Brookings India is launching a report on “Reviving Higher Education in India”, followed by a panel discussion. The report provides a unique and comprehensive analysis of the challenges facing the higher education sector in India and makes policy recommendations to reform the space. Abstract: In the last two decades, India has seen a rapid expansion in…

"The following interactive map displays the acquisition of seaports and establishment of new military installations along the Red Sea coast. The mad dash for real estate by Gulf states and other foreign actors is altering dynamics in the Horn of Africa and re-shaping the geopolitics of the Red Sea region. Click on the flags in…

Since October, Somalia has been rocked by a struggle between Mukhtar Robow, an amnestied former top-level al-Shabab commander, and Somalia’s federal government. The crisis exacerbated the fraught tensions in a sensitive state-building process between the Mohamed Abdullahi “Farmajo” Mohamed government and Somalia’s forming sub-federal states. Critically, it also exposed the problems of secretive deals with…

Ever since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, fighters from abroad have journeyed in ever-greater numbers to conflict zones in the Muslim world to defend Islam from-in their view-infidels and apostates. The phenomenon recently reached its apogee in Syria, where the foreign fighter population quickly became larger and more diverse than in any previous…

Some years ago, a debate about the existence of poverty “traps” appeared to settle around the following tentative conclusion: poverty traps are rare and largely limited to remote or otherwise disadvantaged areas. The graph below takes the poorest 25 countries in 1960, and compares their per capita income in 1960 with that in 2016 (in…

Fragile and conflict-affected states in Africa currently account for about one-third of those living in extreme poverty worldwide. These states struggle with tradeoffs between development and stabilization, the need for economic stimulus and debt sustainability, and global financial stewardship and transparency. Addressing fragility requires innovative approaches, the strengthening of public and private sector capacity, and…

Security and youth top agenda during US Assistant Secretary of State Nagy’s visit to Africa On January 15, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Tibor Nagy headed to Africa for a six-nation tour that included stops in the Central African Republic, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Sudan, Sudan, and Somalia. Security was on the top of the agenda…

Debt relief in Somalia and other African countries On Wednesday, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) jointly announced that Somalia is now eligible for debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative. Successfully completing the HIPC program will reduce Somalia’s external debt from $5.2 billion currently to $557 million in about…

Introduction Militia groups have historically been a defining feature of Somalia’s conflict landscape, especially since the ongoing civil war began three decades ago. Communities create or join such groups as a primary response to conditions of insecurity, vulnerability and contestation. Somali powerbrokers, subfederal authorities, the national Government and external interveners have all turned to armed…

Although jihadist groups have gripped the world’s attention for more than 20 years, today they are no longer in the spotlight. However, ISIS, al-Qaida, and al-Shabab remain active, and new groups have emerged. The movement as a whole is evolving, as is the threat it poses. On May 29, the Center for Middle East Policy…

EXECutive Summary Taiwan will hold its presidential and legislative elections on January 11, 2020. The incumbent president, Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), appears increasingly likely to prevail over her main challenger, Han Kuo-yu of the Kuomintang (KMT). In the legislative campaign, the DPP now has better than even odds to retain its…

Taiwan held elections for the president and all the members of the Legislative Yuan on January 11. Although President Tsai Ing-wen had maintained a strong lead in the polls, there were questions about the reliability of some polls. Moreover, the outcome of the legislative elections was very uncertain. China, which has long made clear its…

The landslide reelection of Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen was in many ways a referendum on how Taiwan manages its relationship with China. Brookings Senior Fellow Richard Bush explains why Taiwan's electorate preferred President Tsai's cautious approach, how other domestic political and economic factors weighed in her favor, and possible lessons from this election on combating…

Taiwan can seem like the third rail of international diplomacy. If a country wants a good relationship with China, Beijing has effectively stated, it cannot have a meaningful relationship with Taiwan. Just this week, the city of Shanghai broke off official contacts with the city of Prague for signing a partnership treaty with Taipei. Beijing…

Many Taiwan policymakers hold the view that U.S.-China tensions create favorable conditions for closer U.S.-Taiwan relations. As the thinking goes, the less beholden Washington is to maintaining stable relations with Beijing, the more it will be willing to show support for its democratic friends in Taiwan. In the coming months, this proposition may be tested.…

As the coronavirus pandemic takes a rapidly increasing toll on the health and well-being of people around the world — as well as the global economy and social fabric more broadly — Taiwan has won widespread recognition for its impressive performance in dealing with the crisis. Relying on a combination of preparedness, technology, and transparency,…

Unlike virtually every country in the world, Taiwan has weathered the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic admirably well. Taiwan’s governance system has stood firm in the face of crisis, gaining international acclaim for the competence and efficiency of its response to the outbreak. And the people of Taiwan have garnered goodwill through their generosity,…

As COVID-19 continues to spread through communities around the world, Asian countries that had been on the front lines of combatting the virus have also been the first to navigate the reviving of their societies and economies. Cities and economic sectors have confronted similar challenges with varying levels of success. What best practices have been…

While there is a growing tendency to discredit the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Dr. Huong Le Thu argues that there is a need to have a more granular look at the intra-ASEAN dynamics. Vietnam emerges as an increasingly important member and may have the potential to reinvigorate the association.

