether there is a new wave to the Eurosceptic populism barely held at bay across the EU in 2016-17.
• Iran may work against US efforts to secure the reselection of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi in May’s Iraqi parliamentary elections.
• Religious parties are likely to make significant gains in Pakistan’s general election -- perhaps enough for them to play kingmaker.
• Voter apathy and lack of credible challengers will deny Egypt’s President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi a cogent popular mandate for his second term.