Political Geography: - CIAO Search Results

39501. Continental Shelf Issue in Iran and Its Southern Neighbors

Author:: Pirouz Mojtahed-Zadeh, Ali-Reza Niknejad, and RamtinSalarian
Publication Date:: 12-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Iranian Review of Foreign Affairs
Institution:: Center for Strategic Research (CSR)
Abstract:: The region of the Persian Gulf can be seen as a heartland under the geopolitical influence of which the Arab-Iranian relations are shaped. As one the world's primary and most significant source of fossil-energy exports, the Persian Gulf cobbles together the eight countries of the region in a geopolitical panorama, in which they enjoy similarities in economic and strategic life, as well as security concerns. As well, the challenges of maritime political geography seem to be quite dependent on an established set of standards and agreements in order to remain on solid grounds. Currently, these challenges manifest themselves in four major categories, with substantial geopolitical consequences between the Iranians and the Arabs of the region, and the complexity of their relationships. These include: Religious Controversies, which concern the sectarian geopolitics, propagated under Jordan-Israeli concoction of "Shiite Crescent", Territorial Contentions; with its major controversy over the naming of the Persian Gulf. This article examines the process of territorial conflicts, proceedings and eventually the settlements over the maritime areas of the Persian Gulf in the past five decades. The arrangement of the maritime political geography in the Persian Gulf is a fitting example of former disputes over the border and boundaries within the maritime regions of the world.
Topic:: Security and Economics
Political Geography:: Iran and Persia

39502. "The Lessons of 1914 for East Asia Today: Missing the Trees for the Forest"

Author:: Todd H. Hall and Jia Ian Chong
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: A century has passed since the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo set in motion a chain of events that would eventually convulse Europe in war. Possibly no conflict has been the focus of more scholarly attention. The questions of how and why European states came to abandon peaceful coexistence for four years of armed hostilities—ending tens of millions of lives and several imperial dynasties—have captivated historians and international relations scholars alike.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: United States, Europe, Middle East, and East Asia

39503. "Domestic Coalitions, Internationalization, and War: Then and Now"

Author:: Etel Solingen
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: The sources of World War I are numerous and widely studied. Some scholars have argued that they are underdetermining individually but overdetermining collectively. The purpose of this article is not to fuel the battle among theories claiming complete explanatory power, but rather to examine some lessons for contemporary international relations. Much of the recent commentary on the war's centenary evokes similarities between Germany in 1914 and China in 2014, and between globalization then and now. There are crucial differences on both accounts, however.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: China and Germany

39504. "Better Now Than Later: The Paradox of 1914 as Everyone's Favored Year for War"

Author:: Jack Snyder
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: One reason why Europe went to war in 1914 is that all of the continental great powers judged it a favorable moment for a fight, and all were pessimistic about postponing the fight until later. On its face, this explanation constitutes a paradox. Still, each power had a superficially plausible reason for thinking this was true.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: Europe

39505. "Dead Wrong? Battle Deaths, Military Medicine, and Exaggerated Reports of War's Demise"

Author:: Tanisha M. Fazel
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: Several recent books argue that war is on the decline. In Winning the War on War, for example, Joshua Goldstein lauds the recent successes of the peacemaking community in countries such as Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Ivory Coast. In The Better Angels of Our Nature, Steven Pinker writes that not only war but violence in general has become much less common, as the civilizing forces of literacy and modern government have tempered our baser instincts and allowed our "better angels" to prevail.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: United States, Middle East, and East Asia

39506. "Delegitimizing al-Qaida: Defeating an 'Army Whose Men Love Death'"

Author:: Jerry Mark Long and Alex S. WIlner
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: Al-Qaida has established a metanarrative that enables it to recruit militants and supporters. The United States and its allies can challenge its ability to do so by delegitimizing the ideological motivations that inform that metanarrative.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: United States, Middle East, and East Asia

39507. "Ethnofederalism: The Worst Form of Institutional Arrangement…?"

Author:: Liam Anderson
Publication Date:: 04-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Security
Institution:: Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:: Critics of ethnofederalism— a political system in which federal subunits reflect ethnic groups' territorial distribution—argue that it facilitates secession and state collapse. An examination of post-1945 ethnofederal states, however, shows that ethnofederalism has succeeded more often than not.
Topic:: International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:: United States, Middle East, and East Asia

39508. The existence and use of 'evil' in international politics

Author:: Anna Geis and Christopher Hobson
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: There is an extensive literature on acts, events and people in international politics that may be described as 'evil' , but much less work specifically focusing on how this idea operates and is used in an international context. This has begun to change recently, however, as a result of leading international figures–most notably George W. Bush–using the term prominently. This special issue seeks to further advance scholarship on these issues by moving beyond purely philosophical accounts on the nature of evil, and considering: how it has been used to frame the identities of actors in international relations (IR); whether it works to enable or preclude specific kinds of behaviour; and what role it plays as part of our moral and political vocabulary. This introduction provides a brief survey of the literature on evil in IR, and gives an overview of the contributions to the special issue.
Topic:: International Relations
Political Geography:: New York

39509. Systemic evil and the international political imagination

Author:: Patrick Hayden
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: In light of the persistence of discourses of atrocity in the post-Holocaust era, and with the resurgence of talk of evil that followed 11 September 2001, it is clear that the idea of evil still possesses a powerful hold upon the modern imagination. Yet, the inter-play of evil and the political imagination–in particular, how different images of evil have shaped the discourses and practices of international politics–remains neglected. This article suggests that evil is depicted through three contending images within international politics–evil as individualistic, as statist and as systemic–and their corresponding forms of collective imagination–the juridical, the humanitarian and the political. It argues further that the dominance of the juridical and, to a lesser extent, the humanitarian imagination obscures our ability to imagine and respond to political evils of structural or systemic violence. Drawing on the example of global poverty, this article contends that the ability to portray and critically judge systemic evils in international politics today depends upon enriching our narratives about indefensible atrocities and reimagining our shared political responsibilities for them.

39510. Beyond good and evil: Ethics in a world of complexity

Author:: David Chandler
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article seeks to analyse the shift away from the moral certainties of the Cold War epoch and of humanitarian interventions in the 1990s, to suggest that 'evil' plays a very different role in politics and international relations today. In current constructions of the world – as much more global, complex and non-linear – the past certainties of liberal internationalism appear to be a symptom of problematic moral hubris. Rather than the transcendental moral certainties of good and evil, globalization and complexity seem to suggest a more immanent perspective of emergent causality, eliciting a reflexive ethics of continual work on 'good' public modes of being. In which case, 'evil' is no longer considered to be an exception but becomes normalized as an ethical learning resource. The 2011 case of the mass killings by Norwegian Anders Breivik will be highlighted as an example of this process. This article suggests that this 'democratization' of evil is problematic in articulating evil as a revealed or emergent truth in the world that requires social and personal self-reflexivity, thereby suborning moral choice to onto-ethical necessity.
Topic:: International Relations and Cold War

39511. The good, the bad, and the ugly: Comparing the notions of 'rogue' and 'evil' in international politics

Author:: Anna Geis and Carmen Wunderlich
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The identification and naming of an 'enemy' is an age-old element within foreign policy and (domestic) security policy discourses. It serves to stabilize speakers' benign conceptions of the self, to structure threat perceptions of 'the world outside' and to legitimate ultimately violent policy options. This article compares the notions of 'rogue' and 'evil' in order to analyse the political implications of such a use of derogative actor categories. The notion of 'rogue states' has played an important role in the security strategies of the US presidents Clinton and in particular George W. Bush and alludes to criminal law. 'Evil' has been a much older, religiously loaded concept and has been invoked in politics for describing the inconceivable, monstrous violence and destruction. While many liberal critics argue that one should abandon the metaphysical category of evil and dispose of the stigmatizing category of the 'rogue', this article concludes with the suggestion that a self-reflexive use of these categories can be instructive: It can make 'us' – the very modern secular liberals – think about ourselves, about responsibility and moral standards as well as about the fundamental ambivalence of our actions.
Topic:: Politics
Political Geography:: United States

