Jagdish Bhagwati argues that growth can reduce poverty and that slow economic growth will hurt social development, which he also argues in his new book with Arvind Panagariya, "India's Tryst with Destiny: Debunking Myths that Undermine Progress and Addressing New Challenges."

Women have made strides in Afghanistan since 2001, but huge issues still remain. While the United States focuses on withdrawal, Afghan women are still in the fight and will be long after 2014, says Gayle Tzemach Lemmon.

As China leaps into the new year with a new generation of leaders, four experts weigh in on what we can expect from the burgeoning power.

A precipitious drawdown to 6,000 troops in Afghanistan after 2014 would cripple the U.S. counterterrorism mission and Afghan security forces, vastly increasing the risk of a Taliban takeover, says Max Boot.

In the next decade, China will continue to rise, not fade. Its leaders will consolidate the one-party model and, in the process, challenge the West's smug certainty about political development and the inevitable march toward electoral democracy.

Li is far too confident in the benefits of Chinese authoritarianism. So far, what has held China back is not any lack of demand for democracy, but a lack of supply.

A recent essay by Robert Ross characterized the Obama administration's "pivot" to Asia as a hostile, knee-jerk response to Chinese aggression. But the shift was not aimed at any one country; it was an acknowledgment that the United States had underinvested in a strategically significant region.

CFR's Daniel Markey examines the prospects for new talks with the Afghan Taliban, especially given improving relations between the United States and Pakistan.

A conservative and a progressive appear to offer South Koreans sharply different presidential options, but both are likely to pursue similar foreign policy tracks, says CFR's Scott Snyder.

Gayle Lemmon, Deputy Director, Women and Foreign Policy Program at CFR and former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan speak on how to involve more women in the peacekeeping process.

In a major electoral comeback, Japan's conservatives have won a supermajority in parliament. But the results have stirred anxieties about how they will use their power, says CFR's Sheila Smith.

Reviving Japan's economy from its two-decade-long slump is key to stabilizing the country's political environment, says expert Gerald Curtis.

On the upcoming South Korean presidential election, Scott A. Snyder says the determining vote will be "South Korea's bulging forties cohort" that played a critical role in South Korea's transition from authoritiarianism to democracy and also has the greatest stake in its economic stability.

Sebastian Mallaby argues that Europe's future is looking frighteningly like Japan's past.

With the passing of International Human Rights Day, Jerome A. Cohen says China still has no effective means of enforcing the rights enshrined in its constitution. Yet, once again, new Communist Party leaders reignite hopes for bringing government and the party under the rule of law.

Joshua Kurlantzick suggests that the interethnic conflict in Rakhine State in western Myanmar is symptomatic of the larger challenges the country faces as it transitions from absolute military rule to democracy.

Sebastian Mallaby argues that microeconomic struggles are tarnishing the macroeconomic success of the BRICs.

Elizabeth C. Economy says, "If the United States and China can begin the process by taking a step back to establish a new narrative for the relationship that minimizes competition, sets aside intractable issues, and keeps global and regional issues where they belong—in a multilateral framework—there will be the potential for the two countries, like the frog in the well, to take two steps forward for every one step back."

Joshua Kurlantzick examines how the Obama administration relies on the Pentagon to serve as diplomatic interlocutor in Southeast Asia and argues against U.S. military cooperation with the region's most oppressive countries.

President Obama gave these remarks at the University of Yangon in Rangoon, Myanmar on November 19, 2012.