Articles by Richard Falk
We found 839 results.
What Makes Ukraine Different from Serbia? Why Kosovo? Why Not Donbas?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2022
Defying Serbian Territorial Sovereignty in Kosovo, Upholding Ukrainian Territorial Sovereignty in the Donbas Region – The blind eye turned toward denials of the right of self-determination to the Palestinian people in what had been their own country of Palestine represents a flagrant example of international double standards.
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Ukraine: War, Statecraft, and Geopolitical Conflict—the Nuclear Danger
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Sep 2022
14 Sep 2022 – The risk of nuclear escalation in the context of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has been a subject of considerable debate in the United States among scholars, policy analysts and media commentators. These debates reveal a broad spectrum of views from those who dismiss Russian references to nuclear capabilities as mere saber rattling to those who worry that if Russian President Vladimir Putin finds his back to the wall in Ukraine, he may resort to tactical nuclear strikes.
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Appraising Mikhail Gorbachev
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Sep 2022
6 Sep 2022 – Mikhail Gorbachev had the greatest historical impact of any public figure since WW II. It is a bitterly polarized legacy of admiration and historical achievement in the West and one of contempt and almost total disrepute in Russia.
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Is It Time to Stop Bullying Iran? Washington Should Restore the Nuclear Program Agreement with Iran Now
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Sep 2022
4 Sep 2022 – It is time for the morally attuned public to awake to the reality that a nuclear Israel has neither security justifications nor political grounds for its continuing bullying of Iran. Iran’s political solidarity with some movements in the region pales in its gravity compared to the U.S. and Israel’s discretionary bombing, political assassinations, interventions, and violations of the basic sovereign rights of countries in the Middle East.
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(Italiano) Il come ricordiamo Hiroshima e Norimberga riflette il potere non la giustizia
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Sep 2022
I pacifisti del vasto mondo sovente scelgono l’8 agosto ogni anno per provare di nuovo la sofferenza umana e la devastazione causate dallo sgancio di bombe atomiche sulle città giapponesi inermi di Hiroshima e Nagasaki.
→ read full articleThe Nuclear Agreement (JCPOA, 2015) Should Be Renewed
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Aug 2022
25 Aug 2022 – Undoing the human and diplomatic harm of Trump’s international legacy is a complex matter that not only exhibits the persisting influence of unrepentant Trumpists but the passivity of the Democratic Party leadership, particularly when it dares to disagree with Israel on a matter of foreign policy concern.
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Movements to Eliminate Nuclear Weapons and to Establish Geopolitical Accountability
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Aug 2022
16 Aug 2022 – Go to the links given connecting you with the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, the NGO that has the longest record of commitment to establish a global security system without nuclear weapons and with geopolitical accountability.
→ read full articleDonation Politics: Worse than Hypocrisy
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Aug 2022
1 Aug 2022 – We need to ask ourselves with a sense of urgency, ‘where is the outrage?’ and ‘why are the streets empty?’ Bob Dylan’s message of the sixties rings truer than ever: ‘The answer, my friends, is blowing in the wind.”
→ read full articleHow We Remember Hiroshima and Nuremberg Reflects Power Not Justice
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Aug 2022
This year the remembrance of the atomic bombings of Japanese cities is especially poignant. The world, as the UN Secretary General noted, is just one miscalculation away from nuclear war. I was also reminded that 8 Aug was the day in 1945 that the Allied Powers had the unfathomable insensitivity to sign the London Agreement setting up the Nuremberg Tribunal to prosecute German war criminals–two days after the first atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and one day before the second one incinerated Nagasaki. Sad to note, times have not changed.
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Biden’s Middle East Visit: An Orgy of Cynicism, Hypocrisy, and Erasures
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Jul 2022
21 Jul 2022 – This piece criticizes the dual tracks of Biden’s ill-executed trip in mid-July to Israel and Saudi Arabia. It faults Biden for the extreme cynicism of pursuing a realpolitik approach in Riyadh and an approach in Israel that mixed silences about apartheid, Shireen Abu Akleh, and the Palestinian ordeal with fanciful claims about shared values and democratic affinities.
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The Worst Is yet to Come: When the Center Cannot Hold
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jul 2022
15 Jul 2022 – This is an attempt to connect my despair about developments in the USA with wider global systemic tendencies. It is not hopeful about the future, yet its central message is that we should continue to struggle for a future we can believe in given that we live at a time of radical uncertainty.
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A European Call for an End to the Ukraine War
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jul 2022
5 Jul 2022 – This piece appeared in the prominent German weekly, ZEIT, last week. It is written from a European perspective, calling for a ceasefire followed by bilateral negotiations between Ukraine and Russia.
