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- Author: Shaugn Coggins, James D. Ford
- Publication Date: 02-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: Arctic regions are experiencing transformative climate change impacts. This article examines the justice implications of these changes for Indigenous Peoples, arguing that it is the intersection of climate change with pronounced inequalities, land dispossession, and colonization that creates climate injustice in many instances.
- Topic: Climate Change, Energy Policy, Environment, Poverty, Culture, Income Inequality, Justice, Indigenous, Sustainability
- Political Geography: Arctic
- Author: Dennis Wesselbaum, Michael D. Smith, Shannon N. Minehan
- Publication Date: 02-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: Global migration flows have increased over the last couple decades. Climate change is a key driver of these flows and will become more important in the future. Foreign aid programs, often intended to manage or even reduce these flows, are typically not large enough and lead to more rather than less migration.
- Topic: Conflict Resolution, Climate Change, Environment, Migration, Foreign Aid, Displacement, Multilateralism, Peace, Sustainability
- Political Geography: Global Focus
- Author: Joshua Fitt
- Publication Date: 02-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: Many of China’s technology companies perfect their products in the domestic market by facilitating the party-state’s oppression and data control, and subsequently seek to export the technology to fledgling authoritarian states or nations with fragile democracies. This is part of Beijing’s strategy to enhance its digital instruments of national power, normalize illiberal uses of technology, and equip foreign governments with the tools to replicate aspects of the CCP’s authoritarian governance model. If Washington wants to blunt this strategy, the US government needs to implement a comprehensive strategy of its own to address this.
- Topic: Science and Technology, Governance, Law, Authoritarianism, Grand Strategy, Multilateralism
- Political Geography: China, Asia, North America, United States of America
- Author: Richard Reid
- Publication Date: 01-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: This article seeks to place the recent conflict in Ethiopia in deeper historical context. It traces the roots of Tigray province’s identity through various phases in Ethiopia’s history, and argues that the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) is the culmination of decades, even centuries, of a struggle for status within the Ethiopian nation-state. The article proposes that Ethiopia’s history, inseparable from that of neighboring Eritrea, is characterized by cyclical shifts in access to power, as well as conflicts over inclusivity and cohesion, and that crushing the TPLF militarily will not resolve those conflicts.
- Topic: Security, History, Conflict
- Political Geography: Africa, Ethiopia, Tigray
- Author: Patrice C. McMahon, Lukasz W. Niparko
- Publication Date: 01-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: Although LGBTQI+ activists in Poland are under attack from the Law and Justice government’s conservative agenda, domestic activists are finding ways to resist and persist.
- Topic: Development, Human Rights, Political Activism, LGBT+
- Political Geography: Eastern Europe, Poland
- Author: Sahar Khan
- Publication Date: 01-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: The international community is focused on the ongoing intra-Afghan peace process, which has steadied despite several challenges. There are two developments, however, that will have a lasting impact on the process: The International Criminal Court’s investigation into war crimes committed by the Taliban, Afghan forces, and US forces, and the strategic evolution of the Taliban as a legitimate political actor.
- Topic: Security, International Law, Terrorism, Taliban, Conflict, Peace
- Political Geography: Afghanistan, Russia, South Asia, Eurasia
- Author: Pavel K. Baev
- Publication Date: 01-2021
- Content Type: Special Report
- Institution: Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
- Abstract: The recent incidence of war in the Caucasus has shown that, when facing deep domestic troubles, Russia and Turkey demonstrate strikingly different patterns of international behavior. While Russia has become more cautious in responding to external challenges, Turkey has embarked on several power-projecting enterprises. Its forceful interference in the long-smoldering conflict around Nagorno-Karabakh took Russia by surprise and effectively secured a military victory for Azerbaijan. Moscow has assumed the main responsibility for terminating hostilities by deploying a peacekeeping force, but its capacity for managing the war zone and its commitment to deconflicting tensions with Turkey remain uncertain. The United States and the European Union have few levers for influencing this interplay of clashing agendas of local actors and regional powers and fewer reasons to trust Russian and Turkish leaders to put peacebuilding ahead of their ambitions.
- Topic: Security, War, Geopolitics, Grand Strategy, Conflict
- Political Geography: Russia, Eurasia, Turkey, Caucasus, Middle East
- Author: Flavio Fusco
- Publication Date: 03-2021
- Content Type: Commentary and Analysis
- Institution: Istituto Affari Internazionali
- Abstract: Located at the heart of the Middle East, connecting the Levant to the Persian Gulf, Iraq has always been at the centre of regional dynamics. Yet, the country is today reduced to a quasi-failed state fundamentally damaged in its political, social and economic fabric, with long-term consequences that trace a fil rouge from the 2003 US-led invasion to the emergence of the self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) and the country’s current structural fragility.
- Topic: Security, Foreign Policy, European Union
- Political Geography: Iraq, Europe, Middle East, United States of America
- Author: Lorenza Errighi
- Publication Date: 03-2021
- Content Type: Commentary and Analysis
- Institution: Istituto Affari Internazionali
- Abstract: If 2020 was the year of “mask diplomacy”, as countries raced to tackle the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and acquire the necessary protective gear and equipment, 2021 is likely to be remembered as the year of “vaccine diplomacy”. Growing competition between states to secure the necessary quantities of vaccines to inoculate their population has already become an established feature of the post-COVID international system and such trends are only likely to increase in the near future. It normally takes up to a decade to transition from the development and testing of a vaccine in a laboratory to its large-scale global distribution. Despite current challenges, the speed of COVID-19 vaccination campaigns is unprecedented. To put an end to the current pandemic – which in one year has led to the loss of 2.6 million lives and triggered the worst economic recession since the Second World War – the goal is to ensure the widest immunisation of the world population in a timeframe of 12 to 18 months. In this context, COVID vaccines emerge as instruments of soft power, as they symbolise, on the one hand, scientific and technological supremacy and, on the other, means to support existing and emerging foreign policy partnerships and alliances with relevant geopolitical implications. From their experimentation in laboratories, to their purchase and distribution, the vaccine has emerged as a significant tool for competition between powers, often associated with the promotion of competing developmental and governance models across third countries.
- Topic: Diplomacy, Health, Vaccine, COVID-19
- Political Geography: Global Focus
- Author: Vedran Džihić, Paul Schmidt
- Publication Date: 03-2021
- Content Type: Commentary and Analysis
- Institution: Istituto Affari Internazionali
- Abstract: In societies devastated by the pandemic, the EU needs to leave its conventional tool-box behind and urgently speed up the Europeanisation of its neighbours in Southeast Europe. The coronavirus pandemic has deepened the vulnerabilities affecting Western Balkan countries and exposed the weakness of their state institutions, especially in the health sector and social protection. At the same time, related to the limited effectiveness of the EU enlargement process over the past years, the progress of reforms has stagnated and some countries have even experienced concerning regressions in the rule of law. The outbreak of the coronavirus crisis has meanwhile increased the presence of other geopolitical players in the region, mainly in the context of competition over vaccinations, not only of China but also of Russia and the United Arab Emirates. Awareness is growing that the EU and the West is not the only available partner. As other powers not known for their democratic practices use or misuse the Western Balkans to promote their interests, the vision of a free, democratic and truly European Balkans is no longer self-evident.
- Topic: European Union, Institutions, Pandemic, COVID-19
- Political Geography: Europe, Eastern Europe, Balkans