It was misty that Monday night. Fog hung thick over the Potomac. There was nary a sound for miles. The noise of reporters, camera flashes and Greek choruses had quieted. Streetlights changed color for no one, except perhaps the odd lobbyist scurrying into his trashcan. After all the speculating and graphing and rebranding and redistricting and speaking and speaking and speaking, the city was asleep. All were resting.All, except for one man.
Read MoreACE conducted this interview with Weather Underground founder Mark Rudd in October 2010.
Read MoreA conversation with Columbia University's Adlai E. Stevenson Professor of International Affairs and former president of the American Political Science Association on withdrawal and recovery in Afghanistan.
Read MoreThe Columbia Political Review has joined with other college political publications to form the Alliance of Collegiate Editors (ACE), hoping to generate cross-campus dialogue on political issues. Rebiya Kadeer, a prominent Uighur rights activist currently living in exile in the U.S., has agreed to answer some of our questions. You can read Ms. Kadeer's biography, including information on her involvement in the July 2009 unrest in Urumchi, in the New York Times here. For background information on Xinjiang/East Turkmenistan, and the Uighurs, click here.
Read MoreAs the final issue of CPR was going to press, volcanic ash was still spewing out of the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland and bringing much of our globalized world to a relative standstill. When I first heard the news, I couldn’t help but laugh. The idea of ash covering huge swathes of land was simply ludicrous to me.
Read MoreDuring the winter break between my two semesters abroad at Tsinghua University in Beijing, I made the trek to Xiaoshan, an administrative district of Hangzhou, one of southern China’s biggest cities. The occasion for this visit to Xiaoshan was a family member’s wedding. My grandmother’s cousin’s daughter, Chen Xingmei, was getting married to a young man, Chen Xingjiang, whom she met through work and with whom, by chance, she shares two of three characters in her name.
Read MoreIn a recent episode of ABC’s new primetime hit comedy Modern Family, audiences were treated to a familiar scenario. Three of the show’s characters—Jay Pritchett, his thirty-something son, Mitchell Pritchett, and the former’s preteen stepson, Manny—go on a trip to the great outdoors for some stargazing and male bonding, but unexpected events soon lead the evening hilariously awry.
Read More“The system must be completely overhauled,” said Nicolas Sarkozy in October 2008, as the world economy was in the midst of a startling decline. A few months later the cover of Newsweek announced “We Are Socialists Now.” These were just two signs of the surprisingly mainstream consensus that the global financial crisis had marked a significant rupture with traditional economics and politics.
Read MoreHistorically, international legislation on the topic of gender equality has often sparked controversy and critical dismissal. The latest version of the debate on women’s rights has focused on the increasing prevalence of quotas for women leaders in both politics and business. Despite the obvious irony, it comes as no surprise that seven Indian MPs harassed Vice President Hamid Ansari on March 8, International Women’s Day, tearing up and throwing copies of the Women’s Reservation Bill at him while shouting anti-bill slogans.
Read MoreOn May 6, the U.K. will hold what David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party, described on April 6 as “the most important election in a generation.”
Read MorePicture a world where the whistle of bullets drowns out the chirping of birds. Where army units patrol violent, poverty-stricken streets. Where farmers walk among fields of poppy, hoping a successful harvest will provide for their families. Where mothers of lost sons gather and pray that each new day may bring a resurrection of peace. This is not a distant snapshot, but a reality close to home. Welcome to the world of narcocultura. Welcome to Mexico.
Read More“Don’t make me angry. You won’t like me when I’m angry,” spat Karl. He’d be damned if he let some senile old waiter bring out a tray of canapes without doilies. Without doilies! Might as well ration the butter and sleep with Stalin’s corpse.
Read MoreWhenever Americans recall Somalia, whether considering lofty foreign policy aims or simply reflecting upon the chance encounter with the name, our minds inevitably snap back to October 3, 1993 and the tragedy that was the Battle of Mogadishu. This is a memory of eighteen U.S. soldiers lying senselessly dead and desecrated, one even decapitated, in the streets of a hostile city. Given the striking clarity with which Black Hawk Down has memorialized the chaos and the horror of this battle, it is no surprise that the trauma remains fresh in our collective consciousness. At the time, the shock of this loss and the seemingly intractable and inhuman belligerence and disorder of the nation compelled the U.S. and all other foreign forces to withdraw. Somalia did not fit with the spirit of the times, the notions of how intervention and aid was to be conducted. After 1993, Somalia dropped off the map of U.S. foreign policy, relegated to a distasteful and repressed memory, and no one has been able to make a great case for a return.
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