worldpolicy.org

In my World Policy Journal article on the “geopolitics of oil” over the next 25 years, I wrote about the many political pressures that will add upward pressure on crude oil prices over the next several years. But we’re now in the middle of a global financial crisis that has helped drop prices from a high of $147 per barrel in July to under $60 today.

Does the steep price drop remove politics from oil markets? Not at all. Look to recent headlines from three of the countries that have profited mightily from the windfall oil profits of the past few years.

In Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the theocrats who hold real power in the country know that lower crude prices give them plenty to worry about. The International Monetary Fund has warned that when oil prices fall below $90 per barrel, Iran starts to run a budget deficit. When oil falls below $75 per barrel, it can’t afford its import bill. We got a glimpse of the jitters in Tehran in early October, when Iran’s oil minister announced that a price below $100 per barrel was “unacceptable.”

For a government that has ordered gasoline rationing and continues to fight a losing battle against 30 percent inflation, this is a serious problem. Iran’s government has increased spending by nearly 90 percent over the past three years. If that politically popular spending is to continue, where’s the money going to come from if not from energy exports? Read the rest of this entry »

The following article appears in the 25th anniversary issue of World Policy Journal. For the month of November, read the entire 25th anniversary issue, fall 2008, for free!

At the heart of the moving puzzle the world faces over the next quarter century are the diverse Muslim populations, collectively known as the “Global Muslim Community.” Spanning the globe and speaking nearly every language, they are united by one faith—Islam. Collectively, they make up one-fifth of the world’s population and sit on 75 percent of its oil wealth. Understanding the emerging trends of these societies is perhaps the world’s leading strategic imperative.

But who will speak for Islam in the future—on democracy, the role of women, or violence? Over six years ending in 2007, the Gallup organization undertook more than 50,000 interviews (representative of the 1.3 billion Muslims who reside in more than 35 nations with majority or significant Muslim populations) in an effort to explore current trends and examine the future. The results, reflective of more than 90 percent of the world’s Muslim community, are the end product of the most comprehensive survey of its kind ever conducted; they defy conventional wisdom and the inevitability of a global conflict— even as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue.Continue reading…

The following article appears in the 25th anniversary issue of World Policy Journal. For the month of November, read the entire 25th anniversary issue, fall 2008, for free!

One can argue that we live today in relatively peaceful times. Organized violence was throughout most of history, both in absolute and relative terms, a much more prevalent part of mankind’s daily life than today— from antiquity to the twentieth century. European integration has pacified the old continent. The creation of the United Nations has provided us with an instrument of collective security that can, if permitted, work. The threat of an all-out nuclear exchange has receded.

Still, conflict, in its traditional form of organized violence between two states or coalitions of states, continues to exist. Examples include the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the U.S. campaigns against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, and the possibility of a U.S.-Israeli attack against Iran’s emerging nuclear capabilities. A significant amount of the world’s military power and arms procurement is still invested in coping with such contingencies. It cannot be excluded that the risk of traditional conflict might grow again in the years to come. Should the United States—in many respects the world’s de facto hegemon—be perceived as being increasingly tied down in Iraq, Afghanistan, and possibly other critical hot spots, and thus be seen as unable (or unwilling) to react to new challenges, then the temptation would develop for many to seize the initiative and create military faits accomplis. One may argue that the Iranian nuclear program is just such an attempt.

Most conflicts in the twenty-first century, however, are no longer of a traditional nature. Continue reading…

Iran’s insistence on enriching uranium in defiance of three UN Security Council resolutions, combined with a bevy of antagonistic threats aimed at Israel’s existence has created an explosive recipe that may well precipitate a horrifying regional conflagration. For Iran’s own best interests, its contentious leaders would be well advised to tone down their anti-Israeli threats, which have not been taken lightly thus far, and find a diplomatic solution to Iran’s suspected nuclear weapons program. The recent Israeli air force exercises and American naval maneuvers in the Persian Gulf, which were countered by Iran’s test-firing of a variety of missiles, have only heightened an already tense atmosphere.

It is now critical to look at who might be in a position to defuse the tension and restore some stability to a volatile region already battered by a devastating war in Iraq. At this point, Turkey has made itself well positioned geopolitically to play such a significant role. The fact that the Bush administration has shifted policy after nearly three decades and agreed to participate in the international talks with Iran’s nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili in Geneva may well open the door for future direct talks to be facilitated by the Turks.
Read the rest of this entry »

The savvy early adopters that read our nascent blog in its first few days last week might have noticed a curious banner advertisement, supplied by Google, along the right-hand side of our homepage. It was hard to miss.

Framed in black, the ad set photographs of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Barack Obama side by side, above the question: “Is it OK to Unconditionally Meet With Anti-American Foreign Leaders?” Below were two buttons: “Yes” and “No.” But the advertisement offered only the illusion of choice; neither button worked and a click sent one directly to a page on John McCain’s website.

While the World Policy Journal has always been a magazine of opinion—both left, right, and center (mostly left and center, to be fair)—the World Policy Institute, both the home and publisher of WPJ, is a “progressive” institution, and decidedly non-partisan. Not to mention that, as a registered non-profit, the Institute is prohibited from supporting political campaigns. The ad is now gone, banished from our site.

But there’s a much larger question lurking here behind McCain’s ad: when did the notion of “meeting” become such a scarlet letter? And how has active, engaged—dare we say preemptive—diplomacy with those who oppose us become tantamount to weakness?

This controversy began as an internecine war, touched off by Obama’s answer to a question posed to the candidates in the July 2007 YouTube debate. Asked whether he would, in the first year of his presidency, meet “without preconditions,” with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba, and North Korea in order to “bridge the gap that divides our countries,” Obama responded affirmatively.

In what was perhaps a gut response, Obama recalled that both JFK and Reagan had met with their Soviet counterparts—not because they trusted them or doubted the very real danger that Moscow posed—but because negotiation, in and of itself, opened a door to the possibility of progress. Senator Clinton was quick to pounce, calling Obama naive, even reckless, and this line of attack has been gleefully inherited by the Republican nominee. It will no doubt intensify through November.
Read the rest of this entry »