In 2021, the new and old faces of international politics have changed. The world bid farewell to Angela Merkel, Germany's first female Chancellor who has been in charge of state affairs for more than a decade, and Netanyahu, Israel's longest serving prime minister, and also witnessed the arrival of the "Biden era" of the United States in the chicken feathers of the riots on Capitol Hill. The Japanese cabinet fell back into the embarrassing curse of "walking the horse lamp" this year. Kan Yiwei, the "housekeeper" of Abe's cabinet, was ordered to become Japan's prime minister. After hosting the Olympic Games, he reluctantly gave Kishida a a stick in the double "loss" of the epidemic and economy.

In 2022, the drama of "you sing and I come on stage" will continue to be staged in the international political arena. South Korea, France, the Philippines, Australia, Brazil and other countries will successively hold leadership elections, and the United States will also usher in the "mid-term election test". According to the statistics in Wikipedia's entry "2022 election", more than 20 countries on five continents will hold all kinds of election activities in 2022, of which the political trend of countries with relatively sensitive geopolitical roles is of particular concern. Saudi Arabia's Arab News Daily website commented that the elections around the world in 2022 will not only affect the politics and economy of the host country, but also have an important impact on international relations in the 1920s.

Many neighboring countries of China will welcome new family members

According to the provisions of the president of Korea for a term of 5 years and no longer a term of office, the incumbent president moon Jae in his office is stepping down. As the date of South Korea's general election in March 2022 approaches, the two popular presidential candidates - Lee Jae Ming of the ruling Communist Party and Yin Xiyue of the largest opposition National Power Party - are deeply involved in scandals and disputes at the same time.

Li Zaiming took the real estate policy as his campaign strategy and said that he would use the policy to "eliminate the behavior of getting something for nothing in the real estate field". However, he is now deeply involved in a bribery scandal involving real estate development in 2015. Yin Xiyue was involved in fierce internal strife within the party. On January 3, the leading group of the national power party collectively expressed its resignation to Yin Xiyue. Yin Xiyue had to announce the complete cancellation of all election activities and start the reorganization of the campaign team on the same day.

South Korean politics has a tradition of being dragged down by "people around". Li Zaiming's son was recently exposed to be involved in online gambling. Yin Xiyue, a former attorney general, and his wife Jin Jianxi were suspected of misrepresenting their personal experience and award-winning achievements when applying for university teaching posts, which suddenly collapsed the "justice" establishment of Yin Xiyue, the former "sword bearer" of the procuratorial system. Moon Jae in the election sprint stage before the sudden announcement of the amnesty, also let the election regenerative variables, led by the survey of Park Geun hye "trusted political authority", personally sent Pu Jinhui to prison Yin Xiyue, now in an awkward position.

Some South Korean media called the current South Korean election an "unprecedented disgust election", accusing the two presidential candidates of seeking reflective interests through a "disgust duel". What people see is the illegal acts of presidential candidates of both parties and their families. Up to now, the latest support rate survey results released by a number of South Korean polling institutions show that Li Zaiming's support rate is still ahead of Yin Xiyue.

The Philippines, another maritime neighbor of China, is scheduled to hold national and local elections in May this year. Similar to South Korea, the Philippine constitution stipulates that the President shall serve for a term of six years and shall not be re elected. This means that duterte, 77, who was elected president of the Philippines in 2016, is about to step down.

There are many things to watch in the Philippine election. Among the candidates are not only the current Vice President Robredo, but also the former TV star, the current mayor of Manila domagoso and Philippine boxing champion Pacquiao. In the second half of 2021, the Philippine election campaign staged a dramatic turn from reversal to reversal. First, in September, duterte announced his unprecedented campaign for vice president and repeatedly expressed the hope that his fellow countryman and confidant, Senator Christopher Wu, would succeed him as president, raising the question of "violating the Constitution and the law". Subsequently, duterte announced in October that he would withdraw from the vice presidential election "in line with the public opinion" and registered for the Senate in November. In December, duterte announced his withdrawal from the Senate election. Meanwhile, one month after announcing his election for president, Christopher Wu officially withdrew from the presidential election at the end of November on the grounds of "not ready".

As duterte carried out this dazzling operation, the competitiveness of the two cross party partners, Marcos Jr., the son of former President Marcos, and Sarah, duterte's daughter, has been strengthened. After the pair announced their candidacy, their support rate reached 55.7% in a poll in December 2021, far ahead. On the one hand, because the Philippine family political tradition is deeply rooted, on the other hand, because the news of the assassination of candidates is interspersed in almost every election in the Philippines, according to tuazon, policy research director of the Philippine people's empowerment Governance Center, "anything can happen in the Philippine General Election".

