The EU is currently facing a number of existential challenges in 2016; ranging from the influx of millions of refugees from Africa and the Middle East to the fear of a second dip Eurozone crisis and last, but not least, the potential for the United Kingdom to leave the Union. All that is certain at …
Continue reading Nicholas Ross Smith | A Brexit could be a boon for further European integration
Mexico’s Supreme Court’s recent decision to block the planned planting of GM soy seeds in the states of Campeche and Yucatan represents a win for not only the indigenous communities who took up the fight, but also Mexico’s rule of law and division of powers which have long been questioned. This decision also may set … Continue reading Yadira Ixchel Martinez Pantoja | Indigenous honey producers empowered against GMOs: Mexico’s Supreme Court decision to protect indigenous rights
As the Paris COP 21 climate talks approach on November 30, attention is turning to the seemingly impossible task of reaching a binding and effective global deal to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Indeed, in a recent climate policy report released by the OECD, the authors argue that not only are current targets too weak to be effective, … Continue reading Julie MacArthur | Climate Power to the People? Bottom-up Policy and Community Renewables
On October 27th 2015, the USS Lassen patrolled within the twelve-nautical-mile territorial limit that China claims around the Spratly islands. This is perceived as a great challenge to China’s sovereignty claim on the islands and adjacent sea area in the South China Sea. Yet this action taken by the US Navy is not unexpected: it … Continue reading Weiqun Qi | A Bargaining Game in the South China Sea
Gender Parity & the 2015 Canadian Federal Cabinet: Trudeau’s first history-making moment. Today Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced his Cabinet and made history by assembling a cabinet that unprecedentedly contains an equal number of men and women. It is a significant achievement that this has come to pass, despite the traditional “merit matters most” … Continue reading Matthew Kerby and Jennifer Curtin | Gender Parity & the Canadian Cabinet
29 October 2015 On 26 October 2015 a US warship deliberately cruised close to one of China’s new artificial islands dredged up from shallow waters of the South China Sea. Beijing immediately objected and called the transit ‘deliberate provocation’ and accused the US of ‘threatening Chinese sovereignty and security interests’ in the region. Does the … Continue reading Stephen Hoadley | South China Sea Tensions: the US Dilemma
Two years ago I was in Ottawa at the Carleton School of Political Management and training graduates on what political marketing is about and how it can be used, and naturally, discussing examples from the main Canadian parties the Conservatives, Liberals and NDP. We discussed the obstacles to Harper staying market-oriented as the longer parties … Continue reading Understanding Canada’s 2015 Election Result: Listening Strategy and Political Marketing | Jennifer Lees-Marshment
At the German Federal Election on 22 September, 2013, two parties failed to pass the five-percent threshold of the electoral system by a very narrow margin. While one of them (the Free Democratic Party FDP) had continuously sent representatives to the national parliament since its foundation in 1949 and failed for the first time, the … Continue reading Rüdiger Schmitt-Beck | From Single-Issue to Right-Wing Populist Party? The Surprising Success of the “Alternative for Germany (AfD)”
The mourning period after the terrorist event is often depoliticized. Scrutiny of the processes which made America vulnerable to 9/11 were sidelined, as Derrida argues, because of the spectacle of mourning that followed the devastation. The spectre of cold war complicities with mujahideen in Afghanistan, the ineptness of our spy agencies under Bush, the banal … Continue reading Paul Gordon Kramer | Resistance and Mourning after the Ankara Bombings
On September 11 2001, the United-States suffered an attack by the Sunni extremist group Al Qaeda which claimed almost 3000 civilian victims. The “9-11” terrorist attacks precipitated the United States into launching a ‘Global War on Terror’ (GWoT), which, 14 years later few would argue was a resounding success. The Americans first got rid of … Continue reading Nicolas Pirsoul | The ironic turn of the ‘Global War on Terror’
Pacific Outlier 