39512. Evilization in liberal discourse: From Kant's 'unjust enemy' to today's 'rogue state'

Author:: Harald Muller
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Liberal discourse should have a hard time looking for 'evil' in international relations. Standing on the pillar of rationalism and humanitarianism, there seems to be little space for the morally and emotionally charged notion of evil to enter considerations. Yet, the liberal belief in the freedom of will implies that humans are capable of turning against the advice of reason and opt for evil behavior and underlying principles. This possibility is epitomized by Kant's construction of the 'evil enemy'. Since 'evil' appears sporadically in international relations, with Hitler's Germany as prototype, its existence in the real world of international relations cannot be ruled out a priori. Designating an 'other' as evil is thus a discursive possibility. The practice to turn this possibility into reality is conceptualized here as 'evilization' in analogy to 'securitization'. There is strong variance among liberal democracies in applying this practice, ranging from 'pacifism' to 'militancy', which often leads to dire consequences. Deriving the principles of fallibility and prudence from liberal reasoning, this article concludes with the proposition that 'liberal pacifism' is the preferable option in most conceivable circumstances, but that the possibility of confronting political evil is rare, but existing.
Topic:: International Relations and Politics
Political Geography:: Germany and Cameroon

39513. Appointing evil in international relations

Author:: Mona K. Sheikh
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article examines how evil has been conceptualised in the discipline of international relations and contributes to a body of critical literature that treats evil as a legitimacy bestowing label. By drawing on securitisation theory, it suggests developing a performative approach to evil as an alternative to descriptive and normative approaches. It is argued that such an approach would not only be valuable for understanding the effects of naming and grading evil, but also fulfils three additional functions. First, it facilitates a shift away from applying intention as the primary measure for determining matters of guilt and condemnation. Second, it challenges the privileged position of the powerful when appointing particular phenomena/adversaries as evil. Finally, it provides an analytical starting point for understanding conflict constellations where different parameters of legitimacy seem to clash. This last function requires particular sensitivity towards the audience and the cultural context of 'evilising' moves.
Topic:: International Relations

39514. Collective evil and individual pathology: The depoliticization of violence against Afghan civilians

Author:: Harmonie Toros and Luca Mavelli
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article explores how the violence against Afghan civilians carried out by the Taliban and US 'rogue' soldiers has been accounted for as the product of, respectively, collective evil and individual pathology. These two seemingly contending explanations, it is argued, are part of the same strategy of depoliticization, which aims to provide support and legitimacy for the US-led war in Afghanistan. The article discusses how the genealogy of the discourse of collective evil surrounding the Taliban can be traced to an Orientalist political theodicy, which frames the Taliban as 'children of a lesser God' – that is, as fanatical puppets at the mercy of a violent God – and how the discourse of individual pathology surrounding the unsanctioned violence of US soldiers is instrumental to exempt military and civilian leadership from collusion and responsibility. The article challenges this latter narrative of individual blame by discussing how killing, torture and desecration of bodies are at the heart of warfare. Hence, it is concluded, the language of collective evil and individual pathology are part of the same strategy of depoliticization, which aims to silence political contestation and conceal the dehumanizing aspect of war, its structural production of violence, and the complex and dispersed nature of responsibility.
Topic:: War
Political Geography:: Afghanistan, United States, and Taliban

39515. Challenging 'evil': Continuity and change in the drug prohibition regime

Author:: Christopher Hobson
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is unique among UN conventions for the appearance of the term 'evil' in the document. Among all the possible wrongdoing and bad things that exist in the world, it is slightly counterintuitive that drugs are the only one to be labelled as 'evil' in international law. Adopting a 'conceptual politics' approach, the article will examine how drugs came to be identified in this manner, with a specific focus on the drafting of the 1961 Single Convention. The latter part of the article focuses on the contemporary relevance of this framing, considering how it contributes towards a much more restrictive environment in which serious change to the drug prohibition regime has proven to be a very difficult task. For those seeking reform it is not enough to demonstrate that the system does not work, they also must successfully challenge the idea of drugs as something evil and a threat to humanity. In concluding it is suggested that by returning to the Single Convention, one finds not only the language of 'evil', but also a more flexible position that allowed for revising the way drugs are dealt with. To bring about change in drugs prohibition regime, reformers will need to recover this more open and balanced approach to understanding drugs.
Topic:: Environment, International Law, Politics, and United Nations

39516. Conceptual relics, mutual assured evilness and the struggle over Israeli public commonsense

Author:: Piki Ish-Shalom
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Iran's imminent rise to nuclear power status raises reasonable fears about the Middle East stability. Having examined the discursive exchange of Mutual Assured Evilness (MAE) by Iran and Israel, some political commentators and decision makers express doubts over the workability of nuclear stability. That is because they question whether these countries can overcome their mutual hatred and find the requisite instrumental rationality for nuclear stability. Their fears are exacerbated when they regard Iran as a religious country and hence supposedly incapable of rational behavior. However, the discourse of evil is not only indicative of hatred. Evil it seems is a conceptual relic encased in religious metaphysics. It is a datum that enables us to expose the religious layers that exist alongside secularism. Israel's hyperbolic use of the term evil resonates as strongly as it does because of the religious metaphysics that coexists with Israel's supposedly secular belief system. Therefore, in some ways, Israeli society may be closer to Iranian society than Israelis generally allow themselves to believe and all the while the two societies are locked in a dance of hatred and fear, fueled, among other things, by MAE.
Topic:: Politics
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, and Israel

39517. After independence? The challenges and benefits of Scottish-UK defence cooperation

Author:: Colin Fleming
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: As Charles Tilly famously argued, 'War made the state, and the state made war'. This symbiosis between the state and its ability to wage war has long been synonymous with statehood itself, and what it means to be independent within the international state system. It is an idea that has underpinned realist accounts of international relations and remains widely accepted, despite changing norms and closer dependencies between states. Indeed, in the context of the Scottish independence debate Malcolm Chalmers has argued that: 'Having independent armed forces is at the heart of what it means to be a sovereign country.' This raises the question whether the Scottish government's favoured cooperative approach to defence would undermine Scotland's new-found sovereignty at the very time that it seeks its own independent voice in international affairs.
Topic:: NATO
Political Geography:: United Kingdom and Scotland

39518. Repairing NATO's motors

Author:: Mark Webber, Ellen Hallams, and Martin A. Smith
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: When NATO heads of state and government convene in Newport, Wales, in September 2014, it will be their first meeting in the UK since the London summit of July 1990. A quarter of a century ago, NATO was reborn. The London Declaration on a Transformed Alliance was NATO's keynote statement of renewed purpose, issued in 1990 as the Cold War was drawing to a close. In it we find the beginnings of the tasks which would come to define the alliance in the post- Cold War period, along with an appreciation of a fundamentally altered strategic landscape. Europe had 'entered a new, promising era', one in which it was thought the continent's tragic cycle of war and peace might well be over. The 2014 summit communiqué is unlikely to reflect such optimism, but what it surely needs to do is to recapture the spirit of enterprise that NATO has on occasion been able to articulate in demanding times.
Topic:: NATO and Cold War
Political Geography:: United Kingdom, Europe, and London

39519. The 'rhinofication' of South African security

Author:: Jasper Humphreys and M. L. R. Smith
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: Counter-poaching operations in South Africa's so-called 'rhino wars' have seen increasing use of kinetic strategies and tactics. It can be argued that this follows the country's historical tendency to react to threats with confrontation in the first instance rather than negotiation, as leaders invoke images of 'backs-to-the-wall' isolation. During the apartheid period the National Party strongly promoted patriotism and self-sacrifice, portraying South Africa as facing 'total onslaught'; today, the rhetoric of 'rhino wars' is often framed in similar terms, not least because the person leading the rhinoceros counter-poaching campaign, Major General Johan Jooste (retired), was himself heavily involved in the 'apartheid wars' in the latter half of the twentieth century.
Topic:: War
Political Geography:: South Africa

39520. Waging a war to save biodiversity: the rise of militarized conservation

Author:: Rosaleen Duffy
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: Conserving biodiversity is a central environmental concern, and conservationists increasingly talk in terms of a 'war' to save species. International campaigns present a specific image: that parks agencies and conservation NGOs are engaged in a continual battle to protect wildlife from armies of highly organized criminal poachers who are financially motivated. The war to save biodiversity is presented as a legitimate war to save critically endangered species such as rhinos, tigers, gorillas and elephants. This is a significant shift in approach since the late 1990s, when community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) and participatory techniques were at their peak. Since the early 2000s there has been a re-evaluation of a renewed interest in fortress conservation models to protect wildlife, including by military means. Yet, as Lunstrum notes, there is a dearth of research on 'green militarization', a process by which military approaches and values are increasingly embedded in conservation practice.
Topic:: War

