United States
United States
Fair Observer provides inclusive, insightful and non-partisan analysis of important American issues, events and trends.
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360° Analysis / Afghanistan / Bridging the Divide / Foreign Assistance / Humanitarian / Iraq / Middle East / United States / Global Change / Middle EastNew technologies and civil society engagement can provide better results through foreign assistance from the US to the Middle East. This is the first of two parts. The American relationship with the Arab world has been in place since the Jeffersonian era. It was forged at a time when uncompromised access to Mediterranean shipping lanes was pivotal to the young nation’s trade capacity. Since then, the landscape of the Middle East has been continuously shifting as various forces — from Marx to Aramco, and from Allenby to the Internet — have played out across the region. For over 100 years, there has been a fundamental anomaly which has plagued the Middle East with unmet...
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To bolster the US government's foreign policy, Washington would be well-advised to attempt to plant and cultivate a relationship with the PJAK, the armed-Kurdish resistance group at odds with Iran. The hills and mountains of the Kurdistan province of western Iran serve as the battleground and shelter for the most potent armed resistance group in the Islamic Republic. For almost a decade, the Free Life Party of Kurdistan (PJAK) has fought an extremely robust insurgency against Iranian security forces. In spite of PJAK's campaign against the Iranian government, the group has not received a fraction of the attention from US strategists that other anti-Islamic Republic militant...
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Mitchell Plitnick, former Director of B’Tselem and the Jewish Voice for Peace, speaks to Heba Al-Adawy about the future of political activism, and the obstacles to peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Heba Al-Adawy: As an American Jew, what (and when) was the turning point in your political consciousness with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? Mitchell Plitnick: There was no single turning point. As a young child in the 1970s, I was fed an absurdly one-sided version of Israeli history and current politics (of that time). The picture was that Israel only ever wanted peace and always had its hand out in friendship, but "the Arabs" hated Jews so much that all...
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360° Analysis / China / China Telecom / Internet freedom / ITU / Politics / Russia / United States / WCIT-12 / Europe / BRIC / Arts & Culture / AsiaBy Min JiangWith the world powers seemingly divided into two opposing blocs at the World Conference on International Telecommunications, Min Jiang looks at the conflict between “Internet freedom” and “Internet sovereignty” models. “The conference was not about Internet control or Internet governance,” said Hamadoun Touré, the head of the Internet Telecommunications Union (ITU), at the closing session of the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT-12) on December 14, 2012 in Dubai. But of course, Mr. Touré was simply denying the obvious. Internet control is precisely what WCIT-12 was about and the ideological divisions between the...
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360° Analysis / Drones / Pakistan / United States / Yemen / Middle East / Global Security / AsiaYemen replaced Pakistan as the primary destination for US drone strikes in 2012. In both countries, official government support for this US policy often comes at odds with the average citizen. Yemen’s President, Abd-Rabbo Mansur Hadi, does not have any particularly strong local powerbase in the country, normally a pre-requisite for leading as unstable a country as Yemen. Perhaps that is why he continues to vocally support the continuation of a US drones campaign in his country in the face of widespread national opposition to a counter-terrorism strategy, that often results in civilian ‘collateral damage.’ Hadi: Drone Strikes in Yemen Hadi needs America’s...
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Democracy / economy / finance / Intelligence / Politics / security / United States / Washington D.C / Focus Article / Global SecurityBy Mike RettigDespite the controversies over the past decade, the US has a good track record of maintaining its democratic traditions while still using secret intelligence services to preserve national security. In 1777, George Washington wrote that the “necessity of procuring good intelligence is apparent.” Indeed, as America fought ardently for its ideals during the Revolutionary War, Washington was said to be an “avid user of intelligence as well as a consummate practitioner.” Washington’s words and actions demonstrate well the contradiction surrounding a democracy’s intelligence service. While the secrecy inherent in a well-functioning intelligence service can...
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360° Analysis / International Women of Courage Award / Novaya Gazeta / Politics / State Department / United States / Yelena Milashina / Europe / BRIC / Arts & CultureYelena Milashina, who covered some of Russia’s most controversial subjects for Novaya Gazeta, is awarded the International Women of Courage Award. A top Russian investigative journalist who has covered extrajudicial kidnappings in the North Caucasus and the killings of fellow journalists will be awarded a prestigious human rights prize by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at a ceremony in Washington on Friday, International Women's Day. Yelena Milashina, a reporter for the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, will be one of 10 recipients of the secretary's International Women of Courage Award, which...
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360° Analysis / Asia-Pacific / North Korea / Nuclear / United States / US / Global Security / AsiaCultural diplomacy, not bellicose rhetoric, should begin to define North Korea-US relations. The Harlem Globetrotters basketball team’s recent trip to North Korea should have been hailed as an effective cultural diplomatic venture. This trip was made possible by the official invitation of the North Korean President Kim Jung-Un, and, headlined by the star power of Dennis Rodman, should have opened a serious discussion in US foreign policy circles over non-confrontational methods to engage with North Korea. Instead, the trip gathered a storm of disapproval from the US media, whipping up a media frenzy of sensational reporting and aggressive bombast towards North Korea’s...
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Adam Smith / American Economics Association / Anglo-American Tradition / Capitalism / David Ricardo / John K. Galbraith / John Keynes / John S. Mill / Karl Marx / Milton Friedman / Social Democracy / United States / Finance & Economics / Focus ArticleBy Bülent TemelSocial democracy promoted by the late Harvard political economist John K. Galbraith is the future of capitalism with its emphasis on equity and responsibility alongside prosperity. Social and economic ills of our time are predictable outcomes of the ideological dismissal of a functional theory of capitalism in the Anglo-American tradition: Social democracy. Those who went through the mills of mainstream economics education are familiar with names like Adam Smith, David Ricardo, John S. Mill, Karl Marx, John M. Keynes or Milton Friedman. Right alongside these great thinkers, however, there are numerous others who could not earn the celebrity status despite making as significant contributions...