Political Economy

Syriza’s surge to power with a campaign against austerity has forced politicians across Europe to justify their economic policies. The UK chancellor was hot-off-the-mark to assure everyone that the Greek election result should not be interpreted as a rejection of...

In a documentary that aired recently on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's popular The Fifth Estate program, an allegory of Vladimir Putin was presented. The wily Russian president was described growing up in a shabby St. Petersburg apartment, where he would...

As the demonizing of Syriza gives way to post-electoral analysis, its victory appears anti-austerity, not anti-EMU.  Politics makes for strange bedfellows, and a small conservative party, Independent Greeks, have agreed in principle to form a coalition.  The period of political...

It is not about the data today though there has been a slew of data that in other times would have moved the market.  The flash HSBC China PMI reported above expectations at 49.8 from 49.6 in December, but still...

The Hong Kong Umbrella Movement, the city’s first significant and sustained extra-legal protest, provided a number of valuable lessons for the future. The Hong Kong Umbrella Movement, the city’s first significant and sustained extra-legal protest, provided a number of valuable...

Prime Minister Abe’s decision to call a snap election paid off big time for him and for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). The LDP and its coalition partner the Komeito emerged from the election with its two-thirds majority in the...

The 2014 Japanese election result was no more or less than a victory for the political status quo. All it did was reaffirm the Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) predominance and the opposition parties’ collective weakness. The 2014 Japanese election result...

Last Sunday’s general election in Japan has returned Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its ally, the New Komeito, with a two-thirds majority in the lower house of the Diet. That the LDP would get a majority...

As the official election campaign rolled out last week, the media are still trying to get a handle on what the upcoming Japanese election is all about. This is ‘the election Japan didn’t need to have’ or the election ‘that’s...

The incumbent Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) seems to be cruising towards a victory in the snap election to be held on 14 December. But beware of interpreting this as a ringing endorsement of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Instead, the likely...

With the snap election in Japan on 14 December looming, Japanese voters may not realise exactly what they are bargaining for if they re-elect an Abe-led Liberal Democratic Party government as expected. The extensive support for state sponsorship of Shinto...

One day in June 2013, President Xi Jinping and his wife and First Lady Peng Liyuan touched down in Trinidad and Tobago. As the pair embarked the aircraft and strode down the gangway, there was something unmistakably ostentatious — a...

Prime Minister Abe is subjecting his ruling coalition — and his nation — to an unnecessary election on 14 December 2014. Abe claims his decision is all about policy, but in reality it is all about politics. His stated rationale...

Many people assume that politics and economics are separate spheres.  We find ourselves often harkening back to the even older tradition of referring to "political economy". Harold Laswell, regarded as the father of modern political science, famously defined politics as...

Recently Bangladesh was side-tracked from an electoral democracy. Earlier this year, the ruling party Awami League formed government after a one-sided election. Bangladesh’s major opposition party, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), boycotted the election on the grounds that it was...