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Human Rights and Confronting China Geopolitically
Richard Falk and Alfred de Zayas | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Jun 2022
16 Jun 2022 – Breakthrough success of Bachelet’s HRC mission to China. We decry those who distort such an achievement to continue to rationalize confronting China coercively. Opportunism in relation to human rights is not a path to peace and justice. Rather than provoking a critical storm the mission, in our judgment, should have been applauded with a sustained shout of BRAVO!
→ read full articleUkraine and the Risk of Geopolitical Conflict — A Reawakening to Nuclear Dangers?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Jun 2022
11 Jun 2022 – The risk of nuclear escalation has been subject of debate in the US. These debates reveal those who dismiss Russian references to nuclear capabilities as mere saber rattling to those who worry that if Putin finds his back to the wall in Ukraine, he may resort to tactical nuclear strikes.
→ read full articleWestphalian Logic and Geopolitical Prudence in the Nuclear Age
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 May 2022
24 May 2022 – The Ukraine War, its complexities and global spillover effects, have not been adequately depicted by either political leaders or the more influential media. Most commonly, the Ukraine War has been narrowly and reductively depicted as a simple matter of defending Ukraine against Russian aggression.
→ read full articleThe Killing of Shireen Abu Akleh
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 May 2022
28 May 2022 – The USA Must Demand a Credible Investigation into Shireen Abu Akleh’s Killing – The assassination sent shock waves throughout the Middle East as Shireen was known and respected as a trusted journalist. We keep waiting for a ‘Sharpville Moment’ with respect to Palestine and Israeli impunity. When will it come?
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(Italiano) Tribunale dei Popoli sulle Guerre Ucraine
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2022
È ormai tempo d’iniziative della società civile per opporsi al disastroso confronto globale che sta ora mettendo in pericolo il mondo, anzi prospettive di sopravvivenza di specie, perseguendo obiettivi politici degli Stati Uniti camuffati con una certa dose di complicità dei media che continuano a trasmettere l’impressione che la guerra in Ucraina concerna la difesa dell’Ucraina.
→ read full articleThe Second Level Geopolitical War in Ukraine Takes Over
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2022
30 Apr 2022 – The recent acknowledgement that U.S. goals are secondarily related to the wellbeing of Ukraine, and primarily by the dangerously regressive goals of taking on challengers to the unipolarity, which has guided U.S. grand strategy since the end of the Cold War.
→ read full articleToward a Peoples Tribunal on the Ukraine Wars
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2022
The time has come for civil society to counter the global confrontation endangering the world for U.S. geopolitical goals disguised, with media complicity, in a Ukraine War for its own defense. This is a false and dangerous image… I hope some readers throughout the world will feel motivated to make the Peoples Ukraine Wars Tribunal a reality!
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Al-Aqsa Violence during Ramadan
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2022
21 Apr 2022 – Once more Israel strikes hard against Palestinian rights when the world has its attention fixed elsewhere, with a mainstream media posture of indifference and inattention compounding the problem . The pro-Palestinian solidarity movement is being seriously challenged not to let this happen.
→ read full articleRenounce the Geopolitical War between the U.S. and Russia
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2022
18 Apr 2022 – Stopping the Geopolitical War being waged by the United States against Russia is a precondition for ending the aggressive war initiated by Russia against Ukraine and also a return to semi-responsible statecraft, which is the most we can expect or hope for in the present. Diplomacy seeking a ceasefire and a political compromise is the only sane path.
→ read full articleComplexities of the Ukraine War
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Apr 2022
15 Apr 2022 – This war can be characterized thus:
– Level One: Russia vs. Ukraine
– Level Two: USA vs. Russia
– Level Three: Ukrainian nationalism vs. Russian-oriented separatism
This Geopolitical War Is a ‘Geopolitical Crime’
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Apr 2022
9 Apr 2022 – There is no doubt that atrocities have been committed in Ukraine, seemingly yet not exclusively by Russian attacking forces, and in a perfect world those who so acted would be held responsible. But the world is highly imperfect when it comes to accountability for international crimes.
→ read full articleMake Peace, Not War, in Ukraine
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Apr 2022
31 Mar 2022 – There were a series of provocations by NATO that aroused security concerns in Moscow, including the expansion of NATO after the Cold War was over, the threat from the Soviet Union had disappeared, and promises were made by Western leaders to Gorbachev of no further NATO expansion. Such geopolitical behavior amounted to imprudent statecraft by the West,
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2022 Global Policy Institute Book Award to Richard Falk
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century - TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Apr 2022
Dr. Falk is now a Santa Barbara resident. After four decades at Princeton, he has served as Visiting Distinguished Professor in Global and International Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and has lectured widely around the world as one of America’s most recognizable and relentless crusaders for international justice.
