Category: Blogs

Germany Muddles Through

By Nick Ottens

The center can still hold in Germany. Angela Merkel’s conservatives have finalized a government deal with the Social Democrats. Barring a last-minute upset—Social Democratic Party members need to vote before the deal can go through—Germany will be ruled by another “grand coalition” for the next four years. The worry is that this one will mostly […]

When Politics Becomes an Olympic Sport

By Ashish Kumar Sen

No matter how deft the backflips or how swift the skaters, Korean unity will likely grab the spotlight (and news headlines) at the 2018 Winter Olympics which open in Pyeongchang, South Korea, on February 9. That is because athletes from North and South Korea will march together under a unified flag at the opening ceremony […]

The View from Inside a Donetsk Prison

By Matthew Kupfer

When Russian-led separatists seized control of Donetsk in 2014, Ihor Kozlovsky did what many residents of the city were doing: he stayed put. But unlike others, Kozlovsky was not a supporter of the self-proclaimed “Donetsk People’s Republic” (DNR). In fact, he was a Ukrainian patriot, a professor and world-renowned expert of comparative religion at Donetsk […]

Donald Trump Is Not the Only One Who Likes a Grand Parade

By Ashish Kumar Sen

US President Donald J. Trump wants a military parade—a grand military parade. Trump, reportedly inspired by the Bastille Day parade he witnessed in Paris last summer, has asked the Pentagon to organize a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington that [wait for it] tops the French. The reaction to Trump’s plan has ranged from skepticism […]

Why Election Reform Should Be a Top Priority Now

By Andrew Fink

Election reform in Ukraine is finally gaining some momentum. In December, parliament passed in the first reading draft law #3112-1, which creates an open list proportional election system and makes it easier for small parties to win seats in parliament. In addition, the president’s long-awaited list of candidates for the Central Election Commission has finally […]

Taking Stock of the Transatlantic Relationship After One Year of Trump

By Ellen Scholl

Open-ended questions surrounding US relations with its European allies have direct implications for the ratcheting up of tensions and “managed competition” between the United States and Russia, according to Christine Wormuth, director of the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht Center for Resilience. Russia represents a nexus between challenges facing US policy at home and abroad, as […]

Ukraine Headed for Perfect Storm of Demographic Decline

By Peter Dickinson

In January, the Czech government announced plans to double its annual quota for Ukrainian fast-track migrant workers from 9,600 to 19,600. Three years ago, the quota had been just 3,800. Prague’s message is clear—Ukrainian workers are not merely welcome but vital to the Czech Republic’s economy. The Czechs are not the only ones in Central […]

Navigating the Saudi road to success

By Alex Damianou

In 2016, in the face of low oil prices and rapidly declining foreign reserves in an unsustainable, oil dependent rentier state, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) was faced with two scenarios: an ‘Open Road’ where social and economic reform would transform the country into a diversified, moderate, and prosperous society; or the ‘Rocky Road’, […]

Syria: Which Way Forward?

By Faysal Itani

Official statement presented to the Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa, on the hearing for “Syria: Which Way Forward?”

A Plan to Thwart Russian Meddling

US Rep. Will Hurd [R-TX] has a strategy to check Russian meddling in the midterm elections later this year and the US Department of Homeland Security would have a pivotal role in that plan. “We have a model that we should be thinking about when countering disinformation, and that’s CVE: Countering Violent Extremism,” said Hurd, […]