Demografia

Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2010 – UNESCAP

Even at the height of this crisis, Asia and the Pacific displayed a new-found resilience. Its developing economies achieved an annual growth rate of 4.0%, making it the fastest-growing region in the world, thanks to growth in China and India at 8.7% and 7.2%, respectively. However, the rest of Asia-Pacific’s developing economies contracted in 2009… »

Russian Analytical Digest No. 82: The Russian Far East

(PDF) – in this issue:
*Putin Is Turning Vladivostok into Russia’s Pacific Capital

*Population Statistics of the Russian Far East

*Russian Opinions on Vigilante Killings of Members of the Militia in… »

Caucasian Review of International Affairs (CRIA) VOL. 4 (2) – SPRING 2010

in this issue:
Russian Energy Politics and the EU: How to Change the Paradigm

*Authoritarianism and Foreign Policy: The Twin Pillars of Resurgent Russia

*The Georgia Crisis: A New Cold War on the Horizon?

*Enforceability of a Common Energy Supply Security Policy in the EU: Intergovernmentalist Assesement

*“Assembling” a Civic Nation in Kazakhstan: The Nation-Building Role of… »

Asia’s Response to Climate Change and Natural Disasters – CSIS

This new report examines the politics of climate change in Asia, the region’s response to natural disasters, and the implications for the future geometry of Asia’s institutions and U.S. policy in the region. The assessment looks broadly at two areas of nontraditional security cooperation in Asia: (1) climate change, including the domestic political factors in… »

One-third of Yemenis going hungry – IRIN

Water scarcity, rapid population growth and internal conflicts are some of the main factors causing an “alarming state of food insecurity” at national and local levels, a new report has warned. Rural areas are particularly affected with five times as many food-insecure people as in urban areas, it said. “If no action is taken, food… »

Aiming for New Vigour: The UK in the Global Economy – Chatham House

The UK’s role in the world is inextricably linked to its economic strength and prosperity. Maintaining a vibrant economy and financial stability is vital to enable the UK to benefit from global growth and pursue its ambitions at home and abroad. Britain’s international influence, in turn, complements and supports its comparative advantages in global services… »

Asia needs more farm investments to feed hungry – BusinessWeek

Asia and the Pacific, home to two-thirds of the world’s one billion hungry people, need increased investment in agriculture of $120 billion a year for the next 40 years to contain hunger and future spikes in food prices, United Nations and Asian Development Bank officials said. They said agricultural investments in the region, currently at… »

Power Constrained: Sources of Mutual Strategic Suspicion in U.S.-China Relations – NBR

The U.S.-China relationship is fundamentally stable and will remain so for the foreseeable future. This is so because the relationship is anchored in the two societies’ respective preoccupations with their own domestic problems, the United States’ draining commitments elsewhere, and the requirement for cooperation on transnational issues such as proliferation, global production chain security, energy,… »

China to move tens of thousands for huge water scheme – Reuters

China will move 345,000 people, mostly poor villagers, within about two years to make way for a vast scheme to draw on rivers in the south to supply the increasingly dry north, an official newspaper said. The forced resettlement for the South-to-North Water Transfer Project will be the biggest China has undertaken since building the… »

The Failed States Index 2010 – Fp/Found for Peace

This year’s index draws on 90,000 publicly available sources to analyze 177 countries and rate them on 12 metrics of state decay — from refugee flows to economic implosion, human rights violations to security threats. Taken together, a country’s performance on this battery of indicators tells us how stable — or unstable — it is…. »

A global China policy – ECFR

China now affects every global issue from trade and the economy to climate change and nuclear proliferation, as well as every region from Africa to the Middle East. Europe therefore needs to reframe its China policy in global terms. Instead of thinking of their relationship with China in bilateral terms,
EU member states need to take… »

Britain’s Foreign Policy in a Networked World – The Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The Foreign Secretary, William Hague, gave the following speech outlining the Government’s vision for UK foreign policy on 1 July… »

The threat of a water war – Boston Globe

Nations fight over water, especially when access is curtailed or threatened, and there are the ingredients for a battle over the 4,100-mile long Nile River. Egypt and Sudan have counted on the abundance of the Nile’s life-giving flow. Now upstream nations want to keep more of the abundance for themselves. Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Congo,… »

