For decades, Latin America’s authoritarian regimes were seen as a right-wing phenomenon, with Cuba as the lone exception — a dictatorship born not from a betrayal of democracy, but of revolution. As Washington’s embargo returns to the headlines, this piece asks what that framing has long obscured: that Cuba has never had just one embargo, but two.
Analyses
- Mohammed Hashas 12 January 2022The late Egyptian philosopher has reshaped Islamic theology, challenged Western thinking and called to fight injustice. Mohammed Hashas draws his profile.
- Seth Moskowitz 4 January 2022Never as on January 6 2021 did America fear outright institutional collapse. While its democracy has proven resilient, none of the ingredients for a constitutional crisis has meanwhile been taken off the table, writes Seth Moskowitz.
- Fabio Turco 23 December 2021The ‘unexpected competitor’ in Hungary’s upcoming elections, Péter Márki-Zay, is strengthening its profile, both internally and at European level. Outgoing PM Viktor Orbán will be counting on the deep state he has built over the last 12 years to cling to power, or come back soon.
- Ananya Vajpeyi 20 December 2021Christophe Jaffrelot’s latest oeuvre provides a comprehensive account of how, and why, India started descending into today’s political nightmare. A review.
- Simone Disegni 15 December 2021EU institutions have launched a large-scale deliberative democracy exercise to gather fresh reform ideas. Now they need to decide what to do with them.
- Abdel Aziz Hali 2 December 2021Contrary to what most readers of the written press think, satire has played an important role in the Tunisian media landscape as it always has done in publications such as ‘Le Canard Enchaîné’ and ‘Charlie Hebdo’ in France. In fact, satire was never more manifest in Tunisia, than it was preceding independence. Wielding this particular style as their sword, our journalistic knights, in upholding their belief in freedom of expression, sought to combat political correctness and continue the crusade against censorship, while cleverly evading prohibitions and taboos with great subtlety.
- Evan Pheiffer 30 November 2021The 100,000-strong Turkish minority of Thrace is proudly attached to its roots – and equally cautious at Ankara’s religious-conservative drift.
- Maria Tavernini 24 November 2021Coal “phasing-down” was seen as bitter disappointment in the West, but as a remarkable result in India. Its élite is now pondering how to make best use of its “re-discovered” diplomatic potential.
- Samantha Libraty 12 November 2021The turning of migrants into political weapons is the latest proof of the irrelevance of the UN refugee protection system in the 21st century. It is high time to reform it.
- Andrea Walton 11 November 2021Covid-battered Bulgaria is heading to polls for the third time in a year. But a hung Parliament looms, again.