By Dr. James M. Dorsey An Indonesian push for a Southeast Asian return to values rooted in an ancient Indo civilisation amounts to an innovative attempt to manage polarisation. Exploiting its rotating chairmanship of the 10-nation Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Indonesia this week inaugurated the ASEAN Intercultural and Interreligious Dialogue. The dialogue opened by Indonesian President Joko Widodo …
By Dr. JAMES M. DORSEY The United Arab Emirates resembles US ‘Teflon President’ Ronald Reagan. Congresswoman Pat Schroeder awarded Mr. Reagan the label because nothing stuck to him while he was president in the 1980s – not the recession, not his interventions in Lebanon that cost the lives of 241 US Marines, not his plunging job approval rating. UAE …
By Dr. James M. Dorsey | For Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, religious reform has long been a question of when rather than if. Mr. Bin Salman’s potential embrace of religious, not just social and economic reform, could have far-reaching consequences for the role of religion in Saudi Arabia and religious soft power rivalry in the Muslim world. A …
By Dr. James M. Dorsey | At first, comparing Palestinian gunmen in the Israeli-occupied West Bank to rioting youth in France may resemble likening apples to pears. In many ways, it is. Youth in France are full-fledged French citizens demanding an end to disenfranchisement, marginalisation, alienation, racism and law enforcement and security force brutality. That is where Palestinians would like …
By Dr. James M. Dorsey | The sigh of relief in a swath of land stretching from China to Africa’s Atlantic coast was audible when Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch who heads the Wagner Group, a state-funded private military company, called off his mutiny against President Vladimir Putin’s military and security establishment. So were the concerns and unanswered questions the …
● The debate about whether a state should be religious or secular doesn’t always affect how a society treats religious minorities. By Peter Jacob | A significant number of states have changed their relationship with religion recently, sparking debate about official government policies towards religious minorities. Bangladesh and Nepal, for example, moved to a secular state model, while Maldives, Tunisia …
By Dr. James M. Dorsey Religious conservatives and nationalists in the Muslim world and beyond have the wind in their sails. So do Arab autocrats, even if they increasingly cloak themselves in nationalism rather than religious conservatism. Last week’s first election round in Turkey saw conservatives and ultra-nationalists win control of parliament. At the same time, Recep Tayyip Erdogan appears …
Dr. James M. Dorsey | US President Joe Biden positions the Ukraine war as a battle between autocracy and democracy. That reduces what is at stake in the war. The stakes constitute a fundamental building block of a new 21st-century world order: the nature of the state. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine represents the sharp end of the rise of a …
By James M. Dorsey Qatar 2022 put the myth of a separation of sports and politics to bed. Like in Qatar, human, worker, and LGBT rights are likely to be left, right, and centre as other Gulf and North African states move centre stage as hosts of and bidders for some of the world’s foremost mega-sporting events, the 2030 World …
SO it’s happened, the dust has settled! The wait is over and all those holding their breath can exhale……..or wait! Is it that simple, given the PTI cricketer Imran Khan’s track record? Has the “has-been” prime minister relented or is this his way (as usual) of trying to wrest the prerogative of the “Chiefs choice” from the man who seemingly …
