| | | | "We are talking about the human machinery that powers Hong Kong literally grinding to a halt," William Pesek writes in the Nikkei Asian Review, underscoring the scale of demonstrations that have drawn millions to the streets and shut down that city's airport over the weekend. Debates have continued over the current crisis, who's to blame, and how to resolve it—the South China Morning Post, for instance, pleads for dialogue in an editorial—but observers are also noting the potential for economic damage to one of Asia's most important financial hubs.
The current situation could "dent Hong Kong's reputation for stability and ease-of-doing business efficiency," Pesek warns—an outcome China would be wise to avoid. Defending the protesters, Sai Pradhan writes in the Hong Kong Free Press that "[t]he city's reputation does not thrive on pictures of police hurting the public." | | Protests Show Liberalism Is Alive and Well | | | As protesters turn out in droves in Hong Kong over China's growing influence, and in smaller numbers in Moscow over local elections, the Financial Times' Gideon Rachman sees it as a good sign for global democracy. Though Russian President Vladimir Putin recently called liberalism "obsolete"—and though liberal democracy is generally viewed as suffering a years-long decline—Rachman writes that "illiberalism does not seem to be doing so well either." Given that "Russia and China represent the major geopolitical and ideological challenges to western liberalism," the fact that both face popular protests shows liberalism's enduring appeal, Rachman writes, even if no one is sure where either protest movement is headed. | | How Long Can the Communist Party Rule China? | | | What will the next few decades hold for China? Chatham House's The World Today asks two China watchers, Graham Allison and Niall Ferguson, some key questions on that topic. While they agree that war with the US is not inevitable (despite Allison having warned of such a conflict in his book Destined for War), they differ on whether the Chinese Communist Party will still be in power 30 years from now.
"I would not bet too much money on that outcome," Ferguson says, pointing to the enormous growth of China's middle class and its inevitable demands for property rights and the rule of law. Allison, meanwhile, gives President Xi Jinping better odds of solidifying party rule and overcoming dissent. "[C]omparing performance in the first two decades of the 21st century in adapting to meet major challenges, an unbiased observer would have to say that their system is working better than either the Americans or the Europeans," he argues. | | In an essay published in the current issue of Time, former deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein lays out some possible approaches to white-supremacist violence that hearken back, in part, to the post-9/11 era. Recommending a "comprehensive strategy" to prevent radicalization of vulnerable individuals (a lesson driven home by accounts of ISIS's Internet-driven radicalization strategy), he also calls for US law enforcement to approach violent white nationalism with the same network-disruption tactics deployed, successfully, by former attorney general John Ashcroft to counter jihadist terrorism during George W. Bush's presidency.
National Interest columnist Curt Mills, meanwhile, voices some concern that the US may be gearing up for a repeat of post-9/11 missteps. "[T]wo decades of evidence argues against changing the whole way we do business in the face of a few fanatics," he writes, asking, "What would a 'war on white nationalism' actually entail? Will it be a decades-long slog, this time on American soil? Will it feature the mistakes of the war or terror?" In the short term, Mills calls for more precise use of words like "extremism" and carefully drawn distinctions between fringe ideology and threats of violence. | | Globalization's Power Law | | Globalization has often been seen as an equalizing force, but we're finding out the opposite is true, Henry Farrell and Abraham L. Newman write in the latest issue of International Security. An interconnected, interdependent world naturally features an imbalance of power, they argue, as some countries serve as "hubs" in the interconnected network of information and trade—and can thus leverage their positions to "coerce" others. America has done so with Internet surveillance programs that capitalize on its centrality to Web traffic and with sanctions regimes, to isolate foes like Iran and North Korea, that make the most of its centrality to global banking.
An interconnected world "result[s] in a specific, tangible, and enduring configuration of power imbalance," Farrell and Newman write. The natural response is for some countries (especially those like Russia and China on the receiving end of coercion) to insulate themselves from the globalized world, avoiding the power brokers by needing them less. | | | | | | |