→ read full article(Italiano) Guerra in Ucraina: una prospettiva geopolitica
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Mar 2022
18 Marzo 2022 – Ripresa modificata di una conferenza tenuta il 9 marzo 2022 a una sessione dei Colloqui su Studi Globali all’Università di California – Santa Barbara convocata dal professor Jan Nederveen Pieters, purtroppo priva di una serie di domande impegnative a seguito del mio intervento, fra cui da vari partecipanti in Europa.
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Ukraine War: Three Academic Perspectives
Daniel Falcone interviews Richard Falk - TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Mar 2022
17 Mar 2022 – The following discussion resulted from three separate interviews. There was no interaction among the three of us. I wonder whether this war is best described as ‘Russo-Ukrainian War’ or simply as ‘Ukrainian War’ or ‘Russo-U.S. Proxy War.’ It seems an amalgam of all three.
→ read full articleThe Ukraine War: A Geopolitical Perspective
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Mar 2022
Talk on 9 Mar 2022 at the Global Studies Colloquium, UCSB. When we agreed on a theme for my presentation, we were in a pre-Ukraine world. Interim developments: the imprudent US-led provocations, Russian aggression against a sovereign state of over 44 million people, the confrontational Western sanctions, and a surging Russophobia produced a win/lose calculus rather than partial win/win political outcomes.
→ read full articleThe Paused Quest for Humane Governance in the Arab World: Is It Time ‘to fail better’?
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Feb 2022
The acceleration of history foreshortens our memory of past events, especially when disillusionment displaces hope. This happened a decade ago when uprisings were celebrated as ‘the Arab Spring.’ The role of activist youth, the spontaneous displays of populist strivings for a better political future, created the feeling that something irreversible, and for the better, was taking place. Yet it was not to be.
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On Israel as an Apartheid State: An Interview with Richard Falk
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Feb 2022
19 Feb 2022 – An interview David Falcone originally published in CounterPunch on 11 Feb prompted by the Amnesty Report but extending beyond it.
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‘Politics as Usual’ Will Never Be a Solution to the Current Climate Threat (or to Nuclear War)
C.J. Polychroniou interviews Richard Falk | DWF News - TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Feb 2022
17 Feb 2022 – There is an ever-growing consensus that the climate crisis represents humanity’s greatest problem. Indeed, global warming is more than an environmental crisis — there are social, political, ethical and economic dimensions to it. (Commentary added by Roger Kotila)
→ read full articleIs the Amnesty International Report an Israeli ‘Sharpeville Moment?’
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Feb 2022
10 Feb 2022 – This interview followed the release on 1 Feb of the explosive Amnesty International Report finding Israel guilty of the continuing crime of apartheid. How much longer can governments, the UN, and liberal Zionist close their eye in face of the mounting consensus in the international human community on the question of Israeli apartheid?
→ read full articleThe Problematics of Middle Eastern Diplomacy: The Case of Iran
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Feb 2022
2 Feb 2022 – In relation to both Iran, Israel, and Palestine, the essential message sent by the new leadership is continuity when it comes to substance combined with a resumption of the pre-Trump pretension of equi-distance diplomacy when it comes to the search for a sustainable peace.
→ read full articleWill the Iran Nuclear Agreement Be Restored?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
31 Jan 2022
26 Jan 2022 – An interview with Mojtaba Majidi of the Mehr News Agency (Tehran) on the Vienna Talks that are seeking to restore the Iran Nuclear Agreement of 2015 reached during the Obama presidency.
→ read full articleDangerous Gaps: Knowledge, Action, and Justice
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
17 Jan 2022
16 Jan 2022 – This essay was published on 13 Jan 2022 on This View of Life, which brings to bear the views of science and evolutionary biology on a series of global challenges increasingly overwhelming the capabilities of civilizational modernity.
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(Italiano) L’ascesa sorprendente della Cina
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Jan 2022
4 Gennaio 2022 – L’ascesa sorprendente della Cina: dovuta a un ‘socialismo con caratteristiche cinesi’ o a un ‘capitalismo con facciata cinese? O a un po’ di entrambi?
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January 6th: A Year Later
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Jan 2022
6 Jan 2022 – In retrospect, the attempted insurrection at the Capitol was about a great deal more than an angry expression of disappointment by the populist side of gun culture America. The coup attempt of January 6th failed, yet it succeeded in undermining the unwritten, yet vital, social contract that brought high levels of stability to United States since the republic was established in 1789.
→ read full articleWhat’s Ahead for Palestine in 2022
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Jan 2022
2 Jan 2022 – To begin with, we will witness a growing awareness that traditional diplomacy will not bring stability, much less peace with justice to this struggle that has gone on for more than a century.
