Category: tribes

Arab Spring, Egypt, Identity, Informal Economy, Informal Justice Systems, Middle East, National Identity, tribes

What is a Nation?
Samuel P. Huntington - World Economic Forum Annual Meeting Davos 2008
Samuel Huntingdon: argued that Nation States would remain the most powerful actors in world affairs. Was he right?

Nationalism, and National Identity, have long been a passion of mine.  But whatever of its role in defining personal and community identity, as a structure it is in flux.  The concept of the nation state in many ways defined the history of the twentieth century: in the lead up to World War I, the subsequent establishment of the League of Nations and various boundary commissions, then World War II and its various alliances, and the establishment of the United Nations, the European Union and the retrenchment from Empire, establishing so many new nation states all over Africa and Asia in particular. The Nation was sovereign, and inviolable; what happened within the State was solely the preserve of the State, and no other State would intervene in matters domestic (until Kosovo, and after Rwanda).

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africa, Arab Spring, Identity, international community, National Identity, syria, tribes

Syria, Now
kerry, brahimi
Tough Job: US Secretary of State John Kerry next to United Nations-Arab League special envoy for Syria Lakhdar Brahimi and Russian Foreign minister Sergei Lavrov.

Twelve months ago it seemed inevitable that Bashar Al-Assad had no future in Syria, that it was merely a matter of time before his reign – and his dynasty – came to an end.  What has been consistent also, however, is that there has been no clarity in terms of who should replace him.  Furthermore, this has never been an internalised, isolated civil war; it is regional, strategic, and symbolic. Continue reading “Syria, Now” →