All Commentaries
Russia Mulls A New Unilateralism
After an informal summit with Central Asian presidents, Russian President Vladimir Putin made surprising remarks about the possibility of moving Russia’s “frontier” south into the former Soviet republics. Putin’s comments ostensibly concerned economic policy, specifically the interests of a Russian-led trade group, the Eurasian Economic Community (EEC). However, the notion of Russia protecting a Central Asian state’s borders is infused with hints of the Soviet-era limited sovereignty doctrine. Russia’s former republics have fixed borders, but Russia’s conception of its own southern frontier appears to remain undefined.
Sudan: Growing Pressure for Harder Line Against Khartoum
A settlement to the 19-year-old war between the predominantly Arab and Islamist government in Khartoum and the mostly African, non-Islamist rebels of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA) is unlikely to be achieved any time soon unless the United States and Europe exert much stronger pressure urgently, according to a new report by an international think tank that specializes in conflict resolution.
Slouching Toward Johannesburg: U.S. is a Long Way from Sustainability
by John C. Dernbach
View Abroad: Bush’s War on Terrorism Is Floundering
But the Bush administration’s policy of “strike first” is more like “Talk loudly and get in everyone’s face.” For America’s allies, the new Bush Doctrine of attacking people before they attack us, known as “first strike,” is another example of a bull-in-a-china shop approach to world affairs.
Bulletin from Bali: What Are We Going to Do About the United States?
This year, in late August 2002, the United Nations will hold the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), an international conference in Johannesburg, South Africa, ostensibly to create a new model of sustainable development that integrates economic development, social justice, and environmental imperatives. WSSD is supposed to be a ten year follow-up and implementation conference to the 1992 Rio de Janeiro UN Conference on Environment and Development–thus, its other name, “Rio plus 10.” In the Preparatory Committee (PrepComm) meetings that have preceded WSSD, (the latest in Bali, Indonesia held in late May through early June) a common theme has emerged–the United States government is bound and determined to undermine, overthrow, and sabotage any international treaties, agreements, and conferences that it believes restrict its sovereignty in any way as the world’s rogue superpower.
Deadly Illusions
The Middle East has always been a place where illusion paves the road to disaster. In 1095, Pope Urban’s religious mania launched the crusades. In 1915, Winston Churchill’s arrogance led to the WWI bloodbath at Gallipoli. Illusion tends to be a deadly business in those parts. And once again, illusions are about to plunge the Middle East into catastrophe.
Capitalism’s Best Pals: Liberals
Corporate corruption is a “moral cancer that … is threatening this great system and our economic health.” These “sins of omission, malfeasance and misfeasance” are “eroding shareholder value for all corporations and public confidence in critical elements of our economic system.” This is a “betrayal of capitalism” in which the “most fundamental principles of our market system were being flouted.”
Heavy Words or Heavy Actions: Stop U.S. Weapons Sales to Israel
The Bush administration has sharply criticized Israel’s latest attack on a densely populated neighborhood in the Gaza Strip, calling it a “heavy handed action that will not contribute to the peace.”
People versus Big Oil: Rights of Nigerian Indigenous People Recognized
At a time when the petropolitics of the Bush administration seem to reign supreme, the rights of peoples affected by the global hunt for oil have received an important boost. An African commission has ruled the Nigerian government should compensate the Ogoni people for abuses against their lands, environment, housing, and health caused by oil production and government security forces. Nigerian and international groups say that the ruling by the nine-member African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR) is a sweeping affirmation of what the human rights community calls ESC rights–defined by the UN’s International Covenant on Economic, Social, and, Cultural Rights.
Capitalist Crisis and Corporate Crime
The unraveling of the reputations of firms that were once the toast of Wall Street continues and the end is not in sight. But one thing is certain: already fragile prior to Enron, the legitimacy of global capitalism as the dominant system of production, distribution, and exchange will be eroded even further, even in the heartland of the system. During the halcyon days of the so-called “New Economy” in 2000, a Business Week survey found that 72% of Americans felt that corporations had too much power over their lives. That figure is likely to be much higher now.