39521. Environmental insecurity and fortress mentality

Author:: Rob White
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: Shortages of food, water and non-renewable energy sources can trigger nefarious activities involving organized criminal networks, transnational corporations and governments at varying political levels. Illegal and excessive fishing, sidestep - ping of regulations on disposal of hazardous waste, water and land theft, fraudulent manipulation of alternative energy subsidies and policies, and transference of toxicity and contaminated products across national borders are driven by a variety of motivations and involve a wide range of actors. The consequences of such activities contribute to even more ruthless exploitation of rapidly vanishing natural resources, as well as the further diminution of air, soil and water quality, thereby exacerbating the competition among individuals, groups and nations for what is left.
Topic:: Government, Politics, and International Security

39522. Human conflict and ecosystem services: finding the environmental price of warfare

Author:: Robert A. Francis and Krishna Krishnamurthy
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: Warfare is a uniquely human endeavour, and has been central to human culture and civilization for many thousands of years. Early forms of intergroup conflict were conducted by our hominid ancestors over one million years ago, while the development of larger-scale, organized conflict is recorded by early civilizations in Mesopotamia and China almost 5,000 years ago. The impetuses for warfare, being a complex mix of genetics, psychology, culture, politics, technology and resource availability, are unlikely to disappear in the future, as long as our species survives. Though the nature of warfare is changing, from its most devastating twentieth- century form of industrial 'total' warfare to the geographically and politically complex 'everywhere war' that is beginning to define conflict in the twenty-first century, violent conflict is certain to remain a defining part of the human story.
Political Geography:: China and Mesopotamia

39523. The roots to peace in the Democratic Republic of Congo: conservation as a platform for green development

Author:: Richard Milburn
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is endowed with a wealth of natural resources, and the presence of high-value minerals such as coltan and diamonds is well known. The country is also endowed with a wealth of biodiversity, although the value of this is often overlooked. The DRC ranks fifth in terms of the most biodiverse countries in the world; it is home to a plethora of endemic species of both flora and fauna and contains the second largest rainforest in the world, smaller only than the Amazon. This range of flora and fauna has suffered enormously from the effects of armed conflict in the country over the past two decades, and many wildlife populations have been decimated. In spite of destruction through conflict, key populations and ecosystems still remain and they are crucial for the country's development and the world's fight against climate change.
Political Geography:: Democratic Republic of the Congo

39524. The UN and the African Union in Mali and beyond: a shotgun wedding?

Author:: Thomas G. Weiss and Martin Welz
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: After the initial post-Cold War euphoria about the potential for the United Nations (UN) to maintain international peace and security, as imagined in its Charter, from the 1990s onwards subcontracting from the world organization to regional organizations has become essentially the standard operating procedure for major military peace operations. While UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali was bullish in his 1992 An agenda for peace, the UN has by and large withdrawn from the peace enforcement business following debacles in Somalia and Rwanda—as Boutros-Ghali's 1995 Supplement to 'An agenda for peace' and the 2000 Brahimi Report recommended.
Topic:: Security and Cold War
Political Geography:: United Nations, Rwanda, and Somalia

39525. After Westgate: opportunities and challenges in the war against Al-Shabaab

Author:: Paul D. Williams
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: On 21 September 2013, fighters from the Harakat Al-Shabaab Mujahideen (Movement of the Warrior Youth) attacked the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, Kenya, killing 67 people and wounding over 200 others. According to Kenya's parliamentary inquiry into the attack, it was conducted by four gunmen (three Somali nationals and a Norwegian citizen of Somali origin), all of whom died in the subsequent four-day siege. The inquiry, by the Joint Committee on Administration and National Security and Defence and Foreign Relations, listed Westgate as the 28th terrorist attack in the country since Kenyan forces intervened in Somalia in October 2011. It concluded that a confluence of factors had left Kenya particularly vulnerable to such attacks: its porous border with Somalia; endemic corruption and poor levels of preparedness among its security officials; youth radicalization (with over 500 Kenyan youths recruited into Al-Shabaab), the proliferation of small arms and light weapons; and the influx of more than 600,000 Somali refugees into Kenya. Overall, the inquiry lamented that despite relevant general information about an impending terror attack on such a target, there had been a 'nationwide systemic failure' on the part of numerous government departments, confusion among government agencies in responding to the attack, and disgraceful looting of premises within the mall by some Kenyan soldiers and police.
Political Geography:: Kenya, Norway, Somalia, and Nairobi

39526. International development in transition

Author:: Sophie Harman and David Williams
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: The project of international development is in a period of transition. The various dimensions of this transition are relatively clear, the outcome much less so. The first aim of this article is to outline and suggest some explanations for what we take to be the main dimensions of this transition. These are changes in development thinking, particularly with regard to the role of the state; changing donor priorities around 'big' and 'small' development; the changing donor landscape and a new age of choice for developing countries; and changing aid relationships that create greater autonomy for developing countries. We suggest that such changes are linked together in ways that are leading to some quite substantial shifts in the policies and practices of international development. The second aim of this article is to signal some of the important questions and debates that arise when we take notice of these shifts. First, there are explanatory questions related to how we capture the dynamics involved in these areas of change and their relations with one another. Second, there are questions about what the new demands will be for developing country governments and aid donors in this new environment. Third, and related, there are questions about what lessons we might draw from past experiences, in the sense that for some of the ideas and practices we see assuming a new significance in the contemporary period, there are at least parallels in the past. Finally, there are questions about the future trajectory of this transition, where it is taking us, and whether it will be sustained and amplified in the future.
Topic:: Development and Government

39527. A call for a new Japanese foreign policy: the dilemmas of a stakeholder state

Author:: Takashi Inoguchi
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: The world was different in 2002 when Henry Kissinger published a book entitled Does America need a foreign policy?, and Le Monde came out in support of the United States after the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001 by proclaiming: 'We are all American.' In many ways, this was the high point of the American global era—the era of unipolar American power. In 2014 the world has moved on. The United States is still the leading global power with unique capabilities and responsibilities for global leadership. But other states—particularly in Asia and the non-western developing world—are on the rise. The world is more fragmented and decentralized. States are rising and falling. The terms of global governance are more contested and uncertain. This article addresses the foreign policy of Japan and the choices that Japan faces in this shifting global context.
Topic:: Foreign Policy and Terrorism
Political Geography:: United States, Japan, America, Asia, and North America

39528. Book Reviews

Author:: Chris Brown
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Institution:: Chatham House
Abstract:: The vulnerable in international society is the latest in a series of books by Ian Clark exploring different aspects of international society, following Legitimacy in international society (OUP, 2005) and Hegemony in international society (OUP, 2011). The two earlier books—along with his co-authored Special responsibilities: global problems and American power (with Mlada Bukovansky, Robyn Eckersley, Christian Reus-Smit and Nicholas Wheeler; CUP, 2012)—are largely concerned with the ways in which international society reproduces itself and manages Great Power relations; The vulnerable in international society shifts the focus towards the other end of the food chain, towards those who are without power. The thesis is that the vulnerable are not simply ill served by international society, by definition insufficiently protected by it, but in a wider sense actually created by international society—the risks they face may sometimes be 'natural', but equally they may actually be a by-product of the way in which international society works. Just as international society confers legitimacy on its members, so it may also create vulnerability. The vulnerable are a socially crafted category and international society is involved in that crafting process, as well as being involved in measures taken to cope with the consequences of this process.
Political Geography:: America

39529. Iran and the P5+1: Getting to "Yes"

Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Crisis Group
Abstract:: That nuclear negotiations between Iran and the P5+1 (China, France, Russia, the UK, U.S. and Germany) were extended beyond the 20 July 2014 deadline was neither unexpected nor unwelcome. The parties ha d made enough headway to justify the extension, which was envisioned in the Joint Plan of Action (JPOA) that was signed in November 2013 and came into force in January, but given the political and technical complexity, they remain far apart on fundamental issues. Unless they learn the lessons of the last six months and change their approach for the next four, they will lose the opportunity for a resolution not just by the new 24 November deadline but for the foreseeable future. Both sides need to retreat from maximalist positions, particularly on Iran's enrichment program. Tehran should postpone plans for industrial- scale enrichment and accept greater constraints on the number of its centrifuges in return for P5+1 flexibility on the qualitative growth of its enrichment capacity through research and development.
Topic:: Development, Diplomacy, Economics, Nuclear Weapons, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: Russia, China, Iran, Middle East, and France

39530. Fateful Elections? Investing in the Future of Europe; Masthead Changes; In this Issue

Author:: JHHW
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: In an earlier Editorial I speculated on the potential transformative effect that the 2014 elections to the European Parliament might have on the democratic fortunes of Europe. I spoke of promise and risk. So now the results are out. How should we evaluate them?

