Austerity alone cannot solve Europe‘s economic and financial crisis. Growth and jobs need to be promoted with equal zeal. European Union leaders now recognize this: kick-starting growth in 2012 was high on the agenda at the European Council’s meeting on January 30. But the big question remains: How?The need for immediate action is clear. The eurozone’s economy contracted in the last three months of 2011; even Germany’s shrank. The new year is looking grim. France is flat-lining (as is Britain).

A surge of foreign tourists, most conspicuously from China and Japan, is an encouraging thing in otherwise generally bleak economic environment these days. As the Chinese government allowed overseas tourism for residents of cities first and then gradually eased travel restrictions, Korea emerged as one of the most popular destinations because of its geographical and cultural proximity. Travelling in Korea, the Chinese witness political and economic advancement of Koreans and visualize the future

Leaders of the euro area’s wealthier nations are increasingly raising a provocative question: Might the common currency now be strong enough to end the bailout agony and let Greece go? The short answer is no. In fact, the euro area is probably more vulnerable to a Greek disaster than ever. Until recently, European officials dismissed the idea of Greece leaving the euro as unthinkable. They seemed to recognize that such a move would amount to mutually assured destruction. Aside from the horrendou

The upheaval in the Arab world has damaged Israel’s strategic environment. Its peace treaty with Egypt, a pillar of national security for more than three decades, is in question. More important, the events in the Arab world have deflected attention from Israel’s most feared scenario, a nuclear Iran, playing into the Iranian strategy to buy time in order to present the world with a nuclear fait accompli. Israel’s leaders fear that the international response is now unlikely to impact Iranian polic

“The one who can beat Obama: Rick Santorum,” the television commercial proclaims. That boast brings cheers from two quarters: the faithful followers of the conservative Republican presidential candidate, and the Democratic president’s political strategists. The former Pennsylvania senator is on fire in the Republican contest, threatening the front-runner, Mitt Romney, in the critical Michigan primary next week and nationally. Still, President Barack Obama’s campaign, the super-PACs supporting it

“Hana” means one in Korean, but the Hana Financial Group will operate with two separate banks for five years after its takeover of Korea Exchange Bank. As the new owners reached a deal with the KEB union last week, new KEB CEO Yun Yong-ro reported to his office Monday, a week after he was appointed by the HFG. The gist of the deal made on the day before the scheduled start of a strike by the union is that KEB, keeping its present name, will have “independent management” until the end of 2016 wit

MADRID ― One year after the fall of Hosni Mubarak, with popular upheavals continuing to roil the Arab world, it is increasingly clear that Europe can no longer sit still and do nothing. The ongoing protests have exposed an urgent need for renewed engagement by the European Union with the region in general ― and, in particular, with the countries of the southern and eastern Mediterranean that are the union’s neighbors.Until now, the European Neighborhood Policy, born as an afterthought of the EU’

Recently in Bangkok, I found myself wandering through the strange but distinctive arena for one of Asia’s latest conflicts: CentralWorld, supposedly the biggest shopping mall in Southeast Asia. Protesters supporting Thaksin Shinawatra, Thailand’s populist ex-prime minister, had set up base camp in the mall’s plaza in May 2010. During a widely covered clash with security forces, they had set the building on fire, destroying much of it. The newly renovated mall ― and the traffic outside, restored

In 1982, I interviewed Syrian Information Minister Ahmed Iskander in Damascus, shortly after the regime had killed at least 10,000 people in the city of Hama.On his office wall hung a painting of an old Hama neighborhood with one of the waterwheels for which the city was famous. “That is our lovely city of Hama,” he told me calmly. “It’s perfectly peaceful. You should visit it someday.”He knew that I knew this neighborhood had been leveled to the ground.Back then, under the regime of Hafez al-As

SYDNEY ― James Madison famously remarked that a popular government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy. The present government of the People’s Republic of China has set out to disprove this rule. Rejecting talk of farce and tragedy, its rulers claim their authority is rooted within a new and higher form of popular government, a “post-democratic” way of handling power which delivers goods and services, promotes social harmony and ro

