Domestic Politics Archive

Some foreign policy analysts believe that President Barack Obama’s legislative victory on health care reform this week will have a positive impact on his ability to make progress in the foreign policy realm as well. Clearly, Obama’s credibility in the eyes of foreign governments would have been severely — perhaps even irreparably — damaged had he failed to pass the flagship legislation of his domestic agenda, despite overwhelming Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress. But the White House is not out of the woods just yet. For the president to build on the momentum he gained from the health […]

As the first day of spring swept across the northern half of the globe, Iranians at home and abroad celebrated Nowruz, the Persian New Year. The ancient holiday’s traditions date back centuries, but new customs have started taking hold in more recent times. This year, amid profound internal divisions and growing international tensions, the Official Nowruz Greeting became a new vehicle for mobilization and an occasion to outline strikingly different visions of the past, the present, and the future of Iran. The Nowruz messages offered by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the country’s two top opposition leaders, and U.S. President Barack […]

The news cycle from Africa is usually predictable, with isolated sparks of individual and community hope amid a heavy dose of despair caused by socio-economic depravity, political squabbles and violence. Last week’s coverage would not have been any different, had it not been for the announcement that the African Union had imposed sanctions on Madagascar’s rulers. The sanctions mark the first time the regional organization has ever invoked such an instrument, despite a plethora of more-brutal regimes on the continent deserving such punishment. The AU’s Peace and Security Council was not necessarily wrong to impose targeted sanctions on Madagascan President […]

Domestic politics is driving U.S. grand strategy. Although this phenomenon is poorly understood by both academic international relations scholars and the Washington foreign policy elite (FPE), it has important implications for the prospect of changing U.S. grand strategy, and therefore should be of interest to both groups. The Gulf between the Academy and the Beltway No one disputes that there is a rift between those who study international relations in the academy and those who make U.S. foreign policy. Most examinations of this disconnect center on: a) whether academics are asking policy-relevant questions; and, b) whether the theories and methodologies […]

MEXICO CITY — Earlier this year, Mexican President Felipe Calderón admonished a meeting of the nation’s top diplomats, urging them to speak better of Mexico in order to counter negative perceptions of the country generated by its ongoing war on drug cartels and the 2009 outbreak of the H1N1 virus. Calderón raised eyebrows, however, when, to emphasize his point, he mentioned Brazil, saying the emerging South American power is perceived abroad in far more favorable terms than Mexico, in part because its own citizens speak well of it. “I have never as a politician nor as president . . . […]

One of the most troubling features of the environment in Washington these days is the inability to make tough strategic choices. This is particularly apparent when foreign policy objectives conflict with domestic political priorities: Because the two policy areas are usually compartmentalized, our diplomats don’t have much leverage to negotiate and bargain with other governments. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s recent trip to Brazil, where she unsuccessfully sought to enlist support on the question of Iran sanctions, is a case in point. There are a number of issues currently causing friction in the bilateral U.S.-Brazil relationship. One is our continued […]

This past Monday, China’s highest governmental legislative body, the National People’s Congress (NPC), wrapped up its annual meetings in Beijing. While these meetings are mostly considered to be rubber-stamp assemblies, they can reveal something of the Chinese Communist Party leadership’s policy priorities, as well as some of the various interest groups within the party. And as the statements and declarations emerging from this year’s meetings make clear, the party leadership has identified consolidating the institutional move toward “inner-party democracy” as the key to curbing corruption and preventing concentration of power at the local levels of government. This “democratic centralism” takes […]

There is little doubt that as president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych will decisively shift the country’s geopolitical posture, with Kiev once again moving closer to Moscow after its pro-Western and pro-EU turn of 2005. The potential consequences on the EU’s energy future are serious, as 80 percent of Russian natural gas exports to Europe transit through Ukrainian territory. The country has been in repeated price disputes with the Russian state-owned gas monopoly, Gazprom, resulting in interruptions of deliveries to the Ukrainian market in January 2006 and 2009, with supplies to Europe affected both times. Mediation on the part of the […]

