If there is one thing we have learned from the events of the last few weeks, it is to expect the unexpected and to at least consider the possibility that worst-case scenarios will materialize. No one could have predicted that in a matter of a few hours the world's third-largest economy would suffer a triple disaster -- a massive earthquake, a devastating tsunami and a slow-motion nuclear nightmare -- just as no one expected that a fruit salesman in Tunisia would trigger a chain reaction of uprisings in the Middle East.

Nassim Taleb called these high-impact, low-probability events Black Swans, and if there is another such transformative development in the offing, it just might be taking place in the tiny island-state of Bahrain. ...