Challenging crypto-kleptocracy
The United States has developed a reputation as the country with the toughest anti-money laundering regime and the most aggressive policies to combat illicit finance in the world, argues Josh… Read more »
Category: Eurasia
Russia protests: ‘This is the erosion of the regime.’
A Russian human rights group says police have raided the offices of three employees of an NGO led by Russian anti-corruption activist and Kremlin critic Aleksei Navalny, RFE/RL reports: Masked… Read more »
When protest is not enough: Movements need alternative vision to the status quo
Recent political protests, from Hong Kong to Moscow, Tbilisi to Belgrade, have been the biggest since 1989, the great year of pro-democracy revolutions. But something fundamental has changed in the… Read more »
Revisionists pose ‘civilizational challenge’ to Western liberal democratic order
The resurgence of threats to liberal democracy — external and internal — does not refute the principal thesis of Francis Fukuyama’s “The End of History?” says a prominent analyst…. Read more »
Is Russia’s ‘new civic activism’ testing Putin’s grip on power?
More people in Russia view the late Brezhnev era of the Soviet Union as “close to the people” than they do President Vladimir Putin’s Russia, according to a survey… Read more »
‘Never-ending state war against civil society’ meets the new face of Russia’s protests
Russian authorities have threatened protesters in Moscow with lengthy jail sentences in an attempt to dampen an unexpected surge in protest mood before a planned opposition rally, The Guardian reports…. Read more »
‘Ray of Hope in the Haze’? How Europe’s democracies combat foreign interference
Online foreign influence efforts are a threat that is here to stay. At least 24 countries worldwide have been targeted, with Russia being by far the most active aggressor; but… Read more »
Putinism minus Putin?
Police detained nearly 1,400 activists (HT: AP/CFR) who participated in a Saturday protest against a ban on some opposition candidates from running for Moscow’s city council, according to a monitoring… Read more »
Russia’s civil society aims to prevent Putinism after Putin
An important test of civil society in Russia is unfolding on the streets of Moscow. It suggests that despite the authoritarian rule of President Vladimir Putin over nearly two decades,… Read more »
Renewal or revanche? Ukraine election starts a ‘test for benevolent populism’
Preliminary results in Ukraine’s parliamentary election suggest President Volodymyr Zelensky’s Servant of the People party is on course to win big as Ukrainians endorse his reform agenda. The Central Election Commission… Read more »