Hong Kong’s peculiar yet privileged position as China’s only liberal spot is coming to an end much faster than anyone has anticipated. Although the Heritage Foundation has ranked Hong Kong as the worl…
Malaysia: Lessons on Institutional Roadblocks to Climate Change Adaptation
It is one of the world’s most tragic ironies that the most detrimental impacts of climate change will accrue to the countries that have had only a minor role in bringing them about. The Southeast Asia…
Why the 2020 Census Will be Fundamentally Undemocratic (and we cannot fix it in time)
Did you know that the 2010 United States census missed upwards of 400,000 Latino children? Doing so rendered them effectively invisible in the eyes of the government. As a result, 400,000 children wer…
The Maldives in Crisis – But What Do Yameen?
The turbulent political developments of the Maldives now, more than ever, have proven twofold: manifesting in both local political power-plays, and larger geopolitical conflict. This year alone, the M…
D10, Democracy, and Donald
Since 2014, a group of high-ranking officials from leading democratic nations have held secret meetings each year to discuss protecting the liberal world order. Who’s this mysterious group? They call …
The Elusive Lesson of Birmingham
In a CNN opinion piece, Democrats, Please Learn from Birmingham, Bakari Seller argues that engaging black voters rather than white working-class voters should be the Democratic party’s main strategy i…
What Really Happened to Egyptian Democracy?
Egyptians went to the polls on March 24th of this year. El-Sisi, Egypt’s current President ran for a second term in an election described by Human Rights Watch as “farcical.” Following the 2011 Tunisi…
Barred from the Ballot Box: Felon Disenfranchisement in America
Six million American adults are legally ineligible to vote, members of a group whose ranks have roughly quintupled over the past 40 years. In Kentucky and Tennessee, this group now comprises more than…
How Catalonia Can Help Itself and the Rest of Spain
In a Business Insider political piece, “Here’s why Catalonia should secede from Spain, and why it won’t” former Catalan MP Alfons López Tena argues in favor of Catalonia’s independence mov…
Duterte vs. The ICC
An estimated twelve thousand dead; bounties offered for each rebel head; and calls for increased violence, including encouragement to shoot female fighters in the genitals: This is the current state o…
How Successful was the Arab Spring’s Only Successful Revolution?
December 17, 2010 is a date Tunisians will never forget. Mohamed Bouazizi, a local resident of Sidi Bouzid was going about his day selling produce on the street corner when a police officer approached…
Trump’s Twitter Regime: Empowering the People, Killing the Press
The president and the press are entrenched in a strenuous game of cat and mouse. It’s a trial of wits in which each president seeks to promote their version of factual truths to the populace without i…
The Trouble of Localism in Hong Kong
A giant locust sits perched upon a mountain, the Hong Kong cityscape in the distance. Next to it, bold black lettering asks, “Are you willing to let Hong Kong spend a million Hong Kong dollars every e…
Homo Hominibus Tigris: Xi Jinping and the Rise of the Good Dictator
To the countries of the Western world, where the ancient Greek traditions of democratic governance have institutionalized over centuries, China is a peculiar, if not an intimidating, case against the …
Crossroads Blues
Crossroads Blues In 1965, the city of Singapore was kicked out of Malaysia. It was poor and isolated, with an economy wholly subsidized by Britain’s Royal Navy. To the north, Malay extremists threaten…
Will the Party Go On?
The Election of Tom Perez Tensions were high as delegates cast their ballots for the DNC chair. It had been the only contested DNC election since 2005, and is the first major election the Democratic P…
The Recession of the Pink Tide
Empty shelves in Venezuela Lenin Moreno’s April victory in the Ecuadorian presidential election must have brought sighs of relief to socialists across the continent, who have been buffeted by scandals…
El Salvador’s Mining Ban: Land Rights, Development, and Democracy in Latin America
The landmark decision in El Salvador to ban all metal mining came as a surprise to many. It passed with multiple parties’ support, with none opposing, and is considered a huge win for environmental ac…