Explainers

Special Projects

CFR produces a range of special resources, including trackers and data visualizations, for policymakers and citizens to get up to speed on major foreign policy and security challenges.

Interactives Filters and Cards

Japan
Constitutional Change in Japan
Japan's constitutional debate is about not simply the document's past but also the nation's ability to respond to twenty-first-century challenges.
Health Policy and Initiatives
The Future of Global Health Is Urban Health
Health and infectious diseases have shaped the history of urbanization, but it is cities that will define the future of global health.
Noncommunicable Diseases
Democracy Matters in Global Health
Democracy has played little role in the recent history of global health, but new research published in the Lancet shows democracy is becoming more important as the health needs of low- and middle-income nations shift from infectious diseases to noncommunicable diseases. 
Immigration and Migration
Growing Up and Moving Out: The Critical Link Between Health and Migration
Migration is seen as the product of desperate circumstances, but increasingly it is the byproduct of success—improved child survival followed by a booming young-adult population.
Women and Women's Rights
Women's Workplace Equality Index
Most countries still have laws that make it harder for women to work than men. This inequality shortchanges not only women but also entire economies.
Women and Economic Growth
Growing Economies Through Gender Parity
Closing the gender gap in the workforce could add a staggering $28 trillion to the global GDP.
Syrian Civil War
Syria’s Civil War and the Descent Into Horror
Protests in Syria have descended into a civil war, giving rise to Islamic State militants and an outpouring of refugees and defying attempts at resolution.
Health
The Changing Demographics of Global Health
Population growth and aging are fueling a spectacular rise in noncommunicable diseases, such as cancers and cardiovascular diseases, in poor countries that are ill-prepared to handle them. 
Human Rights
Preventive Priorities Survey: 2013
The Center for Preventive Action’s annual Preventive Priorities Survey (PPS) evaluates ongoing and potential violent conflicts based on the impact they could have on U.S. interests and their likelihood of occurring in the coming year. Policymakers have limited time and resources for preventive action and thus have to focus on a select number of potentially harmful contingencies from a myriad of possibilities. The PPS polls experts in the field and aims to help the U.S. policy community prioritize these competing conflict prevention and mitigation demands.
Global Governance
Council of Council Report Card 2014-2015
The Council of Councils (CoC) Report Card on International Cooperation evaluates multilateral efforts to address ten of the world’s most pressing global challenges, from countering transnational terrorism to advancing global health. No country can confront these issues better on its own. Combating the threats, managing the risks, and exploiting the opportunities presented by globalization require international cooperation. To help policymakers around the world prioritize among these challenges, the CoC Report Card on International Cooperation surveyed the Council of Councils, a network of twenty-four foreign policy institutes around the world.
Heads of State and Government
Campaign 2016
See where Donald Trump wants to take U.S. foreign policy
Trade
The Long Fight Over Trade and Medicines
U.S. trade deals may not be spurring the large drug price increases and shifts away from lower-cost generics in U.S. trading partners that many predicted. 
Defense and Security
The Rebalance to Asia
Despite the Obama administration’s new approach to East Asia, overall security aid to Southeast Asia actually fell by 19 percent between 2010 and 2015, shows a new analysis by the Council on Foreign Relations.
Democracy
The Arab Uprisings Five Years On
On the eve of the Arab Uprisings’ fifth anniversary, CFR’s Steven A. Cook surveys the region’s tumult and backslide into autocracy.
Financial Markets
CFR Central Bank Currency Swap Interactive
Central bank currency swaps are becoming the new cross-border tool of choice in financial crisis management.  This interactive explores the rapid growth of currency swaps since 2007 and its implications for the global financial system.