Insights

Do I need to have an opinion on Zionism because I’m Jewish?

JPI’s Puja Thapa sat down with Dr. Yass Alizadeh, Clinical Assistant Professor of Persian Language and Literature at NYU, to discuss the women’s rights protests in Iran.

Why does China struggle to win hearts and minds abroad? Why is it still “uncool” in the international arena?

After his election as the new President of South Korea in May, Yoon Suk-yeol hastily implemented one of his key promises: to relocate South Korea’s presidential office from Chung Wa Dae (Blue House) to a Defense Ministry Complex in Yongsan, an underdeveloped neighborhood in Seoul best known for its stationing of the United States military forces.

For three years, the CCP’s zero-COVID policy in the aftermath of the Wuhan outbreak has included mass lockdowns, excessive testings, heightened surveillance, isolation, quarantines, and border closures. For three years, the CCP has managed to justify the policy by broadcasting how they were able to hold the virus at bay during 2020 and 2021 and how they kept excess deaths to low levels while marginally revitalizing China’s economy after an almost 7 percent sharp decline in GDP. 

Met with an enthusiastic round of applause and cheers, US President Joe Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) into law on Aug. 16, 2022. In his address to the American people, Biden triumphantly said the IRA–a bill dedicated to fighting climate change and reducing fossil fuel emissions in a way that will also lower inflation–is one of the most significant laws in American history.

The 27th UN Conference on Climate Change, COP27, saw a pronouncement from French President Emmanuel Macron that the Bezos Earth Fund had pledged $1 billion to protect carbon reserves and biodiversity. With such a prominent pledge, many have begun to ask, what is the Earth Fund, and where is it situated in the architecture of global environmental governance?

In the Arctic, global warming is opening opportunities for the allocation of needed resources even to non-Arctic states.

As the recent 20th Party Congress came to a conclusion, Sino-watchers across the globe were less interested in China’s immediate policy direction. Rather, there was a profound sense that the world’s second-largest economic and military power seemed to have gone adrift; or for some, more depressingly, it highlighted the end of an epoch.

What does it mean to be Chinese? Am I Chinese? With my recent move to New York City, I am surprised at how often I am asked this question: Are you Chinese? I struggle to respond every time because the word “Chinese” can mean a lot of things – a nationality, an ethnicity, a language, and even a culture. And it requires much more than a simple yes or no to answer.

As Putin’s rhetoric and violence continues to increase, and accusations of war crimes mount against the Russian invasion of Ukraine, many around the world are wondering why Russia can’t simply be dismissed from the UN Security Council or at least blocked from voting. In February 2022 Russia Vetoed several Security Council decisions regarding the invasion. Since then, there has been discussion of UN Security Council reform as it has been well established that Putin’s military operation violates the UN Charter on many levels. 

On September 16, I watched as Hong Kongers lined up for hours outside the British Consulate in Admiralty, the city’s eastern central business district, to pay their respects to the late Queen Elizabeth II. A colossal bed of flowers and pictures of the queen were gradually built up against the consulate walls—it may have been one of the greatest displays of affection for the late monarch witnessed outside the UK. 

On Sept. 29, the US-Asia Law Institute at NYU Law invited attorneys Jennifer Wu (NYU Law, 2004) and Lawrence Wee (Harvard Law, 1994) from the Paul Weiss Law firm to discuss anti-Asian hate crime. Wu and Wee spoke on the difficulty of prosecuting hate crimes through the nature of collecting evidence, and why the community response, both digital and protest advocacy, should be made first and foremost with the voice of the victims in mind. In a city-campus where students are already cautious of daily safety, the rise in hate crimes and the deaths of young professionals alarmed safety concerns and brought forward attention and support for the Asian American and Pacific Islanders (AAPI) community.

The war in Ukraine, when viewed side by side with recent wars around the world from Yemen to Syria to Ethiopia, indicates disturbing global trends. There is far too little protection for civilians, and the detrimental impact is heightened for already vulnerable groups. Civilians displaced by war sit in limbo for years, and those lucky enough to escape their war-torn countries are relegated to overcrowded and under-resourced camps. The Council on Foreign Relations reports shrinking opportunities for refugee resettlement, a result of the international community’s inability and/or unwillingness to support them or resolve the conflict that caused their displacement in the first place. Refugees in camps can face intense discrimination and fall victim to starvation, illness, and human trafficking. And the perpetrators of all this global violence and suffering tend to be met with impunity. This is the grim status quo.

