Domestic Politics Archive

Elba Esther Gordillo, the leader of the most powerful teachers union in Mexico, was arrested earlier this week on suspicion of embezzling millions in union funds for personal expenses, including paying for private property and plastic surgery. The arrest of the Gordillo, known throughout Mexico simply as “La Maestra,” or “The Teacher” and previously seen as being above the law, came a day after Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto signed a sweeping educational reform that the union she led had opposed. Duncan Wood, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, said that while a […]

The Thai government announced today that it has agreed to conduct peace talks with one of the groups involved in Thailand’s southern insurgency, following a highly ambitious but unsuccessful raid by insurgents in the country’s south earlier this month. Jeff Moore, an expert on Thailand’s insurgencies, explained the context of the attack and the government’s previous efforts at talks in an email interview from Thailand conducted before the talks were announced. WPR: What has been the recent course of Thailand’s southern insurgency? Jeff Moore: Most recently we’ve seen a beehive of activity. Insurgents have steadily recovered from major government counterinsurgency […]

It wasn’t very long ago that international political observers were marveling at the political acumen of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, with headlines crowning him “King of Israel,” an allusion to his mastery of the political game. Israeli voters and his political rivals were somewhat less impressed, however, and they showed it in the Jan. 22 parliamentary elections, throwing cold water on Netanyahu’s plans to form a formidable coalition for a new term. One month after that election, with the clock ticking on the deadline to form a governing coalition, Netanyahu is struggling in his maneuvers to put together an […]

When Kenyans vote in the country’s presidential, parliamentary and county elections March 4, they will have the chance to distance themselves from the traumatic elections of December 2007. More than 1,000 people were killed and approximately half a million others fled their homes when violence between rival ethnic groups and political supporters broke out in the weeks following the vote. Much has changed since then, a lot of it for the better. But the main causes of the violence remain unaddressed. The 2013 election is thus fraught with hazard, and a mood of trepidation has characterized the campaign period. The […]

Editor’s Note: This is the first of a two-part series examining the record of Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. Part I reviews her domestic policy. Part II will examine her foreign policy. Though often dismissed as the puppet of her exiled brother, Yingluck Shinawatra has survived several critical challenges since becoming Thailand’s first female prime minister in a landslide victory in July 2011 elections. Yet despite initial hopes for reform, the past year and a half have demonstrated that the Yingluck government’s ultimate goal is to maintain its grip on power, and that the successes of Yingluck and her Pheu […]

China recently announced plans to invest $635 billion in water infrastructure over the next 10 years, prompting criticism about the effect of China’s water policy on its downstream neighbors. Scott Moore, a doctoral research fellow at Harvard Kennedy School of Government researching sustainable energy development in China, explained the context and possible consequences of the plan in an email interview. WPR: What is the context of China’s recent announcement of plans to dramatically expand its hydropower capacity over the next few years? Scott Moore: Three factors frame China’s recent plans to expand its hydropower capacity. The first and most important […]

In Djibouti, the small but strategically important state in the Horn of Africa, security forces are still working to disperse opposition supporters protesting the ruling coalition’s victory in Friday’s parliamentary elections. The vote marked the end of the opposition parties’ 10-year boycott on contesting elections. Djibouti is home to the only permanent U.S. military base in Africa, and instability there may have important implications for the wider region, including Yemen and Somalia. On Friday, authoritarian President Ismail Omar Guelleh and his Union for the Presidential Majority claimed to have won 49 out of 65 seats in the National Assembly in […]

Park Geun-hye’s term as South Korean president begins at a time of serious tension on the Korean Peninsula, with North Korea defying international pressure and going ahead with a nuclear test earlier this month. During her campaign, Park had said that as president she would work to mend ties with Pyongyang, which had deteriorated under the government of now-former President Lee Myung-bak, and develop a mutually beneficial partnership that would pave the way for eventual reunification. But along with complications caused by North Korea’s third nuclear test and a general climate of discord, the composition of Park’s government will make […]

Macky Sall, who was inaugurated as president of Senegal last April, came to power amid massive discontent with his predecessor, President Abdoulaye Wade. Critics, including youth protest movements Y En A Marre (“Enough is Enough”) and M23 (named for a 2011 demonstration), accused Wade of failing to address core economic and infrastructure problems while enriching himself and suppressing dissent. In an address to the nation one day after taking office, Sall listed economic issues as being among his administration’s top priorities. “It is a matter of urgency in our cities and our suburbs,” he stated, “to fight unemployment, flooding, insecurity […]

