British and Afghan officials at the signing of the Treaty of Gandamak (Major Cavagnari second from left, Amir Yakub Khan in the center), May 1879. Photo by John Burke, public domain, British Library. Current Analysis Afghanistan’s Present Failure Lies in its Past Design Providing a vital historical perspective, Benjamin Hopkins explains how the failure of the American project in Afghanistan had little to do with Afghan corruption or lack of national unity as understood in Washington. While today the problems of the Afghan state—its dependence on foreign aid, lack o Benjamin D Hopkins • 13 min read
Current Analysis (No) Dialogue in Bahrain In the run-up to the third anniversary of the Bahraini uprising on February 14, 2011, mass protests with tens of thousands of participants again engulfed the small kingdom. At the same time, a number of contacts between the opposition and the royal family sparked hopes of renewed high-level negotiat Toby Matthiesen • 11 min read
Current Analysis The Imperial Lament Niall Ferguson, Colossus: The Price of America’s Empire (New York: Penguin Press, 2004). There is something refreshing about British historian Niall Ferguson’s argument “not merely that the United States is an empire, but that it has always been an empire.” For a certain kind of American liberal, t Joel Beinin • 18 min read
Ian Lustick, Unsettled States, Disputed Lands Ian Lustick, Unsettled States, Disputed Lands: Britain and Ireland, France and Algeria, Israel and the West Bank-Gaza (Cornell, 1993). Barbara Harlow • 3 min read
