The twilight of the liberal world order
SUMMARY
In recent years, the liberal world order that has held sway over international affairs for the past seven decades has been fragmenting under the pressure of systemic economic stresses, growing tribalism and nationalism, and a general loss of confidence in established international and national institutions. The incoming U.S. administration faces a grave challenge in determining whether it wishes to continue to uphold this liberal order, which has helped to maintain a stable international system in the face of challenges from regional powers and other potential threats, or whether it is willing to accept the consequences that may result if it chooses to abandon America’s key role as a guarantor of the system it helped to found and sustain.
Why defending democracy is no vice
Author: Michael McFaul, director of Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Despite recent setbacks, there remain compelling moral and self-interested reasons to support democracy and human rights around the world, argues Michael McFaul, director of Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Democracies offer the most accountable system of government, the only tonic for illegitimacy and the best way to offer political participation to the disenfranchised, he writes for The Washington Post:
A Revanchist Russia Versus an Uncertain West: An Appreciation of the Situation Since the 2014 Ukrainian Crisis
Working Paper, December 2016
Author: Brian Michael Jenkins, Senior Advisor to the President of the RAND Corporation
Publisher: Center for the Study of Democracy
And the winner is … a backroom deal (and Antonio Tajani)
STRASBOURG — Antonio Tajani, of the European People’s Party, was elected the 29th president of the European Parliament on Tuesday night, propelled to victory by a partnership between his center-right group and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe.
US Senate Committee Backs Montenegro’s NATO Bid
The US Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved a resolution on Wednesday supporting Montenegro’s accession to NATO, in a second attempt to push the Balkan’s country membership bid.