In The News

Muslim Pop Culture on the Rise in Indonesia

Solenn Honorine April 8, 2010
Due to the economic crisis that hit Indonesia in the late 1990s, the government of longtime dictator Suharto fell and gave rise to democratic elections. Along with democracy came religious freedom, which for many Indonesians has meant becoming more devout Muslims. As a result, Muslim pop culture, whether manifested in books, television shows, movies, ringtones, or otherwise, has become a central...

Freedom Is Not Found Online

Aditya Chakrabortty April 1, 2010
The growth of the internet has long been perceived as a key to globalizing the notion of a free society as championed by the West. But world leaders like Bill Clinton and dot-com boomers alike now sound naïve to have thought the web's spread could seamlessly produce a "borderless" world of free expression. These "cyber-utopians" failed to realize that the Internet, like...

Globalization in Trouble – Part I

Bernard K. Gordon February 12, 2010
From financial woes to security worries, a new world seems to be dawning in which the process of globalization risks slowing down. In part one of a two part series, YaleGlobal looks at trade troubles that may arise from a non-trade failure. For all the praise of free and open trade creating prosperity in the post-World War II, analysts often forget how the stability of the international system...

A Natural Alliance

Nayan Chanda November 30, 2009
Though India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to the US was being viewed as all form and no substance in the lead up to the trip, the result was the complete opposite. This conclusion is inescapable when one observes the stark contrast between the joint US-China statement – issued a week earlier – and the US-India statement. The former is a study in an uneasy business partnership made...

Mr. Singh Goes to Washington – Part I

Ashley J. Tellis November 23, 2009
India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is being honored as the first state visitor to the Obama White House, but he will not be in the same place since his last visit to Washington. President Obama’s recent trip to China shows how the US policy focus has shifted from the Bush years. Perhaps the biggest challenge, as Ashley Tellis, Senior Associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace...

How to Let Islam and the West Live in Harmony

Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono November 23, 2009
The recently-re-elected president of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, says that religiosity will continue to rise in coming years. But it will come against the backdrop of rising multiculturalism and tolerance as people realize that cooperation and democracy can help transcend global challenges like climate change and terrorism. To ensure this tolerance is secured, Yudhoyono calls for the...

Obama in Asia – Part III

Shen Dingli November 20, 2009
US President Obama’s recent trip to China reveals the ways in which US-China relations might be changing. According to Shen Dingli, Director of the Center for American Studies at Fudan University Shanghai, the tenor of the trip showed that China’s status has risen as the US appears to be accepting China’s terms of the relationship. Obama’s exposure to the Chinese people was also limited as his...