COMMENTARIES
COMMENTARIES
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From Opportunity to Reality in the Middle East
Richard N. Haass Series: The Statesmen's Debate 2005-01-31It has been a long time since the words “opportunity” and “Middle East” appeared in the same sentence. But now they are. Even better, this optimism may have some basis in reality.... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 29169
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The Democratization of Aid
Jeffrey D. Sachs Series: Economics and Justice 2005-01-31The outpouring of aid in response to the Indian Ocean tsunami brought hope to a troubled world. In the face of an immense tragedy, working class families around the world opened their wallets to the disaster’s victims. Former US President Bill Clinton called this response a “democratization of development assistance,” in which individuals lend their help not only through their governments but also through their own efforts. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 26124
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Will Europe’s Sinners Save Themselves?
Hans-Werner Sinn Series: Transatlantic Perspectives 2005-01-31When German officials pushed in the 1990’s for the Stability and Growth Pact as a prerequisite for giving up the Deutschmark, they did not anticipate that Germany would be the first country to violate the pact. While the pact says that a government cannot borrow more than 3% of its GDP, Germany’s public-finance deficit reached 3.7% of GDP and more from 2002 to 2004. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 37969
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The Software of Life
Antoine Danchin Series: Health and Medicine 2005-01-28Being alive, we tend to think that life is easy to grasp. In the accepted classification of sciences, mathematics is thought to be the queen, and the most difficult to grasp, followed by physics, chemistry, and, finally, biology. But this scientific hierarchy is false and misleading: we now know that biology contains more mathematics than we ever imagined. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 45353
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Killing Growth in Russia
Yegor Gaidar Series: A Window on Russia 2005-01-27I want Russia to be a boring country – at least for the next few decades. In the twentieth century, Russia set an unquestionable record for all sorts of upheavals and social experiments that attracted the world’s attention. A time-out is essential. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 24102
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Appeasement Revisited
Vaclav Havel Series: The World in Words 2005-01-26I vividly remember the slightly ludicrous, slightly risqué, and somewhat distressing predicament in which Western diplomats in Prague found themselves during the Cold War. They regularly needed to resolve the delicate issue of whether to invite to their embassy celebrations various Charter 77 signatories, human rights activists, critics of the communist regime, displaced politicians, or even banned writers, scholars, and journalists – people with whom the diplomats were generally friends. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 24513
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The Ghost of Biafra
Ike Okonta Series: Into Africa 2005-01-26When Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo made his surprise announcement on 13 January to begin a nationwide dialogue to discuss constitutional reform, he was bowing to the inevitable. The clamor by disaffected politicians and human rights activists for such a conference had reached a crescendo. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 34775
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Can We Insure against Tsunamis?
Robert J. Shiller Series: Finance in the 21st Century 2005-01-25Most of the discussion surrounding how to respond to Asia’s tsunami disaster has focused on government relief programs and official schemes to implement early warning systems. Little discussion has focused on the promotion of private risk management institutions, notably insurance. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 35458
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The New Bush Doctrine
George Soros Series: The World in Words 2005-01-25President George W. Bush’s second inaugural address set forth an ambitious vision of the role of the United States in advancing the cause of freedom worldwide, fueling worldwide speculation over the course of American foreign policy during the next four years. The ideas expressed in Bush’s speech thus deserve serious consideration. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 30920
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The Environmental Effect of Tsunamis
Arne Jernelov Series: Science and Society 2005-01-24Reports about the tsunamis that devastated Southeast Asia barely a month ago have understandably been dominated by tales of death, suffering, and the physical destruction of infrastructure. But man was not alone in feeling the impact. Ecosystems and other species were also hit. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 74858
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Lessons from the Tsunami
Joseph E. Stiglitz Series: Unconventional Economic Wisdom 2005-01-21There are many lessons that emerge from the tsunami that brought such devastation and loss of life to Asia. It demonstrated the power of globalization, as television brought vivid pictures of the destruction to homes around the world. Indeed, it is at times like this that the world truly does seem like a global village. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 26983
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The Tsunami Effect
Aryeh Neier Series: Human Rights 2005-01-20The extraordinary international response to the tsunamis that devastated South Asia is a remarkable political phenomenon. Though it is too soon to predict all the effects, some good consequences are already evident, as are some that are troublesome and others whose impact will play out over time. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 25327
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Selling America
Joseph S. Nye Series: Of Might and Right 2005-01-19A year ago, then United States National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice announced that, “We are engaged primarily in a war of ideas, not of armies.” She was right, but it is a war that the US is losing, because it is regularly out-flanked by Al-Qaeda. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 23016
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Remembering and Forgetting Zhao Ziyang
Orville Schell Series: China World 2005-01-19So, at last former Chinese Premier and Communist Party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang has died. But the political agenda that he espoused while in office passed away long ago, on May 19, 1989, when he appeared in Tiananmen Square just before dawn to beg tearfully for the forgiveness of protesters. “I am very sorry,” he said to startled onlookers. “I have come too late.” After that, he existed more as an historical chimera than as a real person. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 23053
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A Yukos Autopsy
Christopher Granville Series: Frontiers of Growth 2005-01-18Yukos, once Russia’s leading oil company and a favorite of international investors, is in its death throes. At what many perceived to be a rigged auction, the company’s best assets were sold off to a previously unknown bidder and are now back in the hands of the Russian state. The shell of what remains continues to challenge the company’s fate, notably in a Houston, Texas courtroom. But these spasms will not revive the corpse. What matters now is whether Russia’s economy will share Yukos’s fate. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 21778
