The problem is: Indian foreign policy still is – beyond comprehension – influentially, if not largely,  wedded to the banner slogan “uphold high morality”. That was one of the reasons post independence, Jawaharlal Nehru confidently walked India into non-aligned movement during cold war as he though it was not good to align with either the US or the Soviets. Of course neutrality matters; it helped few European countries. However, this failed policy of Nehru even today influences the Indian foreign affairs establishment – i.e. to only think in terms of being pro-someone/anti-someone or neutral (unlike these select few European countries, Nehru made indefinable moral grounds as the anchor). Ironically, it ignores how such “real neutral” countries have, in a way, built their economies by selling arms and/or protecting inbound “savings” money that particularly fuel violent conflicts across the globe and/or help perpetuate corruption by providing safe havens for “safe banking”, all in the name of being neutral. At least, such countries thrive [at least in the past] economically by providing phenomenal socioeconomic structures for their citizens; for what reason does India “uphold high morality”, I wonder. Even worse, few among these few neutral countries claim (not restricted to Europe):

Distinguished professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Joseph Nye talks about South Korea’s future direction lies ahead

South Korea has turned into an important middle-ranking power in global affairs.  World sees Korea discount now changing to  Korea premium. Having seen South Korea as the 13th national power country amongst G-20 evaluated by the Hansun Foundation, Not just hard power, soft power also has been being improved.  Professor Joseph emphasized the importance of strengthening soft power. He said now it’s time for Korea to jump up with more strengthened sophisticated and efficient soft power, such as ODA or successful democratic political system, etc.     See more from scmp.com

This May’s issue of the International Journal of Cultural Policy is entirely devoted to so-called “implicit” cultural policies. Heading it up is a fine paper by one of the special issue’s editors, Jeremy Ahearne, entitled “Cultural Policy Explicit and Implicit: A Distinction and Some Uses.” [Volume 15, Number 2, May 2009 , pp. 141-153]. I even found a link to it, so you can read it here.

Ahearne picks apart one of the key features of the cultural policy landscape, which is that what governments call “cultural policy” has very little to do with many of the most important policy decisions taken about culture,  and the fundamentally cultural nature of so much government activity. After all, Ahearne remarks, it is easy to see that “appearance-management [is] as an essential task in the preservation of political power.” Citing one of Geoff Mulgan’s early books (and I found Mulgan’s Good and Bad Power one of the best contemporary explorations of pragmatic political philosophy), he points out that:

Geoff Mulgan and Ken Worpole alerted us long ago to the fact that the cultural policies doing most to shape national cultures were not being framed within bespoke government departments but in the boardrooms of powerful transnational commercial organisations such as (in the 1980s) Virgin, News International or Benetton (Mulgan and Worpole 1986, p. 9).

He goes on to look at some of the “soft power” ideas of Joseph Nye, whose belief in the strategic and geopolitical imperatives of US interests led him to argue for such state-sponsored communication policies as Voice of America, and then examines the French cultural policy ideas of Regis Debray such as “laicity.”  All in all, it’s a thoughtful and intersting exploration of a oft-remarke3d but little-studied disjunction in the cultural policy debate. As Ahearne concludes:

The purpose of this article has been to open up rather than close down perspectives. For some readers, I am sure that I will have opened things up too widely, and thrown cultural policy studies way beyond its historically legitimate expertise in arts subsidy and regulation. But as is well known, ‘culture’ is not synonymous with ‘the arts’ (why have two words for the same thing?). And the name of our discipline invites us to explore those areas where policies (strategic courses of action) and cultures (embodied systems of attitudes and values) collide and intersect, whether or not these or other terms are used to describe and to mask the processes involved.

1. Iraq Shiite leader reaches out to political rivals: AP

2. Soldier’s Service Leads to a Custody Battle at Home, New York Times

3. Putting Leadership in Words, Joe Nye. Globe & Mail

4. Be Like Bush, Robert Kaplan. Atlantic Monthly

5. Ghosts on the Front, New York Times

Before new student orientation on August 18, all Public Diplomacy students must read “Soft Power: the Means to Success in World Politics” by Joseph Nye. Since I can’t get away with reading on the job, I’ve turned to youtube, which has a wealth of videos featuring Dr. Nye.

Joseph Nye on soft power
Soft power skills
Soft Power (1/2)
Soft Power (2/2)

There’s more to find, but this will get you started.

