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Boko Haram, the Nigeria-based jihadi movement affiliated with the self-proclaimed Islamic State, has been in decline for more than two years, since it began to lose territory around Lake Chad under joint military pressure from Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon. After retreating from major towns in northeastern Nigeria such as Bama and Mubi, Boko Haram now controls only certain remote rural areas in that corner of the country. But even though its strength peaked back in 2015, Boko Haram is still a major threat to Nigeria and its neighbors, as the group’s decline has been uneven and frequently punctuated by […]

It’s abundantly clear that the State Department is underperforming. The quiet demeanor of the new secretary of state, Rex Tillerson; the vacancies in nearly all the second- and third-tier positions; and the intention of the White House to curtail State’s capacity to be an effective player in national security have converged to marginalize this key institution. Can one conclude that Tillerson is complicit in this shift of fortunes, or are there underlying problems that matter more than the man at the top? As Trump’s approach to foreign policy evolves, the concerns about the role of the State Department—and the new […]

U.S. President Donald Trump campaigned as an outsider candidate, though under the banner of the Republican Party. His message was decidedly populist and continues to be: He alone can save the country from the challenges it faces; the elite and traditional establishment are dangerous and corrupt; the mainstream media cannot be trusted; and other tropes commonly used by populists. America’s election of a president promoting this type of message has led many experts on authoritarian politics to draw parallels between what’s happening in the United States, a country with well-established and robust democratic institutions, and developments seen in authoritarian settings. […]

On March 1, Bakri Hassan Saleh was named prime minister of Sudan, the country’s first since 1989. The move immediately ignited talk of potential scenarios for a leadership transition in a country ruled by the same man since that same year. In an email interview, David Shinn, adjunct professor at the Elliott School of International Affairs at George Washington University and former deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Khartoum, discusses the appointment’s political implications. WPR: What does the selection of a prime minister suggest for President Omar al-Bashir’s future? David Shinn: The selection of Bakri Hassan Saleh […]

Is China going to pass up an opportunity to reshape the international order? Under President Donald Trump, the U.S. appears to be distancing itself from its established role as leader of the global system. Many excitable pundits and even sober diplomats have speculated that Beijing could fill the vacuum America is creating. I have to confess to being one of the excitable ones. I argued in December that Chinese President Xi Jinping could counter Trump “by seizing the initiative on issues including climate change and free trade.” At the time, Trump—then the president-elect—threatened to punish the United Nations for a […]

Xi Jinping is midway through his tenure as China’s president, and the systemic economic reforms he pledged are nowhere to be seen. The economy is increasingly reliant on debt-fueled investments, while bloated state-owned corporations and banks have yet to be trimmed. All the while growth continues to slow. In other countries, this would be a vulnerable time for the top leadership. Long periods of dramatic growth followed by stagnation or decline have historically been a backdrop for dissent, and even revolution, as the political scientist James Davies first described in his J-curve theory in 1962. And even though China continues […]

Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on income inequality and poverty reduction in various countries around the world. Last month, a fresh wave of protests in South Africa against migrants—who are often accused of “stealing jobs”—again brought attention to the country’s high unemployment rate and sluggish economy. Meanwhile, the government is considering a hike in the minimum wage, the effects of which are being fiercely contested by economists and politicians. In an email interview, Johannesburg-based consultant David Ansara discusses how the country’s legacy of inequality is shaping the ongoing debate. WPR: What are the roots […]

In this week’s Trend Lines podcast, WPR’s editor-in-chief, Judah Grunstein, and senior editor, Frederick Deknatel, discuss the security and diplomatic implications of North Korea’s launch of four ballistic missiles aimed toward Japan. For the Report, Zselyke Csaky talks with Peter Dörrie about Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s stealth takeover of the press and silencing of critical media outlets. If you’d like to support our free podcast through patron pledges, Patreon is an online service that will allow you to do so. To find out about the benefits you can get through pledging as little as $1 per month, click through […]

Despite years of warnings, Russia has doubled down on its previously alleged violation of a three-decade-old nuclear arms control treaty by deploying a banned intermediate-range ground-launched cruise missile. Gen. Paul Selva, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed the deployment of the missile to Congress on Wednesday, calling it a violation of “the spirit and intent” of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, commonly known as the INF Treaty. “We believe that the Russians have deliberately deployed it in order to pose a threat to NATO and to facilities within the NATO area of responsibility,” he added. Western […]