In addition, Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, will hold state council elections in March 2022, which is regarded as the "wind vane" of India's general election in 2024. Japan will usher in the re-election of the Senate, which is very important for Japanese politics, in the summer of 2022.

The US mid-term election results may affect its foreign policy

On the other side of the earth, the mid-term elections to be held in the United States in November 2022 are of great concern. The mid-term elections will re elect all the seats in the house of Representatives and one-third of the seats in the Senate. For the Democratic Party of US President Joe Biden, the advantage at this stage is extremely fragile - the Democratic Party has only five seats in the house of Representatives and 50 seats in the Senate. The Democratic Party barely retains its majority only by the key vote of vice president Harris, who is also chairman of the Senate.

Today, Biden's support rate continues to decline, contradictions within the Democratic Party are becoming increasingly fierce, and the domestic epidemic and inflation situation in the United States are severe. The Democratic Party is considered to be on the brink of handing over control of Congress. According to the U.S. Capitol Hill, 23 Democratic congressmen have stated that they will not strive for re-election. Once the democratic party loses the mid-term election, Biden's already difficult legislative agenda will be more difficult. He will also live up to the name of "lame duck president", which will cast a shadow on the democratic election in 2024.

It is generally believed that although foreign policy may not become the core issue of the US mid-term election, the election results will still have a certain degree of international influence. If the democratic party loses the mid-term election, the domestic party struggle and social division will drive the Biden government to focus more on foreign policy than domestic issues. The most likely scenario is that the Biden government hopes to regain the tradition of "wartime president" of the United States and divert domestic attention by provoking more incidents abroad, so as to create a political heritage.

Compared with the mid-term elections that may change the domestic environment of the United States under President Biden's administration, possible leadership changes in Australia and Brazil will also bring greater uncertainty to the "turn" of U.S. foreign policy.

The Australian federal parliament election will be held before May 21, 2022. Morrison, the current prime minister who has long followed the United States, will strive to ensure that the conservative Liberal national party coalition government will serve for a fourth consecutive term. However, according to the latest poll results of the Australian newspaper, Anthony Albanese, the leader of the labor party, has led Morrison for the first time since March 2020.

With the growing right-wing populist forces in the United States, the political pendulum in Latin America has begun to tilt collectively to the "left" in the past two years. Left-wing politicians have successively held power in Argentina, Bolivia, Peru, Honduras, Chile and other countries. The left-wing government has a strong sense of independence, advocates "South South cooperation" and "keep a distance from the United States".

Brazil, a big Latin American country, will hold a presidential election in October 2022. According to the results of public opinion polls, Brazilian media predict that former left-wing President Lula, who announced his "return" in early December 2021, may overwhelmingly defeat "Brazilian trump" and current far right President bosonaro. The British economist reported that bosonaro was poorly managed during the epidemic, the Brazilian economy never really took off, and the chance of re-election seems very low.

Young voters expect "change"

Looking forward to the "world election year" in 2022, Time magazine warned that past history shows that the political class almost always gives priority to "politics" rather than "governance". In many countries, "election year" is not only a test for the ruling group, but also a "yoke" that restricts its pace.

French President macron is in such a dilemma. In the first half of this year, France will preside over the EU Council, which is responsible for setting the internal agenda and leading foreign negotiations. Novel coronavirus pneumonia is increasing at a crossroads, and the EU and Russia are intensifying. The new crown pneumonia epidemic has again reached its peak in many European countries. In this context, macron ambitiously called for the construction of a "strong" and "sovereign" EU, so as to pose as an "EU leader" before the presidential election to distinguish it from other competitors. However, macron was criticized for "erasing French identity" because of the temporary flying of the European Union flag at the Arc de Triomphe. Although macron has not officially announced his intention to seek re-election, he has been regarded as a "popular candidate" in the French general election in April 2022.

In the context of novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemics and weak economic recovery, we expect "change" to be the voice of many people, especially young voters.

In order to seek support from young people, Morrison, the Australian Prime Minister who once said that the overseas version of TikTok, which posed a threat to Australia's national security, had ignored the negative public opinion effect brought about by the inconsistent words and deeds. At the end of 2021, he opened an account on the tiktok platform and carried out "political marketing". Le Pen, the French far right presidential candidate, put forward a number of issues related to the interests of young people, including "supporting young people aged 18 to 25 to take the train completely free during off peak hours", "Abolishing the income tax for people under the age of 30 within five years", and animal protection policies more interested in young people.

In 2021, "millennials" Gabriel borridge was elected the youngest president in Chile's history, which once made "young people leading world change" a hot topic of public opinion; In 2022, it is worth waiting for the international community to see to what extent the opinions of young voters will affect the contest of political power and the changes of major country relations.