Polis Under Construction

This is the third incarnation of a blog begun in 2005, and continued with one of the spottier records in the blogosphere.

Now, I begin again, with a few changes.  Polis, as always, is dedicated to political and economic changes around the world.  But I also hope to focus on international development issues, democratization, and world stories to a greater degree than before.

Personally, I’m a university student in the US studying Political Science and Economics.  I’m interested in, what else, international development and democratisation.  I was extraordinarily happy when the Colour Revolutions were taking place, but that has dimmed.  Kyrgyzstan’s expulsion of Akayev seems to have caused little progress, Ukraine remains locked with an increasingly assertive and authoritarian Russia, and the protests of Burma’s monks seem to have been alarmingly easily silenced.

To my knowledge, Nepal has been the most successful democratiser of any country these past few years.  Gyanendra’s seizure of power was resisted, the parliament has reduced the King to a constitutional monarch, and Nepal is on track to become a republic in 2008.

It is not that I am an endless cheerleader for democracy.  I have a laundry list of complaints about the system here at home.  But I desire freedom, and that other people have it.  To have it requires both political and economic capabilities, and so those then interest me.

So that is the topic of this blog.