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 Ramesh Thakur

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Ramesh Thakur
Ramesh Thakur is Professor in the Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University; adjunct professor, Institute for Ethics, Governance and Law, Griffith University, and editor-in-chief of Global Governance from Jan. 1, 2013. He began writing for The Japan Times in 1998 as Vice Rector of the United Nations University.
For Ramesh Thakur's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 24, 2019
With a fractured opposition, Indian leader gets second chance
Voters trust their strongman over the liberal elite's gentleman for tackling India's most pressing problems.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 21, 2019
Australian Labor Party snatched defeat from the jaws of victory
The ALP needs to introspect on how it managed to put itself on the wrong side of people's everyday aspirations.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 17, 2019
The end of the International Criminal Court?
By remaining in the ICC, states parties will sanctify the weaponization of international justice mechanisms to be used by the powerful against the weak but never against any of their own.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 2, 2019
The next clash between India and Pakistan
The question is when, not if.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 1, 2019
Trump-Kim summitry a work in progress
Engaging with Kim to establish a working relationship that can greatly reduce the risks of a catastrophic war is a big deal.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 15, 2019
Reasons for cautious optimism in Hanoi
Despite the low odds of success for the second Trump-Kim summit, there is no alternative to diplomacy in the search for peace on the Korean Peninsula.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 7, 2019
America's pullout from the Middle East is overdue
Trump's decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria and reduce forces in Afghanistan has exposed the hollowness of arguments in favor of endless intervention.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 6, 2019
Nuclear arms: A year of living dangerously
U.S. President Donald Trump's disdain for international institutions and rules established him as the disrupter in chief of the global nuclear order.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 25, 2018
Trump abandons the cheese to escape the Syria mousetrap
Western interference has worsened the pathology of broken, corrupt and dysfunctional politics from Afghanistan to North Africa.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 30, 2018
Ghosn a symptom of broken global capitalism
There hasn't been a more exciting time to be a critic of the 'greed is good' philosophy of the corporate sector led by self-centric rock-star CEOs.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 15, 2018
Sino-U.S. clash is a great power competition, not 'Cold War II'
The Cold War metaphor is structurally flawed and carries the operational danger of heightening tensions and provoking a very hot war.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 1, 2018
President Moon Jae-in is driving the Korea peace train
Moon's dogged optimism and Trump's unconventional diplomacy might be just the synergetic mix required to shake things up.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 13, 2018
Why Serena Williams owes a triple apology
Serena Williams was the perpetrator, not the victim, of unprovoked abuse in last Saturday's U.S. Open final against Naomi Osaka.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 4, 2018
Use the moral authority of Hiroshima
Geopolitical tensions have spiked across the world. No arms control negotiations are currently under way to reduce global nuclear stockpiles.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Aug 5, 2018
Japan's nuclear options
Signing the treaty banning nuclear weapons would put Japan on the right side of history, geography, legality, morality and humanity.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jul 9, 2018
The Quad isn't a knight in shining armor to slay the dragon
Instead of trying to counterbalance China through a collective defense pact, the Quad four should build an informal security architecture.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 17, 2018
The Kim-Trump summit: the good, the bad and the ugly
Despite praise for last week's 'unprecedented' summit, there were good reasons why previous U.S. administrations had refused multiple requests from North Korean leaders to meet.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 31, 2018
Did John Bolton try to sink the Trump-Kim summit?
U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton detests professional diplomats as gutless appeasers, and has yet to meet an arms control agreement he likes or a crisis that cannot be solved by bombing the enemy.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
May 10, 2018
Trump is master of the art of making America grate
The U.S. president's decision to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal will worsen ties with Europe, destabilize the Mideast and complicate efforts to reverse North Korea's nuclearization.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
May 1, 2018
Spring blossoms on the Korean Peninsula
The belief that the Kim-Trump summit will produce a definitive resolution rests on irrational exuberance.

Longform

Rows of irises resemble a rice field at the Peter Walker-designed Toyota Municipal Museum of Art.
The 'outsiders' creating some of Japan's greenest spaces