Dec 02,2014 Topics of the Month

Civilizational Divides and Regional Confrontations – 4

Reading Kazuhiko Togo’s powerful piece on the dilemmas of Japan, one feels in a time warp. The echo of the 19th century’s choice of modernization with the adoption of Western values and rules that resulted from the Meiji Restoration, and the strategic realism of an embattled 20th century when alliance reversals and conflict reigned, dominate […]

François Godement

Authoritarian state capitalism , Crimea , defense spending , embattled twentieth century , strategic balance

Sep 29,2014 Topics of the Month

Civilizational Divides and Regional Confrontations – 1

To start this exchange, Gilbert Rozman wrote a meditative piece on the dangers of civilizational “pull” for Japan and France were they to respond with some complacency toward Russia and China’s respective challenges to their immediate neighborhoods. He is right on the need for a strategic “push”—one whereby both countries would clearly overcome their old, […]

François Godement

civilizational debates , cultural inward-thinking , France , Putinism , Sino-Russian quasi-alliance , strategic gambles , Ukraine