Tag Archives: Takuya Matsuda

August 21, 2012 · 10:34

The Imran Khan Moment: Pakistani Spring or Mirage?

Commentary by Takuya Matsuda – 21 August 2012

A poster of Imran Khan/ © Takuya Matsuda

As the Middle East is experiencing great political upheaval, South Asia is going through a not entirely dissimilar phenomenon that expresses long-held aspirations of ‘self-determination’ and ‘justice’, demonstrating exasperation with extant politics. In 2011, as protests crippled authoritarian regimes across the Arab world, in India, the anti-graft campaigner Anna Hazare held a symbolic hunger strike against widespread corruption. In Pakistan, the people’s frustration is boiling over, causing an unprecedented ‘tsunami’, an ill-chosen term often used to describe the political movement of the country’s biggest political star, Imran Khan, which may change the political dynamics of a country plagued by violence and sectarian strife. Continue reading →

The Long-Term Perspectives of Obama’s Unclear Middle East Policy

Commentary by Takuya Matsuda – 25 September 2011

Source: blogs.aljazeera.net

Amid the political upheaval in the Middle East, the Obama administration has come under heavy criticism for what many analysts and activists describe as a government with no coherent policy in the region. Others have claimed that Obama is little more than an opportunist who changes his stances in accordance with the evolution of particular situations, rather than basing his policy on democratic and just principles. Continue reading →

Who Lost Lebanon? From Politics of Confrontation to Compromise

Commentary by Takuya Matsuda – 2 September 2011

Rafiq Hariri & Hassan Nasrallah

The year 2011 already seemed likely to flower into a turbulent year for the Middle East, even before the advent of the “Arab Spring” that toppled close to three dictators in the region. Hezbollah’s withdrawal from the national unity government in Lebanon, which kept the country’s chronic sectarian conflicts from resurfacing for the past few years, sparked fears that the Lebanese “time bomb” was finally going to explode. Nobody could have predicted “the Arab Spring”, a series of historical events that have rocked the region’s authoritarian regimes since January. Continue reading →