39531. Scientific Reason and the Discipline of International Law

Author:: Anne Orford
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: International law emerged as a professional academic specialization in a 19th century European context of wide-ranging public debates about the nature and cultural significance of science. Ever since, the status of international law as an academic discipline has been intimately connected with the capacity of international lawyers to demonstrate that our discipline is properly scientific. Yet the ideals of science upon which international lawyers have drawn in seeking to demonstrate the scientific nature of our work have not remained static. This article explores how those shifting ideals of science have shaped the concerns, questions, methods, and theories adopted by professional legal scholars in different times and places, including the 19th century Cambridge of Whewell, the 20th century Vienna of Kelsen, the post-war New Haven of McDougal and Lasswell, and the globally networked university of the 21st century. In returning to the historical debates out of which today's highly stylized versions of positivist and policy-oriented international law emerged, the article shows that while scholars of international law have shared a commitment to scientific values of rationality, progress, and objectivity, they have understood those commitments as requiring different forms of conduct, different means of producing knowledge, and different relations to the state.
Topic:: International Law
Political Geography:: Europe

39532. Social Capital in the Arbitration Market

Author:: Sergio Puig
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Scholars have often assessed and criticized the group of international arbitration professionals, some characterizing this group as a dense 'white, male' group. Faced with limited access and data, however, this critique has not been informed by a robust empirical component. Relying on all the appointments made in proceedings under ICSID between 1972 and February 2014, interviews with arbitration professionals, and an original database created for this project, this article is the first to assess the social structure of investor–state arbitrators. Using network analytics, a long-standing but recently popularized methodology for understanding social groups, the article maps the group of professionals by relying on formal appointments to tribunals. The subsequent analysis of this form of operationalizing the social group reveals who are the 'grand old men' (and formidable women) or 'power-brokers' that dominate the arbitration profession. The article argues, based on the evidence presented, that, among other factors, in addition to good timing and imperfect information, the structure of the process of appointment, and a risk averse culture, key arbitrators may benefit from heuristic biases, or the limited cognitive scope of lawyers making such appointments.

39533. How is Progress Constructed in International Legal Scholarship?

Author:: Tilmann Altwicker and Oliver Diggelman
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: There is a tendency in international legal discourse to tell the story of international law as a story of progress. 'Progress' is a concept which is tied to the process of secularization and Western 18th and 19th century philosophy. It still inspires the debate on international law – despite all setbacks in 'real history'. This article argues that progress narratives in the inter-national legal discourse are constructed by – more or less subtle – argumentative techniques. It highlights four such techniques – four 'bundles of arguments' – which play a key role: ascending periodization, proving increasing value-orientation of international law, detection of positive trends, and paradigm shift-talk. The article offers an explanation of why the pro-gress argument often succeeds in international legal discourse.
Topic:: International Law and Weapons of Mass Destruction

39534. Crafting the Nuclear Regime Complex (1950–1975): Dynamics of Harmonization of Opaque Treaty Rules

Author:: Gregoire Mallard
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: In recent years, international lawyers have increasingly debated the normative consequences of the 'fragmentation' of international law. More rarely have they studied empirically how tensions between overlapping systems of rules emerge, how conflicts are harmonized, and with what effects. This article explains such dynamics in the case of the nuclear non-proliferation regime (NPR) complex. Based on original archival fieldwork conducted in the private papers of American and European diplomats in the early Cold War, it shows how Western states solved the tensions that existed between contradictory commitments contracted in the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) Treaty and the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty in 1968 (NPT). To lessen the tensions between regional and global orders, the Euratom control rules were used as a source of inspiration for the new rules used to monitor compliance with the NPT at the global level. In retrospect, this outcome was puzzling, as the Euratom Treaty was not originally concerned with non-proliferation issues. That the knowledge of the original intentions behind Euratom was lost to the policymakers who negotiated the NPT thus had grave consequences in the future. This case shows the importance of studying the concrete knowledge of international legal rules that gets transmitted across generations of policymakers in order to understand how regime complexity evolves.
Topic:: Cold War
Political Geography:: Germany

39535. The Tower of Babel: Human Rights and the Paradox of Language

Author:: Moria Paz
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Key human rights instruments and leading scholars argue that minority language rights should be treated as human rights, both because language is constitutive of an individual's cultural identity and because linguistic pluralism increases diversity. These treaties and academics assign the value of linguistic pluralism in diversity. But, as this article demonstrates, major human rights courts and quasi-judicial institutions are not, in fact, prepared to force states to swallow the dramatic costs entailed by a true diversity-protecting regime. Outside narrow exceptions or a path dependent national-political compromise, these enforcement bodies continuously allow the state actively to incentivize assimilation into the dominant culture and language of the majority. The minority can still maintain its distinct language, but only at its own cost. The slippage between the promise of rights and their actual interpretation carries some important political and economic benefits, but the resulting legal outcome does not provide the robust protection of diversity to which lip service is paid. Importantly, the assimilationist nature of the jurisprudence is not indifferent to human rights. However, instead of advancing maximal linguistic diversity as a pre-eminent norm, the regime that is applied by judicial bodies supports a different set of human rights: those protecting linguistic minorities from discrimination, and promoting equal access of the group to market and political institutions. The result is a tension between two human rights values: pluralism and equality.
Topic:: Human Rights and Culture

39536. Petitioning the International: A 'Pre-history' of Self-determination

Author:: Arnulf Becker Lorca
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Conventionally, self-determination is understood to have evolved in a linear progression from a political principle during World War I into an international right after World War II. The history of the right to self-determination before 1945 is thus part of 'pre-history'. This article explores that 'pre-history' and finds the conventional linear narrative unconvincing. During the first three decades of the 20th century and in particular during the interwar period, non-Western lawyers, politicians, and activists articulated international law claims to support the demand for self-government. In this process, they appropriated and transformed the international law discourse. Removing the legal obstacles that prevented self-government beyond the West – that is, by eliminating the standard of civilization – interwar semi-peripherals made possible the emergence of a right to self-determination later, when the international political context changed after the second post-war reconstruction of international law.
Topic:: International Law and War

39537. Roaming Charges: Places of Social and Financial Crisis: Dublin 2014

Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: We deal in EJIL with the world we live in – often with its worst and most violent patholo-gies, often with its most promising signs of hope for a better world. But, inevitably, since our vehicle is scholarship, we reify this world. Roaming Charges is designed not just to offer a moment of aesthetic relief, but to remind us of the ultimate subject of our schol-arly reflections: we alternate between photos of places – the world we live in – and photos of people – who we are, the human condition. We eschew the direct programmatic photo-graph: people shot up; the ravages of pollution and all other manner of photojournalism. 'Roaming', 'Charges', and those irritating 'Roaming Charges' – was chosen because of the multiple and at times conflicting meanings, feelings and associations the words, jointly and severally, evoke and which we hope to capture in our choice of photo-graphs. As we roam around the world we aim for images which charge us: please and challenge, even irritate, at the same time. We seek photos which have some ambiguity, are edgy and relate in an indirect way, both to the current circumstance but also to that which is, like human dignity, permanent and enduring.
Topic:: Financial Crisis
Political Geography:: Dublin

