In The News

What's Really Holding Islamic Nations Back

J. Bradford Delong June 9, 2003
Ever since the September 11 attacks, questions about the backwardness of Islamic countries have acquired a new urgency. In this article, economist J. Bradford Delong tries to answer what factors may have contributed to the bad economies of the Islamic world. He first cites the case history of the Industrial Revolution – how the Revolution touched almost all parts of the world but the Islamic...

Thailand Tiptoes in Step With American Antiterror Effort

Raymond Bonner June 8, 2003
Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra has been keeping his assistance to the US anti-terrorist effort private, fearing retaliation from terrorists and the impact of a public avowal on a tourist industry already suffering because of SARS and a bombing in Bali last year. Nevertheless, Thailand has been instrumental to the US anti-terrorism effort, providing interrogation facilities, the use of...

The Arch of Globalization

Abdel-Moneim June 5, 2003
In the first installment of a two-part essay, Abdel-Moneim, director of Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies in Egypt, offers five possible genealogies of the US-led war in Iraq. First, he argues, the war was about opening up the Middle East to processes of globalization. Globalization has been uneven, affecting world regions and countries differently, and the Middle East is the...

George Bush's Aqaba lesson – Jethro's 'The Man'

Rami G. Khouri June 4, 2003
In this opinion piece from the Jordan Times, the author offers some advice to visiting US President George W. Bush. "You would do well to remain humble in Aqaba when you're advising the local Arab and Israeli Semites about how to achieve good governance, because this is the place where it all started some three and a half millennia ago," he writes. The region is steeped in...

America's War on Terror Goes Awry in Pakistan

Ahmed Rashid June 4, 2003
Ahmed Rashid, author of Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia and Jihad: The Rise of Militant Islam in Central Asia, offers a scathing indictment of US foreign policy in South Asia, post-September 11. Rashid argues that US-led military action and victory in Afghanistan did not eradicate the Islamic fundamentalist ideology of the Taliban. Rather, Taliban's...

European Union’s Southern Drive

Shada Islam May 30, 2003
Despite apparent attempts by the US to lead the world in every way and area, when it comes to northern Africa and the Middle East, the European Union has its own ideas. Europe's importation of immigrant labor to support its aging population has contributed to a buildup of over 13 million Muslims of Middle Eastern descent across the continent. In the face of continued economic shifts and...

A Tale of Two Visions

Omayma Abdel-Latif May 30, 2003
After the war on Iraq, Arab intellectuals have grouped into two camps and centered their argument on what really is ahead and what the Arab world should do next. While the liberals and democrats are pro-U.S. in many ways and pushing for reforms in the region, the Islamists and radicals are still opposed to Western intervention of any sort and are holding fast to their ideologies. In this article...