International Political Will

If you live in Mumbai long enough, your brain files away the daily images and patterns emerge. Sights that at first seemed strange or out-of-place begin to fade and appear mundane. Normal.
Events that would normally be the subject of much conversation are forgotten in minutes, and exceptional people become everyday faces. What [...]

Disconnects between reality and our imagination abound everywhere. Often what we see, hope for, or work towards is skewed by our own stereotypes, idealism, or worldview. From the West, it is easy to bloviate about secular democracy, strong central government, and a separation of religion and state in a post-war nation like Afghanistan. [...]

Since January 2004, the country labeled as a “success” in wake of the surge and the bribery of the Sunni insurgency has the world’s highest death toll from terrorist attacks.
However, the inauspicious position of second place on the list goes not to Afghanistan or Pakistan, but to India. More than 3,800 Indian civilians have lost [...]

Suicide bombings in Afghanistan, a few years ago sparse and confined to the southern area of Kandahar and Hilmand provinces, are now occurring in Kabul at regular intervals. The fear of chaos returning is in the back of everyone’s mind, and Afghans working in reconstruction know the solution is a lasting economic impact felt by [...]

Everyone knows the story about India’s amazing economic development.
We hear on nightly media magazines like 20/20 and 60 Minutes about how our 24-hour customer service call centers that are being outsourced to Bangalore to provide middle-class jobs to young people.
President Bush likes to blame India’s “rising middle-class” for the global food crisis and rising energy [...]