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Private Prescriptions for a Better Life in 2022
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Jan 2022
1 Jan 2022 -A thoughtful Indian friend in Paris sent this list as her prescription for a better life in 2022. I adopted her list and added to it. I invite readers to propose their own additions and subtractions.
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Was China’s Amazing Rise Due to ‘Socialism with Chinese Characteristics’ or ‘Capitalism with a Chinese Facade? Or a Little of Both?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Dec 2021
23 Dec 2021 – There has in recent months many discussions centering around the proper characterization of China from an ideological point of view. The Chinese leadership has its own reasons for doing this, seeking to present what it deems a glorious self-image.
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Covering Up Failure: Ignoring the Record of Regime-Changing Interventions
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Dec 2021
6 Dec 2021 – The militarized U.S. political class rejects the record of failure with respect to regime-changing interventions since suffering defeat in the Vietnam War, which ended in 1975.
→ read full articleOn the Collective Will of the Human Species to Survive
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Nov 2021
23 Nov 2021 – The human will to survive is often uncritically taken for granted, which was of little consequence prior to the advent of the nuclear age in 1945. That the first atomic explosion was the event chosen by the scientific community agreed to signal the advent of the age of the Anthropocene is of added significance.
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Climate Change in an Unjust World
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Nov 2021
23 Nov 2021 – It is a great pleasure to participate once again in this annual Congress on Agricultural and Food Ethics. The fact that it coincides with the UN COP-26 Summit on CC taking place is especially appropriate.
→ read full articleClimate Challenge Cannot Be Overcome in an Unjust World
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Nov 2021
16 Nov 2021 – Climate Change, Survival, and Justice in Relation to Agricultural and Food Security – The UN COP-26 delivered mixed messages that disappointed a worried world public. Only the future will tell us whether Glasgow was a welcome new beginning or, in Greta Thunberg’s rhetoric, “more blah, blah, blah.”
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(Italiano) Cambiamento Climatico, Sopravvivenza e Giustizia
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Nov 2021
18 Nov 2021 – Il Raduno sul Cambiamento Climatico ONU COP-26 recentemente concluso a Glasgow ha rilasciato messaggi misti a un pubblico mondiale preoccupato.
→ read full articleClimate Change, Survival, and Justice
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Nov 2021
The recently concluded UN COP-26 Climate Change Gathering in Glasgow delivered mixed messages to a concerned world public. Only the future will tell whether Glasgow was a welcome new beginning or, in Greta Thunberg’s well-chosen rhetoric, “more blah, blah, blah.”
→ read full articleIs This a Sputnik Moment? Or a Paranoid Geopolitical Moment?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Nov 2021
6 Nov 2021 – US Military Interests Are Promoting a Culture of Fear With China – This is a slightly modified interview with Daniel Falcone. It attempts to challenge the pathological geopolitics that diverts attention from climate change and the global justice agenda in a period of growing dangers.
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Colin Powell: In Life and Death
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Oct 2021
Colin Powell died on Monday [18 Oct 2021] at the age of 84. Richard Falk reflects on Powell’s life and the US reaction to his passing including the relevance of identity politics, the question of moderation, his contribution to the horrors of Vietnam and Iraq, and US governmental hypocrisy in the wake of its January 2020 assassination of the comparable Iranian general, Qasem Soleimani.
→ read full articleOn Denigrating the Humanities
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Oct 2021
18 Oct 2021 – This post reflects on the brutal frankness of this year’s winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, Professor Joshua Angrist, unqualified rationale for leaving his faculty position at Hebrew University in Jerusalem for a higher paying professorship at MIT. The put down of literature is mindlessly irresponsible and civilizationally obtuse.
→ read full articleThe Rebranding of Antisemitism after the Holocaust
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Oct 2021
12 Oct 2021 – This post is concerned with the legacy of the Holocaust as providing antisemitism as a policy tool exploited by Israel and Zionist activists to intensify Palestinian suffering and deflect attention from Israeli wrongdoing. My main contention is that the Holocaust experience accentuated the tendencies of the Zionist movement to be opportunistic in the course of its long effort to attain, little by little, its territorial and ideological goals.
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(Italiano) Iron Dome Israeliane: la farsa del finanziamento USA
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Oct 2021
4 Ottobre 2021 – Che gli Stati Uniti paghino il conto per ricostituire la scorta di missili nel sistema difensivo israeliano Iron Dome (Cupola di Ferro) utilizzato durante l’attacco a Gaza in maggio è una caricatura di legalità e giustizia.