The much-awaited rulings of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague—in response to the Philippines’ 2013 submission over the maritime entitlements and status of features encompassed in China’s expansive South China Sea claims—were released this morning. Taken together, the rulings were clear, crisp, comprehensive, and nothing short of a categorical rejection of Chinese claims.

The arbitration panel deemed invalid virtually all of Beijing’s asserted claims to various islands, rocks, reefs, and shoals in the South China Sea, determining that Chinese claims directly violated the provisions of UNCLOS, which China signed in 1982. The biggest looming issues will focus on how China opts to respond. 

In the wake of the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea's ruling this week, the question going forward is how China will respond. Will it double down on the aggressive and coercive activities of the past six years, behavior that has put most of its East Asian neighbors on guard? Will it continue to interpret the Law of the Sea in self-serving ways that very few countries accept? Or, might China recognize that its South China Sea strategy has been an utter failure and that its best response is to take a more restrained and neighborly approach?

In spite of the legal complexities of the South China Sea ruling, the verdict was widely seen as a victory of "right" over "might" and a boost for the rules-based international order that the United States has been championing. In reality, the ruling could also pose profound challenges for the future of U.S. South China Sea policy under the Obama administration and beyond.

Taipei’s claims are similar to Beijing’s. How it responds to the tribunal’s decision could put it at odds with its U.S. ally.

The U.N. arbitral tribunal's decision was an unequivocal rebuke of China’s expansive maritime claims and increasingly assertive posturing in adjacent waters. But, as Richard Heydarian argues, despite the Philippines' landmark victory, what is at stake is no less than the future of the regional security architecture.

During my visit to Myanmar in mid-November, the latest of many since 2010, I witnessed new layers of complexity in the historical and political forces contributing to the Rohingya crisis. While the plight of the Rohingya population has galvanized international opinion, it has reinforced nationalist sentiment within a large segment of the Myanmar population and…

In his first address to the United Nations Security Council in January 2017, the new Secretary-General António Guterres stated: “We spend far more time and resources responding to crises rather than preventing them. People are paying too high a price.” He stressed that a “whole new approach” to conflict prevention is necessary. Indeed, the world…

For people in the West, Myanmar appears to be a mess. Yet, for many in Asia, it still beckons as a land of opportunity. Western media remain focused on the ethnic cleansing operation against the Muslim Rohingya community launched by the government's armed forces in the wake of sporadic attacks from late 2015 by a…

Myanmar stands at a critical crossroads in its democratic transition. In late March, the Union Parliament elected former Speaker of the Lower House U Win Myint as the country’s new president. U Win Myint is a longtime member of the ruling National League for Democracy (NLD) and a trusted partner of State Counselor Aung San…

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been caught up in a whirlwind in recent months, giving congressional testimony and public statements defending Facebook against allegations that it has been too lax in combating online hate speech and disinformation. International criticism has rightly brought attention to the urgent need to address Facebook’s role in stoking ethnic and…

Blog: Revival of BIMSTEC at the Kathmandu Summit? On August 30 and 31, Nepal will host the fourth BIMSTEC Summit in Kathmandu with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other heads of government expected to attend the summit. Founded in 1997, the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) includes Bangladesh, Bhutan, India,…

The Problem The core objectives of tax policymaking should be to raise revenue in an efficient and equitable manner. Current taxation of estates and gifts (and nontaxation of inheritances) fails to meet these goals, perpetuating high levels of economic inequality and impeding intergenerational mobility. The current system also provides an intense incentive to delay realization of capital gains…

Abstract The federal government faces increasing revenue needs driven by the aging of the population and emerging challenges. But the United States collects less revenue than it typically has in the past and less revenue than other governments do today. In addition, how the government raises revenue—not just how much it raises—has critical implications for…

The Congressional Budget Office just projected a series of $1 trillion budget deficits—as far as the eye can see. Narrowing that deficit will require not only spending reductions and economic growth but also new taxes. One solution that I’ve laid out in a new Hamilton Project paper, "Raising Revenue with a Progressive Value-Added Tax,” is…

On this episode: the Iowa caucuses, tax reform, and meet a scholar who studies global poverty reduction. First, a Brookings expert answers a student’s question about why the Iowa caucuses are so important. This is part of the Policy 2020 Initiative at Brookings. If you have a question for an expert, send a audio file…

The Vitals Before and after passage of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), several prominent conservatives, including Republicans in the House and Senate, former Reagan economist Art Laffer, and members of the Trump administration, claimed that the act would either increase revenues or at least pay for itself. In principle, a tax cut could…

The U.S. tax code systematically favors investments in robots and software over investments in people, suggests, a paper to be discussed at the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity conference March 19. The result is too much automation that destroys jobs while only marginally improving efficiency. The paper—Does the U.S. Tax Code Favor Automation by Daron…

The Brookings Papers on Economic Activity (BPEA) is an academic journal published twice a year by the Economic Studies program at Brookings. Each edition of the journal includes five or six new papers on macroeconomic topics currently impacting public policy. Below you’ll find five new papers submitted to the Spring 2020 journal and presented at…