MILAN – The global economy is undergoing very large structural shifts, driven by three megatrends. One is the digital transformation of the foundations on which economies are built and run. Another is the growing purchasing power and economic strength of emerging economies, and China in particular. Lastly, there are broad-based political-economy trends, which include rising nationalism, various forms of populism, political and social polarization, and a possible breakdown of the multilateral framework within which the global economy has functioned since World War II.

In a recent commentary for the South China Morning Post, Helen Wong, HSBC’s chief executive for Greater China, shows that China’s rising generation of 400 million young consumers will soon account for more than half of the country’s domestic consumption. This generation, Wong notes, is largely transacting online, through innovative, integrated mobile platforms, indicating that it has already “leapt from the pre¬web era straight to the mobile Internet, skipping the personal computer altogether.”

Over the last 35 years, Western democracies have seen a rapid rise in political instability, characterised by frequent shifts in governing parties and their programmes and philosophies, driven at least partly by economic transformation and hardship. The question now is how to improve economic performance at a time when political instability is impeding effective policymaking.