→ read full articleL’ONU 75enne: una storia mista di delusioni e adempimenti
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Oct 2021
8 Ottobre 2021 – L’ONU: S’impegna aldilà del suo potenziale [“fa a pugni sopra la sua classe di peso”] ? Le pressioni verso l’unità e il bene pubblico globale possono ricostruire un’ONU orientata e autorizzata a servire gli interessi umani piuttosto che quelli nazionali o la geopolitica? Il suo contributo è nella politica simbolica, come “una superpotenza soft power”, il suo segretario generale è quasi solo come una voce rispettata della ragione e dell’empatia o un gentile critico dell’eccesso geopolitico.
→ read full articleThe UN after 75: A Mixed Record of Disappointment and Fulfillment
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Oct 2021
UN: Does It Punch above Its Weight? Can pressures toward unity and global public good remake a UN oriented and empowered to serve the human interest rather than national ones or geopolitics? Its contribution is in symbolic politics, as ‘a soft power superpower,’ its Secretary General being almost alone as a respected voice of reason and empathy or a gentle critic of geopolitical excess.
→ read full articleReacting to Crime by Waging War(s) – 9/11+9/12: Compounding Tragedy
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Sep 2021
20/22 Sep 2021 – Greater transformative effects resulted from 9/12 than the tragic events of 9/11 due to the vengeful recklessness of the U.S. response. It is a reflection of the deficiencies of political pedagogy and journalistic priorities in the US that despite all that has happened at home and abroad in the course of the last twenty years virtually no distinct attention is given to 9/12.
→ read full articleWhat a Travesty! Iron Dome Subsidy
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Sep 2021
25 Sep 2021 – For the US to pay the bill for Israel’s Iron Dome defense system used during the Gaza attack in May is a travesty of law and justice. And to gain support for such a measure by a vote of 420-9 in the U.S. House of Representatives should be an embarrassment for the strategic rationality of American foreign policy.
→ read full articleFour Remarkable Women
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Sep 2021
13 Sep 2021 – This post reflects an amateurish interest in depicting a fascinating form of feminism that is exemplified by certain exceptional women whom I have been privileged to know. It was originally to be a chapter for my memoir, but I was compelled to cut 100,000 words, and this is one way of saying that my life is bigger than the book!
→ read full articleThe Bipartisan Demise of U.S. Democracy
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Sep 2021
16 Sep 2021 – The Republican Party contempt for liberal U.S. values, traditions, constitutionalism, the findings of science and truthfulness, became routine features of the presidency of Donald Trump.
→ read full articleThe Shared Struggle of Palestinian and Irish Hunger Strikers
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Sep 2021
7 Sep 2021 – Posted below is my foreword to a very illuminating collaboration relating the comparative experience of Palestinian and Irish hunger strikers. Desperate circumstances give rise to desperate behavior. If by states, extreme violent behavior tends to be rationalized as ‘self-defense,’ ‘military necessity,’ or ‘counterterrorism,’ and governmental claims of legal authorization tend to be upheld by judicial institutions.
→ read full articleCrime and Punishment in Afghanistan
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Sep 2021
29 Aug 2021 – Atrocity in Kabul, Geopolitical Crime in Washington
→ read full articleEverything Went Wrong in Afghanistan
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Aug 2021
23 Aug 2021 – In the post-colonial world, the military superiority of Western intervening powers has proved unable to shape the political outcomes of non-Western sovereign spaces, especially if they have unresolved tribal and ethnic conflicts, warlordism, and drug cartels. In Afghanistan, this proved to be once again validated, despite trillions of dollars spent in devastating parts of the country.
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Demystifying Geopolitical Crime and Afghan Debacle
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Aug 2021
26 Aug 2021 – Further Thoughts on Demystifying the Afghan Tragedy and the US-led NATO Geopolitical Crime
→ read full articleToward Global Solidarity: A Politics of Impossibility
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Aug 2021
14 Aug 2021 – This post is my stimulus essay for a Forum sponsored by Great Transition Initiative, a project of the Tellus Institute, dedicated to the exploration of humane and ecologically resonant adjustments to the challenges and threats posed by the onset of the Anthropocentric Age.
→ read full articleDemonizing Durban
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Aug 2021
The Durban Conference was a forum at which Israel, colonialism, the legacy of slavery, and victimization of vulnerable ethnicities would be depicted and condemned. It is no longer plausible to contend that associating Israeli treatment of the Palestinian people as antisemitic. As a Jew myself, I regard Israeli justifications for its behavior toward Palestine as the embodiment of antisemitic behavior, bringing discredit to the Jewish people.
→ read full articleThe Turkish Coup Attempt: Five Years Later
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Jul 2021
16 Jul 2021 – A modified text of my responses to interview questions of Murat Sofuoglu, a Turkish journalist associated with TRT World.
