Is it just another election season?
Güven Sak, PhD
30 December 2018
This week minimum wage has increased by 26 percent while household natural gas and electricity prices have declined 10 percent. The President himself has made the announcement. These can be thought kind of a new year’s present for the nation. Turkey is going to have its municipal election in March 2019. You may say that it is just another election season in Turkey? I tend to disagree. This time is different.
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Why is the US-China confrontation heating up?
Güven Sak, PhD
23 December 2018
About ten years ago, it was the Americans who started funding projects to revitalize the old Silk Road - the land route connecting China to Europe. I specifically remember how an American official told me not to waste my time with projects on Israel-Palestine, and to look more closely at Central Asia. People were doing things like sending test containers over silk road train tracks, just to see how much time it would take. Projections at the time made a striking case. Companies – many of them American – were going to reorient their supply chain logistics according to this plan.
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China to operate the new port in Haifa
Güven Sak, PhD
09 December 2018
It’s that time of the year again, when we look back and think about all that’s happened in the past eleven months. So here’s a question: what was the most significant strategic event of 2018? Let me tell you my favorite in the Middle East. In July 2018, the management of the first part of the new port in Haifa was transferred to the Shanghai International Port Group (SIPG). Despite President Trump’s ferocious anti-China stance, Israel still decided to give SIPG a 25-year strategic perch in our region. I think this is very important. Let me tell you why.
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It’s time to make the G20 work for the Rest
Güven Sak, PhD
02 December 2018
The G20 Summit started in Buenos Aires, Argentina this week. The G7 represents the West (plus Japan), while the G20 could be thought of as G7 + 13, with the 13 being the representatives of “the Rest.” I remember the Turkish and Chinese Presidencies of the G20 in 2015 and 2016 very vividly. How hopeful we all were to make the G20 more inclusive! To turn it into a mechanism that would bring “the Rest” into the fold! Yet the only news item coming out of the G20 this year appears to be bilaterals, or the occasional drama, like who dares to have their picture taken with the radioactive Saudi crown prince. It is a pity, if you ask me.
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