Africa

"With France as the unstated leader, the Mediterranean Union is also animated by a hope to stabilize the region, improve it economically and thus slow the flow of illegal Arab immigration, and provide an alternative to extremism and terrorism. A modern and open Libya, brought to the world by France, would be a major step toward a new European center of gravity, mainly France."

The Winter 2010/11 issue of the Belfer Center newsletter features recent and upcoming activities, research, and analysis by members of the Center community on critical global issues. This issue highlights a major Belfer Center conference on technology and governance, the Center's involvement in the nuclear threat documentary Countdown to Zero, and a celebration of Belfer Center founder Paul Doty.

"Without energy, there is no economy. Without climate, there is no environment. Without economy and environment, there is no material well-being, no civil society, no personal or national security. The overriding problem associated with these realities, of course, is that the world has long been getting most of the energy its economies need from fossil fuels whose emissions are imperiling the climate that its environment needs."

“Two myths have been concocted by the West on Africa: that the Western impact on Africa has been benign while China’s record in Africa has only been negative. The truth in both areas is more complex. This volume, China into Africa, brings out the complexity of the China story in Africa and illustrates why more balanced assessments are needed on Africa’s relations with the world”

            --Kishore Mahbubani

Dean, the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore

As the Biofuel industry surges with investments and new entrepreneurial players, Kennedy School scholars are analyzing it working to develop new ways to create carbon-neutral fuels. Madeline Drexler writes on the Kennedy School's input on this emerging new way to lower greenhouse gas emissions and become less dependent on non-renewable energy resources.

Innovation can help secure the universal access to modern energy and sustainability that Africa so sorely needs, says Calestous Juma.

Despite this extensive activity in the energy sphere, it seems, however, that Ankara's energy policy has been undertaken without a strategic plan and with little integration of energy issues into Turkey's overall foreign and security policies.

TYRANNY OFTEN ends in a whimper, not a conflagration. So it seems in today's Zimbabwe, where President Robert Mugabe's immensely corrupt regime has destroyed a once prosperous African country, leaving behind only the stench of decay.

"Development is crucial for human security, not only for those in poor countries but also for people throughout the world."

Dictatorial despotism spirals Zimbabwe ever downward. Zimbabweans struggle to survive, some even starving.