China & Taiwan

Taiwan and the WHO in 2020: A Novel Virus and Viral Politics

The World Health Assembly (WHA)—the annual plenary session of the 194 members of the World Health Organization (WHO)—convenes on May 18, 2020. The perennial question of Taiwan’s participation and access has again become especially prominent and contentious, largely because...

Read more »

The Swiss Model vs. Swedish Model in Dealing with China

Do you want to know how Beijing would like Europe to act? Take a look at Switzerland. Switzerland and China have been close for decades. It was the first Western nation to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic...

Read more »

Pursuing Politics through Legal Means: U.S. Efforts to Hold China Responsible for COVID-19

Attempts in the United States to use legal means to hold the People’s Republic of China responsible for its role in novel coronavirus-linked harms are legally flawed and politically fraught. So far, they have taken several forms, each problematic...

Read more »

Still First to Fight? Shaping the 21st Century Marine Corps

The headline in the New York Times on June 1, 1918, read “Marines – First to Fight.” The day before, a brigade of Marines attached to the U.S. Army’s 2nd Division had raced to the Western Front to halt...

Read more »

Beyond COVID-19, Part 11: Political Shake-up in Ukraine and Baseball Returns in Asia

Congratulations to our readers: you made it to May! Celebrate the small victories, and do something special for yourself today (aside from reading today’s titillating conversation, of course). Some states are beginning a slow re-opening, but please continue to...

Read more »

The Dominance of the U.S. Dollar During the COVID-19 Pandemic

There have been few “winners” from the coronavirus crisis, but one stands out: the U.S. dollar. As investors realized earlier this year the size of the economic shock that COVID-19 would cause, they sold riskier assets like stocks and...

Read more »

An Illiberal Plague

COVID-19 is much more than a public health or economic nightmare. The virus has transformed society all over the world and triggered rapid political change, some of which may go unnoticed. As people struggle to adapt to stay-at-home orders...

Read more »

What Role Does the Intelligence Community Play in a Pandemic?

Many questions remain about the precise source of the novel coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19), and yet there is one thing of which we can all be certain: there will soon be a collective rush to identify those responsible for our...

Read more »

Lack of Demand: The Coronavirus Pandemic and China’s Belt and Road Initiative

The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), which arose in China and swept around the globe, has devastated the lives of hundreds of thousands. But however large the health impact of COVID-19 ultimately is, hundreds of millions more have already...

Read more »

Beyond COVID-19, Part 9: Space Launches and Growing Authoritarian Crackdowns

The end of April is in sight. Most of us have been working from home and living under quarantine and social distancing policies for six weeks now, but somehow, April’s almost over. Some misguided individuals are now protesting to...

Read more »