The Gulf Needs To Worry About Its Oil

The systemic waste of natural resources in the Gulf is eroding economic resilience to shocks and increasing security risks. The six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries now consume more primary energy than the whole of Africa. Yet they have just one-twentieth of that continent’s population. Almost 100% of energy is produced from oil and gas […]

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The Coming African Oil Spill

Over the next decade, a massive wave of new oil and gas discoveries will transform Africa. If the resource curse plays out as it usually does, this oil boom will only serve to entrench authoritarian rule and inhibit democracy. Unless, that is, African governments embrace a radical approach: handing a large share of the new […]

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Tragedy On The Nile

The divisions in Egypt are deep. Whereas reconciliation had seemed possible, though difficult, until last week, there are now two irreconcilable camps facing off against each other: the military and its secular supporters, on one side, and the Muslim Brotherhood and its supporters, on the other. The young activists and the liberals no longer play […]

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The Mistakes Muslim Brotherhood Made

Imagine a government dominated by paranoia, convinced of conspiracies around every corner. That, in short, was the most defining aspect of the Muslim Brotherhood’s year in power in Egypt. Though the country’s first democratically elected government was overthrown in a military coup in July, the Brotherhood made its fair share of critical mistakes. Read Here […]

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Egypt’s Fear Bubble

More important in my view is the belief expressed by almost half a dozen activists in the course of a week of conversations that the revolutionary movement was never going to be able to defeat both the Brotherhood and the military in a struggle for Egypt’s future. And so to have the army hand such […]

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Urban Slums Define New Africa

Urban slums worldwide will soon reach a tipping point, with young people rejecting the lives that they have been offered. Their power lies in their numbers – more than half of the world’s youth shares their fate – and in their anger. They will rise up, refusing to accept their status as second-class citizens of […]

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Generals And Their Foes

The generals who now run Egypt are not the first Arab rulers to fear the power of those seeking to use open spaces to demand change — and they know how to stop them. But this time around, the Muslim Brotherhood is prepared. Read Here – Foreign Affairs

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Crude Is Not Always Sweet

In the public perception, it is almost axiomatic that overseas oil assets constitute energy security. It assumes that ownership confers rights of unqualified access. There is a belief that if you own hydrocarbon assets in any corner of the world, it automatically and ineluctably entitles you to physically access those resources as and when you […]

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A Month Since Morsi Went

It’s been one month since Egypt’s first democratically elected president has been deposed, and since Mohamed Morsi‘s ouster, the power struggle between the military and Morsi’s supporters has kept the country on edge. Read Here – Al Jazeera

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