Tag: Featured
UN raps Chinese expansionism
In July, the UN-backed Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague released a 500-page judgment on competing claims by the Philippines and China in the South China Sea. The court found that there is no legal basis for China’s historical claims to sea areas based on the “nine-dash line”; that none of the contested features […]
Icelandic foods: A challenging history
Seeking solitude and seclusion, Irish monks in the seventh Century happened upon Iceland by chance, but fled two centuries later as Vikings from Sweden and Norway stumbled upon the island. After that, Norse settlers from Sweden and Norway soon began dotting the country with homesteads, having fled political strife on the Scandinavian mainland. From that […]
The future lies here: China’s New Silk Road Economic Belt Initiative gives a boost to Xinjiang
At a hotel last May in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang, a woman from South Africa was having breakfast on her sixth visit to China. She and her husband had just arrived from Kashgar, an ancient city in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, located in the far west of China. Kashgar was a key stop on the old Silk […]
Portugal’s diplomatic residence off the beaten path
Portuguese Ambassador Jose Moreira da Cunha and his wife, Lurdes, live in what they describe as a modest embassy residence on Island Park Drive, far from some of the baronial manor houses of Rockcliffe where many of their diplomatic friends live. But they say they couldn’t be happier. Not only do they love the location, […]
Liberals’ China dilemma
During the 2015 federal elections in Canada, the Liberal Party platform spoke of building up the Canadian middle class. One of the ways it said it would do that was by forging greater trade relations with emerging markets, including China. But, during the Munk Centre foreign policy debate between the Liberal, Conservative and NDP leaders, […]
China’s domestic problems
Economic growth stood out for a long time as the big story coming out of China, concealing other aspects of its governance that were problematic, including environmental degradation, rising inequalities, worrying demographic imbalance, abuses of power, corruption and a poor record on human rights. For many years, the Communist Party answered critics of its poor […]
Canada’s Foreign Minister Stéphane Dion ‘It’s important to be an interlocutor for peace’
Stéphane Dion is an academic-turned-parliamentarian who was first elected to represent the Montreal riding of Saint-Laurent in 1996. He has served as president of the privy council, minister of intergovernmental affairs and minister of the environment and became leader of the Liberal party for two years, beginning in 2006 after then-prime minister Paul Martin’s electoral […]
China’s scientific rise
In May 2016, Chinese President Xi Jinping set a target for China to become a leading power in science and technology (S&T) by the middle of this century. As he stated at the time: “China should establish itself as one of the most innovative countries by 2020 and a leading innovator by 2030, and become […]
China’s troubling foreign policy
China’s Marxist-Leninist Communist Party came to power under chairman Mao Zedong on the promise of building a radically equal and just society in China. More broadly, the Chinese Communist Party promised to be the instrument of China’s national revitalization as a great power, drawing on its glorious ancient history as a magnificent civilization. In the […]
Globalization as a bad word
Globalization — defined as the free movement of goods, services, capital, people, ideas and information, which is supported by the values of neoliberal institutions — is under threat by the forces of virulent nationalism, xenophobia and protectionism. These forces are prevalent everywhere — in Europe, North America, Asia, Latin America and Africa. As countries erect […]
Recent Comments