Image from: http://laatste.info/bb/printview.php?t=902&start=0

Songs about a Young Hero

What is it about Japanese anime that charms young people all over the world? “Songs about a young hero’s experience of growing up, of justice that others can relate to and cooperation among friends and companions — there’s something very cool about that sort of worldview,” says Ricardo Cruz, 27, a Brazilian-born member of JAM, himself an anime enthusiast.

Soft Power

“Soft power” is the ability to bring about a favorable result not through the power of coercion or compensation, but rather through attraction. A theory put forth by Harvard University Prof. Joseph Nye, it is defined as diplomatic power that can overcome the limitations of military and economic might, otherwise known as “hard power.” Japanese anime, special effects, manga and fashion are typical forms of soft power.

Downplaying Manga Diplomacy

It has only been in the last few years that the Foreign Ministry has acknowledged the soft power of manga and anime, actively employing them in its public diplomacy efforts. While Yasushi Watanabe, an American studies professor at Keio University, remains cautious, saying, “Anime and manga are mere hooks into soft power, just as small energy-conservation efforts and recycling (are hooks into environmentalism). Foisting (cultural products) onto others could lead to accusations of cultural invasion.”

‘Soft power’ of manga, anime winning fans the world over, Mainichi, June 29, 2009

Ten days have passed since the Iranian election. And still, many persist in perpetuating the notion that — somehow — America has something to do with it. Part of this is a product of the nature of our media; the need to localize stories, even foreign ones, has framed much of the Iran happenings in terms of their relationship to America. But I suspect it stems more from American importance as the de facto hegemon in global politics. (Notice I didn’t say self-perceived importance; I do think America’s influence is both real and powerful in the global scheme. In a lot of ways, most everything does come back to the U.S. I’m just not sure if the stirrings of revolution in Iran do to the extent many think.)

The usually impeccable Economist even falls into the trap, asking foreign policy giant Joseph Nye in a recent Q&A, “It seems that Barack Obama has been somewhat successful in exporting hope and optimism to Iran. But if Mahmoud Ahmadinejad retains power, has Iran’s election shown up the limits of soft power?”

Nye avoids the broader implications of the question and steers the conversation to the subject of Obama’s ability to influence Iranian leadership. But to me, this question would seem to imply that Ahmadinejad’s likely rise to a second term would somehow reflect poorly on “soft power” (carrots rather than sticks, in short) as though Obama had been actively trying to convince the Iranian people to elect Mousavi. Or, for that matter, as though the Iranian people care deeply enough about an American president to alter their domestic political preferences. This may have been intended as a throw-away question to steer Nye to apply soft power to a current topic, but it stood out to me as one of many examples of journalists mistakenly inserting America as a salient issue in the Iranian election.

Many news outlets, including the New York Times and Christian Science Monitor, reported that this election hinged largely on the economy, while still clinging to the idea that somehow the election of Mousavi was a referendum on Ahmadinejad’s aggressive relations with the West. The Monitor also conceded that there’s little reason to expect change in Iran’s nuclear policies with Mousavi at the helm, given that his stint as Prime Minister coincided with the nuclear program’s inception. Furthermore, an Iranian opinion poll (pdf) taken in May showed that 52 percent of Iranians favor the development of nuclear weapons, while a whopping 94 percent want to pursue nuclear energy.

Obama’s Response

Connected to all of this is the notion that Obama needs to take a hardline stance in defense of the aggrieved. The Economist reports:

THE House of Representatives was the site of some fascinating realpolitik today, after Mike Pence, a Republican congressman from Indiana, got Howard Berman, the Democratic chairman of the foreign relations committee, to endorse a resolution expressing solidarity with the Iranian opposition.

…

The debate over the resolution was schizophrenic: Democrats defended the president’s policy of soft statements about Iran, while Republicans accused the president of being “silent and confused” (Lincoln Diaz-Balart of Florida), of failing to live up to Ronald Reagan’s example (Dana Rohrabacher of California), of dodging the “moral responsibility to speak out on behalf of the protection of human rights” (Eric Cantor of Virginia) and, in general, of not worrying enough about Iran’s nuclear programme. Democrats, somewhat flustered, defended the president and moved to a vote.

Over at the Washington Post, Charles Krauthammer joins his elected brethren in this line of criticism.

And where is our president? Afraid of “meddling.” Afraid to take sides between the head-breaking, women-shackling exporters of terror — and the people in the street yearning to breathe free. This from a president who fancies himself the restorer of America’s moral standing in the world.

