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December 13, 2011 | Germany Should Not Choose Trade Over Human Rights

Franco Pedroni: Germany, like its European partners, is supposed to stand for human rights, freedom, and dignity. But in its trade relationships with a Chinese system that exploits its people and uses them to profit on the world market, it caves to economic pressures and betrays its values.

September 23, 2011 | Why Europe Should Vote 'Yes' on Palestine

Anno Bunnik: On Friday, 193 UN member states formally received Palestine’s request for statehood. This is a bold move with potential to bring about Israeli-Palestinian peace, and one that will impact future strategic relations in the Arab world. The UN should vote in favor of accession.

August 9, 2011 | Ending Hunger Now

Josette Sheeran: We can, in our lifetime, win the battle against hunger because we now have the science, technology, know-how, and the logistics to be able to meet hunger where it comes. Those pictures of children with swollen bellies will be a thing of history.

December 10, 2010 | Transatlantic Leadership by Example: Toward Inclusive Climate Change Policy

Memo 29: The United States and the EU countries need to lead by example on climate change in order to reestablish moral authority. Environmental sustainability should be made part of the criteria for diplomatic relations. An online and democratic global patent pool will enhance technology transfers.

March 16, 2009 | Security is Central to Global Governance

Johannes Gunesch: The lack of a commonly accepted global approach means that alternative regional approaches outside of traditional organizations such as the UN will become more common.

March 16, 2009 | Regional Organizations Will Gain New Powers

Kyle Robert Coppin: In the future, nations will devolve into smaller, homogenous states that are united into regional organizations that take on responsibilities of foreign affairs, national defense, and others.

January 27, 2009 | A Multidimensional Approach for a Planet in Peril

Scott Michael Moore: The complex global environmental challenges of today require a multidimensional approach to environmental governance, one that engages all nations and levels of government and society.

September 1, 2008 | End the Isolation of Secessionist Movements

Judy Fu: The situation in Abkhazia and South Ossetia is a reflection of the sorry state of affairs for millions of people living under unrecognized de facto government or in secessionist territories. There are important lessons to be learned here in the need to engage non-state actors.

May 11, 2009 | Uncontested UNHRC Elections Are Shameful

The United Nation’s election process for the Human Rights Council is a farce with “no opportunity to choose the best” proponents of human rights. ++ Governments seem to have forgotten the commitment made just three years ago to create an organization able to protect victims and confront abuses. ++ Instead they have opted for expediency with uncontested nominations from countries with questionable

February 24, 2009 | Louis Emmerij, United Nations Intellectual History Project

Louis Emmerij founded the United Nations Intellectual History Project together with Richard Jolly and Thomas G. Weiss in 1999. He was President of the OECD Development Center in Paris, Rector of the Institute of Social Studies in The Hague, and Special Advisor to the President of the Inter-American Development Bank in Washington. He was also the Director of the ILO World Employment Programme in

November 10, 2008 | Samiullah Wardak, EC Delegation to Afghanistan

Mr. Samiullah Wardak was born in Kabul in 1976 and migrated to Pakistan at the age of five. In 2002 he returned to Afghanistan where he had been engaged in reintegration and refugee issues. Mr. Wardak has worked as a program administrator for the United Nations Human Settlement Program (2003 - 2004), as a program officer and advisor for the United Nations Development Program (2004 - 2007), and is

October 31, 2008 | The UN: Obama's Money Pit

With its dubiously opaque financial practices, “chronic scandals and tyrant-friendly tilt,” the UN is in dire need of reform. ++ While McCain proposes a League of Democracies to provide competition, Obama wants to impose serious oversight on the UN, although previous attempts at such have fizzled. ++ Along with espousing the Millennium Development Goals, he wants the UN to play a

October 14, 2008 | Education: The Solution to the Environmental Crisis

As the captains of industry continue to rake in profits with the help of bailouts from “government cronies” without a care for the environment, the ecosystem is facing disaster. ++ We live in a “culture of wastefulness,” where a higher standard of living, such as owning a car, often contributes to environmental damage. ++ Education is the solution. ++ The younger generation is more aware of

May 28, 2008 | The League of Democracies is an American Fantasy

The growing popularity of John McCain’s League of Democracies among US voters of both parties should raise concern. ++ In a post-American world peace and prosperity especially require Chinese and Russian cooperation. ++ Democracies would be no less paralysed into inaction than the UN and would further lack international legitimacy for intervention. ++ It is by reforming the

November 12, 2007 | Rising Geopolitical Paradigms Require a Strong and United Western Alliance

As a community based on values, the West must strengthen its cohesiveness in order to grapple with the pace of globalization, and face a geopolitical axis actively shifting toward Asia, argues Stephen Szabo, executive director of the Transatlantic Academy, which is a partnership between the German Marshall Fund and the Bucerius Zeit Stiftung.

A division of the West could prove