SYDNEY ― James Madison famously remarked that a popular government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy. The present government of the People’s Republic of China has set out to disprove this rule. Rejecting talk of farce and tragedy, its rulers claim their authority is rooted within a new and higher form of popular government, a “post-democratic” way of handling power which delivers goods and services, promotes social harmony and ro

PRINCETON ― Last year, I told a colleague that I would include Internet ethics in a course that I was teaching. She suggested that I read a recently published anthology on computer ethics ― and attached the entire volume to the email.Should I have refused to read a pirated book? Was I receiving stolen goods, as advocates of stricter laws against Internet piracy claim?If I steal someone’s book the old-fashioned way, I have the book, and the original owner no longer does. I am better off, but she

PARIS ― No sooner did U.S. President Barack Obama welcome home American troops from Iraq and laud that country’s stability and democracy than an unprecedented wave of violence ― across Baghdad and elsewhere ― revealed the severity of Iraq’s political crisis. Is that crisis an unfortunate exception, or, rather, a symptom of the failure of Obama’s Middle East diplomacy, from Egypt to Afghanistan?Upon taking office, Obama set four objectives in the Middle East: stabilize Iraq before leaving it; wit

PRINCETON -- Last year, I told a colleague that I would include Internet ethics in a course that I was teaching. She suggested that I read a recently published anthology on computer ethics -- and attached the entire volume to the email.Should I have refused to read a pirated book? Was I receiving stolen goods, as advocates of stricter laws against Internet piracy claim?If I steal someone’s book the old-fashioned way, I have the book, and the original owner no longer does. I am better off, but sh

The rest of the country may be tiring of it, but the drawn-out, high-decibel battle for the Republican presidential nomination is just fine with the Obama campaign.Why? Because the president’s strategists still expect to be facing Mitt Romney in the general election, and his unexpectedly tough fight to sew up the nomination has forced him to keep emphasizing his credentials as a conservative instead of moving toward the center, where the swing voters are.“The long primary fight is driving indepe

An executive in the Shanghai office of an American private-equity firm decided to conduct an experiment with two groups of MBA interns. He gave the same project to a team from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and to a team from a leading business school in China. One group of students gave a well-balanced and coherent presentation. The members of the other team took turns upstaging one another for personal glory and ended up with contradictory conclusions. No one should be su

It being the feast of Saint Valentine, today (Feb. 14) is a favored moment to give or receive that ultimate lovers’ gift: a diamond. This year, however, isn’t a good one for those who want to know for sure that the stone’s origins are above reproach. That’s because the Kimberley Process Certification Scheme, the international regime designed to disconnect human suffering from the rough-diamond supply chain, is losing its sparkle. As the chairman of the process for 2012, the U.S. is positioned to

Spurred by a study showing that whites were four times likelier than minorities to receive a presidential pardon, the House Judiciary Committee has asked Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to explain changes he plans to make in the pardon process. Eliminating disparities is easier said than done, but some reforms are obvious.Although presidents can issue pardons for any reason and without consulting anyone, typically applications are processed by the Justice Department and then forwarded with r

Once again the democratic party of South Korea, now called the Democratic United Party, is railing against the KORUS Free Trade Agreement. The DUP is promising to repeal the agreement should they gain a majority in the April elections. As an outsider observing this obsession against the agreement, I often wonder if it is simply a political tactic to appeal to their base in the countryside or if it is based on an unfortunate holdover of a more xenophobic past. I wonder whether the DUP will also d

In 1982, I interviewed Syrian Information Minister Ahmed Iskander in Damascus, shortly after the regime had killed at least 10,000 people in the city of Hama.On his office wall hung a painting of an old Hama neighborhood with one of the waterwheels for which the city was famous. “That is our lovely city of Hama,” he told me calmly. “It‘s perfectly peaceful. You should visit it someday.”He knew that I knew this neighborhood had been leveled to the ground.Back then, under the regime of Hafez al-As