On the other side, the primary defense of the president’s lack of chutzpah in this situation has been the idea that his expressing support for Iran could undermine the movement. An Iranian American journalist at The Daily Beast (which I cringe at linking to, because of its tabloid-y style) reports:

My older relatives fretted particularly that any real criticism by the United States would be used as a pretext by Ahmadinejad to blame the protests on “outside enemies,” a reflexive response for the president when dealing with even housing inflation and the rising price of tomatoes.

This seems a particularly salient point when considering the things Ahmadinejad and the Supreme Leader have been saying of late, via Juan Cole here and here:

Ahmadinejad called the opposition as a bunch of insignificant dirt who try to make the taste of victory bitter to the nation. He also called the western leaders as a bunch of ‘filthy homosexuals.’

…

Khamenei’s speech on Friday underlined that Iran was under siege from abroad. He implied that Britain and the United States were sponsoring counter-revolutionary fifth columns aimed at overthrowing the regime.

So while there’s certainly evidence backing that particular argument, I think the more important guiding factor in Obama’s restraint is a purely practical one. Ahmadinejad is probably going to win this election, and even if he doesn’t, Obama would do himself no favors by angering the Supreme Leader. These are almost certainly the people he’ll be facing at the negotiating table for the next three plus years.

I’m not saying that a stronger Washington response couldn’t be among the potential desirables in this scenario. But let’s not pretend that Obama’s silence is indefensible or somehow morally reprehensible. For better or worse, morality sometimes takes a back seat to diplomacy. The same considerations do not extend to the media however, and I should say that they’ve done a great job of fulfilling their own responsibilities as human rights advocate. While I think there have been some liberties taken in analyzing the election, overall the media — mainstream and otherwise — have performed superbly despite Iranian interference.

I’ll close with this number from those Iranian opinion polls mentioned earlier: 77 percent favored a system in which the Supreme Leader would be democratically elected. If there’s one conclusion we can definitively reach, it’s that Iran’s people really do like democracy. It’s a shame the country is lacking the institutions that make it sustainable.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies, a US think tank, recently released a report on China’s soft power. Soft power is obtaining what you want through co-option and attraction rather than coercion and payment. The theory was developed by Harvard Joseph Nye who speaks highly of China’s development of its soft power.

Professor Joseph Nye says the growth of China’s soft power in recent years is impressive. He says a further increase of the country’s use of soft power requires continued and enhanced opening to the outside world and integration into the global system.

This March, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, released a report on how China has developed its soft power in recent years. Joseph Nye, a co-founder of the think tank believes the US should draw some inspirations from China’s remarkable progress in the area. He expects greater development of soft power in China as the country carries on with the Harmonious Society strategy.

Source : CCTV

Statement before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – 24/04/08

Richard L. Armitage, President, Armitage International
Dr. Joseph S. Nye, Jr., Distinguished Service Professor, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University

Mr. Chairman,

We would like to thank you and your distinguished colleagues on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for the invitation to speak today on the subject of, “Implementing Smart Power: Setting an Agenda for National Security Reform.”

As you know, we are co-chairs of CSIS’s Commission on Smart Power, a bipartisan Commission that included one of your fellow Committee members, Senator Chuck Hagel, as well as Senator Jack Reed and two distinguished members of the House of Representatives. CSIS’s President and CEO John Hamre asked the two of us to form this Commission in late 2006, and the Commission released its findings on November 7, 2007. It is our privilege to sit before you today to provide our thoughts on implementing a Smart Power agenda in the months and years ahead.

Smart Power: The Big Idea
Mr. Chairman, as you know, your committee held a hearing on Smart Power in March of this year, receiving testimony from Admiral Leighton Smith and General Tony Zinni, who is also a member of our Commission. Admiral Smith and General Zinni spoke on behalf of 52 retired generals and admirals who are backing the idea of Smart Power, organized by the Center for U.S. Global Engagement. The pair did an excellent job of explaining Smart Power, so we do not want to spend too much time here on what you already know. But please allow us to briefly explain how we came to this idea.

The two of us—one Democrat and one Republican—have devoted our lives to promoting America’s preeminence as a force for good in the world. What we have seen recently, however, is that too many people around the globe are questioning America’s values, commitment, and competence.
Two decades ago, the conventional wisdom was that the United States was in decline, suffering from “imperial overstretch.” A decade later, with the end of the Cold War, the new conventional wisdom was that the world was a unipolar American hegemony. Today, we need a renewed understanding of the strength and limits of American power.