The Evolution of News and the Internet – OECD

# After very profitable years, newspaper publishers in most OECD countries face declining advertising revenues, titles and circulation. The economic crisis has amplified this downward development.
# About 20 out of 30 OECD countries face declining newspaper readership, with significant decreases in some OECD countries. Newspaper readership is usually lower among younger people who tend to… »

Don’t underrate Europe’s power – the Daily Star

In May 2010, financial markets lost confidence in the ability of Greece to manage its budget deficit and to repay its debt. Fears of default began to affect other countries, such as Portugal and Spain, among the 16 members of the eurozone. In response, European governments, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund… »

The Race Against Drug Resistance – CGD

In an increasingly interconnected world, drug resistance does not stop at a patient’s bedside—it threatens global health. It has slowed gains against the fatal ravages of childhood dysentery and pneumonia, drastically increased the costs of fighting tuberculosis and malaria, and imperiled efforts to effectively treat people living with HIV/AIDS. Tens of millions of lives are… »

Our Common Strategic Interests Africa’s Role in the Post-G8 World – Chatham House

African countries are playing a more strategic role in international affairs. Global players that understand this and develop greater diplomatic and trade relations with African states will be greatly advantaged. For many countries, particularly those that have framed their relations with
Africa largely in humanitarian terms, this will require an uncomfortable shift in public and policy… »

Think Tanks and Public Policies in Latin America – Fundación Siena/CIPPEC

(PDF) – It is not true that democracy and technocracy are necessarily opposite principles. An
active and growing civic participation is not incompatible with the incorporation of expert knowledge
in public policies. Actually, it is not difficult to grasp that democracy fragility grows when
elected Governments fail to solve, efficiently and effectively, the complex problems of economic
and social… »

Vers un nouveau régime politique en Afrique subsaharienne – IFRI

En français et English.
L’Afrique subsaharienne est revenue sur les espoirs de démocratisation qu’avait suscités la fin de la guerre froide et des régimes de parti unique. L’heure est à la désillusion. Même les pôles de stabilité qu’étaient le Sénégal (depuis l’indépendance en 1960) et l’Afrique du Sud (depuis 1994) sont aujourd’hui menacés d’une dérive autoritaire…. »

African Economic Outlook 2010

The annual African Economic Outlook (AEO) is published jointly by the African Development Bank, the OECD Development Centre and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. he 2010 Outlook covers 50 African countries, up from 47 last year. The AEO presents a promising outlook for the continent with average growth rebounding to 4.5 per cent… »

Climate change and infectious diseases in Europe – EASAC

(PDF) – Climate exerts both direct and indirect effects onthe appearance and spread of human and animalinfectious diseases. The impact of climate changeon the transmission and geographical distribution ofvector-borne diseases, including zoonoses (infectionstransmissible between vertebrate animals andhumans), has been associated with changes in thereplication rate and dissemination of pathogen,vector and animal host populations, which aresensitive… »

Global peace Index 2010

The Global Peace Index is a project of the Institute for Economics and Peace. It is the first time that an Index has been created that ranks the nations of the world by their peacefulness and identifies some of the drivers of peace. The Institute for Economics and Peace, in conjunction with the Economist Intelligence… »

Newborns in Taipei reach new low of 19,403 in 2009 – the China Post

The number of registered newborn babies in Taipei hit a record low of 19,403 in 2009, and the average age of puerperae stood at 32.1, a record high, according to statistics released. Taipei City Government has launched a new program designed to encourage birth of new babies by easing financial burden of young… »

How North Korea Policy Spread Misery – the New York Times

North Koreans are used to struggle and heartbreak. But the Nov. 30 currency devaluation, apparently an attempt to prop up a foundering state-run economy, was for some the worst disaster since a famine that killed hundreds of thousands in the mid-1990s. Interviews in the past month with eight North Koreans who recently left their country… »

America’s Extended Hand: Assessing the Obama Administration’s Global Engagement Strategy – CNAS

