Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. (Reuters)

The Persian Perspective

Snapshot

What the United States Gets Wrong on Iran

Two schools of thought dominate Iran's foreign policy-making; the first holds that Iran and the United States can reach a compromise through negotiations, the second that Washington is not a reliable partner. By pushing new sanctions and reneging on engagement, Washington has proved the second school right.

Letter From

Why Sanctions Won't Stop the Nuclear Program

Kayhan Barzegar

Iran's nuclear program will not live or die because of sanctions. The regime's calculus will not be adjusted because of economic pressure.

Collection

The Iran Debate: To Strike or Not to Strike

The cases for, and against, a military attack against Iran to deter its nuclear program.

Snapshot Vázquez Mota and the 2012 Mexican Election Shannon K. O'Neil There are now three candidates for Mexico's July 1 presidential election, but it is Josefina Vázquez Mota’s place on the ticket that has the potential to upend the future of the country's politics. Unlike her two challengers, who are linked to the old guard and old boys' network, as a woman Vázquez Mota can claim to be the mantle of change, even against her own party.	Snapshot What the Russian Protests Can -- And Can't -- Do Maria Lipman and Nikolay Petrov The current protests in Moscow are too weak to radically change the country's politics by themselves. Nevertheless, they will continue to erode Putin's legitimacy. Even if he wins the March 4 election, he will not enjoy the same monopoly on power that he used to.	Snapshot Negotiating an End to Somalia's War with al Shabaab Afyare Abdi Elmi and Abdi Aynte Somalia's government has recently made gains against the militant group al Shabaab. But those will prove fleeting if it does not find a way to address the organization's grievances and bring moderates into the fold.
Response The Great China Debate Derek Scissors; Arvind Subramanian China’s rise is overstated, and its financial problems are massive, argues Derek Scissors. Arvind Subramanian disagrees, claiming that Beijing already calls the shots in the global economy.	Snapshot Russia's Line in the Sand on Syria Dmitri Trenin Russia vetoed a resolution at the UN Security Council to end the violence in Syria because it feels burned by last year's international intervention in Libya, and it harbors suspicions about the motives of the United States.	Video Foreign Affairs Focus On: Space Exploration with Neil deGrasse Tyson Gideon Rose and Neil deGrasse Tyson An interview with the author of "The Case for Space," an article from the next issue of Foreign Affairs, on newsstands February 28.

Books & Reviews

Capsule Review

No Enemies, No Hatred: Selected Essays and Poems

By Liu Xiaobo. Edited by Perry Link, Tienchi Martin-Liao, and Liu Xia

Jerome A. Cohen

Liu’s critical essays and moving prison poetry combine to form a fascinating portrait of China during a period of rapid development and political change. If there was ever any doubt that Liu deserved the Peace Prize, this book erases it.

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New In Books

In the Magazine

Table of contents

January/February 2012, Volume 1, Number 91

Comment

Making Modernity Work

Gideon Rose

Today’s troubles are real, but not ideological: they relate more to policies than to principles. The postwar order of mutually supporting liberal democracies with mixed economies solved the central challenge of modernity, reconciling democracy and capitalism. The task now is getting the system back into shape.