Barack Obama has been reelected by concentrating on domestic issues. A look beyond US borders would have been unbearable to American voters anyways. That isn’t Obama’s fault: Foreign policy problems usually come with a long history, and we certainly can’t blame the president for not forecasting global turmoil. Yet we can admit that the global […]
There is no fiscal cliff in China, and probably no sex scandal at a spy agency waiting to burst, yet China’s new leader, Xi Jinping, is under just as much pressure as U.S. President Barack Obama to hit the ground running. Xi is assuming control of the Communist Party at a time when there is […]
n November 2010, President Obama visited India for three days. In addition to meeting with top Indian business leaders and announcing deals between the two countries worth more than $10 billion, the president declared on several occasions that the US and India’s would be the “defining partnership of the twenty-first century.” Afterward, Obama flew straight […]
Barack Obama, re-elected president of the United States, will start his new term in January. Xi Jinping, who will lead China for the next decade, will start his stint soon after. The two will have to become friends if they are to ensure that the global economy’s baby steps towards recovery are not crushed midway. […]
From his office window, Roberto Garcia watches workers repair the USS Emory S. Land, a submarine support vessel that is part of a U.S. military buildup as Washington turns its attention to fast-growing Asia and a newly assertive China. The Philippines, Australia and other parts of the region have seen a resurgence of U.S. warships, planes and personnel […]
The second term Obama administration is taking office facing challenging economic conditions. The economy continues to expand, yet the pace is disappointingly slow. The unemployment rate has fallen below 8 percent for the first time in almost 4 years, but is still unacceptably high. The economic expansion remains fragile and vulnerable to risks associated with […]
IN SEVEN weeks America‘s federal budget will self-destruct and plunge America back into recession unless Barack Obama can persuade the Republicans in Congress to raise taxes, which they have vowed never to do. So what is he doing between now and then? He’s heading off to visit south-east Asia and attend the East Asian Summit. […]
President Barack Obama will visit Myanmar (formerly known as Burma) later this month and meet President Thein Sein, who is trying to steer the country toward democracy. Yet sectarian strife could still deal a setback to the government’s significant political, economic, and social reforms that have been made since the democratic transition began in 2011. […]
It’s too bad that Mitt Romney didn’t win. If the Republicans had won, we could finally have known for sure that our suspicion of America‘s imminent demise is correct. “Four more years,” translated into the German viewpoint means little more than a “four-year reprieve.” For the über-watchful among us, the signs of the downfall are […]
In the run-up to the U.S presidential polls, when bilateral diplomatic activity was expected to taper off, South Block logged as many as a dozen delegations from Washington between September 25 and end-October. Four of these were headed by cabinet minister-level officials. Even just a couple of days before the Americans went to the polls, […]
looking beyond borders 