In The News

“Axis of Democracy” Flexes Its Military Muscles

Hisane Masaki April 4, 2007
As new economic powers emerge in Asia, nations that border the Pacific jockey for new agreements on security. The US and Japan have convinced India to join a joint military exercise in the Pacific this month. Japan and Australia, India and the US, and India and Japan, have various forms of bilateral agreements addressing security. For “Asia Times, Hisane Masaki writes that China holds suspicions...

Turning Globalization on Its Head

April 4, 2007
People who want to join the global economy must do more than learn about it from home. Germany has a shortage of qualified information-technology personnel – and must outsource such jobs to India. As a result, more Germans travel to India for internships and jobs. Likewise, Indian firms are starting businesses in Europe. Germany faces some big hurdles in any attempts to welcome firms and workers...

As Globalization’s Benefits Grow, So Do Its Skeptics

David Wessel April 3, 2007
Global trade is suspect among some in the West because of globalization’s implied dichotomy of winners and losers. Fearing displacement of North American jobs, many US workers have little faith that globalization delivers wide-scale benefits. Citizens rally around globalization efforts more readily when combined with simultaneous investments in improving foreign relations, argues journalist David...

The Rise in Extremism – Part II

Baladas Ghoshal April 3, 2007
For centuries, Islam in Southeast Asia was renowned for its adaptability to local practices and tolerance of other religions. Over the past three decades, however, fundamentalists have tried to homogenize Islam, introducing new tensions. The second article of this two-part series explores Arab influence on Islam throughout Malaysia and Indonesia, as fundamentalists reject tolerant and eclectic...

Time for Détente With Iran

Ray Takeyh April 3, 2007
After decades of pursuing a policy of containment and preaching virulent anti-communism, Richard Nixon traveled to China in 1972, marking a new era of negotiation, compromise and cooperation that became known as “détente.” China, a rising East Asian power, assisted the US in exiting the unpopular Vietnam War, tackling more serious threats and bringing stability to the region; the US could gain...

The Trouble with Japanese Nationalism

Francis Fukuyama March 30, 2007
The US has supported the rearmament of Japan since the end of the Cold War, but Washington is becoming trapped in an increasingly difficult position behind the overt nationalism of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi. Throughout his five years in office, Koizumi sparked fierce antagonism in China and South Korea with annual visits to the Yasukuni Shrine, where some...

The Rise in Extremism – Part I

Fahad Nazer March 30, 2007
As the US and its coalition partners wage their war on terror in Afghanistan and Iraq, extremists emerge elsewhere in the world. This two-part series examines how governments of Muslim nations tangle with religious extremism within their own borders. In the first article, author Fahad Nazer describes Saudi Arabia’s efforts to confront militants fighting in the name of Islam. Walking a tightrope...