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COMMENTARY / World

Sep 20, 2009

Putin's preferred memory of World War II

By Alexander Etkind

CAMBRIDGE, England — Soviet ideology was always about the future. By contrast, today's official Russian ideology seems to be focused squarely on the past.

COMMENTARY

Sep 20, 2009

Divining Japan's new leadership amid the expectations of change

By Hugh Cortazzi

LONDON — On a recent visit to France, I was frequently asked about the results of the Japanese election. Did the results mean that Japan was really changing? Would the new Japanese government increase Japan's influence in the world?

COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT

Sep 20, 2009

Now suicide has become a political issue, how will Japan address it?

By Roger Pulvers

Without a doubt the grimmest statistic coming out of Japan today concerns the number of suicides, which have exceeded 30,000 annually for 11 years in a row — engendering indescribable tragedies for so many families.

COMMENTARY

Sep 19, 2009

Colombo risks squandering Sri Lanka's hard-won peace

By Brahma Chellaney

If Sri Lanka is to become a tropical paradise again, it must build enduring peace. This will only occur through genuine interethnic equality, and a transition from being a unitary state to being a federation that grants provincial and local autonomy.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 18, 2009

Japan's harmonious drift

By Guy Sorman

PARIS — Forget what you have heard about the hardworking Japanese salaryman: Since the early 1990s, the Japanese have slackened their work habits.

COMMENTARY

Sep 18, 2009

Competing northern passages

By Gwynne Dyer

LONDON — Early next week two German-owned container ships will arrive in Rotterdam from Vladivostok in the Russian Far East, having taken only one month to make the voyage. That's much faster than usual — but then they didn't take the usual route down through the South China Sea, past Singapore,...

COMMENTARY

Sep 18, 2009

Beijing's 'internal affairs'

By Frank Ching

HONG KONG — Ever since the 1950s, China has subscribed to the principle of noninterference in the internal affairs of other countries, which was first written into a treaty that it signed with India in 1954. China has loudly upheld this principle and criticized those who, in Beijing's view, interfere...

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 18, 2009

Economists banked too much on rationality

By Robert J. Shiller

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — The widespread failure of economists to forecast the financial crisis that erupted in 2008 has much to do with faulty models, which meant that economic policymakers and central bankers got no warning of what was to come.

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 17, 2009

With Chen behind bars, Taiwan set to heal

By Sin-ming Shaw

BANGKOK — Last week, a Taiwanese court sentenced Chen Shui-bian, Taiwan's president from 2000 until 2008, to life in prison for corruption. Chen had embezzled millions of dollars of public funds. He did not act alone. His wife, children and other relatives all helped to hide the stolen loot in overseas...

COMMENTARY / World

Sep 17, 2009

Foreign policy and the democratic paradox

By Dominique Moisi

PARIS — Elections stolen in Iran, disputed in Afghanistan and caricatured in Gabon: Recent ballots in these and many other countries do not so much mark the global advance of democracy as demonstrate the absence of the rule of law.

COMMENTARY

Sep 16, 2009

Mounting Afghan follies give U.S. a way out

By Gwynne Dyer

Maybe it's the relatively thin air up on those high plateaus that makes them foolish. First, ballot fraud apparently helped Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who would probably have won the second round in the presidential election in Iran anyway, to win in the first round and avoid a runoff. The incredible voting...

COMMENTARY

Sep 16, 2009

Back to Earth with the DPJ

By Brad Glosserman

The wave of hysteria that greeted the victory of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) in parliamentary elections last month has receded. The win doesn't signal the end of the U.S.-Japan alliance, nor does it necessarily imply a rough patch for bilateral ties. In fact, domestic rather than foreign policies...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.

What comes after 100?

By Tomoko Otake

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

Looking ahead to Yokohama’s Green × Expo 2027

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