It is six years on from 2015 when over a million migrants arrived into Europe by sea. The European migrant crisis still continues to this day with inflows of migrants through the Balkans. Caitlin Ayre explains how the crisis has been shaped by the coronavirus pandemic. Many migrants are now stuck in squalid conditions, trapped by border closures and bureaucratic mismanagement.
In 2019, police in Brazil managed to kill 1,800 people, around five a day. This isn’t an exceptional statistic for Latin America, as Harriet Allan discusses. Corrupt, and eager to use excessive force, the police are distrusted by much of the public in the region, leading to a brutal and ineffective institution.
For many of us, social isolation has been an unfortunate yet temporary consequence of the coronavirus lockdowns. But it is a regular occurrence for the 80,000 people, who on any given day, are held in solitary confinement in US prisons. Many will suffer for months or years without proper social contact. Hannah Comiskey explains how this form of punishment has been overused and is an excessively cruel way to treat prisoners.
The Iran deal was one of Obama’s crowning foreign policy achievements when he was US President. Then Trump tore the deal up. Brooke Siegler looks at the potential for Biden to negotiate a new deal with Iran, and the difficult challenges that both parties face to make it happen.
In the Arab world, countries are scrambling to digitise their countries, desperate to diversify their economy and create jobs for their rapidly growing populations. Nadeen Al-Awadh illustrates how this transformation is taking place, and the risks it brings in arming fascistic regimes with digital tools to suppress dissent.
Finally, St Andrews’s first South Asian Symposium was held by the St Andrews South Asian Society (Sanskriti) in partnership with The Lafayette Club, Scores Consultancy Group, and The St Andrews Economist. The event featured Dr. Harsha de Silva, a Member of Parliament (MP) in Sri Lanka, Mr. Karti Chidambaram, a MP in India, and Mr. Michael Kugelman, the Deputy Director of the Asia Program and a Senior Associate for South Asia at the Wilson Centre. The event offered a great insight into political and economic issues across South Asia.
Europe
Latin America
- Authoritarian Legacies: Policing in Brazil and Latin America by Harriet Allan
Middle East and Africa
- A Digital Economy: MENA’s Next Big Venture by Nadeen Al-Awadh
- Biden’s Iran Deal by Brooke Siegler
Asia-Pacific
Theory
- The Hidden Harm of Solitary Confinement by Hannah Comiskey
The St Andrews Economist 