39538. Conceptual Confusion and Methodological Deficiencies: Some Ways that Theories on Customary International Law Fail

Author:: Laszlo Blutman
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Andrew Guzman declares that customary international law is in trouble. I disagree. It is those who seek to explain it who are in trouble. Theoretical efforts are plagued with descriptive insufficiencies (for example, the formation of various customary norms takes place within a heterogeneous, opaque process that resists any general and meaningful description in specific cases), systemic uncertainties (for example, locating the source of rules that govern the formation of customary norms), semantic problems (such as what exactly is general practice) and the divergence of conceptions articulated within international practice. These difficulties, which hamper a better understanding of international law itself, originate from the conceptual level. This article will therefore focus on certain symptomatic conceptual and methodological problems. Nine of them are outlined, and three will be analysed in greater detail, namely the relationship between opinio juris and acceptance, the characteristics of the concept 'general practice' and the failure of attempts to describe customary international law by dichotomies. As a conclusion, the author identifies seven requirements of, and assumptions about, a possible, workable theory of customary international law.
Topic:: International Law

39539. Women's Rights and the Periphery: CEDAW's Optional Protocol

Author:: Loveday Hodson
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: This article places the UN Women's Committee at its centre in order to consider the normative implications of having a space within the realm of international law that is headed by women decision-makers, whose remit is specifically gendered and whose task is to uphold the rights of women. It suggests that the Committee's importance has largely been overlooked, which is a considerable oversight. The Committee is uniquely positioned to contribute to the transformation of human rights norms, occupying, as it arguably does, positions simultaneously at the centre and at the periphery of international law. In particular, this article examines the jurisprudence that has emerged under the individual complaints procedure of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and questions how far the Committee has been able to develop women's rights in recent years into a body of law that departs from the normative and structural limitations of international human rights laws.
Topic:: Human Rights
Political Geography:: United Nations

39540. The Venice Commission of the European Council – Standards and Impact

Author:: Wolfgang Hoffmann-Riem
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: The article analyses the activities of the European Commission for Democracy through Law. Addressed are the standards applied in the Commission's opinions, especially on constitutional provisions and other legal norms or drafts. The article looks at the impact that these (non-binding) opinions have on the states concerned as well as on the European Court of Human Rights. Though recommendations are sometimes disregarded, most states do react positively, at least in part. To some extent the Commission could enhance the effect of its opinions by joining forces with other relevant institutions in the field, especially the Council of Europe and the European Commission. Endorsing and implementing recommendations gives states an opportunity to share in the reputation that comes with being part of a community founded on Human Rights, the Rule of Law, and Democracy. An overall assessment is made of the Commission's approach to its work.
Topic:: Human Rights
Political Geography:: Europe

39541. Mark Mazower. Governing the World. The History of an Idea

Author:: Jochen von Bernstorff
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Mark Mazower provides us with a very readable and highly stimulating intellectual history of Western internationalism starting with the Vienna Congress in 1815 and ending in 2012 with the ongoing Syrian civil war. The historical analysis focuses not only on the philosophical and political currents at the heart of 19th and 20th century internationalism but also on how Anglo-Saxon politicians and high ranking civil servants viewed and shaped international institutions during these two centuries; all of this is full of interesting biographical findings, illustrative contemporary quotations, and insightful historical judgement.
Topic:: Civil War
Political Geography:: Europe

39542. Mónica García-Salmones Rovira. The Project of Positivism in International Law.

Author:: David Roth-Isigkeit
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: That positivism is not the promised land of legal methods has become a truism among critical international lawyers. All too often the proclaimed objectivity, neutrality and science has turned out to be intertwined with ideology and domination. In line with the historical-economic turn of the Helsinki school, Monica García-Salmones Rovira's book The Project of Positivism in International Law finds the historical roots of positivism deeply embedded in the development of a global neo-liberal economy. The economic foundations of the method are unearthed with two intellectual biographies of its founding fathers, Lassa Oppenheim and Hans Kelsen, whose life projects have so far escaped critical scrutiny. The book weaves into these two biographical studies the story of international law as a pragmatist and scientific project that freed the discipline from the tradition of natural law to become a servant of global economic interests.
Topic:: International Law and War

39543. Carlo Focarelli. International Law as Social Construct. The Struggle for Global Justice

Author:: Lorenzo Gradoni
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: An enigmatic epigram welcomes the reader of Carlo Focarelli's book: '[w]hat is a mountain for? For the moon to set behind' (at lv). Poetic images not infrequently hint at hidden meanings; in this case, however, the enigma stems from the fact that the phrase, although appearing between quotation marks, is not credited to anyone (which is strange for a heavily footnoted book whose name index includes more than 1,000 entries). Since a Google search takes the reader straight back to the book under review and nowhere else, the temptation to assume that the anonymous poet was the author himself has been strong (and maybe imputable to the advent of EJIL's 'Last Page'). I resisted this impulse for fear of appearing too unlearned ('other readers will surely have recognized the author', I said to myself) to be considered fit to review the immensely erudite book that Focarelli's International Law as Social Contract indisputably is. Turning a blind eye to the epigraph would have been an easy way out; I chose to ask the author. He was kind enough to reveal to me that the phrase is an abridged version of a dialogue between the famous Swiss psychologist (and polymath) Jean Piaget, asking questions about the Salève, a mountain also known as the Balcon de Genève, and a seven – year – old boy named Rou: 'The Salève was made "by men. – Why? – It couldn't make itself all alone. – What is it for? – For the moon. – Why? – For it to set behind."' Enquiring about the meaning of the epigraph turned out to be a serendipitous choice.

39544. Philipp Dann. The Law of Development Cooperation: A Comparative Analysis of the World Bank, the EU and Germany

Author:: Giedre Jokubauskaite
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Philipp Dann has long been committed to the legal issues of international development cooperation, and now his monograph on this subject, originally written in German, has been published in English. The comprehensive monograph entitled The Law of Development Cooperation skilfully builds upon the knowledge that already exists on this topic and systematizes an enormous amount of relevant literature. The reader is presented with a stimulating text that is dense in terms of its arguments and yet easy to engage with.
Topic:: International Law

39545. Efthymios Papastavridis. The Interception of Vessels on the High Seas, Contemporary Challenges to the Legal Order of the Oceans

Author:: Seline Trevisanut
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: Many are the threats that challenge the security of the oceans today. Piracy, which was thought to be relegated to history and adventure books (and films), has re-appeared and threatens human lives but also, cynically more importantly for states, the safe transport of goods. The seas provide the main route for trade in goods worldwide. Their security is an imperative for a globalized economy. In the 2008 Report on Oceans and the Law of the Sea, the UN Secretary General identified seven specific threats to maritime security: (1) piracy and armed robbery; (2) terrorist acts against shipping, offshore installations, and other maritime interests; (3) illicit trafficking in arms and weapons of mass destruction (WMD); (4) illicit trafficking in narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances; (5) smuggling and trafficking of persons at sea; (6) illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing; and (7) international and unlawful damage to the marine environment.
Topic:: Human Rights

39546. Kjetil Mujezinović Larsen, Camilla Guldahl Cooper and Gro Nystuen (eds). Searching for a 'Principle of Humanity' in International Humanitarian Law

Author:: Catriona H. Cairns
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: The stated aim of the book under review, edited by three prominent Scandinavian academics, is to explore whether a 'principle of humanity' exists as an independent, binding norm in international humanitarian law (IHL) or whether its legal impact is limited to the norm-creation process. It consists of 11 articles (with an introduction and a conclusion), divided into two principal sections: 'theoretical perspectives' and 'Nordic experiences'.

39547. Morten Bergsmo and Ling Yan (eds). State Sovereignty and International Criminal Law

Author:: Alexandre Skander Galand
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: State Sovereignty and International Criminal Law, edited by Morten Bergsmo and Ling Yan, brings together two recent issues of international law: the rise of international criminal law as a building block in the nascent constitution of the international legal order and the increasingly active participation of China in international law. Even though China is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), it has until recently been de facto absent from the debates over norms of international law. Likewise, international criminal justice is a field of law that stagnated for more than 40 years. The last two decades have witnessed a revival of both phoenixes.
Topic:: International Law
Political Geography:: China

39548. Kevin Jon Heller and Gerry Simpson (eds). The Hidden Histories of War Crimes Trials

Author:: Milan Kuhli
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: The book The Hidden Histories of War Crimes Trials – edited by Kevin Jon Heller and Gerry Simpson – is a compilation of 21 contributions to a conference convened in Melbourne at the end of 2010. The project aims at a scholarly recovery of accounts of war crimes trials that were ‘either neglected or under-rehearsed’ (at 1) in the discipline of international criminal law. Accordingly, the contributions tell ‘stories about familiar but under-explored and misunderstood landmarks in the conventional history of international criminal law’ as well as about trials that have been less analysed in this field (at 1). Gregory S. Gordon’s illustrative chapter on the trial of Peter von Hagenbach (chapter 2) is a story of the first kind, whereas Benjamin E. Brockman-Hawe’s comprehensive account of the Franco-Siamese tribunal for the Colonial Era (chapter 3) exemplifies the latter type.
Topic:: International Law and War
Political Geography:: Europe

39549. The Waiting Room

Author:: Kim Lockwood
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: This here is nowhere. A circle of whiteness squared to still the furthest confines of the room. Passengers pass by with nothing to declare, papers and permissions all approved. As ceaseless movement breaks in waves of sound on sound, a static too thickly sewn to undo grounds us in a place of stark sensation where mattresses are spread thinly on the ground and belonging can't be found in our slow translations.