La suite sur http://foreign.senate.gov

Source : Boston Globe

By Joseph S. Nye Jr.

August 19, 2006

IN TRADITIONAL international conflicts, the side with the stronger military force tended to win. In today’s information age, it is often the party with the stronger story that wins.

Thus in addition to their shooting and killing, Israel and Hezbollah are struggling to shape the narrative that will prevail as the fighting stops. They are locked in a struggle over soft power — the ability to get what you want by attraction rather than coercion.

The ability to combine hard and soft power into a winning strategy is smart power and, thus far, Hezbollah seems ahead on that score. All that Hezbollah needs to win is not to lose, and to be able to tell the story that it was the only Muslim force brave enough to stand up to Israel.

Sadly, the struggle over soft power did not have to turn out this way. When Hezbollah kidnapped Israeli soldiers and launched rockets across the border, the actions were condemned by many Lebanese and criticized by Sunni Arab governments such as Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia. Today that public criticism has vanished, and Hezbollah is lauded for resisting Israel.

Lire la suite sur le site du Boston Globe

Source : www.nonfiction.fr

janvier 2008

A l’approche des élections présidentielles américaines, de plus en plus d’intellectuels ressentent le besoin de redéfinir le sens de l’engagement des Etats-Unis dans le monde. L’exercice, nécessaire, peut sembler présomptueux tant le pays a besoin de solutions concrètes et immédiates face aux crises rencontrées actuellement, plutôt que d’une série de leçons professorales. C’est ce que Joseph Nye, professeur de Relations internationales à Harvard, essaye pourtant de faire dans le cadre du prestigieux think tank CSIS, qui a lancé en novembre 2007 un comité baptisé “Commission on Smart Power“  et un rapport relativement médiatisé. Il le co-préside avec Richard Armitage, grande figure de l’Administration Bush et proche de Colin Powell, dans un esprit bipartisan avoué. Reste à savoir si ce rassemblement de Démocrates et de Républicains apporte réellement de nouvelles idées, de nouvelles solutions précises aux tensions actuelles.

Lancée au début des années 90 dans Bound to lead , Nye renonce aujourd’hui symboliquement à sa célèbre formule “soft power” (puissance douce); disons plutôt qu’il la troque pour un autre adjectif, “smart“, dont la subjectivité laisse sceptique dans un premier temps, mais qui a le mérite de redire avec plus de clarté ce que le professeur affirme depuis maintenant 18 ans : les Etats-Unis ont besoin d’un nouvel équilibre entre leur appareil militaire (son utilisation comme son poids institutionnel et budgétaire) et leur force d’attraction, qui doit l’essentiel à son appareil diplomatique et à son attitude sur la scène internationale. Les auteurs du récent rapport abondent dans ce sens lorsqu’ils parlent d’une augmentation du budget du Département d’Etat, de celui de l’Agence pour le Développement International ou d’un doublement du financement des bourses et échanges Fulbright. Le consensus est en effet large sur cette question de la transformation de la diplomatie américaine – il est d’ailleurs pertinent.

Lire la suite sur Nonfiction

El mundo hiperconectado por Internet, las redes sociales y las nuevas tecnologías redefine el poder.  Las nuevas formas de poder requieren estilos diferentes de dirección y acción.

 Joseph Nye, Politólogo de la Universidad de Harvard y director del Consejo de Inteligencia Nacional durante la primera administración de Clinton invita a pensar la relación de las redes con el poder y plantea la idea de “soft power” en un artículo publicado por el Diario El País de hoy.

De forma sintética, el “Poder Blando” se refiere a cómo influir en los demás para conseguir que hagan lo que uno quiere que hagan pero valiéndose de medios culturales e ideológicos en contraposición al poder duro que utiliza formas coercitivas como la acción militar o la presión económica. 

Destaco algunas ideas principales del artículo:

1. “La Información crea poder y en la actualidad hay mas personas que tienen mas información que ningún otro momento de la historia”.
2. Las jerarquías se están volviendo más horizontales. Las instituciones y los dirigentes tradicionales pierden poder mediadora ante las nuevas tecnologías que socializan y democratizan los procesos políticos y Sociales.
3. Las redes débiles que se promueven a través de Internet son uno de los “factores aglutinantes de las sociedades diversas” por tener una mayor extensión, aportar información más novedosa, innovadora y no redundante.