On Sunday, Cyprus will hold runoff presidential elections between conservative candidate Nicos Anastasiades and the left-leaning Stavros Malas. The election will likely determine whether Cyprus, one of the eurozone’s economic trouble spots, will accept a bailout from the European Union in exchange for economic reforms or risk a bankruptcy that will aggravate the eurozone crisis. Anastasiades, the conservative, pro-bailout candidate, is favored to win. Demetris Christofias, the current president, has resisted meeting the tough terms of the bailout. The European Union, meanwhile, has not hidden its hopes for an Anastasiades victory. James Ker-Lindsay, a senior research fellow who studies the […]

Last October, the largely unknown French group Generation Identity occupied a mosque in the town of Poitiers. Founded only a month before, the group had already attracted interest after releasing a “declaration of war” through YouTube outlining goals focused heavily on opposing multiculturalism and Islam. The young activists presented themselves as a generation of “ethnic fracture,” who had suffered from record levels of unemployment, debt, multicultural decline and the “forced mixing of the races.” From the mosque’s rooftop, the group demanded a referendum on Muslim immigration. While it is tempting to view such groups as isolated and largely insignificant, their […]

Zin Mar Aung, a former political prisoner in Myanmar who is now a candidate for the country’s 2015 parliamentary elections and an activist for women’s rights, was in Washington on Tuesday to raise awareness about the continuing underrepresentation of women in the decision-making bodies of Myanmar’s government. “It is ironic that the face of the Burma democracy movement has been a woman’s face when women in fact have not been allowed to be as central as they need to be in all levels of government,” said Susan Williams, a professor and director of the Center for Constitutional Democracy at the […]

BOLOGNA, Italy — Since the beginning of the financial crisis in Europe, anti-Brussels sentiment has been on the rise from Britain to Hungary. These days, however, the European Union is losing ground not only among citizens of traditionally recalcitrant member countries but also, and more troublingly, among those that have historically been ardent supporters. The EU’s relations with Italy, for example, a founding member and the bloc’s fourth-largest economy — the eurozone’s third-largest — are on the rocks. Italians have historically been in favor of a strong Europe. But now, crushed by record-high taxes and sharp cuts in government spending, […]

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez returned home Monday after 10 weeks of cancer treatment in Cuba, tweeting to his supporters, “We will live and we will conquer!” Still, many believe Chávez has come home to die, a belief supported by comments from his son-in-law, Science and Technology Minister Jorge Arreaza, who days earlier described his medical care as “palliative.” The prospect that Chávez will soon leave not only the presidency of Venezuela but also his undisputed position as the most prominent of the leftist leaders in Latin America has triggered a race to fill his revolutionary boots. The charismatic and histrionic […]

Mexico’s economic resurgence is attracting widespread attention and optimism, with the Financial Times recently dubbing the country the “Aztec Tiger.” The change in focus and tone is a welcome one, and has allowed a more balanced and accurate portrayal of Mexico to emerge. Mexico’s prospects look better now than they have in decades. President Enrique Peña Nieto has been in office just three months, yet there is a sense of urgency attached to his ambitious agenda. Substantial challenges loom, and surmounting them will require his administration’s full complement of skills: from political deal-making and legislative maneuvering to strategic communications and […]

Armed groups proliferate like rabbits in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. From the state’s collapse in the early 1990s through two wars at the turn of the 21st century to today, the lack of government control over the country’s territory makes it easy for a few dozen — or a few thousand — men to take up arms, tax local populations, exploit natural resources and engage in massive human rights abuses against civilian populations. The DRC’s numerous armed groups are formed for a diverse array of reasons, ranging from legitimate concerns over land rights in the country’s eastern Kivu […]

After years of political wrangling, Zimbabwe’s power-sharing government announced in mid-January an agreement on a new constitution, setting the stage for a constitutional referendum and general elections in the coming months. While progress on the constitution is a welcome step forward for institutional and democratic reforms, President Robert Mugabe’s continued grip on the country’s coercive apparatus and disregard for formal institutions mean that a new constitution will likely be insufficient to avert another round of electoral violence in Zimbabwe. The compromise draft document, which curtails the power of the executive, among other changes, enjoys support from all parties in the […]