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The Other Palestinian Revolution
Shlomo Avineri Series: The World in Words 2005-01-17The euphoria that has, for over a week, greeted Mahmoud Abbas's election as President of the Palestinian Authority was perhaps justified. But now it is time for a clear-eyed assessment of what lies before Palestinians, Israelis, and, perhaps more importantly, for the wider Arab world. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 21944
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Remembering Zhao Ziyang
Bao Tong Series: China World 2005-01-17The conditions under which Zhao Ziyang lived at the time of his death, in utter isolation from Chinese society due to an illegally imposed 16-year house arrest, shames both Chinese justice and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 23128
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Islam’s Democratic Imperative
Sheik Dia al- Shakarchi Series: Islam 2005-01-13Mahmoud Abbas’s election in Palestine and the forthcoming vote in Iraq on January 30 have pushed the question of Islam’s compatibility with democracy to the center of the world’s agenda. Sheik Dia al-Shakarchi, a leading Shi’ite theologian, argues that democracy is not only compatible with Islam, but is essential to it. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 21940
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Legitimacy and Elections
Ralf Dahrendorf Series: Against the Current 2005-01-12So Ukraine now has a legitimate government. Or does it? Viktor Yushchenko has been elected with 52% of the popular vote. His opponent received 44%. Observers confirm that infringements of the electoral rules were but minor. Yet questions remain. The defeated candidate, Viktor Yanukovich, contests the result. The country is deeply divided. Will the miners of Donetsk start the next revolution, this time in red against the orange of the protests staged by Yushchenko’s supporters against the original election with its clearly illegitimate result? Will there be a secession movement in eastern Ukraine? ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 23949
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Saudi Arabia’s Democratic Baby Step
Saad Eddin Ibrahim Series: The World in Words 2005-01-12This month’s elections in Iraq and for the presidency of the Palestinian Authority may be claiming all the world’s headlines, but another potentially far-reaching ballot is also underway, albeit to far less acclaim: the registration process for the municipal elections in Saudi Arabia in mid-February. As the heartland of some of the strongest Islamist forces anywhere, this Saudi effort – if successful and a harbinger of other needed changes – may have an even more profound impact than the elections in Iraq and Palestine. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 27876
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Bush’s Crash Test Economics
J. Bradford DeLong Series: Anatomy of the Global Economy 2005-01-11Fifteen years ago, the United States was in the midst of what you could call its “Age of Diminished Expectations.” Productivity gains had stalled, energy prices were high, the backlog of potential technologies that originated in the Great Depression had been exhausted, and waning benefits from economies of scale led nearly every economist to project that economic growth would be slower in the future than it had been in the past. With productivity growth stagnating for almost two decades, it made sense back then to argue that the US government’s social-insurance commitments (Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid) were excessive and so had to be scaled back. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 27376
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Building on the Euro
Guido Tabellini Series: European Economies 2005-01-11The euro is now six years old. It is past time to consider how it is performing, and whether it has lived up to the expectations that accompanied its birth. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 22774
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Palestine’s Moment of Decision
Daoud Kuttab Series: The World in Words 2005-01-07NOT TO BE PUBLISHED BEFORE JANUARY 10 ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 20386
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Loving America’s Deficits
Kenneth Rogoff Series: Frontiers of Growth 2005-01-06With the weak dollar hanging like the sword of Damocles over the global economy, almost everyone laments America’s spendthrift habits. But did it ever occur to anybody how hard Americans must work to make everyone else look good? ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 26487
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Pinochet’s Trial, Chile’s Dignity
Jorge Arrate Series: Latin America 2005-01-05The court battle on whether or not to punish former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet is now over. After prolonged reflection on medical reports regarding Pinochet’s health, Judge Juan Guzmán found him mentally fit to stand trial on nine counts of kidnapping and one count of homicide. Chile’s Supreme Court has now upheld that indictment. All of those crimes were committed during "Operation Condor," a Latin America-wide program among the continent’s dictators to physically eliminate their opponents on the left. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 32510
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Asia’s Post-Tsunami Future
Fan Gang, Michael Garrett and Jean-Pierre Lehmann Series: The Asian Century 2005-01-05There can be no underestimating the scale of the human devastation wrought by Asia’s horrific tsunamis. Family members have been lost, homes destroyed, and livelihoods ruined. As is often the case in natural disasters, the poor are suffering the most. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 27846
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Political Evolution
George A. Papandreou Series: The Worldly Philosophers 2005-01-04People everywhere want a new relationship with power – more autonomy and more respect. This reflects our current era, in which new knowledge, ideas, and possibilities have made our identities richer, more fluid, and less subject to fate. At the same time, the information society and globalization have made ours a more insecure world, where we experience risks that politics-as-usual has been unable to address. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 22208
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Exiting International Justice
Ruti Teitel Series: Human Rights 2005-01-04I recently took part in a conference in Belgrade entitled “Dealing with the Past in ex-Yugoslavia.” Although the rest of postcommunist Europe confronted such questions a decade ago, the Balkan wars of the 1990’s left both perpetrators and victims stuck in a time warp of justice delayed. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 22413
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Paying for the Past in 2005
Joseph E. Stiglitz Series: Unconventional Economic Wisdom 2005-01-02The beginning of each year is high season for economic forecasters. With few exceptions, Wall Street economists try to give as upbeat an interpretation as the data will allow: they want their clients to buy stocks, and gloom-and-doom forecasts do little to sell them. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 24394
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The Euro Grows Up
Wim Duisenberg Series: European Economies 2005-01-01On January 1, the euro celebrated its sixth birthday. Today, we look back on a period in which the European Central Bank has successfully pursued a stability-oriented single monetary policy serving more than 300 million citizens. ... read Comments: 0 Recommended: 0 Read: 22870