Invito a seguir leyendo “Nuevos escenarios que plantea Internet para la acción política” en una clase especial en la Universidad San Andrés.

From 7:02 – 7:21

“We must use what has been called smart power. The full range of tools at our disposal: diplomatic, economic, military, political, legal and cultural. Picking the right tool or combination of tools for each situation. With smart power, diplomacy will be the vanguard of our foriegn policy.”

That sounds kind of familiar:

“An emergent theory of warfare premised upon manipulation of multiple economic, political, social and military forces in multiple domains to effect positional changes in systems and achieve a consilience of effects to leverage a specific goal or set of circumstances.”

So what is smart power? According to Joseph Nye; “Smart power is the combination of hard and soft power. Soft power is the ability to get what you want through attraction rather than coercion or payments.”

I see smart power as using the right combination of kinetic and non-kinetic force. More specifically, having the most effective combination of doctrines at the tactical, operational, strategic and grand strategic levels of the use of Force, in order to most effectively accomplish a desired goal or circumstance.

As U.S. Vice-President elect Sen. Joe Biden wraps-up his visit to Afghanistan, western writers are processing the visit with a spin towards Soft Power, and the influence of a new administration on an over militarized U.S. foreign policy.

In the face of international spin, Biden and the new crew are still non-committal on specific plans. But it’s clear, a different approach is on its way.

Sen. and Vice President Elect Joe Biden visits troops and officials in Afghanistan this week, signalling the administration's pivoting focus on Afghanistan.

By year’s end, there will be an expected 50,000 U.S. Troops in Afghanistan, a number emerging days after the Taliban launched an unusual attack on Pakistani targets, motivated, in our view, by Pakistan’s decision to re-open the Khyber pass (a decision we posted on here.) The pass is a key supply route for U.S. troops and a strong regional trade network. It’s also smack-dab in the middle of Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled northwest province, known as Waziristan. It’s like Asia’s South Central L.A., but with no police and bigger mountains. Osama is there too.

Julian Barnes, of the LA Times, posits the key dilema in Afghanistan as a matter of deciding between securing the border and key geographical points like the Khyber to create stability. Or, on the other hand, taking the choice to secure the population, like we’ve tried in Iraq. Read today’s piece here.

We here in Mountain Country think trade is the most vital element to securing Afghanistan and getting people to come out of their holes and start living again. We say this because we are believers in the Cooperationist brand of international theory. It’s also a role the Country’s geographical position favors, and could help create stability well-beyond the Afghan border if done correctly, like with secure railroads, paved roads, and electrical grids. You know, schools would be good too. Mariam Nawabi, an Attache with the Afghan Embassy wrote a short analysis on Afghanistan’s trade routes, here. Her assessment is geared more toward contemporary analysis, and might make it easy to forget Afghanistan’s role throughout world history has been as a key transit point between European, Arabian, and Asian markets.

That’s why so many nations have tried to control it throughout history. As the fabled British Geographer, Halford Mackinder posited with such geopolitical insight, “They who control the heart of the Eurasian continent, can command the world’s largest island. They who control the world’s largest island, control the world.”

Easier said than done.

[Persians, Romans, Soviets, Chinese, Mongols, Turks, Nazis, U.S. Troops, and Al-Qaeda leadership all nod in agreement as author types. The Taliban simply moan... knowing their time is coming too.]

British Geographer Halford Mackinder thought controlling the Eurasian Heartland relied on a region he called the "Pivot" shown here. It begins, surprise surpise, in Afghanistan. We think it begins with trade, not tanks.

We think the key to controlling Afghanistan is to let it control itself. Give it the commercial infrastructure to rely on centuries-old trading routes and equally dated nomadic and farming practices, and the country will fuel its own growth, instead of sulking around on the only market protected by the Taliban: Opium. The U.S. Dept. of Commerce gets its, but just not enough funding. Here’s their approach. Many others, including the OSCE are of this persuasion as well.

Let’s hope Washington is listening.

After much speculation, President-elect Barack Obama has at last announced the personnel for his Asia policy team. At first glance, the line-up is ripe with liberal think-tankers and academics, many of whom are unknown beyond the ever-so insular world of Asia policy wonks. To ease this personnel shift, I have done my best in this post to consolidate biographical info. for the major players below, with the hope that readers can familiarize themselves with the long list of names they are soon to read oh so much about.

