WPR Articles 07 Oct 2013 - 11 Oct 2013

WPR Articles 07 Oct 2013 - 11 Oct 2013

Afghan Presidential Race Sees a Fractured Field

By: Kathy Gilsinan | Trend Lines

Sunday was the final day in a three-week registration period for Afghan presidential hopefuls to file their candidacies with Afghanistan’s Independent Election Commission. When the commission closed yesterday evening, 27 candidates had officially entered the race to succeed President Hamid Karzai.

Global Insider: Somalia Still Unsafe for Large-Scale Refugee Returns

By: The Editors | Trend Lines

In an email interview, Anna Lindley, a lecturer in migration, mobility and development at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, explained where Somali refugees live and the likelihood of their return.

As Hopes for Nuclear Deal Rise, Iran’s Missiles Still Pose Problems

By: Bruno Tertrais | Briefing

Iran’s missile program does not make headlines as often as its nuclear efforts, but the two programs are linked—technically, because Iran has been keen to develop nuclear-capable rockets; and legally, because U.N. sanctions target the missile program almost as much as the nuclear one. What would happen to these missiles in the event of a deal on Iran’s nuclear program remains a largely underexplored issue.

World Citizen: On Iran, Israelis Agree With Netanyahu’s Assessment, Debate His Approach

By: Frida Ghitis | Column

As the central drama of the just-concluded U.N. General Assembly played out, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu performed a supporting but crucial role. He came on stage as the mood spoiler, disrupting the central narrative of a new, nonthreatening Iran under President Hasan Rouhani ready to reconcile with the world. Netanyahu told the world to wake up and realize Iran’s new image was a fiction.

Maldives Election, If It Stands, Reflects a Clear Mandate Against Conservatism

By: Vishal Arora | Briefing

The Oct. 7 decision of the Supreme Court of the Maldives to annul the results of the Sept. 7 presidential election appears to be an attempt to avert the predictable win of ousted President Mohamed Nasheed, who is fighting a lonely battle against powerful conservative forces. Local and international observers had praised the polls as free and fair, and pressure is now building for the new vote to be run cleanly.

More Diplomatic Fallout: Sidelined Over Syria, France Pushes for U.N. Reform By: Richard Gowan | Column The U.N. Security Council’s management of the Syrian conflict has been a source of disappointment. Though the council has put in place a framework for the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons and called for humanitarian access to war-torn cities, these gestures cannot erase memories of its earlier deadlocks. Could the Syrian war nonetheless precipitate changes in the way the council handles future atrocities? U.S.-Indonesia Partnership Needs More Support to Reach Potential By: Brian Harding | Briefing Had President Barack Obama not canceled his Southeast Asian tour, he would have touched down in Indonesia today for his third visit to the country as president. Nevertheless, he and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono can still congratulate themselves on having overseen a blossoming partnership. Unfortunately, those gains are at significant risk due to a lack of constituents in both Washington and Jakarta. Checks and Imbalances: Executive Design and Political Stability By: Robert Elgie | Feature Post-conflict states have to deal with many difficult issues. Drafting a constitution that maximizes the prospects of political stability is just one. One of the issues that is always hotly debated is the best form of executive-legislative relations. This article examines the benefits and shortcomings of different ways of organizing executive-legislative relations, the evidence that some choices are more conducive to political stability than others, and what other factors need to be taken into account. Ecuador’s Amazon Drilling Plan Raises Concerns Over Environment, Oil Dependency By: David Dudenhoefer | Briefing In August, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa announced that he was abandoning the initiative by which Ecuador would not drill for oil in parts of the Ecuadorean Amazon in exchange for compensation from the international community. This has sparked objections from environmentalists, indigenous leaders and those who warn that the government budget is too dependent on oil to fund its varied social programs. Fierce Contest: Constitutional Islam and the Arab Spring By: Clark Lombardi | Feature Over the past 25 years, the Muslim world has witnessed constant struggle between liberals and conservative Islamists, one that often intensifies when constitutions are being drafted or amended. The Arab Spring has thus ushered in an era of fierce contest. Observers must keep in mind that the same constitutional provisions have radically different effects in different countries, and that the provisions that most affect the lives of citizens may not be the ones that explicitly mention Islamic law. Global Insights: Aegis Successes Give U.S. BMD Efforts a Boost By: Richard Weitz | Column A recent series of ballistic missile defense tests confirm the growing capabilities of the Navy’s premier at-sea interceptor. Even better, the tested system will soon deploy in Europe to bolster NATO’s missile defenses. The remaining challenges are to induce European allies to contribute more resources to NATO’s missile defense efforts and for the U.S. to incorporate these systems into a homeland defense role. Identity Politics: Democratic Institutions in Ethnically Divided States By: Benjamin Reilly | Feature The past decade has seen an explosion of creative institutional design in new democracies. From Indonesia to Iraq, scholars and policymakers have engaged in overt “political engineering” with the aim of promoting stable democracies in ethnically divided societies. For the most part these efforts have privileged consociational and communal solutions. However, there are potentially more rewarding approaches designed to focus electoral competition at the moderate center rather than the extremes. Strategic Horizons: A U.S. Strategic Pivot to Nowhere By: Steven Metz | Column Today there is growing criticism that the Obama administration’s rhetoric about a strategic rebalancing toward Asia has been backed by little substance and that the “pivot” is stalled. In part this is due to political dysfunction in Washington that hinders all serious initiatives, but it also reflects deeper, more intractable strategic factors that offer guideposts on the future evolution of American security. U.S. Special Operations Raids Quick in Execution, Years in Coordination By: Catherine Cheney | Trend Lines Over the weekend, members of special mission units under the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command carried out raids in Somalia and Libya, capturing a senior al-Qaida official in the latter country. New Index Shows South Asia Is Ill-Equipped to Cope With Change By: Shehzad H. Qazi | Briefing Floods and earthquakes in Pakistan, an economic slowdown in India and tenuous regime stability in Afghanistan: South Asia is currently experiencing many of the sudden shocks and long-term change-drivers that countries can face. A new index measures the ability of a country's government, businesses and society to cope with such changes—and the five South Asian countries included do not perform well. The Realist Prism: Libya, Somalia Raids Point to Emerging Sovereignty Norm By: Nikolas Gvosdev | Column Last weekend’s dispatch of U.S. special operations units into Libya and Somalia to capture leading terrorist figures confirms that the U.S. is moving to adopt a new norm of “conditional sovereignty” in international relations. This approach recognizes that events in one state rarely remain confined to its own territory but spill out to affect other countries and even potentially the global system as a whole.

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