BY SYLVIE STOLOFF AND ANNA GIANNUZZI What if we could deescalate some of the world’s deadliest conflicts by nudging people to think differently about their opponents? Contemporary international conflicts are increasingly shaped by identity politics, since religion, race, social background and other identity-based factors play a large role in determining political affiliations. This poses a […]

The rise of Mohammad bin Salman raises the question of Saudi Arabia’s future relationships with the US and Russia.

Humans constantly over-indulge, and our long-term health suffers for it. Behavioral science tools called “commitment devices” could help us both stay on track and stay alive.

Despite recent disasters and major national efforts to promote disaster readiness, a full two-thirds of American households do not have adequate plans or have no plans at all for a disaster. What can behavioral science teach us about how to get people to prepare?

BY MARIE LAWRENCE The behavioral science revolution is officially underway. Nudge, one of the discipline’s most influential trade books, is now on more than 750,000 bookshelves worldwide, and its co-author Richard Thaler is a new Nobel laureate. The Behavioural Insight Team’s (BIT) successful effort to encourage Brits to pay £210 million in overdue taxes found […]

BY HUBERT WU Many major shortcomings of economic policy making can be attributed to an over-reliance on “one-size-fits-all” policies that ignore differences in countries, industries, and individuals. Until the early 21st century, the accepted means to increase the wealth of developing countries centered on a set of largely standardized policy prescriptions. At the industry level, […]

Head of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House, Lina Khatib, addresses the power dynamics behind the crisis in the Gulf, its motivations, and implications for conflicts in the region.

While members of the Palestinian diaspora occupy a precarious social position and are often subject to successive removals from new homes, refugees have nonetheless put down roots and sought to secure their new homes in a number of ways.
Dr. Nadya Hajj, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Wellesley College, shows how this is the case.

In response to our recent piece by Theophilus Kwek proposing what asylum policies in Singapore could look like, a reader argues that the experiences of migrant workers and long-term immigrants form a cautionary tale to be considered before we naively implement asylum policies for refugees.

Despite the international community’s efforts to shape governance in Syria, moderate opposition groups have failed to gain a foothold in the country’s political sphere. This is largely related to the international community’s strategy in Syria, which has shifted from demanding the departure of Bashar al-Assad to providing humanitarian assistance and countering the Islamic State. As part of this shift, the international community has emphasized the promotion of a “good” rebellion and governance training for rebel groups in Syria.

BY LIZ HANSON With each passing year, the fight against climate change becomes more critical to our success in maintaining livable communities around the world. In December 2015, 195 nations recognized the urgency to take action and joined together to adopt the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).[1] The […]

Has the possibility of an independent Kurdistan forced the governments of Turkey, Iran, and Iraq to overlook their intersecting rivalries in the Middle East?