The concept of debt-trap diplomacy has been widely used in recent years, including by world leaders. Most of the time, it is associated with the People’s Republic of China, particularly when bilateral agreements which are part of the Belt and Road Initiative are signed between the Chinese and other developing nations. But what exactly does… Continue reading
Open source investigations
In October 2016, a respected US news organization, BuzzFeed, published an investigative report about the 2009-2010 Ghana-Kosmos Energy dispute. The article (https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/dinograndoni/oil-in-ghana), titled ‵How Hillary Clinton’s State Department Fought For Oil 5,000 Miles Away′, exposed Johnnie Carson’s and Riva Levinson’s actions against Ghana’s interest. Asked by BuzzFeed to comment on the revelations, both Carson and… Continue reading
The past few weeks have been quite tense on the Armenian-Azerbaijan border, with the two countries waging a full-scale war over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh territory. This piece of land, located right at the border of these two countries, has been a bone of contention between Armenia and Azerbaijan for decades. Both states consider the territory… Continue reading
Is there such a thing as “responsible lobbying”? Sure there is, but the act of lawfully attempting to influence something usually gets hurdled with the many examples of how corporations and interest groups have successfully managed to regulate government policies in their favor, regardless of how good or bad those policies were. The good When… Continue reading
The unconditional basic income is an idea that becomes more mainstream by the day. It was adopted as a policy by the center-left Spanish government, and it is promoted as an experiment in countries like Finland and Germany. As an idea, it has both supporters and opponents, but both parts usually think that introducing a… Continue reading
At least since 1976, a majority among white voters continuously and constantly supported the Republican candidate in the US presidential elections, no matter who that candidate was. This majority varied from as low as 52% in 1976 to as high as 66% in 1984. The only exception is in 1992, when only a plurality (41%)… Continue reading
The coronavirus pandemic that has caught the world by surprise in the beginning of this year has forever changed the way we look at global disasters and how they can drastically alter our way of life in just a short span of time. But now, when the dust has cleared, and the virus has been… Continue reading
We’re almost half-way through 2018 and the international political landscape is as volatile as it will ever get. This year has been marked by events that seem to advance the idea that the entire political spectrum has returned to its Cold War origins – a collapsing Middle East that seems to have no bright future… Continue reading
