Foreign Policy in Focus

Foreign Policy in Focus is a “Think Tank Without Walls” connecting the research and action of more than 600 scholars, advocates, and activists seeking to make the United States a more responsible global partner. It is a project of the Institute for Policy Studies. FPIF publishes timely commentaries on U.S. foreign policy, sharp analyses of global issues, and on-the-ground dispatches from around the world. We also are interested in pieces that explore the intersection of foreign policy and culture, and on dispatches from social movements involved in foreign policy.

Israel/ Palestine

As the Far Right goes Global, so do Bills trying to Outlaw boycott of Israel

By Rachel Hodes | – (Foreign Policy in Focus) – An increasingly global campaign to tar the BDS movement as “anti-Semitic” comes as Israel’s staunchest global defenders are increasingly anti-Semites themselves. Israeli politics have moved into uncharted territory over the past several months, as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu found himself unable to form a coalition […]

Israel/ Palestine

Trump’s Calls to “Send Them Back” are Mainstream in Israel

Foreign Policy in Focus

The affinity between Trump and Netanyahu is more than personal. It’s rooted in a shared fantasy of a perfectly homogeneous society.

Arms Sales

The US is Flooding the World with Guns: Congress Can Stop That

Foreign Policy in Focus

By John Lindsay-Poland | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus) – When gun exporters and importers gather at a trade conference at the Trump Hotel in Washington later this month, they will confront mixed trends in their industry. Gun manufacturing in the United States fell sharply in the first year of the Trump presidency, by […]

Iran

Iranians are not our Enemies: Can Public Diplomacy Work?

Foreign Policy in Focus

When foreign policy as we know it isn’t working, creative citizen diplomacy can step in to humanize the real people who would be most impacted by war.

Immigration

American Concentration Camps, Then and Now

Foreign Policy in Focus

By Harry Blain | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus) – When human beings are framed as a national security threat, barbed wire is the next logical step. But unlike during the Japanese internment, today there’s high-level political resistance. By Harry Blain, July 1, 2019. Print A Japanese-American internment camp in Colorado (Shutterstock) In our […]

Donald Trump

Trump’s incessant Talk of Mexico Tariffs is about White Nationalism, not Trade

Foreign Policy in Focus

By Laura Carlsen | – (FPIF) – There’s nothing “uncontrollable” about people applying for asylum. All the U.S. has to do is meet its obligations under international law. Donald Trump has once again torpedoed the U.S. relationship with Mexico — its third-largest trade partner, closest neighbor and, actually, an ally — by announcing his decision […]

racism

Why Brown Terrorists are ‘Terrorists’ and White Terrorists are just ‘Mentally Ill’

Foreign Policy in Focus

By Maha Hilal | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus) – Whether authorities classify an act as “terrorist” depends almost entirely on who carries it out, not what they did. Terrorist attacks by white supremacists have been on the rise. But federal law enforcement agencies aren’t simply failing to respond. In many cases, they’re failing […]