• 48: Democracy Is Dying in Brazil: To Stop Bolsonaro, the Opposition Must Unite, submitted on 2021-11-02 00:13:53+08:00.
• 49: Iran Won’t Back Down: As Nuclear Talks Resume, Tehran Isn’t Looking to Compromise, submitted on 2021-11-03 01:21:01+08:00.
• 50: The ICC’s Flawed Afghan Investigation: Why the Court Shouldn’t Let America Off the Hook, submitted on 2021-11-04 00:26:52+08:00.
• 51: The Wars Within Islam Are Not Over: But the Post-9/11 Era Is—and America Must Adapt, submitted on 2021-11-05 04:40:45+08:00.
• 52: Can Ethiopia Survive?: What Might Happen If Abiy Ahmed Falls, submitted on 2021-11-05 22:13:06+08:00.

48: Democracy Is Dying in Brazil: To Stop Bolsonaro, the Opposition Must Unite, submitted on 2021-11-02 00:13:53+08:00.

—– 48.1 —–2021-11-02 00:15:37+08:00:

[SS from the article by Oliver Stuenkel, Associate Professor of International Relations at Fundação Getulio Vargas]

No matter what happens during Brazil’s elections in October 2022, the country’s democracy faces a major test. Democratic backsliding in other countries such as Hungary, Turkey, and Venezuela suggests that strongmen are often emboldened by reelection and grow increasingly authoritarian. If he wins another term, Bolsonaro is unlikely to be an exception. If, however, he loses, refuses to concede, and mobilizes his supporters, Brazil’s weakened democratic institution may be unable to withstand the authoritarian onslaught.
To head off a democratic crisis, Brazilian opposition figures must avoid being lulled into a false sense of security by Bolsonaro’s frequent vows to moderate his political behavior. Instead, these groups must present a united front—avoiding the frequent infighting and factional division that have allowed the president to dominate public debate for the better part of the past three years. Just as in the Czech Republic, where a broad spectrum of groups recently joined together to defeat the populist prime minister Andrej Babis, anti-Bolsonaro groups must temporarily overcome their political differences and form a broad pro-democracy coalition. Simultaneously, both the Biden administration and the European Union must make it very clear that any further attempts to undermine Brazil’s democratic institutions would have serious consequences for Bolsonaro. If the president fails to change course, U.S. and European options should include downgrading military ties, halting ratification of the Mercosur-EU trade deal, and freezing Brazil’s admissions process to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Such a combined approach—one that addresses both the international and the domestic underpinnings of Bolsonaro’s antidemocratic movement—is the best way to ensure that Brazil’s democracy survives past 2022.

49: Iran Won’t Back Down: As Nuclear Talks Resume, Tehran Isn’t Looking to Compromise, submitted on 2021-11-03 01:21:01+08:00.

—– 49.1 —–2021-11-03 01:21:38+08:00:

[SS from the article by Mohammad Ayatollahi Tabaar, Associate Professor of International Affairs at Texas A&M University and a Fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy.]

As Iran’s nuclear program nears its breakout point, some in Washington are already calling for a “Plan B” of coercive economic measures and threats of the use of force should Tehran refuse to return to full compliance with the nuclear deal. Raisi is already facing massive economic problems at home—with potentially explosive consequences for the regime—and such measures would aim to pressure him into reviving the JCPOA, which could ameliorate those difficulties.Iran is unlikely to give in to such coercion. Tehran’s conservative leaders were underwhelmed by the benefits supposedly accorded to Iran by the JCPOA and now seek to nurture a sanctions-resistant economy by bolstering its domestic industries and forging new ties with rising powers in Asia. Raisi is also convinced that the United States remains committed to keeping Iran boxed in even if the JCPOA is revived, and he is therefore focused on amplifying Iran’s military and economic leverage to protect not only the Islamic Republic but the broader Shiite Persian nation from what he views as an existential threat.In Washington, the conversation about Plan B against Iran has been gaining currency. But to the Islamic Republic, Plan B was in fact Plan A from the outset.

