Social Science Research Council

Mr. Badawi in his recent post “Indebted to the Save Darfur Coalition?” plays loose with the numbers and the definition of Sudan’s “odious” debt. In addition, he mischaracterizes the objectives of the Save Darfur Coalition’s position related to how the international community should deal with Sudan’s debt crisis and ignores the coalition’s support thus far [...]

Is the devil making work for idle hands now that the two key publicity drivers for the ‘Darfur cause’ – food in the internally displaced camps and fighting between government and rebel forces – have both passed the worse for quite a while now?
It sure looks that way.
Following hot on the heels of its [...]

The US government and the American people sincerely want to do the right thing by Sudan. Help turn it into a democratic, stable, equitable, prosperous and, preferably, united country. However, US Congressional hearings about Sudan usually follow the same, stale format: a raft of, frankly woefully under-informed, testimonies focused solely on condemning loudly the behaviour [...]

Supporters of US oil sanctions on Khartoum, and who are in many cases supporters of the SPLM, are strangely silent with respect to its impact on South Sudan. Yet nowhere is the case of the “unintended consequences” of sanctions more clearly apparent than on this vital sector of South Sudan’s fragile economy.
US policy-makers [...]

Helping Sudan turn into a democratic, stable, equitable, and prosperous country. That’s the ultimate dream end-destination; but there’s a huge problem with the US government’s wanton resort to placing sanctions on the Sudanese government: they have actually made steering Sudan on to that track tougher, not easier.
Sanctions have severely narrowed the escape from poverty for [...]

Over the past twelve years, the U.S. has put forth a confusing array of legislation to impose economic sanctions on Sudan. Horrified initially by the Sudan government’s early support for international terrorism and, later, its behavior in Darfur, yet aiming to support the signed peace agreements, US policymakers have enacted a disconnected series of measures [...]

I hope to provide some comments that help clarify the goals and tactics of the Sudan divestment campaign.
In 2006, the Genocide Intervention Network launched the Sudan Divestment Task Force (SDTF) to coordinate the developing Sudan divestment movement, which at the time consisted of varying, divergent approaches. Some states had adopted sweeping divestment statutes covering [...]

Apropos of Ibrahim Adam’s call to increase foreign direct investment in Sudan, it’s worth considering whether a strategy, pushed by American divestment activists, that bringing firms to the negotiating table offers a more productive soft power strategy than sanctions. In my view, there is a small chance that it does.
What began as a push by [...]

On August 14th in this space, Ibrahim Adam argued for the removal of United States sanctions and an end to the international targeted divestment campaign meant to turn the screws on Khartoum. The argument is convincing only if you accept Mr. Adam’s implied premises: that the war in Darfur is merely a result of economic [...]

The US government and the American people sincerely want to do the right thing by Sudan. Help turn it into a democratic, stable, equitable, prosperous and, preferably, united country. Trouble is they don’t seem to know how. At least that’s what it looks like judging by America’s neurosis with placing new, and keeping old, economic [...]