Domestic Politics Archive

Editor’s note: This is the second of a seven-part series examining conditions in Afghanistan in the last year of U.S. military operations there. The series will run every Wednesday and will examine each of the country’s regional commands to get a sense of the country, and the war, America is leaving behind. The series introduction can be found here. Historically a crossroads of commerce and culture linking Persia and Central Asia, the ethnically mixed western region of Afghanistan has more recently been notable for the stability and wealth of its most important province, Herat, and its capital city of the […]

In the past month, events in the long, drawn-out process toward the dissolution of ETA, the violent Basque separatist organization, have taken a surprising turn. On Dec. 28, ETA’s prisoners—more than 500 of whom are dispersed across prisons in Spain and France, vastly outnumbering the few dozen militants who remain in hiding—issued a statement in which they distanced themselves from armed struggle and recognized the suffering and harm inflicted by decades of violence. They also pledged to pursue their release from prison through the Spanish legal system, abandoning their old demand for amnesty. A week later came the turn of […]

Given budget pressures and widespread disillusionment with the outcome of the American counterinsurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, critics contend that the United States does not need a large, active-duty Army but should instead rely on other nations and reserve forces. As land power advocates and the Army’s leaders push back, debate rages. This is not simply a quibble over budget figures. Rather, it reflects a monumental strategic decision. Choices made today about the Army—and the rest of the military—will determine the options available to American presidents years and even decades from now. A recent essay by defense expert Kori […]

Last week, 75 officials resigned from Burkina Faso’s ruling party, citing the disappearance of democracy under President Blaise Compaore. In an email interview, Michael Keating, a lecturer in the Department of Conflict Resolution, Human Security and Global Governance and director of operations at the Center for Peace, Democracy and Development at the McCormack Graduate School at University of Massachusetts, Boston, explained the state of political opposition in Burkina Faso. WPR: What has been the general state of political opposition and dissent in Burkina Faso in recent years? Michael Keating: Burkina Faso is one of the most underreported countries in the […]

China’s new leaders are striving to consolidate their country’s return to prominence on the world stage. They confront Promethean challenges: restructuring a dynamic economy; responding to the demands of an increasingly prosperous and sophisticated society; controlling horrendous environmental pollution; liberating the cultural, civic, academic and intellectual potential of their talented people; reducing the endemic corruption that is undermining their success; adapting the Communist political system to promote these prodigious changes while balancing the needs of public order and human rights; and improving cooperation with other countries by enhancing foreign respect for China’s accomplishments. Courts, or some effective functional substitute, are […]

In the past month, a nasty fight has broken out in public between Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) on one side and Turkey’s judiciary on the other. Given Turkey’s international reputation as an emerging democracy, casual observers of Turkey may be surprised at the battle underway. After all, judicial independence and integrity are hallmarks of democracy and rule of law, and the fact that the government is alleging improper judicial interference in its activities and attempting to limit the courts’ powers is striking. While the AKP’s assault on the judiciary indeed […]

The end of 2013 witnessed a flurry of legal activity in the Russian Federation. A number of prominent political defendants—including the members of Pussy Riot; some, but not all, of the Bolotnaya Square demonstrators arrested in May 2012; and the Greenpeace activists arrested offshore three months ago—were released as part of a major amnesty passed by the Russian Duma. President Vladimir Putin’s unexpected pardon of Mikhail Khodorkovsky fueled additional speculation as to the future direction of Russian legal reform. Some observers cited Putin’s own initiative in freeing Khodorkovsky as an encouraging sign, while other commentators insisted that far from having […]

Depressing headlines from the Middle East have thrown cold water on any lingering optimism that U.S. policy objectives in the region were on track. In Iraq, Fallujah and Ramadi have been lost, at least for now, to al-Qaida-linked insurgents. The Syrian conflict has apparently transformed into a multi-sided war, increasing the likelihood that Bashar al-Assad’s regime will survive. And progress remains elusive in Afghanistan as the countdown to withdrawal continues. Not long ago there was reason for hope in all these countries. The surges in Iraq and Afghanistan were supposed to have worked, and the Arab Spring, it was hoped, […]

