Identity Politics Goes Global

Members of the Amhara militia walk along the road in a rural area near the village of Adi Arkay in Ethiopia, on July 14, 2021. (Getty Images)

Alongside the return of great power competition, the eruption of identity politics is the single most consequential political feature of our time, argues Walter Russell Mead in The Wall Street Journal. Preoccupied by the pandemic, climate change and the intensifying rivalry between the U.S. and China, policy makers aren’t paying enough attention to the news in Africa. What is happening on the continent offers insights into the destructive role identity politics seems destined to play in world politics, where conflicts based on differences in ethnicity, culture, language or religion are the most powerful forces in human affairs.

Virtual Event | How Anti-Corruption Efforts in Latin America Can Accelerate COVID-19 Recovery

A boy is inoculated with the Pfizer-BioNtech COVID-19 vaccine at a school in Medellin, Colombia, on September 7, 2021 amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. (Getty Images)

Fair, transparent institutions are key to forging well-functioning democracies, economic productivity, and robust trade, investment, and innovation. In Latin America and the Caribbean, endemic corruption has hindered development, eroded trust, and exacerbated the enormous toll that COVID-19 has taken on the population.

Join Hudson Institute for a live discussion on these issues with Mauricio Claver-Carone, president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), Hudson Senior Fellow Marshall Billingslea, and Research Fellow Nate Sibley. Audience members will be invited to submit questions to Mr. Claver-Carone during the discussion.

🎙Counterbalance | Ep. 26: Was Afghanistan a Failure of Intelligence?

Was the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan the result of intelligence failures? Hudson adjunct fellow and former senior intelligence official Ezra Cohen joined Michael Doran and Marshall Kosloff on Counterbalance to discuss the role of intelligence in the debacle and the impact of the withdrawal on America’s intelligence capabilities.

Biden Might Stop a Sanctions Revolution

U.S. President Joe Biden at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. on July 2, 2021. (Getty Images)

As the U.S. government reviews its sanctions policies, the Biden administration has an opportunity to double down on the ones that are actually effective, write Paul Massaro and Casey Michel in Foreign Policy. Washington’s arsenal of specific, targeted tools aimed at taking down oligarchs and kleptocrats by disabling their financial networks and blocking access to financial systems should be expanded on all fronts.

🎙Making a Killing | Ep.19: Jonathan Hillman on China's Belt and Road Initiative

Since launching the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013, Beijing has poured trillions of dollars into infrastructure development around the world, using these funds as a tool to expand its political and economic influence, often through corrupt practices. CSIS scholar Jonathan Hillman tells Nate Sibley about the good, the bad, and the ugly of the BRI on the latest episode of Making a Killing.

BEFORE YOU GO...

With the inconclusive results of the intelligence community’s investigation into the origins of COVID-19, what can Congress do to address the many questions that have not been adequately answered? In his new policy memo, Tom DiNanno calls on Congress to ensure that the Bureau of Arms Control, Verification, and Compliance recommences its investigation into possible dual-use biological programs at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.