The first national federation of unions, the National Labor Union, was created in 1872 after workers demanded for an eight-hour workday. In the following decades, unions representing an assortment of trades and demands sprang up across the US. Their goal was to protect the rights – to safety, humane conditions, and social and economic freedom – of workers as booming corporations seemingly sought to eliminate them.

JPI’s Roya Lotfi sat down with Dr. Damien Leader, former Foreign Service Officer for the United States Department of State and Deputy Director of the…

As Russia continues its war against Ukraine, the similarities between Ukraine and Syria are striking. Specifically, Russia’s weaponization of civilians and refugees is a primary tactic that continues to be utilized to achieve geopolitical goals.

Although the barrage of news coverage surrounding the Russia-Ukraine war tends to describe the conflict as “unprecedented” and “with no historical parallel,” the underlying interests and tensions that drove Vladimir Putin to invade Ukraine are by no means new.

Foreign war drama, Quo Vida, Aida? offers heartbreaking and powerful insight into the July 1995 Srebrenica Massacre, an eleven day event of the Bosnian War.

JPI’s Roya Lotfi sat down with Mr. Robert Dry, former counselor for scientific, environmental, technological, and health affairs at the U.S. embassy in Paris and…

Since their inception in ancient Greece, the Olympic Games have been used as a tool for peace promotion.

Noora Lori’s book, Offshore Citizens, offers a compelling picture of international citizenship, its power, and the plights of the stateless.

JPI Online’s Roya Lotfi sat down with Dr. Shinasi Rama, Clinical Professor of Politics and International Relations to discuss the timely topic of humanitarian efforts…

One of the first things I did when I moved to New York was sign up for Wag, an app-based dog-walking service. I love both…

As you may have noticed on your morning commute, listening to your preferred daily news podcast, that stories of the Middle East have yet again…

The rise of right-wing populism has sparked the demise of democracies across the globe. Whilst this may be true, frankly, our outdated, 20th century educational…

As the oldest political revivalist group in the Islamic world—and one of the most polarizing—the Muslim Brotherhood has the disputed status throughout the region as…

The United Nations peacekeeping operations (PKO) have long been the organizations backbone, with its relevance and effectiveness in maintaining international peace and security. With 14…

Yesterday’s election saw large numbers of Americans turning up to cast their votes. The New York Times is estimating that some 114 million ballots were cast…

On Tuesday, Pakistan’s Supreme Court acquitted Asia Bibi, a woman falsely accused of blasphemy, in a landmark verdict. This long-delayed, historic decision freed Bibi after…

NEW YORK—The U.N. General Assembly’s upcoming vote on a resolution to address the effects and use of depleted uranium weaponry is its first since the…

They were starved and abused. While they wouldn’t have believed any negative information about ISIS once indoctrinated, they said had they known what membership entailed…

        Photo courtesy Wikimedia Commons            What if the next time you fell ill, seriously ill—the kind of…

Excerpt from ‘The Torture Report’ | Photo courtesy Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón On September 17, 2001, the United States took its first steps into a…

A woman walks past a gas pipeline near the city of Asaluyeh, Iran, Jan. 22, 2014. | Photo courtesy  Xinhua News I remember once during a…

Michel Houellebecq’s “Submission” should bear a trigger warning | Photo courtesy WSJ blogs With the French Presidential campaign in full swing, anti-Muslim sentiment has reached fever pitch…

Rumors of a special relationship between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin began to circulate months before election day, but it wasn’t…

Jake Witzenfeld presented his documentary Oriented at New York University’s Gallatin School, sparking a conversation about identity crises on the Mediterranean shores. In the opening…

  The room was filled with an impatient buzz. Students and faculty looked around, both admiring their surroundings and hoping to get a glimpse of…

Austria sends more. Uruguay, Yemen and Denmark send more. Even Finland sends more troops to United Nations peacekeeping missions than the United States, though its…

[Originally posted here] Books and movies often portray U.S. intelligence as a salacious world of secrets and spies, evoking images of Liam Neeson scaling buildings…

Europe has lost its direction. Seven years after the financial crisis, most of the continent has still not recovered. An unresolved sovereign debt crisis, thousands…

It is incredibly difficult to listen to Slavoj Žižek without allowing his personality to obscure what may be utter brilliance and innovative thought on the…

At some point we have all discussed war. These discussions generally start along the lines of its merits and drawbacks, why countries engage in war,…

Iran, ISIS, and the Future of Gulf Security March 2, 2015 Furman Hall | The Center on Law and Security | NYU School of Law…

The Journal of Political Inquiry is pleased to announce the introduction of Insights, a new web feature that allows our student community to share perspectives on…