Foreign Policy Blogs

Regions

Pensions for Some, but Not for Others

Pensions for Some, but Not for Others

Pension reform is something that has a great effect on the future of Brazilians, Latin Americans and to be honest the rest of us as well. Brazil was always a unique case, a country that built an administrative centre in the middle of the country in the 1950s that is populated by mostly government administrators […]

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Voting Advice Applications in Pre-Electoral Ukraine

Voting Advice Applications in Pre-Electoral Ukraine

PROвибір and other electronic instruments are helping Ukrainians to distinguish parties according to their political, socio-economic and cultural agendas Which party to vote for in an election? In Ukraine, like in countries around the world, people are making their political decisions based on a range of factors from emotional attraction to rational calculation. In the […]

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How Distrust toward Voting Advice Applications May Lower the Quality of Ukraine’s Parliamentary Elections

How Distrust toward Voting Advice Applications May Lower the Quality of Ukraine’s Parliamentary Elections

Kyiv’s main media outlets keep ignoring Ukraine’s new voting advice applications So far, Ukraine’s major newspapers and electronic media have largely ignored the freely available novel Ukrainian voting advice applications (VAAs) designed to help voters to make more informed and rational decisions on 21 July. VAAs are computerized instruments that summarize in circa 15 to 40 statements […]

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Plight of Hindus in Bangladesh Continues to Deteriorate

Plight of Hindus in Bangladesh Continues to Deteriorate

A recent report in the Times of India claimed that up to 2,447 members of minority communities in Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan were recently granted Indian citizenship.  One of the major reasons why India expedited the process of granting these refugees Indian citizenship is because the plight of minorities in these three countries is horrendous.  […]

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On NAFTA and the USMCA

On NAFTA and the USMCA

As Mexico became the first nation to ratify the United States-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement, let’s take a look at what NAFTA was and how the USMCA hopes to improve…

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Malaysia’s Foreign Policy Balancing Act

Malaysia’s Foreign Policy Balancing Act

One year on since the 2018 electoral victory, Malaysia’s Pakatan Harapan government, led by Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad, has kept the main thrust of foreign policy of past governments of the Barisan Nasional. But slight readjustments have been made to reorient Malaysia’s foreign policy to the center, enabling Pakatan to strive for more balance […]

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Complications in Tbilisi’s Friendship with Kyiv: The Georgian Orthodox Church and Ukrainian Autocephaly

Complications in Tbilisi’s Friendship with Kyiv: The Georgian Orthodox Church and Ukrainian Autocephaly

  By Tamar Chapidze and Andreas Umland Over the last two decades, Georgia and Ukraine have become close geopolitical allies vis-à-vis both Russia and the West. In 1997, Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova created between themselves a multilateral consultative forum that, in 2001, was upgraded into the Organization for Democracy and Economic Development, better known […]

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Critical Questions for Ukraine’s New President: A List of Issues for this Year’s Reform Agenda and Kyiv’s Relations to the West

Critical Questions for Ukraine’s New President: A List of Issues for this Year’s Reform Agenda and Kyiv’s Relations to the West

On 20 May 2019, Ukraine’s new President Volodymyr Zelenskiy was inaugurated. Later this year, the European Parliamentary elections will lead to the formation of new EU leadership in Brussels. Finally, Ukraine’s upcoming parliamentary elections this summer or autumn will likely reconfigure much of the – if not the entire – Ukrainian governmental elite, and lead […]

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Open Source: A Month of Sputnik Radio

Open Source:  A Month of Sputnik Radio

Five years into operation and two years into its 24/7 radio broadcast in Washington, what’s Kremlin-sponsored radio talking about?  I listened for a month to find out. Of three main areas discussed on Sputnik Radio – the United States, U.S. foreign policy, and Russia/Putin – there is fairly little discussion of Russia/Putin.  With a studio […]

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Bangladeshi Hindu rights activist: “Prime Minister Modi, please help your Hindu brethren!”

Bangladeshi Hindu rights activist: “Prime Minister Modi, please help your Hindu brethren!”

“I especially call upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, whom we share the same faith with, to help out his Hindu brethren, who are being left destitute,” Hindu human rights activist Shipan Kumer Basu declared. In Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka following the Easter bombings, the plight of Hindus is rapidly deteriorating.  In Pakistan […]

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Narendra Modi re-elected Indian Prime Minister: “An opportunity for Bangladesh’s minorities”

Narendra Modi re-elected Indian Prime Minister: “An opportunity for Bangladesh’s minorities”

In honor of the re-election of Modi, Shipan Kumer Basu, the President of the World Hindu Struggle Committee, declared: “Under your leadership, you will play an important role in protecting the oppressed minorities in Bangladesh, who are presently being slowly and gradually ethnically cleansed from their ancestral homeland.” According to the BBC, Indian Prime Minister […]

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AIPAC’s Weakening Grip On US Foreign Policy

AIPAC’s Weakening Grip On US Foreign Policy

Despite the 18,000faithful who gathered recently in Washington, D.C. to pledge their unwavering support to Israel, AIPAC finds itself in a Dickensian moment of history that could be described as ‘It was the winter of gloating; it was the spring of scrutiny’. AIPAC’s guests of honor may vary in faith and political affiliation; they may […]

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Corruption Almost Never Disappears

Corruption Almost Never Disappears

Since the Americas became home to millions of refugees from Venezuela over the last year, a great deal of attention has been given to the situation in the country. With a new government in waiting declaring their legitimacy and international condemnation of the Maduro government, little has changed however in Venezuela or for Venezuelans. Maduro’s […]

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Sri Lanka bombings and the rise of ISIS in Asia

Sri Lanka bombings and the rise of ISIS in Asia

After I reported that ISIS is starting to move its forces to Africa and Asia following the destruction of the Caliphate, the Sri Lanka bombings occurred.   Across Asia, ISIS is on the ascent.  How should American policy makers respond?   Last week, as Christians across the globe were celebrating Easter and Jews throughout the world were […]

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Secondary literature list for my seminar “Ukraine between the European and Eurasian Unions” @UniJena, in April-June 2019 (books, journals, websites)

Secondary literature list for my seminar “Ukraine between the European and Eurasian Unions” @UniJena, in April-June 2019 (books, journals, websites)

“Ukraine between the European and Eurasian Unions: Revolution, War, Reform” The seminar aims to introduce Master-students into one of Europe’s critical conflicts today, and to illustrate, using the example of Ukraine, inter-relation between Europeanization, post-Soviet transformation and security politics. We will touch upon general themes of European studies, like democracy promotion, neighborhood policies, transposition of […]

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