Canada’s Role in Securing International Waters – Event by Fraser Institute
Canada is of strategic importance, not only for bilateral relations with the United States, but also as a multi-lateral force around the world, at least in security terms. A little over a month ago, I attended a conference in Kingston-Ontario that was hosted by Queen’s University. This particular conference focused on Canada’s military role in [...]
The Motorhome Diaries Talks with Tom Palmer
The Motorhome Diaries, sponsored by the Atlas Network, recently rolled though Washington, DC and I had the opportunity to interview Tom Palmer. We discussed how he discovered the ideas of liberty and what he has done to further these ideas, including the launch of the Atlas Global Initiative.
Mexico’s Seven Deadly Questions by Roger Pardo-Maurer
Yesterday we held our monthly International Thursday event, and one of our speakers made a comment that got my attention. When talking about the shift towards populism, and the erosion of capitalism and democracy in Latin America, he said that their is nothing more worrisome than the longevity of liberal democracy being in the [...]
Ethnic Tensions in the Philippines and Elsewhere
For years the Philippines has battled against radical Islamic insurgencies in Mindanao, and the recent bombings have further exacerbated the ethnic tensions behind this identity-based conflict. At the same time, China is experiencing similar problems with their ethnic minorities. For today’s post, we will draw on the expertise of Priscilla Tacujan, who holds a PhD [...]
Secure Freedom Radio
By the name of the title, you would think that the SFS program is going to host our own radio program. I only wish! Actually, this is the name of the new radio program by the Center for Security Policy, which will broadcast every weekday evening from 9-10pm on WTNT in Washington DC. Secure Freedom [...]
Security Cooperation in the Western Hemisphere
A week ago, I traveled to Kingston Ontario, Canada for a conference on Latin America titled “At Home in the Americas: Canada, the US and Hemispheric Security.” This was the fourth annual conference co-sponsored by the Queen’s Centre for International Relations, Royal Canadian Military, and the US Army War College. Skipping the conference presentations, which [...]
Finding the Nexus of Economics and Security
The key component of the Think Tanks for a Secure Free Society mission is to promote the work of think tanks that “Engage in issues where economics intersects with security, intelligence, and defense.” While this network is continually developing, we have been able to identify a handful of experts that are well versed in both [...]
Roman Ortiz speaking at Security Conference in Canada!
Since the turn of the century, many in the foreign policy world have turned their attention to regions with immediate security challenges (e.g. Middle East, Horn of Africa, etc.). In the meantime, the security environment in Latin America has steadily deteriorated as insurgency groups have resurfaced in Peru, drug cartels have dominated most of Central [...]
Paying Attention to North Korea
In light of yesterday’s weapon’s test by North Korea, we thought it might be good to draw your attention to some work we’ve discussed previously, by In-Young Kim, a professor at Hallym University in South Korea. Dr. Kim recently spoke on a panel at the Heritage Foundation’s Resource Bank meeting, in addition he published an [...]
Unrest in Guatemala Poses Threats to Liberty
Some of you may have seen a YouTube video where a recently murdered lawyer, Rodrigo Rosenberg, explicitly accuses the Guatemalan President of murder, as he states: “If you are watching this, it is because I was murdered by President Alvaro Colom.” Rosenberg made this accusation because one of his clients, Khalil Musa, refused to take [...]
New Policy Paper from CDFAI – “Getting it Done in Foreign Policy”
If you have noticed the trend of this blog, we have been communicating, through our think tank partners, the message of increased bilateral relationships even amidst this global economic crisis. It is because of the crisis, that the future of multilateral institutions is uncertain, thus, nations must return to diplomacy 101. This is the crux [...]
Challenges of an Increasingly Dangerous World
As the general concern around the world has shifted towards the global economic crisis (rightly so), we thought to remind everyone that this crisis could manifest itself into other areas, namely the security arena. As it stands, there are still many parts of the world where dictatorial leaders would use this economic downturn as an [...]
North Korea’s Game
North Korea’s defiant launch of a long-range ballistic missile, has given President Obama his first major security crisis. As many of us watched the news to see how Obama would react to this diplomatic challenge, across the ocean some of our allies provided their own analysis of the situation. One particular contact – Dr. In-Young Kim [...]
Canada’s Counterterrorism Policy
In a time of economic crisis, perhaps counter terrorism policy is not at the forefront of a nation’s policy agenda, but ignoring this field can lead to negative. The Canadian Defense & Foreign Affairs Institute (CDFAI), who has been prominent in enriching the policy debate in this arena, has just released the first of it’s [...]
Inaugural STI: The Czech Experience and Georgia’s Challenges
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned a pilot project that our SFS Program initiated two months ago. The project is a Security Training Initiative (STI), meant to leverage the security experts in our network to act as trainers for building up the security expertise of free market think tanks that are part of the [...]
New Security Training Initiative
A key driver to the mission of the SFS program is to build up the security expertise of free market think tanks that face prevailing security challenges in their respective countries/regions. As part of this effort, we have developed a pilot project which will leverage the security experts in our network to act as trainers [...]
Intellectual Entrepreneurs Contributing to Latin American Security Debate
It does not take a thorough understanding of Latin America to see that many countries in the region are sprinting down the path of socialism. This inherently brings about many security challenges for the region, as poverty becomes rampant and rule of law is increasingly absent. As the SFS program is focused on bringing to [...]
Introducing Roman Ortiz and Fundacion Ideas para la Paz in Colombia
I have written in the past about the work of Roman Ortiz and Fundacion Ideas para la Paz (FIP), but today we are offering a more formal introduction to their excellent work and efforts in Colombia. Although FIP is not a new think tank, 2008 was the first year Atlas has collaborated with them in any [...]
Three SFS Partners Mentioned as Top Think Tanks in Their Regions
As a faithful reader of this blog, you already know about Dr. James McGann’s Global Go-To Think Tank Guide which was published earlier this month. Many of Atlas’s longstanding partners have made it onto this list, and we have written previous posts recognizing this achievement. Now, I’d like to congratulate three more organizations who also partner with [...]
What do Mexico, Al Gore, and Iraq Have in Common?
In this case, they are all areas of focus for recent research studies released by the Canadian Defense and Foreign Affairs Institute (CDFAI), an think tank based in Calgary. This type of wide-ranging research is characteristic of the work that CDFAI consistently produces in pursuit of their mission to be a “Catalyst for innovative Canadian [...]
Cato and Counterterrorism
Cato has been at the forefront of various public policy debates, ranging from domestic education to international trade. However, one area that Cato is not particularly known for is the field of Counterterrosim policy. With the coming of a new year, and new administration, Cato seeks to remedy this by hosting a special two-day conference [...]
Security, The Free Society and the Future
As we work to advance freedom around the world we often encounter unique challenges outside the realm of economics, like more immediate security threats of violence, sabotage, subversion, and state led aggression. Unfortunately this is not unfamiliar territory for Atlas, as many of our partners around the world face these challenges, which inhibit the advancement [...]
More Insight into the Mumbai Attacks
Recently, Priscilla wrote an excellent post offering various perspectives about the tragedy in Mumbai from our friends in Asia. Here in the U.S. many of our partners who have expertise on this issue have also been vocal in presenting their analysis of these attacks. One such expert, who is highly recognized for his work on [...]
Obama’s New National Security Team – Missile Defense?
As the President elect Barack Obama prepares to officially announce his national security team this morning, many throughout the world are anxious to see how he will react to the world´s most pressing security challenges. One such challenge which Eastern European think tanks, and our own blog, have been closely following is that of Missile [...]