Last month, Myanmar inked 16 different business deals with neighboring Thailand, ranging from cooperation in infrastructure to banking and agriculture. Myanmar’s fourth-largest foreign investor, Thailand hosts many migrant laborers from Myanmar, mainly in Bangkok and in the northwest along the border. But Thailand is not the only country Myanmar is forging investment ties with. Singapore led with $4.3 billion in investment last year, followed by China, the country’s largest trading partner, with $3.3 billion. Last fall, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe pledged $7.7 billion in development assistance. As recently as 2011, China was Myanmar’s largest investor by a factor of […]

When U.S. Republicans gathered to nominate Donald Trump as their presidential candidate at the party’s national convention last July, one of the many apocalyptic speeches they heard came from a man with a Dutch accent, bearing stark warnings from Europe: Geert Wilders, with his trademark bleached blonde bouffant, delivered a message that resonated with crowds accustomed to hearing Trump’s ominous worldview. “The situation in Europe today is worse than ever,” Wilders announced. “Europe, as a matter of fact, is collapsing, is imploding, is exploding. We have terror attacks by the Jihadis almost every week.” Wilders, a member of the Dutch […]

Almost five months after Morocco’s leading Islamist party, the Justice and Development Party, or PJD, won a plurality in legislative elections, the country still does not have a government. In a region where Islamists in power are the exception—and whose political experiments, when they were in power, were short-lived—the PJD appeared well on its way toward a second term at the helm of the Moroccan government. But unlike past years, the task of building a coalition has proven difficult, if not impossible at this point. The usual coalition parties, all too eager in the past to join the government in […]

The arrival of interim authorities in northern Mali combined with the launch of joint security patrols involving soldiers and former rebels underline the government’s determination to make significant headway this year toward implementing a stagnating 2015 peace accord with separatist insurgents in the region. But both efforts have run into trouble, and the recently announced alliance of three jihadi groups is a reminder that the threat of disruptive extremist violence isn’t going away. Beginning in late February, interim authorities have been sent to the northern cities of Gao, Kidal and Menaka. Their arrival marks an attempt by the government, based […]

Seventy years ago, a new world order emerged from the ashes of World War II. It never worked perfectly; there were still wars between and within nations. But the system did help prevent large-scale, great-power conflict and provide a rules-based process for interaction between nations. Now it may be dying. The United States was not the sole inventor of the post-WW II order, but Washington was its primary architect. But the new order did not take the shape that U.S. leaders expected. As WW II ended, Americans thought that the victorious allied powers would manage world order in concert. When […]

Earlier this week, as President Donald Trump released his revised travel ban on citizens from six Muslim-majority countries entering the United States, Israel announced a ban of its own: a law that prohibits the issuing of temporary visas and residency permits to any non-Israeli who has publicly supported or participated in or called for a boycott of Israel. The vaguely worded law, which passed by a comfortable margin of 18 votes in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, not only applies to supporters of the “Boycott, Divest, Sanction” movement, known as BDS, but of “any area under Israeli control”—a clear reference to […]

It was once almost axiomatic that Africa was a continent of coups, with the military coup d’etat the principal mechanism for regime change. The figures told their own story, with over 200 coups and attempted coups between many countries’ independence in the early 1960s and 2012. The post-independence narrative became wearily familiar, with periods of civilian rule punctuated by military takeovers. There was, however, a perceptible change from the 1990s onward as a result of the democratic wave that swept Africa following the end of the Cold War. Although fragile, incomplete and imperfect, this wave produced a popular intolerance for […]

Romania’s biggest protests since the fall of communism in 1989 have been widely hailed as a victory for people power and civic activism against a corrupt elite. The weeks-long mass demonstrations, which led to Prime Minister Sorin Grindeanu’s new government backing down on controversial plans to weaken anti-corruption laws, energized those previously unengaged with politics. But long-term questions remain about democracy in Romania, where street protests have become increasingly frequent as Romanians lose faith in their political parties. Protests began in January against plans by the government, which is led by the left-leaning Social Democratic Party, or PSD, to effectively […]