Showing 1 - 8 of 8
A Brexit lesson from the cradle of democracy
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 16/01/2019
» The Macedonian parliament's vote to rename the country and thus remove the biggest obstacle to its integration into Western institutions is evidence that intractable political issues are best resolved through the traditional backroom dealings of representative democracy rather than through the direct expression of popular will.
The year of the woeful world leaders
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 28/12/2018
» The dictionaries have decided on their 2018 words of the year. Oxford picked "toxic". Merriam-Webster went for "justice". Collins chose "single-use". However, I'd zero in on "misgovernment". Surely, 2018 saw a number of countries misruled by the worst crop of world leaders in recent memory.
What's scary about Facebook's new troll findings
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 03/08/2018
» Facebook's widely publicised discovery of a possible influence operation through "inauthentic" accounts warrants some scrutiny -- and some reflection about the difference between a genuine political debate on social networks versus its simulated version.
Putin sees himself as world's 'chess grandmaster'
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 09/01/2017
» Russian President Vladimir Putin is on a roll. The catalog of his alarming moves is well-known: aggression in Ukraine, interference in Syria on the side of President Bashar al-Assad, stepped-up intelligence efforts that may include a hybrid operation to discredit Hillary Clinton, a slick, prolific propaganda machine, support for nationalist and populist movements in Europe. But why is Mr Putin doing all this?
Anti-Trump protests are detrimental
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 17/11/2016
» The footage of the anti-Donald Trump marches and the belligerent tweets criticising the US president-elect fill me with ambivalence. On the one hand, Mr Trump's victory hardly makes me happy; then again, as someone who has seen, and taken part in, both successful and failed mass protests, I believe the liberal cause would be better served if the demonstrators stayed home.
Putin waging war on too many fronts
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 26/11/2015
» Has Vladimir Putin finally overreached? The Russian president is confronting several simultaneous crises. Over the weekend, Ukrainian activists blew up high-voltage transmission towers and cut off electricity supplies to Russian-held Crimea. In St Petersburg, his home city, on Tuesday a column of 600 heavy trucks was crawling toward the city government building to protest tolls on Russian roads (a son of a close friend of Mr Putin has a financial interest in the system). And on the Turkey-Syria border, the Turkish air force downed a Russian bomber.
Return of Adolf Hitler makes for uneasy comedy
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 10/11/2015
» The movie He's Back, a comedy that revolves around the return of Adolf Hitler to modern-day Germany, is a huge hit. There may be more than meets the eye to this success, however.
Backlash against new urban tourists
News, Leonid Bershidsky, Published on 17/08/2015
» Cities like Barcelona, Berlin, Lisbon and Hong Kong, which only became major tourist destinations in the last couple of decades, are starting to look for ways to keep visitors out. This isn't about xenophobia: it's a protest against the changing nature of tourism.