Sameer Lalwani on the G20 Summit

Sameer Lalwani on the G20 Summit

Tuesday, September 5, 2023

By: Sameer P. Lalwani, Ph.D.

At the G20 summit, the United States should focus on engaging with the Global South. “A lot of these countries are worried about bread-and-butter issues,” says USIP’s Sameer Lalwani. “In the absence of U.S. leadership at an institutional level … there’s going to be other actors that fill that vacuum.”

Type: Podcast

What to Know About Gabon’s Coup

What to Know About Gabon’s Coup

Thursday, August 31, 2023

By: Archibald S. Henry;  Elizabeth Murray

On August 30, just hours after Gabon’s election commission announced that President Ali Bongo Ondimba had been elected to a third term, a group of Gabonese military officers from the elite presidential guard unit seized power and placed the president under arrest at his palace. Later that day, the officers declared General Brice Oligui Nguema as chairman of the transition. While the election itself had been marred by reports of irregularities, the officers’ coup marks the latest in a long line of recent military takeovers across the African continent that have jeopardized regional stability and security.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Democracy & Governance

What BRICS Expansion Means for the Bloc’s Founding Members

What BRICS Expansion Means for the Bloc’s Founding Members

Wednesday, August 30, 2023

By: Heather Ashby, Ph.D.;  Daniel Markey, Ph.D.;  Kirk Randolph;  Kirtika Sharad;  Henry Tugendhat;  Aly Verjee

After more than 40 countries expressed interest in joining, the question of whether BRICS would admit new members was finally answered during the group’s summit last week. Despite pre-summit reports of division over the potential expansion, leaders from the five-nation bloc announced that Saudi Arabia, Iran, Ethiopia, Egypt, Argentina and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) would join the group starting in 2024.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

Henry Tugendhat on the Geopolitical Impact of BRICS Expansion

Henry Tugendhat on the Geopolitical Impact of BRICS Expansion

Tuesday, August 29, 2023

By: Henry Tugendhat

The expansion of BRICS is a significant step in the bloc’s push to counterbalance the Western-led international order. But as a consensus-based group, “the question remains to what extent will they agree on what [that] alternative world order might look like,” says USIP’s Henry Tugendhat.

Type: Podcast

Why the BRICS Summit Could Be a Big Deal

Why the BRICS Summit Could Be a Big Deal

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

By: Andrew Cheatham;  Adam Gallagher

The leaders of the so-called BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are gathering in Johannesburg this week in what is likely to be pivotal meeting for the bloc’s trajectory. Russian President Vladimir Putin will not be attending due to an International Criminal Court warrant. But Moscow and Beijing will be pushing for the group’s expansion in a bid to strengthen the bloc as an alternative to the U.S.-led liberal international order. Over 40 countries have applied to join. But there is division within the five members. Brazil and India fear that expansion will dilute their influence and impact their nonaligned foreign policies.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

West Africa’s Leaders Face the High Stakes of Niger’s Coup

West Africa’s Leaders Face the High Stakes of Niger’s Coup

Thursday, August 10, 2023

By: Ambassador Johnnie Carson

Amid the global challenges to building international stability and peace, a crisis increasingly forcing itself to the foreground — even amid those of record human displacement, climate degradation and unresolved wars — is the plunge by six countries across Africa’s Sahel region into coups d’état and military rule. Eight coups since 2020 have left 150 million people under rule by their armed forces. The latest coup, in Niger, is drawing a heightened international response, and a key player, the 15-nation West African community, today that it will pursue a long campaign of economic and diplomatic pressure, and that it sees military force as a last resort.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

How to Respond to Niger’s Coup — and Prevent the Next One

How to Respond to Niger’s Coup — and Prevent the Next One

Thursday, August 10, 2023

By: Joseph Sany, Ph.D.

Military officers in Niger are rushing to consolidate the power they seized 15 days ago, while West Africa’s elected governments and regional institutions are seeking ways to reverse the July 27 coup d’état. Niger’s coup seems a particular setback for democracy, completing a six-nation belt of military regimes across Africa’s Sahel region. Amid this uncertain power struggle, how can the world support Africans’ demonstrated demand for elected, democratic governance that meets their peoples’ needs? We should begin by hewing to several basic principles. One is to keep our responses to coups coherent — but not uniform. Niger’s coup is distinct; our response must be as well.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

Countering Coups: How to Reverse Military Rule Across the Sahel

Countering Coups: How to Reverse Military Rule Across the Sahel

Thursday, August 3, 2023

By: Kamissa Camara;  Susan Stigant

Three years of coups around Africa’s Sahel region — eight of them in six nations, from Guinea on the Atlantic to Sudan on the Red Sea — leave many African and other policymakers frustrated over how to respond. The Sahel’s crises have uprooted more than 4 million people and could add millions more to our record levels of global human migration as Africa’s population grows and its climate destabilizes. Yet the pattern of coups and other evidence — notably from USIP’s Sahel fieldwork, counter-coup research and bipartisan analysis teams — offer guidelines for effective responses by African, U.S. and international policymakers.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

A Coup in Niger: What It Means for Africa, U.S. and Partners

A Coup in Niger: What It Means for Africa, U.S. and Partners

Thursday, July 27, 2023

By: Kamissa Camara

This morning’s coup d’etat in Niger only deepens the pattern of instability across Africa’s Sahel and damages what has been a rare process of fairly steady democracy building in the region. Niger’s democratically elected government has been a valued partner for African and international efforts to stabilize the Sahel against its web of insurgencies, extremist movements and military coups. Kamissa Camara, a former foreign minister of Niger’s neighbor, Mali, now an analyst on the region with USIP, says the coup underlines lessons already evident about how to improve international efforts to build democracy and peace.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Civilian-Military RelationsDemocracy & Governance

La transition politique au Tchad pourrait être la dernière chance pour la démocratie et la paix

La transition politique au Tchad pourrait être la dernière chance pour la démocratie et la paix

Thursday, July 6, 2023

By: Gondeu Ladiba

L'état de la transition politique au Tchad n'est pas rassurant. Malgré quelques signes de progrès lors du Dialogue national inclusif et souverain (DNIS) d'octobre dernier, les forces de sécurité se sont engagées dans une violente répression des manifestations peu après - tuant des dizaines de civils. Entre-temps, l'actuel président Mahamat Idriss Déby a pris des mesures pour consolider le pouvoir avant les élections prévues pour octobre 2024, laissant l'opposition et les groupes de la société civile préoccupés par le fait que Déby pourrait ne pas remettre le pouvoir à un gouvernement civil.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Democracy & Governance