→ read full articleDeclaration of the Crime of Apartheid: Israel
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Jul 2021
9 Jul 2021 – The Declaration on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid in Historic Palestine below is an initiative endorsed by scholars and artists worldwide. Please distribute widely as there is a campaign underway to reach 1,000 signatures. List of the 773 signatories (last update : 8 Jul 2021)
→ read full articleApproaching Iran: The Flaws of Imperial Diplomacy in the Middle East
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Jul 2021
28 Jun 2021 – Biden pledged as a candidate to restore JCPOA, but has so far shown only a limited commitment to rejoin the earlier agreement, and seems to be insisting on a new agreement that is more restrictive of Iran’s nuclear program and its regional political activity. The U.S. Government seems to forget that it was its actions that led to the breakdown of the agreement.
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Who Was Edward Said? Biographically Interpreted and Existentially Recollected
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Jul 2021
3 Jul 2021 – This is an edited text from the 30 Jun 2021 book launch of Timothy Brennan’s ‘Places of Mind: A Life of Edward Said’ (2021), under the auspices of the Cambridge Centre of Palestinian Studies and moderated by its director, Dr. Makram Khoury-Machool.
→ read full articleCulture as Combat: Palestinian Voices
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Jun 2021
Festivals, Museums and Awards – In stirring opening remarks at the international 2021 mega-conference, Palestine Writes, Susan Abulhawa asserts that “… this festival is meant to expand Palestine’s cultural imprint in the world.”
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Confronting the Ruling Elite
Chris Hedge interviews Richard Falk | RT – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Jun 2021
5 Jun 2021 – Richard Falk joins Chris Hedges for a new episode of “On Contact.” Falk has denounced what he calls “the global legalization of rogue behavior embedded in the UN Charter” which vests a right of veto in the five permanent members of the Security Council, the only organ within the UN system with the authority to reach binding decisions.
→ read full articleIDF Operation ‘Guardian of the Walls’: Prelude, Aftermath, Prospects
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Jun 2021
7 Jun 2021 – The Palestinian ordeal is certainly not over, but for the first time we can envision it ending!
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Whither Palestine? Whither Israel? After the Violence Spike, after the Abraham Accords, after Netanyahu
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Jun 2021
13 Jun 2021 – The changing circumstances in Israel/Palestine over the last six weeks. Two questions that will shape the Palestinian destiny: Will the post-Netanyahu government push harder the political agenda of the right-wing settler movement? Will the aftermath of the IDF military operation, Guardian of the Walls, increase Palestinian resistance and global solidarity?
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(Français) Réflexions sur le génocide comme crime ultime
Alfred de Zayas et Richard Falk | Investig'Action - TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Jun 2021
10 Juin 2021 – L’utilisation abusive du mot «génocide» est un manque de respect envers les proches des victimes des massacres arméniens, de l’holocauste et du génocide rwandais. Il est bien plus dangereux de découvrir que nous risquons également d’être immergés dans les eaux troubles du «faux droit» (fake law). Il est urgent de réagir. Une telle évolution n’est pas tolérable.
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(Italiano) ‘Ordine internazionale su base normativa’: nuova metafora per un primato geopolitico U.S.A.
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Jun 2021
3 Giugno 2021 – Questa enfasi su un mondo ‘governato da norme’ implicitamente esprime l’asserzione polemica che gli Stati Uniti si muovono secondo le regole mentre gli avversari no. Ma Snowden ha rivelato che gli USA hanno investito più pesantemente di qualunque altro governo del pianeta nello sviluppo di capacità di sorveglianza intrusiva. I precedenti USA di manipolazione di elezioni estere sono notori, e sono da tempo una parte ben nota del repertorio CIA.
→ read full articleA New Different Cold War, an Old Geopolitics
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
31 May 2021
30 May 2021 – This text is based on responses to questions posed by C.J. Polychroniou, a skilled interpreter of the global scene and noted author and interviewer.
→ read full article‘Rule-Based-International-Order’: A New Metaphor for U.S. Geopolitical Primacy
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
31 May 2021
The implication of this ‘rules-governed’ world is that the USA plays by the rules whereas our adversaries do not. But Snowden revealed that the US has invested more than any other government in intrusive surveillance. Its record of manipulating foreign elections is notorious being a well-known part of the CIA’s portfolio. It has projected more deadly force outside its borders than any other state in last 75 years and has intervened repeatedly in disrupting democracies, blocking and sanctioning their governments if they refuse U.S. tutelage.
→ read full articlePalestine Is Winning the Legitimacy War
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 May 2021
19 May 2021 – This piece attempts to contextualize the current violence directed against Gaza in earlier Israeli provocations and takes note of Israel’s reliance on excessive force upon a helpless Gazan civilian population of over two million people trapped inside a crowded and unlawfully blockaded enclave. I find it appropriate to recall Gandhi’s famous observation along these lines: “First, they ignore you, then they insult you, then they fight you, then you win.”
