Harvard International Review articles from June 2003

Harvard International Review archives from June 2003

Heaven is high: demystifying the People's Republic of China. (Editor's Note).(Editorial)
June 22, 2003... In the mouth of an old man fishing on the Oujiang River, it carries the authority of ancient wisdom: "Heaven is high; the Emperor is far away." This Chinese aphorism, used since time immemorial to emphasize the distance between China's...

Old English sheepdog economists. (Letters to the Editor).
June 22, 2003... Reading David Dollar's article ("Eyes Wide Open," Spring 2003) made me feel as if I were in the company of an alert old English sheepdog. Like so many establishment economists, Dollar was trying to see and indeed thought he was seeing...

Where's the beef? (Letters to the Editor).
June 22, 2003... Joseph Stiglitz's ("Dealing with Debt," Spring 2003) discontent apparently continues to be more with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) than with globalization per se. In this piece, he elaborates on some of the themes previously developed...

Currently indisposed: managing radioactive waste. (Global Notebook).
June 22, 2003... For nearly 50 years, the world has steadily increased its production of nuclear energy without a permanent strategy for disposing of radioactive waste products. Radioactive waste has long been the Achilles' heel of nuclear power. As...

AIDS in India: Denial and disaster. (Global Notebook).
June 22, 2003... With 3.97 million reported cases, India has the second largest HIV-positive population in the world, with an expected 20 to 25 million cases by 2010. These numbers are thought to be underestimates, as the stigma attached to harboring the...

Conflict diamonds: not so clear-cut.
June 22, 2003... In 1998, the world was surprised by the discovery of a link between the rebel movements in Angola, Sierra Leone, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Global Witness, a non-governmental organization (NGO), announced that the rebel group in...

Rebel assault: Maoist insurgence in Nepal. (Global Notebook).
June 22, 2003... Nepal is in danger of a humanitarian crisis. Over 40 percent of the Nepalese population lives in poverty, and 45 of its 75 districts suffer from food shortages. A series of famines, floods, and epidemics over the past four years have...

Chavez's charade: democracy in Venezuela. (Global Notebook).
June 22, 2003... In December 1998, Hugo Chavez, a former lieutenant colonel and paratrooper in the Venezuelan Armed Forces, became president of the world's fourth-largest oil producer and third-largest exporter of crude oil to the United States. Defying...

Breaking the bank: Japan's bad loans. (Global Notebook).
June 22, 2003... Although Japanese banks closed L their account books at the end of the fiscal year in March 2003, they can never close their eyes on the ever-present problem posed by bad loans at home. Non-performing loans began to plague financial...

Beyond the headlines: changing perceptions of Islamic movements. (Perspectives).
June 22, 2003... Despite the failures political Islam has confronted when governing Afghanistan, Sudan, Pakistan, and Iran, Islamic movements in the 21st century continue to be a significant force in mainstream Muslim politics, from Morocco to Indonesia. The...

Pillars of public diplomacy: grappling with international public opinion. (Perspectives).
June 22, 2003... Modern diplomacy, once a largely one-dimensional, nation-to-nation process, is now a multi-dimensional enterprise in which so-called "non-state" actors and foreign publics play an increasingly prominent role. The latest Iraq war is the most...

Love thine enemy: interdenominational violence in Christian communities. (World in Review).
June 22, 2003... From Pope John Paul II to US President George Bush, from liberal political theorists to conservative journalists, many have warned of a world divided along religious lines in a "clash of civilizations." Following the argument of political...

Dying for independence: world separatist movements and terrorism. (World in Review).
June 22, 2003... "I swear by God we are more keen on dying than you are keen on living," the black-clad Chechen separatist informed the Russian government on videotape. The communication came in October 2002, just days after 40 armed Chechen militants swarmed...

The emperor is far away: understanding challenges faced by the new leadership. (China).
June 22, 2003... HARVARD INTERNATIONAL REVIEW: China enjoyed remarkable growth rates in the last 20 years. What accounts for this accelerated rate of development, and how has China's economic liberalization affected its attitude toward the West? ...

Crossing the river: legalism, reform, and political change. (China).
June 22, 2003... Despite doomsday predictions from all sides, Communist China has successfully transformed its command economy into a market system after two decades of reforms. While China observers may point to some economic areas that require decisive...

The quiet revolution: The emergence of capitalism. (China).
June 22, 2003... When Deng Xiaoping unveiled his vision of economic reform to the Third Plenum of the 11th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party in December 1978, the Chinese economy was faltering. Reeling from a decade of stagnation during the...

Going bust: overcoming a dysfunctional credit system. (China).
June 22, 2003... Lenders all over the world have the same problem: how to get debtors to pay them back. Basic game theory dictates that in interactions between a lender and a debtor, the debtor's best strategy is to default. Of course, lenders know this, so...

The defense of Xinjiang: politics, economics, and security in Central Asia. (China).
June 22, 2003... As a state long noted for its potentially destabilizing ethnic heterogeneity, China has been extremely mindful of the northwestern region of Xinjiang, which is often viewed as one beset by what the Chinese have termed the "three evils" of...

An epidemic of denial: stalled responses to HIV/AIDS. (China).(related article: Exacerbating an Epidemic)
June 22, 2003... China's HIV/AIDS outbreak among blood donors is arguably the worst medically-caused HIV/AIDS epidemic in the world. The outbreak started among the rural poor who sold their blood in an unregulated industry in the 1990s. Today, at least four...

Cyber speech: catalyzing free expression and civil society. (China).
June 22, 2003... In November 1992, an oceanographer in Seattle called my office after finding a bottle that had been drifting across the Pacific Ocean for 11 years. A leaflet inside contained information about Wei Fingsheng, then China's most prominent...

The buck stops here: The Bush administration at war. (Interview).(Bob Woodward)(Interview)
June 22, 2003... Bob Woodward is Associate Managing Editor for The Washington Post. As an investigative journalist for The Washington Post, Mr. Woodward earned a Pulitzer Prize for his work on the Watergate presidential scandal, and his coverage of the...

Democracy or self-interest? An investigative look into Islamic democracy and US policy. (Review Essays).(After Jihad)(Book Review)
June 22, 2003... After fibad presents a persuasive argument for a new US policy to encourage Islamic democracy instead of continuing support for autocrats in the Muslim world. The author argues in theoretical and practical terms that Islamic democracy is...

Bigger guns, more missiles: China's Military modernization and US policy. (Review Essays).(Modernizing China's Military: Progress, Problems, and Prospects)(Book Review)
June 22, 2003... China's People's Liberation Army (PLA), the world's largest military by headcount, is modernizing. Powered by rapid economic development that has lasted for more than two decades, the new PLA is getting bigger guns and more missiles. A stronger...

The real crisis: North Korea's nuclear gambit. (End Paper).
June 22, 2003... While the world's attention was fixated on Iraq, a more urgent crisis was brewing in Northeast Asia. In the midst of the protracted confrontation and war with Iraq, the deeply isolated, erratic, and unpredictable government of North Korea...