Does Democracy Matter?
Negative experiences from state-building projects in Iraq and Afghanistan, the mixed record of democratic change in the former Soviet Union and the aftermath of Arab Spring have led many… Read more »
Inside Venezuela’s opposition
Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López was just one of several political leaders—including current Mayors Daniel Ceballos of San Cristóbal and Enzo Scarano of San Diego—arrested after a wave of peaceful student… Read more »
Will Kiska revive Slovak democracy?
The election of the political newcomer Andrej Kiska as fourth president of the Slovak Republic was a blow to Prime Minister Robert Fico, writes Olga Gyárfášová (left), an analyst at… Read more »
West’s democracies have ‘moral duty’ to aid Ukraine
Russia praised a Ukrainian law granting self-governance powers to separatist-held areas of Ukraine, a measure that faces a challenge from some politicians in Kiev who call it a giveaway to… Read more »
Why does West repeatedly get China so wrong?
Why does doubt and conjecture still shroud a nation that for six decades we have studied, worked against, then allied with, then clashed with again? The answer that I’ve come… Read more »
Time for realism on building new democracies?
What has gone wrong with the dream of democracy’s transformational potential? What stands out is a generalized disillusionment with the ability of democracy to provide public goods, the key functions… Read more »
Tying up the internet, Balkanizing the digital world
Concerns are rising that efforts to protect citizens from foreign surveillance will Balkanize the digital world. Blocking websites, bottling up information so it cannot flow freely around the world and… Read more »
Refuting jihadism
Western policy-makers and academics have focused in recent years on the need to provide an effective counter-narrative to the global jihadist movement, say two leading analysts. The common threads in… Read more »
Democracy ‘losing the global battle of ideas’?
The tide of global democratic change, which at the start of the new millennium looked like an unstoppable force of nature, has been turned back over the last decade. How… Read more »
Iran prepares for leadership transition?
Though Iran has been broadcasting pictures and videos of top state officials and noted foreign dignitaries visiting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in the hospital, the health of the man… Read more »