This paper assesses the administration’s global public engagement strategy and its implementation
to date. Though the administration’s commitment to engagement has encompassed a range of efforts such as negotiating with adversaries as well as allies, working through multilateral institutions, and a stronger commitment to diplomacy, the authors focus on just one key dimension of the president’s… »

Third OIC Observatory Report on Islamophobia

(PDF) – The third Annual Report covers the period from May 2009 to April 2010. It was a most turbulent period during which steady rise of Islamophobia, threatening global as well as regional peace and security, continued to be a source of concern particularly in the Western Europe and North America. Fundamental rights of Muslims… »

No. 78: Russian Military Thinking Today – Russian Analytical Digest

(PDF) – in this issue:
*Russia’s New Military Doctrine: A Compromise Document
*The Role of China in Russia’s Military Thinking
*Poll: The Russian Population on Military Threats and the State of the Armed… »

Paradigm Lost: The Euro in Crisis – CEIP

(PDF) – While ballooning public debt may be the clearest manifestation of the Euro crisis, its roots go much deeper—to the secular loss of competitiveness that has been associated with euro adoption in countries including Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Spain (GIIPS) – by Uri… »

South Ossetia: The Burden of Recognition – ICG

The war dealt a heavy physical, economic, demographic and political blow to South Ossetia. The permanent population had been shrinking since the early 1990s and now is unlikely to be much more than 30,000. The $840 million Russia has contributed in rehabilitation assistance and budgetary support has not significantly improved local conditions. With its traditional… »

Changes in China Could Raise Prices Worldwide – the New York Times

Coastal factories are raising salaries, local governments are hiking minimum wage standards and if China allows its currency, the renminbi, to appreciate against the U.S. dollar later this year, as many economists are predicting, the cost of manufacturing in China will almost certainly rise. Although the salaries of factory workers in China are still low… »

Europe’s coming age-quake – Upi

Germany, like much of the rest of Europe, is not only feeling poor with high unemployment, big state debts and the recession grinding stubbornly onward; the Europeans are also starting to believe that this grim state is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. The main reason for this is that Europe is starting to… »

After BRICs, look to CIVETS for growth – Reuters

After the dynamic growth of the BRIC countries in the last decade, a batch of six more countries — the CIVETS — will be the ones to watch in the next 10 years. Colombia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Egypt, Turkey and South Africa will take over as the new BRICs, as Brazil, Russia, India and China were… »

Asian Development Outlook 2010 – ADB

Developing Asia can look ahead to a robust recovery in the next 2 years. Growth is forecast to rise to 7.5% in 2010 and moderate to 7.3% in 2011, marking a healthy rebound from the 2009 slowdown. Shifting the drivers of growth from the support of monetary and fiscal expansion to robust private sources is… »

Russia says 20-year population fall may be turning – Reuters

Russia’s population rose by 10,000 to 141.9 million in 2009, stoking optimistic statements from senior health officials that Russia’s 6.6 million decline since 1995 may be coming to an… »

Egypt’s neighbors press for more Nile water – Japan Times

Egypt is the economic and cultural superpower of the Arab world: Its 78 million people account for almost a third of the world’s Arabic-speaking population. But 99 percent of it is open desert, and if it were not for the Nile river running through that desert, Egypt’s population would not be any bigger than Libya’s… »

Kashmir: Paths to Peace – Chatham House

This opinion poll was commissioned by Dr Saif al Islam al Qadhafi in May 2009 and administered in
September-October 2009. This is the first poll to be conducted on both sides of the Line of Control (LoC) that has separated Indian and Pakistani controlled Kashmir since the UN-brokered ceasefire on 1 January 1949. The ongoing dispute… »

Russia’s Red Herring – ISN

Next month will see the Russian armed forces stage an operational-strategic exercise dubbed “Vostok-2010″ (East-2010), called “the main event of the combat training” in 2010 in a press release by the Russian Defense Ministry. Thousands of soldiers from the army, including the CBRN Protection Forces, the navy, air force, airborne troops and other elements of… »

Africa Command: U.S. Strategic Interests and the Role of the U.S. Military in Africa – CRS

