Carnegie Endowment Events

Negotiators from the P5+1 and Iran have agreed to extend the talks on Iran’s nuclear program to June 2015. Many issues are still to be solved, such as establishing a formula for verifiably limiting Iran’s uranium enrichment capacity as well as an acceptable process for relieving sanctions. Still, all parties to the talks have stressed the need to reach a comprehensive agreement.

In Taiwan's “nine-in-one” elections citizens selected candidates for a slew of municipal and local offices. Many campaigns focused on local issues; however, interested observers endeavor to draw larger implications for the 2016 presidential and legislative elections.

How good are the prospects for real cooperation on oil and its impacts, as opposed to skin-deep cooperation on oil and its impacts? Can a deep strategic mistrust be overcome to engage in deep dialogue on energy? Robert Hormats and Jessica T. Matthews discussed the synergies, fault lines, and future prospects for cooperation for the two largest oil consumers. They examined multiple fronts for cooperation, including trading technology, the role of their navies in the international oil trade, domestic energy security, climate change issues, and dealing with other actors such as Afghanistan and Iran.

China is becoming an increasingly engaged actor globally. Beijing’s concerns about energy security has led it to search for less risky sources of oil than places like Sudan, leading it to investigate Russian and Venezuelan energy exports. It has also been building pipelines in places like Myanmar and Russia, boosting interdependency while exposing itself to energy risks. Meanwhile, Beijing works to reform energy governance, seeking to quickly acquire technological expertise and managerial experience to hydraulically fracture shale and produce a shale revolution of its own. Bo Kong, Andrew Weiss, and Matt Ferchen explored China’s methods for, and implications of, collaborations with various countries around the world.

A low oil price environment has not brought as much renewable and alternative sources of energy to the market. Instead, it has brought us different kinds of oil, and oils are not created equal. They have different environmental impacts - climate emissions, air quality, water quality and water quantity - as do their products. Energy policy thus has to take into account environmental, water and energy security. China became a net exporter of petroleum products this year due to a significant refining capacity build out, while importing millions of tons of petroleum coke (a petroleum product) from the United States. Deborah Gordon, Scott Moore, David Livingston, and Wang Tao discussed the various environmental implications of the global oil paradigm shift.

The development of technologies to extract unconventional resources such as shale oil have led to low global crude prices. This constitutes a global oil paradigm shift. It encourages the two largest consumers of oil to consume even more, which means their decisions on how to react to this low oil price environment have a significant impact on the global oil market. The United States and China are also significant foreign policy actors in energy resource rich regions such as Sudan, South Sudan, and the Middle East. Xu Qinhua, Mikkal Herberg, and Matt Ferchen discussed how China and the United States are reacting to this paradigm shift and what the global implications of their actions are.

The growth of jihadist movements in the Middle East has fueled regional instability and captured global attention. Adam Baczko, Gilles Dorronsoro, and Arthur Quesnay will address their emergence in Afghanistan, Syria, and Iraq. Based on extensive fieldwork, they will assess the failure of U.S. policy to anticipate current developments and suggest new orientations. They will analyze the similarities and differences between the Taliban and the Islamic State regarding military strategy, governance, and engagement with Western countries, as well as compare the respective levels of sectarian violence in Iraq and Syria with Afghanistan. Frederic Wehrey will serve as a discussant, and Frederic Grare will moderate.

As the deadline for withdrawal of U.S. troops in Afghanistan approaches, Afghanistan’s neighbors will have a greater impact on shaping the country’s uncertain future. Samina Ahmed and Mark L. Schneider will discuss the transition with a particular focus on Pakistan’s role. They will look at civil-military divisions over Pakistan’s Afghanistan policy, assess the impact of cross-border militancy on Afghanistan’s stabilization, and discuss the implications of Pakistan’s involvement in a potential negotiation process between the Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai government and the Taliban. Carnegie’s Frederic Grare will moderate.

The North Caucasus may be out of the headlines, but it remains the most turbulent part of the Russian Federation.

The United States and Japan are entering the critical final phase in revising their guidelines for defense cooperation, even as Japan’s government prepares legislation to codify the Cabinet’s historic decision in July to exercise limited rights of collective self-defense and expand its “Proactive Contributions to Peace” via international cooperation.

Prospects for the Coalition Government in Afghanistan Discussion by Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Hungary offers an important example of the problems that an apparently consolidated democracy can encounter. It also poses a test for the European Union and the United States on how to respond when democracy comes under stress in an EU member state. To foster greater understanding of these issues, Carnegie hosted a symposium on “Understanding Hungary’s Political Path.”

Emerging democracies are periodically vulnerable to legitimacy crises by the expansion of popular participation. The recent book Incomplete Democracy in the Asia-Pacific: Evidence from Indonesia, Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand explores the nature of public opinion and the process of day-to-day participation that has made the electoral democracies of Indonesia, South Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand vulnerable to repeated crises. Giovanna Dore and Karl D. Jackson presented the main findings of their book and discuss the lack of public demand for good governance that enables continued elite control of these Asian democracies. Vikram Nehru moderated.

According to the World Bank’s standard poverty measure, one in five Asians live in extreme poverty. However, a recent Asian Development Bank (ADB) report, asserts that this standard measure does not capture the true extent of extreme poverty in the region.

The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership initiative is a grand plan for revitalizing economic growth and enhancing international competitiveness. While Brussels and Washington work to reach a deal, large numbers of interested third countries—even major EU and U.S. trade partners—are left out.

October 21 marks the twentieth anniversary of the 1994 Agreed Framework with North Korea, which froze Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program in return for the provision of nuclear power reactors and the eventual normalization of ties with the U.S. In the decades since the Agreed Framework was struck and then subsequently unraveled, successive American presidential administrations seem to have exhausted available policy tools in an effort to curtail North Korea’s growing nuclear and missile capabilities. Carnegie held a conversation with key players from the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations who have dealt directly with North Korea and who shared their insights and advice for the future. Carnegie’s Duyeon Kim moderated.

Nuclear disarmament, nuclear nonproliferation, and the threat of nuclear terrorism are among the most critical challenges facing the world today. In a major new book, Unmaking the Bomb, a group of physicists and experts on nuclear security from Princeton University’s Program on Science and Global Security and the International Panel on Fissile Materials propose a fresh approach to addressing these long-held nuclear challenges.

The entangled threat of crime, corruption, and terrorism remain important security challenges in the twenty-first century. In her new book, Dirty Entanglements: Corruption, Crime, and Terrorism, Louise Shelley argues that their continued spread can be traced to economic and demographic inequalities, the rise of ethnic and sectarian violence, climate change, the growth of technology, and the past failure of international institutions to respond to these challenges when they first emerged.

The first one hundred days of a new government can be tumultuous as power shifts hands and leaders make dramatic decisions, as evidenced by then Indian prime minister Vajpayee’s nuclear test soon after he assumed office in 1998. But Prime Minister Narendra Modi has thus far proceeded in a more nuanced fashion, making an assessment of his first four months in office more complicated.

Pakistan’s army has locked the country in an enduring rivalry with India to revise the maps in Kashmir and to resist India’s slow but inevitable rise. To prosecute these dangerous policies, the army employs non-state actors under the security of its ever-expanding nuclear umbrella.