Today is a public holiday in South Africa – Human Rights Day. There’s a certain irony in spending the day focusing on China’s President Xi Jinping’s visit to Vladimir Putin, knee-deep in a human rights disaster.
What one makes of the Ukraine crisis increasingly maps on where one lives. This is made clear by a remarkable new set of polling data recently published by the European Council on Foreign Relations ...
Author: LSE IDEAS
LSE IDEAS is a foreign policy think tank at the London School of Economics and Political Science. IDEAS was founded as a think tank for Diplomacy and Strategy in February 2008, succeeding the Cold War Studies Centre founded in 2004. The Chair is Professor Michael Cox and its Directors are Professor Christopher Coker and Professor Christopher Alden. The 2018 and 2017 Global Go To Think Tank Index run by the University of Pennsylvania's Think Tank and Civil Societies Program ranked LSE IDEAS as the number one European university-affiliated think tank, and the number two university-affiliated think tank in the world.
IDEAS runs seven research projects, hosts public and private events (43 in 2017-2018), and publishes analyses of international affairs. From 2017 to 2018, it released 75 publications and held 43 fellowships and scholarships. In addition, IDEAS houses the LSE Executive MSc International Strategy and Diplomacy, a program designed to enhance the strategic vision of mid-career professionals.
Insecurity in Pakistan: Losses and Gains for China
By Saniya Kulkarni Security in the Central-South Asian region is an issue of increasing importance to China, especially in light of growing uncertainty in Pakistan and an ongoing threat to infrastructure projects in Afghanistan. The Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISIS-K, or ...
Analysis from Cobus van Staden
Xi Bets on Global South in Moscow
How Significant Is China’s Role in the Saudi-Iran Rapprochement?
By Chris Alden, Felix Brender and Lukas Fiala Saudi Arabia’s and Iran’s decision to restore diplomatic relations has taken many observers by surprise. Even more so, the fact that Beijing was presented as the mediator bringing to an end the seven-year hiatus ...
Does the Private Sector Matter to Xi’s Foreign Economic Policy?
Elisa Gambino, Global Development Institute On Monday, Xi Jinping visited national political advisors from the China National Democratic Construction Association and the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce who are attending the 14th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference ...
Has France Just Taken a Page out of China’s Playbook?
By Lukas Fiala With great powers bickering over an impasse in the debt negotiations while reheating the ‘lab leak theory’ in the debate on the origins of COVID-19, it seems we’re once again far away from a constructive solution to some ...
China, Russia, and the New Era of “Systemic Competition”
By Lukas Fiala Earlier this week we had the opportunity to host the German Marshall Fund’s Andrew Small for a discussion about his latest book The Rupture: China and the Global Race for the Future. As the title suggests, Andrew ...
Is Turkey Serious About Its Recent Criticism of China?
By Buğra Süsler Last December Turkish Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu held an end-of-year press conference to review the year’s foreign policy developments and Turkey’s relations with the world. A highlight of this conference was his exceptionally open criticism ...
China’s Free Trade Agreements in the Global South: Quito and Beijing
By Alvaro Mendez and Chris Alden After eleven months and five rounds of negotiations, Ecuador announced last month that it has completed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China. It still has to obtain legislative approval, but we believe it will ...
China’s Provinces as Global Actors: Evidence From China-Africa Relations
By Charlotte Lenz With the launch in the early 2000s of China’s ‘Going Global’ Strategy, Chinese provinces became one group of actors participating in China’s South-South relations. This has complicated our perception of China, which is often still seen as a ...
China-India Relations in 2023: The Challenging Year Ahead
By Saniya Kulkarni and Lukas Fiala On December 9th, Chinese and Indian troops clashed once again along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) that separates northern India from China. Following on from previous confrontations, this latest skirmish might appear to ...
The Limits of China’s Engagement in Afghanistan
By Lukas Fiala On Monday, armed extremists opened fire inside Kabul Longan Hotel, a popular accommodation for Chinese citizens in Afghanistan. With many dead or injured, the Islamic State has claimed responsibility and that the attack targeted Chinese citizens. More than one ...
Understanding Chinese Influence
By Lukas Fiala Xi Jinping’s current trip to Saudi Arabia has been accompanied by the usual framing of great power competition between the U.S. and China. The story in many of this week’s newspapers is one in which China increasingly ...