Domestic Politics Archive

The much-anticipated announcement by Egypt’s ruling military council of a schedule for the nation’s first post-revolution parliamentary elections was met with dismay by a wide range of political parties, from the Muslim Brotherhood to the liberal Ghad Party to the conservative Freedom and Justice Party. In all, more than three dozen parties are saying they plan to boycott the elections, the first round of which is slated for Nov. 28, on grounds that the timeline for voting unfairly stacks the deck in favor of former political allies of ousted President Hosni Mubarak. While no one is actually running under Mubarak’s […]

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s announcement last Saturday that he would not stand for re-election, instead nominating his predecessor and current prime minister, Vladimir Putin, to once again assume the office, came as a surprise to those of us who were expecting a continuation of the Medvedev-Putin tandem. At the same time, however, the somewhat trite and simplistic analysis being proferred by those who argue that Medvedev was nothing more than a seat-warmer for Putin until the latter could reclaim the presidency is not particularly helpful in understanding the direction Russian politics has taken — and will take. If Putin had […]

In Bolivia, another government minister has quit over a police crackdown on protesters opposed to a jungle highway.

Many observers today view Pakistan much as they do neighboring Afghanistan: primarily in terms of terrorists and the Taliban. Yet, despite their lethality, these groups have so far remained largely limited to Pakistan’s periphery — an area of historical neglect with little consequence for the upper echelons of state power. In contrast, attention paid to the rest of Pakistan, where the vast majority of Pakistanis reside, has been sparser. This skewed focus makes it difficult to fully grasp the challenges driving insecurity in Pakistan. In fact, despite the dire depictions, no tribal insurgency can defeat Pakistan’s army and overthrow the […]

With Syria’s crackdown on democracy activists now in its seventh month, serious questions have begun to arise over the extent to which a militarized faction of the protest movement may, or may not, be able to mount an armed revolt against the government of President Bashar al-Assad. Reports this week honed in on a group of recently defected Syrian military soldiers and officers calling themselves the Free Syrian Army. While the group has created a presence online, according to Joshua Landis, the author of Syria Comment, a leading English-language blog on Syria, it now faces a true test in attempting […]

The news this past weekend of Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s impending return to the presidency has elicited a wide range of commentary on the potential impact it might have on Russia’s foreign policy and, in particular, on U.S.-Russia relations. There are several key points that one should keep in mind when considering the development. First, in the years since he left office in 2008 after serving as president since 2000, Putin has remained Russia’s most powerful figure. He has been able to determine policy in any area and any direction, constrained only by objective factors related to Russian state […]

Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak’s announcement last week that he will introduce sweeping reforms has mostly met with a positive reception. Some observers have also added that in seizing the political initiative on reform, he has stopped the momentum of Bersih, a grouping of 62 civil society organizations closely associated with the opposition coalition. There are grounds for a less-rosy assessment, however. What Najib has promised, and how Bersih is likely to respond, needs to be seen in the context of both Najib’s recent slump in popularity and indications that he wants to burnish his image before calling a snap […]

A Muslim woman has launched a bid to become the president of France in protest against a ban on Islamic veils.

The recent Inter-American Court of Human Rights ruling ordering Venezuela to stop trying to block a leading opposition candidate from challenging President Hugo Chávez in upcoming elections has breathed fresh life into the field of candidates seeking to unseat the Venezuelan leader. The ruling, met by brazen criticism from Chávez, paves the way for Leopoldo López Mendoza, the 40-year-old former mayor of a wealthy Caracas suburb, to run in primary elections slated for next February. More importantly, according to Christopher Sabatini, senior director of policy at the Americas Society and Council of the Americas, the ruling sets the stage for […]

When Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in his Tunisian village last December, nobody knew he would electrify the entire Arab world and send the existing political order in the region into a long period of turmoil. Very quickly, however, there were signs that the success of Tunisian demonstrators in toppling their long-ruling dictator had sparked something important — something with probably lasting, although unclear consequences. As the first signs emerged that the movement might catch on elsewhere in the region, a catchy label derived from Czechoslovakia’s brief Cold War-era uprising against Soviet rule quickly engraved itself in the Western […]

This is the second of a two-part series examining the policies and political challenges facing the new government of Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. Part I examined domestic issues. Part II examines foreign policy and the implications for regional stability. With its domestic opponents watching closely for missteps, the government of Thailand’s recently elected prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, will have to tread extremely carefully in matters of foreign policy. The mishandling of relations with Cambodia by the administration of Yingluck’s predecessor, former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, had resulted in border skirmishes that killed 28 people this year alone. Yingluck’s Pheu […]

Editor’s note: This is the first of a two-part series examining the policies and political challenges facing the new government of Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. Part I examines domestic issues. Part II will examine foreign policy and the implications for regional stability. CHIANG MAI — Weeks into Yingluck Shinawatra’s term as Thailand’s first female prime minister, the streets of Bangkok are so far free of the protests that have indelibly marked recent years of Thai political life. But that could change. Yingluck’s government faces formidable challenges in implementing the ambitious platform that brought her Pheu Thai Party a sweeping […]

An archipelago of 17,000 islands stretching 3,000 miles from east to west, Indonesia sits astride some of the world’s most important sea lanes of communication. Its 240 million people make it the world’s fourth-most-populous state and third-largest democracy, and with 88 percent of its population Muslim, Indonesia is home to the world’s largest Muslim community. Indonesians believe that their country’s size, strategic location and domestic achievements entitle it to a leadership role in global affairs, and that case is strengthened by the country’s experience with various transnational threats: Indonesia faces homegrown and transnational terrorism, is the world’s fourth-largest emitter of […]

BEIJING — Hamstrung by domestic sensitivities and an inadequate institutional framework for managing its proliferating overseas interests, China has found itself behind the curve on Libya. Beijing’s response has revealed the disparate interest groups within its foreign policy apparatus and the challenges it faces when responding to international events. Despite previous progress, China’s foreign policy apparatus needs to become more adroit at public positioning and more discrete and institutionally consistent in its private diplomacy to secure its international rise. Last Monday,* Beijing became the last major economic power to recognize Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC), 10 days after Russia did […]

India’s government is defending its decision to raise fuel prices for the twelfth time in two years. It says the hikes are needed to ease its budget deficit, but the main opposition party says the latest five percent increase will harm the budget in the long run.

Predictions of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s fall from power have been frequent among Western observers. On this view, events involving two American hikers jailed in Tehran are seen as the latest display of Ahmadinejad’s political impotence in the face of clerical power. But, despite the predictions, and as a few observers outside Iran ha ve realized, Ahmadinejad’s political demise is far from imminent. The president and his appointees have been portrayed as diminished and defeated, and as about to resign or be sacrificed as scapegoats. Some analysts have speculated Ahmadinejad will be arrested on charges of treason for imprudently opposing […]

The multilateral South American organization UNASUR announced Friday that its members planned to begin pulling troops from the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Haiti, known by its acronym Minustah. “There’s consensus for a gradual withdrawal of troops, consistent with Haiti’s needs,” Brazilian Defense Minister Celso Amorim told the press after the body met in Montevideo, Uruguay. Amorim’s words carry weight. South America contributes the most peacekeepers to Minustah’s 12,000-strong mission, and Brazil leads its forces. But while the announcement may seem to mark the beginning of Minustah’s withdrawal, the mission is far from over. In fact, the Minustah mission is not […]