Since China embarked on a credit-fueled stimulus package in 2009 designed to stave off the impact of the global financial crisis, the rapid buildup in the country’s aggregate debt has become a source of concern. Although successful at the time, the stimulus has increasingly become viewed as ill-judged by government officials. As a result, the new leadership is making a concerted effort to quantify the leverage situation and control associated risks. Measures to increase capital discipline in the economy are gaining traction, but Beijing increasingly finds itself striking a balance between managing debt risks and maintaining adequate economic growth. China’s […]

Hery Rajaonarimampianina has won Madagascar’s first presidential election since a 2009 coup, according to provisional results announced by the country’s electoral commission. But Madagascar’s Special Election Court must rule on the definitive outcome after considering appeals and claims of fraud from rival candidate Jean Louis Robinson. The court has about 10 days to decide whether to verify the announced results of the Dec. 20 election, according to which Rajaonarimampianina, a former finance minister, won 53.5 percent of the vote, a comfortable seven-point margin over Robinson’s 46.5 percent. The court has already rejected conflicting submissions by both candidates, each seeking to […]

As 2014 begins, there is no shortage of conflict around the world. For sheer political drama, though, nothing compares to the events unfolding in Turkey, where Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan stands at the center of a high-intensity feud that is slowly tearing apart the once wide-ranging coalition that made him enormously powerful. A corruption investigation reaching into the highest levels of government has brought into the open a festering feud among rival Islamist groups. Every day brings new revelations involving some of the country’s most prominent figures, and each day the stakes grow. With every move, the question on […]

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has won the country’s 10th parliamentary elections in a disputed poll that was boycotted by the opposition and its allies and held amid large-scale violence that left at least 18 dead. Armed with a landslide “victory,” Hasina is set to form the next government even as questions are being raised about her legitimacy and the credibility of the elections. The opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) has demanded that the polls be declared null and void. A defiant Hasina, however, has claimed that the victory is legitimate and has said the BNP “made a mistake” by […]

Last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a decree mandating the dissolution of RIA Novosti, the main state news agency, and its replacement with a new agency aimed at promoting Russia’s image. In an email interview, Jukka Pietiläinen, a senior researcher at the Aleksanteri Institute at the University of Helsinki, Finland, with expertise in Russian media and journalism, explained the relationship between the state and the media in Putin’s Russia. WPR: How has state involvement with media in Russia changed since Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency? Jukka Pietiläinen: The Russian state has increased its presence in the media significantly […]

Ireland and Portugal, though dissimilar in many ways, share the distinction of being the first members of Europe’s troubled periphery to graduate from a bailout. They also share a pressing need to go beyond the budget austerity they have had to adopt and secure fundamental economic and financial reforms. In this, the two countries exemplify a more general need throughout the eurozone and underscore why, for all the gains made in dealing with this fiscal-financial crisis, Europe remains vulnerable to another crisis. There is much reason to cheer the successful emergence of these countries from their bailouts. In 2011, Ireland […]

The Italian political landscape is slowly changing. In the past few weeks, major shifts have occurred in the leadership and structure of both the key parties of the left-right coalition that is supporting the government of Prime Minister Enrico Letta. Developments in the center-right directly affected the size and composition of the parliamentary majority backing the cabinet. Due to his conviction for tax fraud, former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was expelled from the Senate in late-November. Earlier that month, Berlusconi had decided to sink his People of Freedom Party (PdL) and relaunch Forza Italia, the movement of his 1994 political […]

Mexico’s recently enacted energy reform bill marks an important first step on the long path of transforming the country’s energy sector. Now that the constitutional changes have been ratified by a majority of states, the real work of drafting the enabling legislation, creating new institutions and profoundly changing many existing ones now begins. All of this will take time, and there will be much to debate along the way. The reform’s ultimate success will depend on maintaining political support while managing public expectations during the long slog of implementation. While Mexico’s challenges in implementing the reform are complex and many, […]

Many commentators have described 2013 as a “lost year” for the Obama administration. The enthusiasm generated by the second inaugural quickly dissipated in continued stalemates with Congress, culminating in the government shutdown in October. No major pieces of legislation were passed, nor did the United States spearhead new international initiatives. Some of this can be attributed to the famed “second-term curse.” As I noted in these pages after the president’s re-election, “Every second-term president over the past 30 years—Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush—overestimated the amount of political capital their re-election generated, and each was also distracted by […]