First, the regional personnel line ups, done by country:

The Japan team, according to Chris Nelson’s eponymous publication, the Nelson Report (quoted liberally below), is to be supervised by Michael Schiffer. This group includes former National Security Council economics adviser Matt Goodman and Derek Mitchell, the head of the International Security Program at CSIS. A cadre of academics have also been tapped to advise the group including Columbia’s Carol Gluck, George Washington’s Amy Searight, Columbia’s Gerry Curtis, and Skipp Orr. Jospeh Nye will take over as Ambassador of Japan.

The much awaited announcement of the Japan team has no doubt relieved a number of policymakers in Tokyo worried about the prospect of a new set of pro-China US Japan hands and a crusty US-Japan alliance. The Japanese media has thus far praised the selection of Nye as Ambassador and seems generally pleased with the familiarity of the Obama roster.

The Korea team’s point man will be Frank Jannuzi, formerly an adviser to Vice President-elect Biden and the top Democrat Asia adviser to the House Foreign Relations Committee. (For a great look at Jannuzi at work see him here at the Asia Policy Debate in September.) Gordon Flake of the Mansfield Center will work with former Ambassador Tom Hubbard and former President of The Korea Society, Tom Gregg.

The China Team will be run directly by Jeffrey Bader, an eminent China specialist, who will take over the helm at the NSC. Bader started his political tenure at the Department of State under Jimmy Carter, helping then Assistant Secretary Holbrooke “navigate Congressional waters.” His long Asia experience includes postings at USTR and the NSC. Major assistance will come from Richard Bush, former President of the American Institute in Taiwan and current head honcho at the Brookings Institution. Other prominent players include “Ken Lieberthal, formerly of the NSC; Mike Lampton, at SAIS; Evan Medeiros, at RAND again; Bob Kapp, former president of the US-China Business Council; Kevin Nealer, The Scowcroft Group; Bob Suettinger, former NSC and CIA now consultant.”

Now to the individual movers and shakers, the so-called “high appointments”:

Harvard professor Kurt Campell was announced to replace Christopher Hill as Assistant Secretary of State for Asia, an unsurprising pick given his connections to Hillary Clinton. This does, however, come as a shock to many of the political players “who had assumed that he would go back to DOD.” Previously at the DOD, Campbell helped “raise the department’s foreign policy profile and was deeply involved in the initial stages of re-defining the US-Japan strategic relationship – in particular the Okinawa/Futenma relocation problem.” Of tremendous importance to Asia is the appointment of Under Secretary of State Economics Advisor, who is coincidentally Lael Brainard, Kurt Campbell’s wife.

Wallace Gregson, a former Marine General, will take over Asia policy at the pentagon.

Deputy Secretary of State will be Jim Steinberg, long experienced in East Asia issues, especially China policy; Deputy Secretary of the DOD will be Bill Lynn, “a proven adult supervisor of finance and management.”

A few important players have been given free reign to negotiate policy within broad regional frameworks, bearing the title of Special Envoy. Notably, Richard Holbrooke will be in charge of South Asia (India and Pakistan. In addition, former Albright advisor Wendy Sherman will likely take over the helm of the six party talks with N. Korea as a counselor to all American departments involved.

The appointments adumbrated above are not likely to shake things up; rather, it seems that they will continue much of the policy tracks laid out by the Bush administration. Engagement with China, for better or worse, looms large, as many see  management of US-China policy as the defining policy challenge for the Obama administration. Other potential areas of policy innovation are (in order of likelihood): increased pressure on the six-party talks to see a major turnaround by Japan and China in calling for transparency; a delayed relocation of America’s troop relocation from Okinawa to Gaum; reformed economic policies in Asia may steer regional policy towards further engagement with China. This is, of course, an exercise in conjecture. Who knows what the year of the Ox will hold?

Obama’s mantras of hope and change are about all that the US – and much of the world – clings to in these hard times.  Yet, as Tobias Harris at Observing Japan has aptly observed, “change, it seems, is for matters other than Asia policy.”

It seems that hope, for now, will have to suffice – at lease in Asia.

Israel är ett pyttelitet land, och där finns väldigt lite naturresurser. Golda Meir sade en gång skämtsamt:

Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!