→ read full articleConversation at the Crossroads
Joseph Camilleri talks with Richard Falk and Stuart Rees – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 May 2021
Conversation at the Crossroads have chosen two inspiring books and their celebrated authors for an international event on Tuesday 8 June:
>Public Intellectual-The Life of a Citizen Pilgrim by Richard Falk
>Cruelty or Humanity by Stuart Rees
Citizen Pilgrim: To Be or Not to Be
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
17 May 2021
Public Intellectual: The Life of a Citizen Pilgrim – Conversation with Richard Falk, Noura Erakat, Victoria Brittain and Jeremy Corbyn~
Monday 17 May, 5:30–7:00 PM (GMT-BST), Where: Online
Biden’s Foreign Policy and Nuclear Weapons: A Dialogue
Richard Falk and David Krieger | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 May 2021
5 May 2021 – Biden’s international bipartisan approach risks a renewed arms race in a political and economic atmosphere that makes it unaffordable as well as acutely dangerous. My conversation with David Krieger explores some of the ramifications.
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Israeli Apartheid and Palestine Grievances
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 May 2021
3 May 2021 – Questions from Rodrigo Craveiro from Correio Braziliense, 27 Apr 2021, in response to Report of Human Rights Watch on Israeli Apartheid; it is followed by my responses to questions of Zahra Mirzafarjouyan on behalf of Mehr News Agency in Tehran, addressing some of the underlying causes of Palestinian grievances.
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(Italiano) Riflessioni sul genocidio come crimine estremo
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 May 2021
L’abuso del termine genocidio è sdegnoso verso i parenti delle vittime dei massacri armeni, dell’Olocausto, del genocidio rwandese – come pure un disservizio alla storia, al diritto, e alla conduzione prudente dei rapporti internazionali. Sapevamo già di essere alla deriva in un oceano di fake news. E’ ben più pericoloso scoprire che rischiamo anche di venire sommersi nelle acque turbolente del “fake law” [falso diritto]. Dobbiamo reagire, con senso d’urgenza. Tale sviluppo non è tollerabile.
→ read full articleReflections on Genocide as the Ultimate Crime
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Apr 2021
26 Apr 2021 – The misuse of the word genocide is disdainful toward relatives of the victims of the Armenian massacres, the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide – and as well a disservice to both history, law, and the prudent conduct of international relations. We already knew that we were adrift in an ocean of fake news. It is far more dangerous to discover that we are also at risk of being immersed in the turbulent waters of “fake law”. We must push back with a sense of urgency. Such a development is not tolerable.
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Remembering Ramsey Clark
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Apr 2021
12 Apr 2021 – Ramsey Clark was a great man, and it was my privilege to work with him closely on several occasions. His death is a time to mourn, but it is also a time to remember who he was and why his life mattered in profound ways to so many people.
→ read full articleThe Middle East: Geopolitical Battleground
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Apr 2021
18 Apr 2021 – Questions posed on the basis of my memoir, ‘Public Intellectual,’ by an Egyptian journalist. The interview covers several distinct issues that involve interpretations of major foreign policy concerns in the Middle East.
→ read full articleHow Significant Is the $400 Billion Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between China and Iran
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Apr 2021
This post consists of my responses to questions posed by the Iranian journalist Javad Heiran-Nia, Questions on the China/Iran Agreement (4 April 2021). The agreement, officially known as Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, was signed formally just a few weeks before it was announced that so-called ‘indirect talks’ between Iran and the U.S. were taking place in Vienna.
→ read full articleDo We Really Want a Second Cold War?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Apr 2021
31 Mar 2021 – The protection of human rights is being geopolitically manipulated to mobilize public support for an anti-Chinese foreign policy in the West that risks generating a dangerous geopolitical confrontation. Such a confrontation amounts to war-mongering and diverts U.S. attention from self-scrutiny and global peacebuilding. Whether a second cold war is already underway is a matter of interpretation.
→ read full articlePalestinian Balance Sheet: Normative Victories, Geopolitical Disappointments
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Mar 2021
21 Mar 2021 – . It seems to me that Israeli leaders understand that South African racism collapsed largely because it lost the Legitimacy War. Maybe some Israeli leaders are beginning to grasp the writing on the wall. The ICC decision may turn out to be a turning point not unlike the Sharpeville Massacre of 1965. This may be so even, as is likely, not a single Israeli is ever brought to justice before the ICC.
→ read full articleThe Geopolitics of the Normalization Agreements
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Mar 2021
Listen Closely to the Israeli Discourse in an American Liberal Idiom: Geopolitical Dreams, Ethical Nightmares
→ read full articleCorrupting Democracy One Dollar at a Time
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Mar 2021
Commodifying Democracy is a Costly Failure in America – Everyday I receive ten to twenty times more appeals for money to support this or that political campaign than I receive any kind of serious substantive statement of explanation or concern. And because this storm has become so deadening, the language of most appeals is nearly always hysterical, wildly exaggerating good or bad marginal developments designed to create a sense of urgency on the part of recipients.