39550. The Impact of Asian Investment on Africa's Textile Industries

Author:: Tang Xiaoyang
Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:: Asian investors' impact on Africa's cotton, textile, and apparel sectors may have profound consequences for the continent's industrialization and development. As southeast African countries seek to industrialize and build indigenous cotton-textile-apparel value chains, the interactions between Asian—particularly Chinese—investors and African companies become more and more complex. Indeed, Asian investors present both a challenge to and an opportunity for local industries, and southeast African countries need a clear vision and tailored policies to make the most of the opportunities. Asian investors' impact on Africa's cotton, textile, and apparel sectors may have profound consequences for the continent's industrialization and development. As southeast African countries seek to industrialize and build indigenous cotton-textile-apparel value chains, the interactions between Asian-particularly Chinese-investors and African companies become more and more complex. Indeed, Asian investors present both a challenge to and an opportunity for local industries, and southeast African countries need a clear vision and tailored policies to make the most of the opportunities.
Topic:: Economics and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:: Africa and Asia

39551. Who Runs the International System? Power and the Staffing of the United Nations Secretariat

Author:: Paul Novosad and Eric Werker
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: National governments frequently pull strings to get their citizens appointed to senior positions in international institutions. We examine, over a 60 year period, the nationalities of the most senior positions in the United Nations Secretariat, ostensibly the world's most representative international institution. The results indicate which nations are successful in this zero-sum game, and what national characteristics correlate with power in international institutions. The most overrepresented countries are small, rich democracies like the Nordic countries. Statistically, democracy, investment in diplomacy, and economic/military power are predictors of senior positions, even after controlling for the U.N. staffing mandate of competence and integrity. National control over the United Nations is remarkably sticky; however the in influence of the United States has diminished as US ideology has shifted away from its early allies. In spite of the decline in US influence, the Secretariat remains pro-American relative to the world at large.
Topic:: Demographics, International Cooperation, and International Organization
Political Geography:: United States

39552. Rigged Cars and Barrel Bombs: Aleppo and the State of the Syrian War

Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: International Crisis Group
Abstract:: As Aleppo goes, so goes Syria's rebellion. The city is crucial to the mainstream opposition's military viability as well as its morale, thus to halting the advance of the Islamic State (IS). After an alliance of armed rebel factions seized its eastern half in July 2012, Aleppo for a time symbolised the opposition's optimism and momentum; in the following months, it exposed the rebels' limits, as their progress slowed, and they struggled to win over the local population. Today, locked in a two-front war against the regime and IS, their position is more precarious than at any time since the fighting began. Urgent action is required to prevent the mainstream opposition's defeat: either for Iran and Russia to press the regime for de-escalation, to showcase their willingness to confront IS instead of exploiting its presence to further strengthen Damascus; or, more realistically, for the U.S., Europe and regional allies to qualitatively and quantitatively improve support to local, non-jihadi rebel factions in Aleppo. Any eventual possibility of a negotiated resolution of the war depends on one course or the other being followed.
Topic:: Conflict Resolution, Civil War, Islam, Terrorism, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:: Arabia and Syria

39553. Examining China's Assertiveness through the Eyes of Chinese IR Scholars

Author:: Kai He and Huiyun Feng
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
Abstract:: China's assertive diplomacy in recent years has ignited intense debates among International Relations (IR) scholars. Some argue that China's assertive behavior is rooted in its perception of increasing power and capabilities. Others suggest that it is U.S. policies that triggered China's assertive reactions. Relying on an original survey of China's IR scholars conducted in Beijing in 2013 and using structural equation modeling (SEM), we empirically examine Chinese IR scholars' attitude towards Chinese power versus the United States, their perceptions of U.S. policy in Asia, and their preference for an assertive Chinese foreign policy. We find that both the power perception and policy reaction arguments make sense in accounting for Chinese IR scholars' attitude regarding China's assertive diplomacy. However, our research suggests that a more pessimistic view on Chinese power is more likely to be associated with a preference for an assertive foreign policy.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Emerging Markets
Political Geography:: China and East Asia

39554. Water Pressures in Central Asia

Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: International Crisis Group
Abstract:: Water has long been a major cause of conflict in Central Asia. Two states – Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan – have a surplus; the other three say they do not get their share from the region's great rivers, the Syr Darya and Amu Darya, which slice across it from the Tien Shan, Pamir Mountains, and the Hindu Kush to the Aral Sea's remains. Pressures are mounting, especially in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The population in Central Asia has increased by almost ten million since 2000, and limited arable land is being depleted by over-use and outdated farming methods. Extensive corruption and failing infrastructure take further toll, while climate change is likely to have long-term negative consequences. As economies become weaker and states more fragile, heightened nationalism, border disputes, and regional tensions complicate the search for a mutually acceptable solution to the region's water needs. A new approach that addresses water and related issues through an interlocking set of individually more modest bilateral agreements instead of the chimera of a single comprehensive one is urgently needed.
Topic:: Agriculture, Treaties and Agreements, Bilateral Relations, Natural Resources, and Water
Political Geography:: Central Asia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan

39555. Qatar and the Recalibration of Power in the Gulf

Author:: Lina Khatib
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:: Long a minor regional actor in the shadow of Saudi Arabia, Qatar wants to increase its influence. But Doha's expansionist foreign policy has been plagued by miscalculations, domestic challenges, and international pressure—all issues connected to Doha's relationship with Riyadh. As a result of these setbacks, Qatar's regional role has diminished, and for the foreseeable future, its external influence is likely to remain under the direction of Saudi Arabia.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Islam, and Power Politics
Political Geography:: Middle East, Arabia, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar

39556. Neoliberalism without Neoliberals Evidence from the Rise of 401(k) Retirement Plans

Author:: Michael A. McCarthy
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies
Abstract:: This paper considers the rise of defined-contribution (DC) pensions – such as 401(k) plans – in order to contribute to the debate about neoliberalism. It challenges the generalizability of two common accounts: the weak state intervention thesis, which argues that neoliberal policy change is driven by state retreat and deregulation, and the state-managed transition thesis, which argues that neoliberal policies are both enacted and managed through new regulations. In contrast, this paper argues that the development of the employer-based pension system between 1970 and 1995 is an instance of “neoliberalism without neoliberals.” A battery of regulations was passed between 1974 and the late 1980s that were intended to make the traditional system of defined- benefit (DB) pensioning more secure. However, this legislation triggered a business shift to 401(k)s. The legislation worked in such a counterintuitive way because of three factors related to changes in “the balance of class forces” in American society: (1) new laws increased costs for firms, with small businesses being hit the heaviest, (2) employment in the manufacturing sector, labor's traditional stronghold, declined as a share of total employment, and (3) because unions were unable or unwilling to unionize emergent sectors of the economy, new businesses in them were not compelled to negotiate DB plans. In such a context, growing regulatory costs pushed many firms to adopt DC pensions for their employees. The outcome was a major policy shift, considered by many to be a defining feature of the neoliberal era.
Topic:: Development
Political Geography:: America

