COVID's impact on education and its long-term geopolitical consequences: Gerald Butts

COVID Impact on Education & Geopolitical Consequences | Gerald Butts | Global Stage | GZERO Media

It's not just kids spending too much time on their screens because they got so used to doing everything remotely during the pandemic.

The impact of COVID-related educational disruption - and the growing inequality gap - could have big geopolitical fallout in the future. Why?

Because with diminished education comes fewer economic opportunities. That will likely exacerbate already deep divisions, says Eurasia Group Vice Chairman Gerald Butts.

As a result, he adds, watch out for more future disrupted politics around the world, both within countries and between countries.

Butts spoke during a Global Stage livestream on September 15, 2022: "Live from the UN General Assembly: Transforming Education"

More from GZERO Media

US President Donald J. Trump signs executive orders in the Cabinet Room of the White House on March 25, 2025.

Sipa USA via Reuters Connect

US President Donald Trump signed an executive order on Tuesday that aims to secure elections by requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote. The order aims to guard against illegal immigrants voting in elections and would require all ballots to be received by Election Day.

US President Donald Trump attends a Cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, D.C., on April 10, 2025.
REUTERS/Nathan Howard

Wednesday’s tariff respite is firmly in the rearview mirror, as China announced on Friday it was raising its duty on US imports to an astronomical 125%, taking effect Saturday.

A Zimbabwean farmer addresses a meeting of white commercial farmers in the capital Harare, at one of a series of meetings that led to a 2020 accord on compensation for white forced off of their lands in 2000-2001.
REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo
South Sudan's president Salva Kiir, earlier this month. His recent moves against the opposition pushed the country towards civil war, but now the opposition itself is in crisis.
REUTERS/Samir Bol

The world's newest country has been on the brink of a return to civil war.