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Calm in the Eye of the Cyclone

By Jakub Polansky, University of Sussex In August 2019, I embarked on a year-long journey to Khorog, a town in the south-eastern part of Tajikistan, to research cross-border trade along the Afghan-Tajik border. As part of my fieldwork, I recently drove to the local bazaar to talk to the owners of Khorog’s second-hand clothes businesses. […]

The time to “sober up” has arrived: Could COVID-19 provide the global wake-up call the world needs?

By Saba Karim Khan, NYU Abu Dhabi Last week, my brother sent me a video from the China Global Television Network. The video opened with a warning, addressed to no one in particular but to the world in general: “Sober up. Covid-19 respects no national borders, no social bounds, no political systems and no cultural […]

Thailand’s Political Conflict – A Jasmine Revolution? by Christian Stampe Jensen

The revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt and the political unrest that it has sparked in neighbouring countries throughout the Middle East has raised the question how these events influence popular uprisings and struggles for democracy in other parts of the world. In Thailand, political unrest and conflict between ‘Red Shirts’ and ‘Yellow Shirts’ have been […]

Controversial Chinese activist receives the Simone de Beauvoir prize for Women’s freedom

On January 11th, in Paris, the Simone de Beauvoir prize for Women’s freedom 2010 was awarded to two Chinese women, GUO Jianmei 郭健梅, a lawyer in Beijing and Prof. AI Xiaoming 艾晓明 from Sun Zhongshan University (Canton). The Simone de Beauvoir Prize is an international human rights prize for women’s freedom, awarded since 2008 to […]

Hva er det med Nord Korea?

For 60 år siden brøt krigen løs i
Korea. Bare fem år etter verdenskrigens slutt ble den kalde krigens trusler til
virkelighet. Katastrofen var enorm, landets ødeleggelse total, våpenhvilen er
aldri avløst av en fredsavtale, og sårene etter krigen er ennå ikke leget.
Etter krigen ble Korea offer for verdens fortsatte ideologiske deling. Da
Sovjetunionen brøt sammen, Tyskland og Europa atter ble samlet, og Kina åpnet
for markedsøkonomien, fastholdt de koreanske statene status quo. Sør-Korea er i

The Ethnic Crises in Burma/Myanmar: 2010 and Beyond Dilemmas & Opportunities for the International Community

Burma/Myanmar is a very ethnically diverse country, with ethnic
minorities comprising about 40 percent of its estimated 56 million population. Burma has been
afflicted by ethnic conflict and civil war since independence in 1948, exposing
it to one of the longest running armed conflicts in the world. Ethnic
minorities have long felt marginalised and discriminated against. The situation
worsened after the military coup in 1962, when minority rights were further
curtailed. The military government, which now calls itself the State Peace and

Be reminded, it is co-creation that we should understand?

By

Sudhanshu Rai 
8^th June 2010

The (new) North Korean Crisis: what can be expected and what should be done as a response to the sinking of the Cheonan corvette

by Mikael Weissmann and Linus Hagström, The Swedish Institute of International Affairs

The Path of Bliss

By Stig Toft Madsen April 23, 2010 The Ananda Marga – the Path of Bliss – was founded in 1955 by Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar as a socio-spiritual organization. In 1959, Sarkar added the political wing, known as Proutist Universal, where PROUT stands for Progressive Utilization Theory. Sarkar was born a Bengali in Bihar in 1921. […]

Powerful men who like the word “no”

In May 2008, a massive cyclone hit Myanmar. An
estimated 1,5 million people were affected and the victims were in dire need of
help. However, all foreign aid workers’ visas were rejected and the aid planes,
filled with water and food for the people, were stopped in Rangoon and asked to turn back.