Q & A Archive

After 20 years of on-and-off negotiations, leaders from the European Union and South America’s Mercosur trade bloc announced late last month that they had reached a sweeping trade agreement encompassing 800 million people and almost a quarter of the global economy. Hailed on both sides of the Atlantic as a “landmark,” the accord must still be ratified by the negotiating parties’ legislatures, and it faces stiff opposition in key European countries like France and Ireland as well as in the four Mercosur member states of Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. In an email interview with WPR, Bruno Binetti, a Buenos […]

In this week’s Trend Lines interview, WPR’s associate editor, Elliot Waldman, talks with Jake Sullivan about the damage being done to America’s global standing under Trump, how domestic issues tie in with the perception of the United States overseas, and the challenges Democrats face in crafting an effective foreign policy message as they vie to take Trump on in 2020. A former national security adviser to Vice President Joseph Biden and director of policy planning at the State Department, Sullivan is currently a visiting fellow at Dartmouth College. If you like what you hear on Trend Lines and what you’ve […]

Editor’s Note: This article is part of an ongoing series on food security around the world. In the short term, it is critical to respond to the immediate food shortages being caused by persistent African drought conditions. But the search for more lasting solutions may actually mean looking back to traditional systems. Persistent drought conditions across large swaths of Africa have left tens of millions in need of food assistance, particularly in the semi-arid eastern and southern regions of the continent. These areas are on the forefront of the fight against global climate change and will be increasingly hard-pressed to […]

This week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to block President Donald Trump’s effort to bypass Congress and complete major arms deals with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The resolution will almost certainly be vetoed by Trump, but it nonetheless demonstrates an emerging consensus in Washington on the need to reevaluate close U.S. ties with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf monarchies in the wake of human rights abuses like the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. How durable might this shift be? And how else is the U.S. foreign policy consensus evolving in the Trump era? In this week’s […]

Leaders from across Africa gathered in Niamey, the capital of Niger, earlier this month to officially launch the African Continental Free Trade Area, or AfCFTA. The sweeping agreement, which covers 54 out of 55 African Union members, is designed to boost intra-African trade and eventually create a single African market for goods and services. It has been called a potential “game changer” for Africa, but member states must now complete the hard work of implementing the deal and negotiating specific reductions in tariffs and non-tariff barriers to trade. In an email interview with WPR, Trudi Hartzenberg, the executive director of […]

Ecuador’s highest court ruled last month that the country’s prohibition on same-sex marriage was unconstitutional. The 5-4 verdict was a victory for LGBT activists in the heavily Catholic country, but it is not immediately clear that the decision will be accepted among all segments of Ecuadorian society, according to Amy Lind, the Mary Ellen Heintz Professor of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Cincinnati. In an email interview with WPR, she explains how Ecuador’s Constitutional Court reached its decision and why the benefits of this ruling may only immediately be felt by the most “privileged” same-sex couples […]

After the U.S. announced in May that it was ending sanctions waivers for countries to purchase oil from Iran, India, like many other major oil-importing countries, has been forced to diversify its suppliers. U.S. sanctions have also affected other aspects of India’s economic ties with Iran, making the Trump administration’s so-called maximum pressure campaign against Tehran a significant irritant in U.S.-India relations. In an email interview with WPR, Harsh V. Pant, a professor of international relations at King’s College London and director of studies at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi, explains how the Trump administration’s hard line is […]

As its trade war with the United States goes on, China in recent months has raised the possibility of weaponizing its control over 80 percent of the world’s supply of rare earths, minerals that are used in a wide array of important industrial and consumer products. In response, Washington wants to partner with other countries to help develop their mineral reserves to diversify the global supply chain, and even boost its own domestic supplies. But while that may sound sensible on paper, it is based on an unrealistic portrayal of the threat posed by China’s near-monopoly supply of rare earths, […]

When North Korea’s young dictator, Kim Jong Un, came to power in 2012, many observers thought his days at the top would be numbered. Yet despite numerous predictions of an imminent coup or even regime collapse, Kim defied all odds by ruthlessly purging potential rivals and consolidating power. Now, he sits securely atop one of the most reclusive and repressive governments in the world. Few official details are available about Kim’s life, but a new book aims to peel back the layers of secrecy around him. In “The Great Successor: The Divinely Perfect Destiny of Brilliant Comrade Kim Jong Un,” […]

Critics say that under President Donald Trump, human trafficking victim protections have weakened in the United States, and the U.S. has not pushed other countries to address the issue more forcefully. The State Department recently released its annual Trafficking in Persons Report, which it describes as “the U.S. Government’s principal diplomatic tool to engage foreign governments on human trafficking.” The report assigns every country to one of three tiers based on its government’s efforts to combat human trafficking, with Tier 1 being the best and Tier 3 being the worst. Under the Obama administration, the U.S. began grading itself in […]