NAIROBI, Kenya — If you ask John Duku, South Sudan’s outgoing envoy to crucial ally and neighbor, Kenya, the upcoming elections in Sudan are all but irrelevant to the future of Africa’s largest country. The election represents the country’s first multiparty ballot in 24 years, but for Duku, its outcome is a forgone conclusion and its fairness is already in question. Nonetheless, the April polls just might loosen the grip that President Omar al-Bashir’s National Congress Party has held on power through two civil wars and a series of internal skirmishes over the past two decades. The election comes at […]

Most coverage of the outcome of Iraq’s March 7 elections has portrayed Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s re-election as seriously in doubt, with former Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, a secular Shiite, contending for the position. However, not only is another term for Maliki likely, his only real obstacle is securing Kurdish support. Allawi, on the other hand, does not represent a realistic threat. More generally, the election will result in a parliament that is more polarized between majority Shiite Islamists and opposition Sunni Arab nationalists, with secular Shiite and tribal parties almost entirely wiped out. Although definitive tallies have not yet […]

BANGKOK — It was billed by local media as the last stand of former Premier Thaksin Shinawatra’s red-shirted rural supporters against a bureaucratic elite that they claim rules Thailand as an “Orwellian state.” But despite heightened fears of a “final battle,” Sunday’s mass protest has so far only set the stage for more political instability in the coming days and weeks. The rally in Bangkok was called to protest a court seizure of the ousted premier’s assets, a decision that dealt a blow to the grassroots movement Thaksin funds from exile. Fearing the worst, the Thai government made sweeping preparations […]

SANTIAGO, Chile — As conservative billionaire Sebastian Piñera was sworn in as Chile’s 38th president on March 11, hanging lamps and flower displays in the Chilean Congress swayed due to aftershocks from the earthquake that had fractured a large swath of the country less than two weeks earlier. The tremors were a reminder that Piñera’s success as president, and perhaps the future of his party, will depend on his ability to lead an efficient recovery from the country’s worst natural disaster in 50 years. The 8.8-magnitude earthquake that shook Chile before dawn on Feb. 27 toppled buildings and bridges and […]

The outcome of the U.K.’s upcoming general election is no longer a foregone conclusion, with the opposition Conservative Party’s steady lead in opinion polls recently narrowing. An election date of May 6 has been floated, leaving plenty of time for the usual twists and turns of election campaigning. All the same, given Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s political difficulties and popular fatigue with the Labour Party’s long grip on power, a Conservative win is certainly plausible. So what would be the implications of a Conservative victory on foreign and development policy? Answering this question is tricky, not least because a consistent […]

The run up to this weekend’s Iraqi election — the second general election held since the fall of Saddam’s regime — was marked by speculation, anticipation and no shortage of controversy. Since the last such election in 2005, the Iraqi people have witnessed continual changes to their country and political map, and the trajectory of Iraq as determined by this latest election could change accordingly. There is little doubt that, although the elections saw some violence, they were a marked improvement from 2005 and a testament that democracy is taking root in Iraq. There is much at stake in the […]

It could take over a month before the Iraqi Supreme Court confirms the results of Sunday’s legislative elections, but the process itself has already shown significant successes in several dimensions. Even so, important questions regarding Iraq’s future, and America’s role in it, remain unresolved. Most importantly, this latest election confirms Iraq’s status as a functioning democracy in which multiple candidates and political parties compete for office in essentially free and fair elections, whose outcome could not be predicted in advance. While such an achievement would not be remarkable in many parts of the world, it is a rarity in the […]

NAIROBI, Kenya — It’s easy to confuse the interior of Nairobi’s Habesha restaurant with a lost corner of Ethiopia. The smell of frankincense and thick, dark coffee waft through the air as the latest tunes by Teddy Afro vie to be heard over the Amharic-language patter of denizens from Addis Ababa, Lalibela, Mekele and Gonder. There’s a good reason for the resemblance: Many of Habesha’s clients are in exile for speaking out against the government of Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. And if the 2005 elections as well as this year’s campaign season are any indication, it might be even […]

National security types have long noted — and complained about — the relative lack of military veterans in Congress, which results in too few experienced votes being cast when the prospect of overseas interventions is raised. I have long noted — and complained about — the fact that Congress’ most prominent military vets hail from the Vietnam era, which has led many to instinctively reject the necessity and utility of conducting nation-building and counterinsurgency. Clearly, our lengthy interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan will alter this generational equation, but how will the experiences of today’s veterans impact their votes in tomorrow’s […]