Research Library

The authors examine the varied approaches used by the U.S. and Iran during the ongoing nuclear negotiations, with particular emphasis on how each side approaches the Israeli-Palestinian arena and Iran’s entrenchment in Syria and Lebanon.

Using a framework based on vulnerability, risk and offsets provides valuable insights for evaluating the security of an energy system in transition, writes energy fellow Mark Finley.

This report analyzes political and religious authority in Saudi Arabia under the regime of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

In the current absence of direct negotiations, the Obama administration has an opportunity to reshape the Israeli-Palestinian negotiating framework, according to a report by the Conflict Resolution Program at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. The report recommends that the administration continue to demonstrate strong U.S. support for the two-state model, test the willingness of the parties to compromise and adopt a more comprehensive approach to resolving the conflict with the support of the international community.

Fossil fuel subsidies have allowed energy exporting countries to distribute resource revenue, bolstering legitimacy for governments, many of which are not democratically elected. But subsidy benefits are dwarfed by the harmful consequences of encouraging uneconomic use of energy. Now, with consumption posing a threat to long-term exports, governments face a heightened need to raise prices that have come to be viewed as entitlements. While reforms of state benefits are notoriously politically dangerous, previous experience shows that subsidies can be rolled back without undermining government legitimacy — even in autocratic settings — given proper preparation.