Best of the week - 9 April 2021

Each week BISA Director, Juliet Dryden, scours the internet for IR-related content that might interest you. Here she brings you this week's best readings and podcasts to keep you up to date with what's happening around the world.

Getting ready for COP26

• In 2018 we bailed out the banks. In 2021, we need to bail out the planet. George Monbiot in Open Democracy.

Global politics

• The liberal order begins at home. How democratic revival can reboot the international system. Robin Niblett and Leslie Vinjamuri in Foreign Affairs
• The moral cost of choosing stability over justice. Kim Ghattas in The Atlantic
• China wants a rule based international order, too. Stephen M Walt in Foreign Policy
• The new age of protectionism. Coronavirus ‘vaccine wars’ could herald a broader retreat from the new market. Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman in Foreign Affairs.
• China is betting that the West is in irreversible decline. The Economist
• China’s wolf warrior diplomacy is here to stay. Rachel Cheung and Benjamin Wilhelm for World Politics Review
• Foreign aid can help stem the decline of democracy if used in the right way. Rachel M Gisselquist and Miguel Niño-Zarazúa
• Podcast: Is the West fundamentally racist? The west is rich because the rest is poor. Capitalism is racism says Kehinde Andrews. Listen to Intelligence Squared
• Podcast: History lessons: Margaret Macmillan on war. Listen to Engelsberg Ideas
• Podcast: Adam Curtis on his new series ‘Can't Get You Out of My Head’. A look at the history of the rise and fall of individualism. Why do so many people feel so powerless in the age of the empowered individual? How has digital technology turbo-charged our feelings of alienation? Plus Nixon, China, Dominic Cummings, complex systems, Max Weber and conspiracy theories. Listen to TALKING POLITICS.

United States/China/Russia foreign policies

• Biden rethinks Central American strategy. Catherine Osborn in Foreign Policy
• Turning away from the Middle East. Steven Simon in the New York Review of Books
• Russia and China present a united front to the West but there’s plenty of potential for friction. Natasha Kuhrt in The Conversation
• In Russia, Navalny is stealing back the agenda – by putting his life on the line. Talyana Dvornikova in Open Democracy
• Are US and China really opposed in Iran and Myanmar? Emma Ashford and Matthew Kroenig in Foreign Policy
• China’s unrestricted war on India. Brahma Chellaney for Foreign Affairs.

UK and Europe

• The transformation of Mitteleuropa. Richard Bassett for Engelsberg Ideas
• The fragility of Europe’s China strategy. Adam Tooze in Internationale Politik Quarterly
• Europe’s identity crisis: Muslims are collateral damage in the continents culture wars. H A Hellyer for The Globe and Mail
• How Germany created the neoliberal order. Quinn Slobodian in Foreign Policy
• Erdogan’s decision to pull out of Istanbul convention has put him in opposition to women. Devran Gulel and Leila Choukroune in The Conversation
• The fatal consequences of EU disengagement from Mediterranean search and rescue. Luca Doll in The Loop.

Middle East                 

• A little history of the modern Middle East. Simon Mayell for Engelsberg Ideas
• How liberals lost in Israel. The American left should heed their lessons. Yehuda Mirsky in Foreign Policy
• Nobody knows why Syria matters. Foreign Policy
• The Middle East’s next conflicts won’t be between Arab states and Iran. Vali Nasr in Foreign Policy
• Unveiling Iran. Roya Hakakian in the New York Review of Books
• Why King Abdullah’s troubles are not over. David Hearst in Middle East Eye
• The Palestinians need a new approach. Hussein Agha and Ahmad Samih Khalidi in Foreign Affairs
• A day in the life of Abed Salama. Nathan Thrall in the New York Review of Books.

Africa

• Tigray is deliberately being starved to death. Alex De Waal in World Politics Review
• The Libya allergy. The last humanitarian venture? Colum Lynch in Foreign Policy
• How ISIS has flourished in the poverty and neglect of southern Africa. Jane Flanagan in the Times
• To understand Mozambique’s insurgency look at local unrest not global jihad. Tristan Mcconnell in the New Statesman
• The Senegalese exception loses its lustre. Samba Dialimpa Badji in World Politics Review
• Podcast: Church, state and colonialism in southeastern Congo. Peter Brett is joined by Dr Reuben Loffman. A Mile End Institute podcast from the Queen Mary University.

Asia

• Myanmar is on the precipice of civil war. Lucas Myer for Foreign Policy
• One country, two systems, no future. The end of Hong Kong as we know it. Jane Perlez in Foreign Affairs
• Podcast: The military that murders its own people. Listen to the Daily with Hannah Beech,  the Southeast Asia bureau chief of the New York Times for the Daily Podcast.

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