In The News

Russia Sets Out to Bring the Middle East Under New Order

Chris Miller November 8, 2016
With a combination of low-cost intervention in Syria, counterterrorism resources and support for Iran, Russia is making strides in bringing the Middle East into multipolar balance. “Moscow is eyeing a new order,” explains Yale scholar Chris Miller. “The main fracture dividing the Middle East will not be between US allies and insurgent groups, the Kremlin hopes, but between fluctuating coalitions...

The World Is Watching America's Election

Frida Ghitis November 8, 2016
The US election had its bizarre moments, and global interest runs high. Citizens of Canada, Mexico and elsewhere sense that their countries have a huge stake in the outcome. Newspapers around the globe detail poll closing times for the 50 states, and small crowds gather around televisions, laptops and smartphones to monitor results. “But watching America is not just a spectator sport -- people...

In the Art World, Globalism’s New Spin

Holland Cotter November 7, 2016
When the struggling US economy turned to globalization as its saving grace in the 1990s, the art world embraced globalism as a key principle. However, the promise of economic globalization has faded for many, and similarly, globalism fell out of favor among some curators. Globalism is returning to the world of contemporary art in the form of global consciousness, explains Holland Cotter of the...

The Rise and Rise of Fake News

November 7, 2016
News spreads quickly via the internet, and research suggests that increasing numbers of US adults rely on social media for their news. “There are hundreds of fake news websites out there, from those which deliberately imitate real life newspapers, to government propaganda sites, and even those which tread the line between satire and plain misinformation,” reports BBC News. The purpose of some...

UNICEF: 300 Million Children Breathe Toxic Air

November 4, 2016
Air pollution is an increasing danger for children’s health. One out of every seven children, 300 million in all, are exposed to toxic levels of outdoor air pollution, reports the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF. “The World Health Organization, WHO, says air pollution kills about seven million people a year, nearly 12 percent of all deaths worldwide,” reports the Environment News...

Climate Change and the Risks of Denying Inconvenient Truths

Martin Wolf November 2, 2016
Many industries – including agriculture and insurance – anticipate major disruptions from climate change. Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator for Financial Times, is pessimistic about US leadership on the issue, expressing alarm that climate change was not discussed more during the presidential campaign. He points to two types of denial: Major denial from Donald Trump and the right stems...

Global Health Funding Faces a Shortfall of Billions to Fight Diseases

Andrew Green November 1, 2016
The global health community has tools to prevent and treat diseases, however, a “decline in global health funding threatens not just to stymie scientific advances against diseases like HIV, but to actually reverse gains made in the past decade,” writes Andrew Green for World Politics Review. Research on diseases has contributed to the largest population of young people in the planet’s history,...