In The News

Death in Darfur

Mohamed Buisier June 9, 2006
The Arab League’s response, or lack thereof, to the massacres in Darfur signals a leadership problem that must be confronted. Political activist Mohamed Buisier opposes the culture of fear that supports Arab leaders as well as the crimes committed by leaders against their own people – and urges reexamination of leadership and government’s legitimacy in the Arab world. The Arab League’s denial of...

Latin America’s Left Turn

Jorge G. Castañeda June 7, 2006
Mexican-born political scientist Jorge G. Castañeda describes the resurgence of left-identified political leaders in Latin America as two-pronged. One form, most present in Chile, Uruguay and Brazil, has Marxist and Castroist roots, but has evolved to a practice based in social policy and internationalism within a market framework. The other – which Castañeda defines as “peculiarly Latin...

Peru Still Wary of Garcia’s Past

Robert Plummer June 5, 2006
Alan Garcia has been re-elected as president of Peru, despite leaving his country with a 5 percent approval rating and $900 million less in its reserves at the end of his previous term in 1990. Garcia enters office with new plans on changing Peru’s highly stratified society, with its 52 percent poverty rate, according to journalist Robert Plummer. Hopefully for the people of Peru, Garcia has...

Southeast Asia Casts Wide Net for Cooperation

Barry Desker May 30, 2006
US leaders are divided over maintaining distance from China or finding new ways to cooperate. By contributing to trans-Pacific institutions and establishing a myriad of cooperative obligations for the rising power, the US could defuse any threat from China, according to East Asia scholar Barry Desker, former Singaporean ambassador to Indonesia. While Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a...

This is Freedom, Say Courageous Women Risking All for Democracy

Declan Walsh May 24, 2006
As Afghanistan falls back into violence at the hands of the Taliban, a small number of courageous women risk their lives for the cause of democracy. Emerging from a history that has notoriously treated women’s views, education and personhood as beneath consideration, several female politicians – including one 18-year-old – have come to prominence in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, that prominence...

A Taliban Comeback?

Ahmed Rashid May 23, 2006
Almost five years after the US invaded Afghanistan in retaliation for 9/11, the Taliban appears on a comeback trail, sparking a renewal of ethnic and warlord-based conflict with an overlay of ambition from neighbors. In confronting a powerful Taliban resurgence in southern Afghanistan, the Pakistan-US alliance is also at odds. Complicated politics and unrest place Afghanistan’s moderate...

Europe Faces Globalization – Part II

Bruce Stokes May 18, 2006
Free trade may offer macroeconomic benefits, but it also claims human victims – laid-off workers who are lucky to find new jobs for less pay. The developed nations of Europe, with established manufacturing centers and generous social benefits, employ a range of strategies to compete globally with nations that have lower wages and minimal social protections. The second in this two-part series...