50: The ICC’s Flawed Afghan Investigation: Why the Court Shouldn’t Let America Off the Hook, submitted on 2021-11-04 00:26:52+08:00.

—– 50.1 —–2021-11-04 00:27:06+08:00:

[SS from the article by Kelebogile Zvobgo, Assistant Professor of Government at William & Mary and Founder and Director of the International Justice Lab.]

The Afghanistan investigation offered the ICC a chance to begin its third decade by asserting—legally, reasonably, and powerfully—its jurisdiction over a global superpower. For the United States, meanwhile, it would have been an opportunity to reflect on the harms of 20 years of war. Khan’s defenders may cite his pragmatism in averting any possibility of an all-out confrontation with the United States if its service members were indicted and warrants were issued for their arrest and transfer to the ICC to stand trial. But avoiding conflict is at odds with the court’s purpose. Accountability is not a voluntary exercise. And as the international law scholar Sophie Duroy has powerfully argued, “when the Prosecutor of a universal court, with a mandate to end impunity for all persons without any distinction, decides to pursue a one-sided investigation . . . the resulting impression is more one of double standards than pragmatism.”Still, hope remains. The ICC has reversed itself in the past when it comes to the United States. Bensouda’s request to open a full investigation into the war in Afghanistan was rejected in 2019 but then approved in 2020. Khan may also reverse his decision—but only if criticism and pressure mount on his office to reexamine his priorities and consider the long-term costs to international criminal justice and the rule of law.

51: The Wars Within Islam Are Not Over: But the Post-9/11 Era Is—and America Must Adapt, submitted on 2021-11-05 04:40:45+08:00.

—– 51.1 —–2021-11-05 04:41:08+08:00:

[SS from the article by Philip Zelikow, Professor of History at the University of Virginia.]
“Since 1979, an often violent struggle about how to adapt to modernity has convulsed the Islamic world, from West Africa to Southeast Asia, and has engulfed expatriate Muslim communities, especially those in Europe. To see this as a “clash of civilizations” pitting Islam against the West would be a profound misjudgment. What Americans mostly see are spillovers from the wars within Islam. These struggles over the future of Islamic civilization bear some resemblance to the wars of religious and social reformation that sprawled across the Christian world in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and to the long struggles in the nineteenth century and twentieth century over how to organize modern industrial societies.
Fundamentally, the United States has always been an outsider to these struggles inside the Muslim world—a reactive and reluctant participant. Americans naturally tend to put themselves and their government at the center of these stories, casting themselves as either victims or perpetrators. But this astigmatism distorts perspective and hinders development of more constructive strategies, which must involve complex global partnerships. Meanwhile, the geopolitics of the wars within the Muslim world have changed. So have the threats to the United States—and so, too, must Washington’s approach.”

52: Can Ethiopia Survive?: What Might Happen If Abiy Ahmed Falls, submitted on 2021-11-05 22:13:06+08:00.

—– 52.1 —–2021-11-05 22:13:14+08:00:

[SS from the article by Nic Cheeseman, Professor of Democracy at the University of Birmingham, and Yohanness Woldemariam of the University of Colorado]
As East Africa’s largest nation and arguably its most powerful one, Ethiopia has long been held up by its allies as a force for stability in an otherwise volatile region. It has been a close counterterrorism partner of the United States, and its military has played a leading role in the fight against al Shabab extremists in neighboring Somalia. Yet even before the recent crisis, critics pointed out that Ethiopian intervention in Somalia often did more harm than good. And as the conflict in Tigray has intensified, it has become increasingly clear that the country has become a source of instability rather than a bulwark against it.
Even if the fighting can be halted, fierce disagreements about who should govern Ethiopia and how will persist. Without a compelling and widely shared vision for the Ethiopian state, neither Abiy nor any potential successor will be able to prevent the centrifugal forces from overwhelming the centripetal ones. “The state must have a reason for existing,” Hartshorne wrote. If Ethiopia is to survive in its current form, it will need to come up with one.

—– 52.2 —–2021-11-10 03:49:15+08:00:

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