Cranes at the Port of Gulfport are silhouetted by the setting sun in Gulfport, Mississippi, Dec. 2, 2018 (AP photo by Charlie Riedel).

After a more-bark-than-bite approach to trade during his first year in office, President Donald Trump took on the world in 2018 and shows no sign of letting up. In Europe, British Prime Minister Theresa May has so far failed to convince Parliament to accept the Brexit deal she negotiated with Brussels. And under the radar, the World Trade Organization is facing paralysis if there is no compromise on how to reform its system of settling disputes. These are among the ongoing challenges that are likely to make 2019 another unsettling year for global trade. Even before the calendar turned to […]

A Bolivian coca leaf producer packs 50-pound bags of the dried plant to be sold and delivered to traditional market retailers, La Paz, Bolivia, March 28, 2006 (AP photo by Dado Galdieri).

Drug trafficking laws have led to some contentious relationships among North and South American countries. Now the decriminalization of drugs is challenging these relationships in new ways. Find out more—when you subscribe to World Politics Review. Drug trafficking has become such a part of the landscape in Mexico that those involved in the practice even have their own unofficial patron saint: Jesus Malverde, a mustachioed bandit from the hills of Sinaloa state who, according to legend, stole from the rich and gave to the poor until his death by hanging in 1909. Though primarily an icon for those who run […]

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres makes remarks congratulating Nobel Peace Prize winners Dr. Denis Mukwege and Nadia Murad at U.N. headquarters, New York, Oct. 5, 2018 (AP photo by Bebeto Matthews).

Calling someone or something “primitive” is not normally meant as a compliment. But I have just learned that I may be a “primitive multilateralist.” It is a badge that I wear proudly. This weekend, Financial Times columnist Simon Kuper published a smart think piece on the process that led to the 1919 Versailles Treaty and the end of World War I. There will certainly be many more articles in this vein to mark the ill-fated agreement’s 100th anniversary this year. A lot of pundits will note that the Paris Peace Conference gave birth to modern multilateral diplomacy through the creation […]

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the briefing room of the White House in Washington, Jan. 3, 2019 (AP photo by Evan Vucci).

In this week’s podcast, WPR’s Judah Grunstein and Frederick Deknatel discuss the top stories WPR will be keeping a close eye on in 2019—beginning with the unpredictable nature of U.S. foreign policy under President Donald Trump and its impact on issues like global trade, relations with China, European politics, and stability in Latin America and Africa. If you like what you hear on Trend Lines and what you’ve read on WPR, you can sign up for our free newsletter to get our uncompromising analysis delivered straight to your inbox. The newsletter offers a free preview article every day of the […]

Attendees at a hearing of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights display photos of people who went missing while trying to cross the border from Mexico into the United States, Boulder, Colorado, Oct. 5, 2018 (AP photo by David Zalubowski).

The Trump administration’s crackdown on immigrants and asylum-seekers has placed the United States in the same camp as the countries recently denounced by National Security Adviser John Bolton as the “troika of tyranny”—Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela. For years, those three countries have denounced or refused to participate in the proceedings of the Organization of American States’ inter-American human rights system when their own violations of democratic norms and human rights are under scrutiny. Over the past two years, the Trump administration has joined their ranks, ignoring or rebuffing the Western Hemisphere’s premier human rights body. Since Trump’s inauguration, the OAS’ […]

U.S. President Donald Trump and James Mattis, then the secretary of defense, during a reception in the East Room at the White House, Washington, Oct. 25, 2018 (AP photo by Manuel Balce Ceneta).

During the Cold War, America’s global strategy was based on two pillars: leadership and security partnerships. First applied only to Europe, this strategy later expanded to the Pacific and, by the 1970s, to the Middle East, which became and remain the most important regions in American foreign policy. Global leadership placed economic and military burdens on the United States, but most Americans believed that the benefits justified the costs. While there were always debates over precisely how and where to implement the strategy, there was broad agreement on the two core pillars. The political right and left, Republicans and Democrats, […]

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