(PDF) – In recent years, analysts and U.S. policymakers have noted Africa’s growing strategic importance to U.S. interests. Among those interests are the increasing importance of Africa’s natural
resources, particularly energy resources, and mounting concern over violent extremist activities
and other potential threats posed by uncontrolled spaces, such as piracy and illicit trafficking. In
addition, there is ongoing… »

National Security Strategy 2010 – The White House

(PDF) – At the dawn of the 21st century, the United States of America faces a broad and complex array of challenges to our national security. Just as America helped to determine the course of the 20th century, we must now build the sources of American strength and influence, and shape an international order capable… »

NATO 2020: Assured security; Dynamic engagement

(PDF) – Analysis and recommendations of the group of experts on a new strategic concept for NATO chaired by Madeleine K. Albright. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) enters the second decade of the twenty-first century as an essential source of stability in an uncertain and unpredictable world. NATO needs a new Strategic Concept because… »

Russia’s Peacetime Demographic Crisis: Dimensions, Causes, Implications – NBR

Modern Russia is in the throes of a prolonged depopulation which, according to the report’s author Nicholas Eberstadt, qualifies as “nothing short of a humanitarian catastrophe.” This population crisis is marked by disastrous mortality levels and an eroding human resource base and will present serious challenges for Russia’s future domestic and international policy priorities. This… »

Seniors to outnumber children by 2021, Statscan says – the Globe and Mail

For the first time ever, senior citizens will outnumber children by 2021, according to new population projections from Statistics Canada. The estimates, released Wednesday, indicate the population of over-65s will more than double, from 4.7 million in 2009 to between 9.9 million and 10.9 million by 2036. Seniors will surpass children aged 14 and under… »

Arab attitudes one year after Cairo – Bitterlemons

One year ago, President Barack Obama traveled to Cairo to deliver what was billed as an “Address to the Muslim World”. Obama understood that after eight years of neglectful and/or reckless Bush administration policies in the Middle East, it was important to signal a change in direction to the people of that region. From polls… »

Ten Years of Talks and Still No Resolution to Nile Controversy – All Africa

The 14 May Nile River Basin Cooperative Framework was signed by Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda, but was left open for a year. It followed a meeting of water ministers in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt, where Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda agreed to it. Egypt and Sudan have rejected it,… »

Building a BRIC Foundation – CFR

Brazil, Russia, India, and China aimed to deepen ties between the emerging-market powers leading the global economic recovery. Collectively known as the BRICs, these countries–which represent 40 percent of the world’s population and 20 percent of the global economy–command a growing slice of the global economic pie. Just how deep the ties can be… »

For want of a drink – the Economist

Water, it is said, is the new oil: a resource long squandered, now growing expensive and soon to be overwhelmed by insatiable demand. Aquifers are falling, glaciers vanishing, reservoirs drying up and rivers no longer flowing to the sea. Climate change threatens to make the problems worse. Everyone must use less water if famine, pestilence… »

Brussels Increasingly Looks Like Any Great Middle East City – MEMRI

In a column titled “The Muslims Are Coming!” in the Saudi Arab News daily, Aijaz Zaka Syed, a Dubai-based journalist and commentator, wrote that “no matter what Europeans think of Muslims and other recent arrivals, the continent badly needs new blood and ideas.” He adds that “Europe’s past is catching up with its present and… »

Very Low Fertility in Asia – East-West Center

Fifty years ago, women in Asia were having, on average, more than five children each, and there was widespread fear of a “population explosion” in the region. Then birth rates began to fall–in several countries more steeply than anyone had anticipated. This unexpected trend has now raised concerns about the social and economic impact of… »

Climate change and transboundary water resource conflicts in Africa – ISS

(PDF) – Climate change has been identifi ed as a leading human and environmental crisis of twentieth-century Africa. Understanding climate change or global warming is one of the major problems confronting African people. Water scarcity has attracted the attention of Africa and
the international community and is considered one of the major environmental issues of the… »

State of emergency in South Kyrgyzstan after ethnic clash – Reuters

A state of emergency was declared in Jalalabad on Wednesday after two people died and 74 were injured in clashes between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in southern… »