Professor Chris Alden (Director of LSE IDEAS) and Professor Alvaro Mendez (Director of the LSE Global South Unit) co-authored China and Latin America: Development, Agency and Geopolitics The rising fortunes of Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) over the last decades launched an economic and social transformation every bit as consequential as the onset of…
Dr Christoph Bluth is Professor of International Relations at the University of Bradford South Korea, in the 21st century, is facing a complex security environment as one of the few liberal democratic states persistently threatened by its neighbour and, therefore, a frontline state in the the emerging geopolitical configuration of the region. The persistent conflict…
Dr Punchada Sirivunnabood is Associate Professor of Political Science at Mahidol University in Thailand After eleven months as Prime Minister of Thailand, real-estate tycoon Srettha Thavisin, backed by the Pheu Thai-led coalition, has not yet successfully implemented any policies promised during his campaign. These include Pheu Thai’s signature 10,000 baht digital wallet, the Thai soft…
Dr J E Hoare is an academic and historian specialising in Korean and Chinese studies and was formerly a career diplomat in the British Foreign Office. In London on 12 December 2000, Sir John Kerr, the Permanent Undersecretary of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and Kim Chun Guk, head of the European Department of…
Glyn Ford is a former member of the European Parliament and author of Talking to North Korea (2018) and Picturing the DPRK (2024) North Korea’s nuclear programme is the symptom of weakness, not strength. Pundits confuse David with Goliath. The reality is that Pyongyang is comprehensively out-spent, out-gunned and out-resourced by its southern alter ego. Seoul’s military budget dwarfs…
Matthew Hurst is a doctoral student at the University of York researching the Sino-British negotiations over the future of Hong Kong during the 1980s and ’90s. The past can be a poor indicator of the future. Anyone looking to history books as if they were a crystal ball is likely to find themselves disappointed. In…
Co-authors Richard Wilding and Elisabeth Dodinet have spent their careers working with intangible cultural heritage, Richard as a writer and filmmaker in the Middle East and Elisabeth as an archaeo-ethno-botanist conducting research on aromatic plants. Speaking via Zoom from an office in the town of AlUla in northwest Saudi Arabia, three young women talk excitedly…
Andrew Ward is a Lieutenant Commander in the Royal Navy and is currently a Hudson Fellow at Oxford University’s Changing Character of War Centre where he is researching the early Cold War and its relevance for today’s power dynamics at sea. Building a navy is insufficient to become a sea power. By some measures, the People’s…
Sue Byrne is an independent researcher specialising in Mongolia. Who would have thought that a twenty-six year old British Army Officer would be the first European to enter Urga in February 1912 mere weeks after the Bogd Khan’s declaration of independence? The young man was Charles Binsteed, who had taken Extra Regimental Leave beyond empire…
Bolor Lkhaajav is an international relations researcher and writer Over the last decade, Mongolia has experienced tremendous political, economic, and social transformation. The 2024 parliamentary election will be a turning point in Mongolia’s democracy, governance, and how Ulaanbaatar engages the world in an increasingly unstable geopolitical environment. The 2024 parliamentary election will be one of…
