Risk experts say geopolitical turmoil will continue to affect businesses in 2023.

Governments are using “financial incentives” to advance national security goals, said Lindsay Newman, head of geopolitical thought leadership at S&P Global Market Intelligence. That development has clear implications for businesses.

“Where geopolitics is reserved for dinner-and-party discussion or cocktail-party discussion, clients are coming to us and saying, ‘We need a geopolitical risk management function,'” Dr. Newman said. “The post-Cold War era is clearly over, and there are major forces seeking to shape the future.”

“We see more volatility in the future than less,” she said.

Risk experts have become more cautious. According to a survey by the World Economic Forum Marsh and more than 1,200 risk experts, policymakers and industry leaders, geoeconomic conflict ranks among the top risks predicted for the next two years. McLennan Cos. and Zurich Insurance Group Ltd

More recent threats are perceived as the cost of living crisis, and natural disasters and extreme weather.

Another survey, this time of more than 1,300 executives by consulting firm Protee Inc., found that geopolitical risks weren’t necessarily top of mind among respondents to that survey — talent challenges, economic conditions and labor costs were the top three concerns — but respondents were up from last year. They have shown some big jumps in comparison.

Brendan Hannifin, a partner at the law firm of Ropes & Gray LLP, Russia in 2011. He said the US response to the 2022 invasion of Ukraine was a “comprehensive sanctions by another name” approach.

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Its more than three-decade departure from Russia – with its trademark arches in some cases carried by cranes – presents some difficulties for the globalization project. More than 1,000 companies, from consumer brands to law firms, have left the country or ceased operations since last year’s crackdown, according to data from the Yale School of Management.

In June, businesses collected more than $59 billion in losses from their Russian operations. US, UK and other sanctions have frozen assets worth tens of billions of dollars.

Meanwhile, China and the US butted heads, in some cases openly. For example, China’s treatment of the Uyghur minority in Xinjiang amounts to “genocide,” a charge the US has repeatedly denied. China launched a major military exercise in response to then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August.

Amid the tensions, US rules are expanding, making it harder to do business with China. US sanctions are targeting the development of China’s semiconductor industry and are subsidizing domestic chip production. The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which went into effect in June, banned imports of most cotton and solar panel parts and other goods from Xinjiang province, which is the source.

Mr. Hannifin said companies are raising questions about how to manage the complex U.S. relationship with China.

Covid-19 and supply chain disruptions Many companies have already announced the risk of an oversupply in China. But as pandemic-related outages grow, legal and compliance uncertainty and concerns have prompted some companies to reassess how they source from the country, said Stephen Gosnell Handler, a partner at law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP.

Businesses don’t necessarily need to rethink their use of Chinese suppliers, she said, but they should assess the risks of compliance with new laws targeting China and possibly with broader geopolitical implications in the future.

Some China watchers fear that another big “exporter” from the US to China – US investment dollars – could become a hindrance if the government decides to review foreign investments for national security reasons. The U.S. currently reviews some foreign investments by foreigners for red flags, but members of Congress from both parties have begun pushing for a regime that would apply similar scrutiny to U.S. foreign investments.

The body that can conduct those reviews, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US, has added staff and taken a tougher approach. The Biden administration recently directed Cephus to investigate deals that could provide critical technologies to China or other adversaries or threaten supply chains.

Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said in November that the U.S. is not looking to break away from China. Sridhar Thayer, a supply chain management expert who teaches at Carnegie Mellon University’s business school, said that while some companies are shifting operations from China to places like Vietnam and India, American businesses are still heavily involved at home.

Professor Tayur said that in addition to finished goods, many raw materials and components will eventually return to China, and it will take years for businesses to move their supply chains out of the country.

S&P’s Dr. Newman predicts that, despite current tensions, global cooperation may prevail in the long term as countries try to tackle common challenges such as climate change and transitioning away from fossil fuels.

“It’s not going to happen where countries are going to take their balls home and not solve those problems together,” she said. “These challenges are common and require common solutions.”

Write to Richard Vanderford at Richard.Vanderford@wsj.com