Men Israel är ändå en framgångssaga utan dess like. Judiska Nationalfonden startade strax efter förra sekelskiftet ett enträget arbete som fortfarande pågår. Malariaträsken dränerades. Över 210 miljoner träd har planterats, vilket gör Israel till det enda land i världen vars skogsareal ökade under 1900-talet. Vattenreservoarer och vattenledningar anlades. Idag finns det fiskodlingar i Negevöknen!

Utdikning av träsk vid Ein Harod.

Idag är hitechindustrin Israels stolthet. Israel har 66 företag registrerade på NASDAQ. Hela Europa har 31, inte ens hälften av vad Israel har!

I en tidigare bloggpost berättade Yankele Maman, borgmästare i Kochav Yair:

EU och Sverige genom SIDA och andra organ ger mycket pengar till både israeliska araber och palestinska araber. Utmärkt, det är välbehövligt!, säger han.

Men för allt i världen se till att ni öronmärker era pengar för specifika projekt, kräv insyn och följ sedan upp att allt har förlöpt planenligt. Det är just det som är stötestenen – ni tar stora mängder pengar från era egna skattebetalare och dessa pengar dyker upp här och i PA-området i form av stora lyx-bilar, vapen och antisemitisk propaganda.

Fiskodling i Negevöknen.

En av kandidaterna till premiärministerposten i det stundande valet i Israel, Likuds Benyamin Netanyahu, anser att nyckeln till en framtida fred ligger i ekonomisk utveckling. Har han rätt? Och även om ekonomisk utveckling skulle ge fred – kan man ens åstadkomma ekonomisk utveckling? Betrakta detta lilla citat ur en rapport från United Nations Development Programme, skrivet av Joseph Nye, professor på Harvard:

Half the world’s countries are democracies, yet none of the 22 Arab countries is among them. The UN’s Arab Human Development Report is frank in its criticism of the region’s economic and social progress. Economic growth has been slow, approximately half of all women are illiterate and the region is not well integrated into the world economy. Indeed, with a population of more than 300 million, Arab countries export less to the world, excluding oil and gas, than Finland.

Låt det sjunka in…om man räknar bort de fossila bränslena, så lyckas 300 miljoner araber exportera mindre än vad 5 miljoner finnar exporterar!!! Vad är orsaken? Författaren och journalisten Dr Shaker al-Nabulsi riktade 2004 förödande kritik mot den arabiska mentaliteten:

If the Arabs had today a well-burnished mirror in which they can see themselves, and if they had the requisite courage to look in it, they would be stricken by fear and panic at the sight of themselves. The image [would be] that we have become the most terrorist nation and the greatest spillers of blood in the world in this [current] stage of history in which nations resolve their problems through dialogue, diplomacy, conventions, and through appeal to the world’s better judgment, to public opinion, and to intellectuals, instead of threatening [others] with bloodshed if this or that demand goes unmet… The image is that we have become a nation devoid of reason!
[...]
The Arabs think in a medieval fashion regarding politics, society, the economy, and education, even if [they do this] by way of modern electronics. For their foods and their transportation they make use of the latest in Western science and technology in all of the various fields, but at the same time they think in a medieval fashion and behave in their lives as though they are still living in the Middle Ages, and indeed they are still slaves to a medieval mentality and to thinkers from the Middle Ages…

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Tempura by Orimo

Tempura

Tempura (天ぷら) is a classic Japanese dish of deep fried battered vegetables or seafood. Tempura was introduced to Japan in the mid-sixteenth century by early Portuguese and Spanish missionaries and traders. There is still today a dish in Portugal very similar to tempura called peixinhos da horta, “garden fishies.

Soft Power

Soft power is a term used in international relations theory to describe the ability of a political body, such as a state, to indirectly influence the behavior or interests of other political bodies through cultural or ideological means. The term was first coined by Harvard University professor Joseph Nye, who remains its most prominent proponent, in a 1990 book, Bound to Lead: The Changing Nature of American Power. He further developed the concept in his 2004 book, Soft Power: The Means to Success in World Politics.

(Dr. Nye is the North American chairman of the Trilateral Commission as well as an active member of the Bilderberg Group.)

Cuisine Power

Cuisine power is a term used in international relations theory to describe the ability of a political body, such as a state, to indirectly influence the behavior or interests of other political bodies through food recipes aka Cuisine. The term was first coined by NeoShinka, who remains its first and only proponent, in a 2008 blog post, “My Kingdom For a Tempura Bowl“.

Tabetai kara ;_;