Tag: Foreign Policy

  • Review: 'How New and Assertive is China's New Assertiveness' by Alastair Iain Johnston, Spring 2013

    [This review is part of a new experiment. I have read for general impressions, main points, and potentially useful material for myself and others. This is not a detailed methodological or theoretical examination, nor is it a conscientious summary. I have tried to consider both specialist and generalist audiences. Comments are very welcome, as I hope…

  • Language skills lacking in the U.S. foreign service?

    Josh Rogin at Foreign Policy reports that government auditors found language skills among foreign service officers to be far more rare than they would hope. On China, he quotes from the unreleased Government Accountability Office report: In China, officials told us that the officers in China with insufficient language skills get only half the story…

  • How to 'Pressure' 'the Chinese' on Human Rights

    At Foreign Policy, former Amnesty International Executive Director William F. Schultz considers how to “pressure Beijing.” Aside from taking a little too literally Chinese government statements about “the Chinese” and their supposed hurt feelings, Schultz, who is now a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress (disclosure: my former employer), makes an interesting suggestion:…