1. Barack Obama
President, United States of America
Age: 51
The decisive winner of the 2012 U. S. presidential election on all counts: Obama took the popular vote, the electoral college and 7 out of 7 toss-up states. Now he gets 4 more years to push his agenda past weakened congressional Republicans. Still, he faces major challenges, including an unresolved budget crisis, stubbornly high unemployment and renewed unrest in the Middle East. But Obama remains the commander in chief of the world’s greatest military and head of the sole economic and cultural superpower-literally the leader of the free world.
2. Angela Merkel
Chancellor, Germany
Age: 58
The world’s most powerful woman is the backbone of the 27-member European Union and carries the fate of the euro on her shoulders. Merkel’s hard-line austerity prescription for easing the European debt crisis has been challenged by both hard-hit southern countries and the more affluent north, but it-and she-are still standing. Merkel has served as -chancellor since 2005, but one of her biggest challenges still lies ahead: bolstering her government’s sagging popularity before the 2013 German general election.