→ read full articleA German Court Punishes an International Crime Committed in Syria
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Mar 2021
26 Feb 2021 – The case is significant because it asserts the legal authority of a national court to impose accountability when the territorial sovereign is itself the culprit and international tribunals lack the means to pursue those most responsible for the commission of the most serious international crimes. In this instance, Russia and China vetoed an attempt in the UN Security Council to authorize allegations against Syria.
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(Italiano) La violenza nucleare è il motivo per cui viviamo nell’Antropocene
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Mar 2021
26 Febbraio 2021 – Comprendo l’essenza del consenso emerso da questa discussione dell’eloquente scritto di Paul Raskin. Infatti si tratta di un’accettazione dell’Antropocene come un terribile avvertimento che la specie umana è destinata al disastro, se non all’estinzione, se la sua impronta ecologica non sarà notevolmente ridotta in un futuro relativamente prossimo.
→ read full articleNuclear Violence Is Why We Are Living in the Anthropocene Age
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Feb 2021
15 Feb 2021 – Violence: Another Existential Crisis – As I grasp the essence of the consensus emerging from this discussion of Paul Raskin’s eloquent essay, it is an acceptance of the Anthropocene as a dire warning that the human species is headed for disaster, if not extinction, if its ecological footprint is not greatly reduced in the relatively near future.
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(Italiano) Un Bilancio Palestinese: Vittorie Normative, Delusioni Geopolitiche
Richard Falk | Centro Studi Sereno Regis - TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Feb 2021
Nei decenni a venire la decisione ICC può risultare il punto di svolta, non così diverso dal Massacro di Sharpeville. Prima dell’alba la notte è più buia. La maggioranza Africana attese allora oltre 30 anni per la propria emancipazione dall’apartheid. I palestinesi hanno già sopportato gli stenti e le umiliazioni della soggiogazione razzista e della supremazia ebraica per più di 70 anni. Quando finirà, e come?
→ read full articleIran’s Islamic Republic Celebrates Its 42nd Anniversary
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Feb 2021
9 Feb 2021 – Iran is in the process of celebrating the 42nd Anniversary of the Islamic Revolution that led to the downfall of the Shah of Iran’s dynastic rule and its replacement by the Islamic Republic of Iran, which has defied the odds by resisting successfully a variety of attempts to restore the old established order either by an Iraqi encouraged war in the 1980s, destabilization efforts all along pushed by the U.S. and Israel, and an undisguised goal of regime change.
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Living by Love [Haiku]
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Feb 2021
30 Jan 2021 – Haiku is my form of lockdown therapy.
→ read full articleA Palestinian Balance Sheet: Normative Victories, Geopolitical Disappointments
Richard Falk – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Feb 2021
In decades to come the ICC decision may turn out to be a turning point not unlike the 1960 Sharpeville Massacre. Before dawn, the night is darkest. The African majority waited more than 30 years for their emancipation from apartheid. The Palestinian people have already endured the hardships and humiliations of racist subjugation and Jewish supremacy for more than 70 years. When will it end, and how?
→ read full articleRemembering George Shultz after 53 Years
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
15 Feb 2021
I recall nostalgically, George’s civility, which according to reports, nevertheless required backbone, resisting the Nixon’s tactics that prefigured Trump’s antic presidency. George impressively stood his ground firmly whenever political leaders asked him to cross his red lines, so unlike the Republicans who inhabit Congress, and toe the Trump line no matter what. [He died on 6 Feb 2021 at the age of 100.]
→ read full articleThe B’Tselem Report on Israeli Apartheid
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Feb 2021
3 Feb 2021 – The significance of the B’Tselem Report, which recently concluded that Israel imposes an apartheid regime to sustain Jewish supremacy on both Israel itself and all of the Occupied Palestine.
→ read full articleIs There an American ‘Deep State’?
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Jan 2021
23 Jan 2021 – Trump’s foreign policy was indeed disastrous, but it did somewhat illuminate the anachronistic character of the zombie like ‘bipartisan consensus’ that yet be revived in the course of reaffirming the old Cold War/neoliberal globalization orthodoxy of pre-Trump America.
→ read full articleBlocking Twitter & Twitter Blocking Trump: Why We Should Worry
Richard Falk | Global Justice in the 21st Century – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jan 2021
Should a government have the authority to limit the dissemination by social media of material derogatory to or defamatory of the elected leadership of the country, as well as have a mandate to impose limits on access to sexually explicit material in deference to public morals?
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