CFR.org - Foreign Affairs

In Defense of Oil Speculators

Blake Clayton — Mon, 09 Apr 2012 10:27:28 -0400

Blake Clayton says Wall Street is not to blame for high gas prices.

NATO's Victory in Libya

Ivo H. Daalder, and James G. Stavridis — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:15:20 -0500

NATO's operation in Libya has rightly been hailed as a model intervention.

Rethinking Latin America

Christopher Sabatini — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:14:58 -0500

Running down the list of the U.S. State Department's Latin America policy objectives in El País in September 2010, the economist Moisés Naím noted that they focused almost exclusively on domestic concerns.

Chinese Computer Games

Adam Segal — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:13:31 -0500

In March 2011, the U.S. computer security company RSA announced that hackers had gained access to security tokens it produces that let millions of government and private-sector employees, including those of defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin, connect remotely to their office computers.

The Case for Space

Neil deGrasse Tyson — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:12:04 -0500

In 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama articulated his vision for the future of American space exploration, which included an eventual manned mission to Mars. Such an endeavor would surely cost hundreds of billions of dollars -- maybe even $1 trillion.

God and Caesar in America

David Campbell, and Robert D. Putnam — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:11:58 -0500

From the day the Pilgrims stepped off the Mayflower, religion has played a prominent role in American public life.

The Future of U.S.-Chinese Relations

Henry A. Kissinger — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:10:52 -0500

On January 19, 2011, U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao issued a joint statement at the end of Hu's visit to Washington.

The Missing Middle in American Politics

Reihan Salam — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:02:55 -0500

After Lyndon Johnson's victory over Barry Goldwater in the 1964 U.S. presidential election, the once-mighty Republican Party was reduced to a regional rump.

Poker Lessons From Richelieu

David Bell — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:01:00 -0500

Armand-Jean du Plessis, better known to history as Cardinal Richelieu (1585–1642), spent most of his career contending for and then exercising control over a deeply divided, indebted, and dysfunctional superpower.

Freedom’s Secret Recipe

Michael D. Mann — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 12:00:14 -0500

Francis Fukuyama shot to fame with a 1989 essay called "The End of History?" which he expanded into a 1992 book, The End of History and the Last Man. His thesis was a reworking of the "end of ideology" argument propounded in the 1950s by Daniel Bell and others, with an even more emphatic twist.

The Arab Spring at One

Fouad Ajami — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:09:46 -0500

Throughout 2011, a rhythmic chant echoed across the Arab lands: "The people want to topple the regime."

Why We Still Need the World Bank

Robert B. Zoellick — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:08:19 -0500

In 2007, the World Bank was in crisis. Some saw conflicts over its leadership. Others blamed the institution itself.

Clear and Present Safety

Micah Zenko, and Michael Cohen — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:07:15 -0500

Last August, the Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney performed what has become a quadrennial rite of passage in American presidential politics: he delivered a speech to the annual convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

The Iraq We Left Behind

Ned Parker — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:06:14 -0500

Nine years after U.S. troops toppled Saddam Hussein and just a few months after the last U.S. soldier left Iraq, the country has become something close to a failed state.

War Downsized

Carter Malkasian, and John Weston — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:05:20 -0500

The United States, facing deepening economic and fiscal woes at home, is preparing to withdraw from Afghanistan.

The Globalization of Animal Welfare

Miyun Park, and Peter W. Singer — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:04:38 -0500

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948, articulates the idea that it is wrong to exclude any member of the human species from the circle of moral concern.

A Farewell to Fossil Fuels

Amory B. Lovins — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 00:03:14 -0500

Nearly 90 percent of the world's economy is fueled every year by digging up and burning about four cubic miles of the rotted remains of primeval swamp goo

Foreign Policy and Obama's State of the Union Address

James M. Lindsay — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 14:30:49 -0500

James M. Lindsay discusses the political calculations behind President Obama's State of the Union address.

Both Sides of the COIN

Sun, 01 Jan 2012 15:34:41 -0500

Abandoning counterinsurgency doctrine after Afghanistan would doom the U.S. military to irrelevance and impotence, writes Christopher Sims and Fernando Luján. Not so, says Bing West; like it or not, the United States will be much less ambitious in future wars.

How We Got Here

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:39:50 -0500

Selections from the Foreign Affairs archives tracing the ideological battles of the past century and the evolution of the modern order.

Making Modernity Work

Gideon Rose — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:33:06 -0500

Today's troubles are real, but not ideological: they relate more to policies than to principles. The postwar order of mutually supporting liberal democracies with mixed economies solved the central challenge of modernity, reconciling democracy and capitalism. The task now is getting the system back into shape.

The Future of History

Francis Fukuyama — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 14:23:48 -0500

Stagnating wages and growing inequality will soon threaten the stability of contemporary liberal democracies and dethrone democratic ideology as it is now understood. What is needed is a new populist ideology that offers a realistic path to healthy middle-class societies and robust democracies.

The Democratic Malaise

Charles A. Kupchan — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 13:29:52 -0500

Globalization is widening the gap between what voters demand and what their governments can deliver. Unless the leading democracies can restore their political and economic solvency, the very model they represent may lose its allure.

The Strange Triumph of Liberal Democracy

Shlomo Avineri — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 13:14:08 -0500

Intelligent observers of Europe in the 1930s thought its future belonged to communism or fascism and would have ridiculed the notion that decades later the entire continent would be democratic.

Time to Attack Iran

Matthew Kroenig — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 12:57:53 -0500

Opponents of military action against Iran assume a U.S. military strike would be far more dangerous than simply letting Tehran build a bomb. Not so, argues this former Pentagon defense planner. With a carefully designed strike, Washington could mitigate the costs—or at least bring them down to a bearable level—and spare the region and the world from an unacceptable threat.

Talking Tough to Pakistan

Stephen D. Krasner — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 12:46:08 -0500

The United States gives Pakistan billions of dollars in aid each year. Pakistan returns the favor by harboring terrorists, spreading anti-Americanism, and selling nuclear technology abroad. Washington must tell Islamabad to start cooperating or lose its aid and face outright isolation.

Balancing the East, Upgrading the West

Zbigniew Brzezinski — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 12:33:58 -0500

As the United States looks ahead, it faces two central challenges in foreign policy: enlarging the zone of prosperity and democracy in the West while balancing the rise of China and allaying the fears of the United States' Asian allies.

The Failure of the Euro

Martin S. Feldstein — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 12:19:51 -0500

The collapse of the euro is no accident; the seeds of the crisis were planted before the monetary union even began, argues a former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers.

When Currencies Collapse

Barry J. Eichengreen — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 12:04:57 -0500

Confidence in the dollar and the euro continues to falter, threatening the inter - national monetary system.

The Future of the Yuan

Sebastian Mallaby, and Olin L. Wethington — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 11:56:08 -0500

China seems to want the yuan to dethrone the dollar as the global reserve currency. But don't expect China's currency to take over anytime soon.