Featured Topics and Countries

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine once again raises the question of sanctions’ effectiveness. Economic sanctions are a popular foreign policy tool for addressing a wide range of international issues, including armed conflict, human rights violations, and terrorism. 

How do geopolitics, populism, and global power relations influence international climate politics? Our researchers analyse these interdependencies and examine how countries of the Global South can promote sustainable development to engender fairer and more effective climate policy worldwide. 

The global digital transformation is changing the way we live and work, as well as how states relate to each other. Our researchers analyse the ensuing opportunities and challenges in the Global South and explore emerging instruments of state–society interactions and foreign policy, such as digital diplomacy, and cyber-sanctions, including anti-fake news laws. 

Approximately 80 million people worldwide are currently displaced due to war or political violence. Millions more have fled their homes because of environmental disasters and socio-economic marginalisation. As there is no immediate end in sight, forced migration is one of the most pressing challenges facing world politics today. We focus on the causes of this phenomenon in our study regions. 

The Indo-Pacific has emerged as the world’s economic and strategic centre of gravity, an area in which established and rising powers are now heavily competing with one another. Our work particularly emphasises the perspectives of actors (both governmental and non-governmental) in the Indo-Pacific. Learn more about the GIGA’s research on this mega region. 

It is not only non-democratic regimes that resort to authoritarian practices. They can increasingly be found in use also in formally democratic states, as the examples of shrinking civic space, populism, and democratic backsliding show.

Democracy builds on common principles such as elections, a division of power, and the rule of law. In practice, democratic institutions often underperform due to executives overstepping the mark, conflicts and power struggles causing a stalemate in the policy process, as well as governance instability.

Religion is a key facet of society and affects politics and socio-economic development in a multitude of ways. In the name of religions, terrorist attacks are committed, armed conflicts are fought, and xenophobia is justified. At the same time, religion can also be a vital contributor to peace. Our research explores the interplay between religion and security.  

The Andean region is caught between the poles of democratisation, social conflict, violence, drug trafficking, and global power shifts. At the GIGA, we research democratisation, violence and peace-building efforts, gender equality, climate policy, and international cooperation. On this page, you can explore how these factors shape society and politics. 

Brazil is striving to play a leading role on the international political stage – with implications for global power relations. At the GIGA, we delve into Brazil’s role in international forums such as BRICS and the G20, as well as in the realm of international climate policy. We also examine developments in democracy, foreign direct investment, and violence and security, as well as the country’s labour markets. 

China is a partner, competitor, and systemic rival vis-à-vis the European Union. But it is also a political actor that needs to be understood on its own terms. The GIGA offers significant expertise on China’s political and economic development, as well as on the country’s role in both regional and global affairs. 

With a population of 1.4 billion, a dynamic economy, and growing political weight in the global order, India has become an important partner for Germany in the EU. GIGA researchers analyse India’s foreign policy, digital policy, the role played by its media, and the country’s role in forums for global governance, including the climate regime and BRICS. 

GIGA researchers examine political, socioeconomic, and cultural dynamics in North Africa, including authoritarian rule, regime stability, civil-military relations, political Islam, and social movements. They also study migration, youth, kinship, cultural production, precarity and repression.

South Africa exemplifies a largely successful peace process after the end of Apartheid. However, considerable political, social, and economic challenges persist. GIGA researchers examine South Africa’s democracy, political representation, foreign policy, and transitional justice, as well as its role in international relations. 

After 54 years of dictatorship and over 13 years of war, the Assad regime fell in December 2024. GIGA researchers examine Syria’s future, offering expertise on the political transition and on the dynamics of authoritarianism, violent conflict, displacement, and climate-related mobility.