Politics

In this week’s podcast, we discuss the attempted resignation of Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and the growing protests in Algeria against President Bouteflika’s proposed fifth term. In Iran, Zarif announced his resignation in a February 25th Instagram post, but President Rouhani insists that Zarif keep his job after widespread support for the Foreign Minister’s […]

Netanyahu is attempting to head off the Gantz-Lapid challenge before it can gain too much momentum. The announcement of his indictment on corruption charges further destabilizes Israel’s turbulent politics ahead of April elections.

This week, Egypt’s parliament approves a motion to amend the country’s constitution. The proposed amendments would keep the current President, General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in power until 2034. In Libya, Libyan National Army (LNA) commander Khalifa Hifter continues operation to take territory in the country’s southwest, including al-Sharara oil field. And in Washington, the US […]

In a lecture at the Harvard Kennedy School, Sultan al-Qassemi discusses the role of art in the contemporary politics of the Middle East.

As Israel’s 2019 elections approach, Netanyahu remains popular despite corruption investigations and high-level defections from his ruling coalition in parliament. Centre-left parties must unite if they hope to defeat him.

BY KEVIN FRAZIER When we think of great leaders, we often think of U.S. presidents. It’s easy to find books on what these presidents achieved, but what leadership traits made their accomplishments possible? It’s a question that John Kroger, a Hauser Leader in Residence at the Kennedy School of Government and a Fellow of the […]

BY HILARY GELFOND While in attendance at the Harvard Kennedy School’s bipartisan conference for newly elected members of Congress, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that “[our] ‘bipartisan’ Congressional orientation is cohosted by a corporate lobbyist group.” The conference, which was jointly hosted with the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and […]

BY AMANDA PATARINO The day after the midterm elections, President Trump announced that Attorney General Jeff Sessions was resigning and that Matthew G. Whitaker would become the acting attorney general. Initial outcry focused on the fact that Whitaker would oversee the Mueller investigation, but discussions quickly shifted to the constitutionality of his appointment. While Trump […]

African states are increasingly leveraging the power of telecom operators to advance goals that the state itself struggles to secure (e.g. security and fiscal goals). This suggests a paradigmatic shift in African politics, whereby telecom operators have become a face of the state, exerting agency over state and citizen in pervasive and sometimes unexpected ways. […]

Mexico’s Andres Manuel López Obrador was a populist candidate. Will he become a populist president?

BY MICHAEL AUSLEN Indiana is hardly the poster child for voting rights. In 2005, it became the first state in the country to pass a strict photo identification (ID) requirement for voting—a measure criticized as an unfair barrier to participation for poor and minority communities.[1] When the US Supreme Court refused to throw out the […]

BY KOREY TE HIRA Every two years, thousands of Americans run for office promising to “clean up Washington” and usher in a new kind of politics.  Why then do we see these same promises being made every election cycle? Looking to nature, we find the answer. Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution through natural selection describes […]