Rebuild China With an Olympic Amnesty

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

A Civil Society Emerges From the Earthquake Rubble

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

China's High Schoolers: Pro‐American Consumers or Nationalists?

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

Tibetans Are Looking to the Post‐Olympic Era

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

China's Youth: Ravenous for the West,With No Memory of the Past

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

Do Human Rights Require a Strong State?

Will China's authoritarian leaders succeed in building a future by erasing the past? Can the ideology of “nationalist consumerism” obliterate memory altogether? Will the Olympic applause drown out the weak and exiled witnesses of the Tiananmen crackdown? In this section we listen to a key Tiananmen student leader two decades on as well as check in with today's young elites in Beijing. A political leader from the reformist regime in 1989 calls for justice from house arrest and a young Chinese novelist wonders what kind of identity is possible without memory.     

Obama,Reagan and Zero Nukes

Is President Barack Obama's proposal for zero nuclear weapons realistic? Will it make the world more secure, or more prone to wars since they are no longer unthinkable? To evaluate this bold strategic initiative, we have invited comments from two former US secretaries of state, a former director of the CIA and the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency who led the hunt for Saddam's non‐existent weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the Iraq war.     

A Season for Disarmament

Is President Barack Obama's proposal for zero nuclear weapons realistic? Will it make the world more secure, or more prone to wars since they are no longer unthinkable? To evaluate this bold strategic initiative, we have invited comments from two former US secretaries of state, a former director of the CIA and the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency who led the hunt for Saddam's non‐existent weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the Iraq war.     

Obama Plan May Spur Proliferation

Is President Barack Obama's proposal for zero nuclear weapons realistic? Will it make the world more secure, or more prone to wars since they are no longer unthinkable? To evaluate this bold strategic initiative, we have invited comments from two former US secretaries of state, a former director of the CIA and the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency who led the hunt for Saddam's non‐existent weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the Iraq war.     

Better to Remain Ambiguous on Nukes

Is President Barack Obama's proposal for zero nuclear weapons realistic? Will it make the world more secure, or more prone to wars since they are no longer unthinkable? To evaluate this bold strategic initiative, we have invited comments from two former US secretaries of state, a former director of the CIA and the former head of the International Atomic Energy Agency who led the hunt for Saddam's non‐existent weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the Iraq war.     

Why China Won't Follow Arab Revolt

Do China's mandarins have anything to fear from the winds of freedom that have blown away Arab autocrats? The short answer is no—for now. The Chinese government has performed for its people, lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty during the same length of time Hosni Mubarak reigned in Egypt. Though many in the West would like to think so, it is not likely that the rising middle class in China will one day also fill Tiananmen Square in protest. In the immediate future, the chaos and economic drift that will now engulf the liberated Middle East will remind them again that China was right not to go down the path of Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika in Russia. And it is not as if they will have a chance. The authorities are determined never to allow any two people who vent virtually on the Net to meet in the street. In this section, we discuss the impact of the Arab revolt—and lack of it—on China's system of governance.     

China's “Color Revolution” Is Red

Do China's mandarins have anything to fear from the winds of freedom that have blown away Arab autocrats? The short answer is no—for now. The Chinese government has performed for its people, lifting hundreds of millions out of poverty during the same length of time Hosni Mubarak reigned in Egypt. Though many in the West would like to think so, it is not likely that the rising middle class in China will one day also fill Tiananmen Square in protest. In the immediate future, the chaos and economic drift that will now engulf the liberated Middle East will remind them again that China was right not to go down the path of Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika in Russia. And it is not as if they will have a chance. The authorities are determined never to allow any two people who vent virtually on the Net to meet in the street. In this section, we discuss the impact of the Arab revolt—and lack of it—on China's system of governance.     

When Western Interests Trump Values

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

China and the Rest Are Only Joining the American‐Built Order

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

Is Japan Closer to the West Than Turkey?

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

Here Comes the Second World

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

The Coming Battle of the Atlantic: Euro vs. the Dollar

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

Facing a Post‐American World

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

Be Wary of Asian Triumphalism

American‐led globalization has enabled the third great powershift of the last five hundred years—the “rise of the rest” following on the rise of the West and then the rise of the US as the dominant power in the West. When China, India, Brazil, Turkey and the rest sit at the table of global power with the West what will the world order look like? Will it be post‐American? Will it be culturally non‐Western, but play by the same rules of an open international order laid down by the American's after World War II? In the following pages, leading American and Asian intellectuals ponder these questions.     

Crescent and Sword: The Hamas enigma

This article analyses the popular support for Hamas, the most important of the Palestinian Islamist movements today and charts the movement's historical ascendancy from a fringe Gaza-based group to a mainstream Islamist movement and mouthpiece for dispossessed Palestinians. Since 2001 Hamas's leadership has come under increasing attack from Israel, which has killed a number of the movement's leaders and senior members, most prominently Sheikh Yasin, the movement's founder and spiritual leader, and his successor as Hamas leader, Abd al-Aziz Rantissi. Nonetheless, Hamas's duality as ‘worshippers’ and ‘warmongers’ has made the organisation extraordinarily popular among dispossessed Palestinians and has created a mounting political challenge to the secular nationalism of the plo. At present two-thirds of the Palestinians live below the ‘poverty line’ and it is likely that it is in this disenfranchised segment of the population that Hamas finds its core support. About one in every six Palestinians in the Occupied Territories benefits from support from Islamic charities. Hamas, for its part, allocates almost all its revenues to its social services, but there is no evidence that Hamas or the other Islamic charities provide assistance conditional upon political support.