39557. Is China's Property Market Heading toward Collapse?

Author:: Li-gang Liu
Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: China's property market has slowed significantly since the first half of 2014, with sharp declines in sales and a buildup in the inventory of new homes. This sharper than expected downturn—which has affected not only second- and third tier smaller cities but also first-tier megacities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, and Guangzhou—contrasts with last year's buoyant sales and double-digit price surge. Compounded by fears of a default in the shadow banking system and the perception of a highly leveraged Chinese economy, the sudden declines in the property sector are being watched closely. Many commentators believe this could be a turning point for the sector, triggering a hard landing of the Chinese economy and even a financial crisis. Over the last decade, China's property sector has become an important pillar for the country's growth as well as the key source for elevated commodity prices. A property market slump would hurt other sectors, as well as drag down resource-rich economies that rely heavily on China to buy their exports.
Topic:: Economics, Financial Crisis, and Urbanization
Political Geography:: Japan, China, and United Nations

39558. Debt Sanctions Can Help Ukraine and Fill a Gap in the International Financial System

Author:: Anna Gelpern
Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: The escalating crisis in Ukraine has prompted the United States and Europe to impose the toughest economic sanctions against Russia since the end of the Cold War. Continued instability and military conflict in eastern Ukraine are straining Ukrainian finances. Despite a generous international support package, the government faces shrinking revenues, rising costs, and a spike in foreign debt payments over the next two years.
Topic:: Cold War, Debt, and Economics
Political Geography:: Russia, Ukraine, and Asia

39559. The Federal Reserve Engages the World (1970–2000): An Insider's Narrative of the Transition to Managed Floating and Financial Turbulence

Author:: Edwin M. Truman
Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: This paper traces the evolution of the Federal Reserve and its engagement with the global economy over the last three decades of the 20th century: 1970 to 2000. The paper examines the Federal Reserve's role in international economic and financial policy and analysis covering four areas: the emergence and taming of the great inflation, developments in US external accounts, foreign exchange analysis and activities, and external financial crises. It concludes that during this period the US central bank emerged to become the closest the world has to a global central bank.
Topic:: Economics, Foreign Exchange, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:: United States

39560. Demographic versus Cyclical Influences on US Labor Force Participation

Author:: William R. Cline and Jared Nolan
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: This paper applies time series analysis to distinguish between cyclical and demographic causes of the decline of the labor force participation rate. Some public discussions suggest that the decline of US unemployment from its 2009 peak of 10 percent to about 6 percent by mid-2014 grossly exaggerates recovery because most of the decline reflects the exit of discouraged workers from the labor force. This study finds instead that one-half to two-thirds of the decline in labor force participation by about 3 percentage points from late 2007 to early 2014 is attributable to aging of the population. Although about one-third is found attributable to the lagged influence of high, and especially long-term, unemployment, going forward the potential rebound in the participation rate from recovery is projected to be approximately offset by further aging of the population.
Topic:: Demographics, Economics, Labor Issues, and Population
Political Geography:: United States

39561. Oil Prices and Interstate Conflict Behavior

Author:: Cullen S. Hendrix
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:: Anecdotal evidence suggests high oil prices embolden leaders in oil-rich states to pursue more aggressive foreign policies. This article tests the conjecture in a sample of 153 countries for the time period 1947–2001. It finds strong evidence of a contingent effect of oil prices on interstate disputes, with high oil prices associated with significant increases in dispute behavior among oil-exporting states, while having either a negative or null effect on dispute behavior in nonexporting states.
Topic:: Conflict Resolution, International Relations, Foreign Policy, Oil, and History

39562. Does Clientelism Work? A Test os Guessability in India

Author:: Mark Schneider
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for the Advanced Study of India
Abstract:: Local brokers are thought to possess fine-grained information on voters' political preferences, material needs, and even social preferences. Research on clientelism assumes that brokers meet the most basic informational requirement of knowing voters' partisan preferences, if not their votes. This assumption drives theoretical predictions on the types of voters politicians should target with selective benefits, and whether or not a quid pro quo exchange of benefits-for-votes is an efficient electoral strategy relative to programmatic distribution. Nonetheless, existing scholarship does not test this assumption and analysis of variation in brokers' ability to identify voters' partisan preferences has not been conducted. To test this assumption, this paper develops a behavioral measure – guessability – based on whether or not village council presidents in Rajasthan, India correctly guess the partisan preferences of voters sampled from their local areas. I find guessability to be lower than existing theory and low-information benchmarks expect. Local leaders can identify the partisan preferences of voters who are most guessable either because they belong to core partisan ethnic groups or because they are integrated into their local co-partisan networks. However, they perform poorly at identifying those whose partisan preferences are uncertain and require monitoring to reveal. This has consequences for the targeting strategies parties and politicians pursue.
Topic:: Political Economy, Politics, Political Theory, and Sociology
Political Geography:: India and Rajasthan

39563. The State of REDD+ Finance

Author:: Marigold Norman and Smita Nakhooda
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: This paper presents a thorough synthesis of available data to illuminate the current global state of finance for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD+). It adds to a growing body of work that seeks to understand the size and composition of finance for REDD+ initiatives, as well as the delivery of climate finance more generally. The analysis shows that aggregate pledges of both public and private finance are significant, at more than US $8.7 billion for the period between 2006 and March 2014, but the pace of new pledges slowed after 2010. The public sector contributes nearly 90% of reported REDD+ finance, with the preponderance of funding concentrated among a relatively small number of donors and recipient countries. The paper analyzes early experience with performance-based finance, although such finance represents less than two-fifths of pledges to date. The extent to which new institutions in the climate finance architecture such as the Green Climate Fund will provide a new and effective channel for increasing support for REDD+ remains to be seen.
Topic:: Economics, Environment, International Cooperation, and Politics

39564. Self-Selection into Credit Markets: Evidence from Agriculture in Mali

Author:: Dean Karlan, Bram Thuysbaert, Christopher Udry, and Lori Beaman
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Global Development
Abstract:: We partnered with a micro-lender in Mali to randomize credit offers at the village level. Then, in no-loan control villages, we gave cash grants to randomly selected households. These grants led to higher agricultural investments and profits, thus showing that liquidity constraints bind with respect to agricultural investment. In loan-villages, we gave grants to a random subset of farmers who (endogenously) did not borrow. These farmers have lower – in fact zero – marginal returns to the grants. Thus we find important heterogeneity in returns to investment and strong evidence that farmers with higher marginal returns to investment self-select into lending programs.
Topic:: Agriculture and Economics
Political Geography:: Africa

39565. Pathways to Security Council Reform

Author:: Richard Gowan and Nora Gordon
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center on International Cooperation
Abstract:: In this paper, New York University's Center on International Cooperation (CIC) seeks to explore potential pathways to United Nations Security Council (UNSC) reform. We begin with an overview of the current context, which has been characterized by increasing international pressure for Security Council reform. The Council's abysmal performance in the Syrian crisis has fueled the mounting pressure for reform, which includes the French proposal to limit use of the veto and Saudi Arabia's rejection of a non-permanent seat. We then offer a brief history and analysis of previous reform attempts; an explanation of global perspectives on the issue of UNSC reform; background on the Intergovernmental Negotiations (IGN) on UNSC reform in New York; and an analysis of discussions on reform in and around the African Union.
Topic:: Security, International Security, and Reform
Political Geography:: Africa, New York, and Saudi Arabia

39566. Rethinking Afghan Local Governance Aid After Transition

Author:: Frances Z. Brown
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:: The conclusion of the U.S.-led "surge" of 2009 onward and the closure of provincial recon¬struction teams and other local civil-military installations have affected how aid is delivered in Afghanistan's more remote and contested areas. The time is ripe for a recalibration of donor approaches to local governance and development in areas previously targeted by the surge. Specifically, foreign stakeholders should reexamine three central principles of their previous subnational governance strategy. First, donors should revise their conception of assisting service delivery from the previous approach, which often emphasized providing maximal inputs in a fragmented way, to a more restrained vision that stresses predictability and reliability and acknowledges the interlinked nature of politics, justice, and sectoral services in the eyes of the local population. Second, donors should reframe their goal of establishing linkages between the Afghan govern¬ment and population by acknowledging that the main obstacles to improving center-periph¬ery communication and execution are often political and structural rather than technical. Third, donors should revise the way they define, discuss, and measure local governance prog¬ress in contested areas, away from favoring snapshots of inputs and perceptions and toward capturing longer-term changes on the ground in processes, structures, and incentives. The coming political and development aid transition provides an overdue opportunity for Afghan governance priorities to come to the fore. At the same time, the ever growing chasm between Kabul's deliberations on the one hand and local governance as experienced in more remote, insurgency-wracked areas on the other presents renewed risks. In the short term, donors let the air out of the aid bubble carefully. In the long term, resolving Afghanistan's local governance challenges continues to demand sustained commitment and systematic execution.
Topic:: International Relations, Economics, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and United States

39567. 2013-2014 Global Resources Report: Philanthropic and Government Support for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Intersex Communities

Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Global Philanthropy Project (GPP)
Abstract:: GPP and Funders for LGBTQ Issues have partnered to release a new Global LGBTI Resources Report, the most comprehensive report to date on the state of foundation and government funding for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) issues. This first-of-its-kind report captures data on 9,632 grants awarded by 415 foundations and intermediaries and by 16 government and multilateral agencies over the two-year period of 2013-2014. The report provides detailed data on LGBTI funding distribution by geography, issue, strategy, and population focus, offering a baseline for identifying trends, gaps, and opportunities in the rapidly changing landscape of LGBTI funding.
Topic:: Government, LGBT+, and Philanthropy
Political Geography:: Global Focus

39568. The US Trillion Dollar Nuclear Triad

Author:: Jon Wolfsthal
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: The James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) convened an event to release its latest report “The Trillion Dollar Nuclear Triad: US Strategic Nuclear Modernization Over the Next Thirty Years.” The report concludes that the United States will likely spend over $1 trillion during the next three decades to maintain its current nuclear arsenal and purchase their replacement systems. The necessary level of procurement spending, as a percentage of the defense budget, will peak at levels comparable to the Reagan-era build-up of nuclear forces. To date, few senior officials from the White House or Department of Defense or in the Congress have publicly acknowledged or laid out the full scale of these costs to the American public. This lack of public debate will likely lead to sticker shock as the full cost of these programs come due, leading to budget cuts and program delays. “The strategic and financial challenges facing our country are enormous,” said Jon Wolfsthal, CNS Deputy Director and former nuclear advisor to Vice President Joseph Biden. “Policy makers lack the basic information needed to make smart choices about our nuclear arsenal, putting both our deterrent and future reductions at risk.” The report cites particular concern over the pace of planned construction of strategic systems to replace systems that are set to retire starting in 2030. The United States plans, from 2024-29, to build five strategic submarines, 72 strategic bombers, and 240 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). This represents more delivery vehicles than the combined nuclear forces of China, the United Kingdom, and France. It is unclear that the industrial and management capabilities in the United States are capable of this production rate in times of budget constraint.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Military Strategy, Nuclear Power, Budget, and Military Spending
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

39569. New Media Solutions in Nonproliferation and Arms Control: Opportunities and Challenges

Author:: Bryan Lee
Publication Date:: 02-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: CNS has released a ground breaking new report investigating the role new and social media can play in tracking nonproliferation and verifying arms control. The paper lays out how these new technologies have the potential to significantly enhance current practices in the field of nonproliferation and arms control. They stress, however, that it is critical to approach anything that is so new and fluid with caution and flexibility as technologies that might be effective today for solving a particular nonproliferation or arms control problem might not work or require a major redesign in the future. The paper contains four detailed examples that show how new media can be applied to the nonproliferation challenge. They include: 1) election mapping; 2) Github; 3) real time commercial satellite image analysis; and 4) a Twitter text mining analysis. The findings demonstrate emerging technologies and procedures that can enhance the ability of countries or organizations or even individuals to identify when weapons of mass destruction are being built or used, or in ensuring that countries live up to their international treaty obligations.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, Media, Social Media, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Global Focus

39570. US and Russia Can End Use of Weapons-Usable Uranium for Medical Uses

Author:: Miles A. Pomper
Publication Date:: 02-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: A new report co-authored by CNS Senior Research Associate Miles Pomper recommends steps for the United States and Russia to cooperate in ending Russian use of highly enriched uranium (HEU) in medical isotope production, an important step in keeping this nuclear weapons material from terrorists. Great progress has been achieved in recent years in minimizing civilian use of HEU as part of the international efforts to reduce the nuclear terrorism threat. In particular, the leading global suppliers of the molybdenum-99 (Mo-99) isotope, which is widely used in medical diagnostics, are taking steps to reduce and, in the medium time frame, completely eliminate the use of HEU in the production of medical isotopes. Major new steps towards phasing out HEU use in medical isotopes production could be announced at the Nuclear Security Summit that will take place in The Hague on March 24-25, 2014. The Russian nuclear industry has set for itself an ambitious goal of becoming one of the three top global suppliers of Mo-99, used in 80 per cent of the medical procedures involving isotopes particularly as a diagnostic tool. Growing Russian production could help stabilize the global Mo-99 market, which faced severe shortages on several occasions in 2005-2013. According to some estimates, in 2010 during a six month period medical facilities around the world were unable to perform diagnostic procedures for several million people due to the shortage of Mo-99; the shortfall was estimated at 7 million doses. However, until recently, Russia had been bucking global trends by planning to use HEU fuels and targets rather than safer low enriched uranium (LEU) for much of this production. The ‘Ending HEU Use in Medical Isotope Production: Options for Russian-US Cooperation’ report co-authored by the Moscow-based Center for Energy for Energy and Security Studies (CENESS) analyses what can be done by Moscow and Washington to harmonize the Russian producers’ plans to win a share of the global market, while at the same time facilitating the Russian nuclear industry’s transition to new market requirements for producing Mo-99 without HEU.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, Nuclear Power, Nonproliferation, and Medicine
Political Geography:: Russia, Europe, North America, and United States of America

39571. Alternatives to High-Risk Radiological Sources

Author:: Miles A. Pomper, Egle Murauskaite, and Tom Coppen
Publication Date:: 03-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: There is growing global awareness of the need to secure radiological sources in order to prevent terrorists from using such materials in a radiological weapon, such as a “dirty bomb.” A new CNS report calls for a move towards permanently reducing this threat by substituting non-isotopic alternatives for these sources in civil uses. As an initial step, the authors propose a move towards gradual phase-out of cesium chloride use in pre-transfusion blood irradiation on a global scale – a domain where non-isotopic alternatives are considered to be the most viable in the short-term. They urge United States to launch an international initiative involving the phase out of cesium-chloride and other high-risk radiological sources as a “gift basket” for the upcoming 2014 Nuclear Security Summit. Cesium chloride is one of the most commonly used radiological materials, despite being an IAEA Category 1 “extremely dangerous” source. Because cesium chloride is easily dispersible, water soluble, and relatively easy to handle, it is particularly suitable for terrorist purposes. The blood irradiators that use it as a source are located in many large hospitals and blood banks (inherently publicly accessible spaces), and the source is usually transported through regular civilian infrastructure at the beginning and the end of its lifecycle, giving more cause for concern. Cesium chloride based irradiators are used to treat blood and blood products prior to transfusion in order to prevent a rare but fatal Graft Versus Host Disease (GVHD). A growing number of non-isotopic alternatives are becoming available for that purpose, but there is a serious lack of awareness about the range of options and how they compare to current practices, both among the medical professionals and national regulators.
Topic:: Health, Biological Weapons, Radiological Weapons, and Medicine
Political Geography:: Global Focus

39572. Mind the Gap: Regimes & Strengthening Radiological Security

Author:: Miles A. Pomper
Publication Date:: 08-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: According to a new paper from CNS Senior Research Associate Miles A. Pomper, inadequate liability and insurance regimes mean that users of high-risk radiological sources have insufficient incentive to protect those sources from terrorists or substitute less risky alternatives. Such sources are used in medicine, oil and gas exploration, and industry, among other fields, and can be used in “dirty bombs” or other forms of radiological terrorism. Since the 9/11 attacks, governments, including the United States, have taken it upon themselves to institute emergency measures to improve source security, often using public funds. However, these measures are less than optimal and are expected to take many more decades. Moreover, even the United States—the lead country in spending on these efforts—routinely sacrifices radiological security to other budget priorities. Pomper therefore recommends two potential options to improve liability and insurance regimes governing radiological sources in order to incentivize users to reduce the risk of radiological terrorism.
Topic:: Security, Terrorism, Budget, Radiological Weapons, and Medicine
Political Geography:: North America and United States of America

39573. Countering Nuclear Commodity Smuggling: A System of Systems

Author:: Leonard Spector
Publication Date:: 11-2014
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:: A comprehensive Center for Nonproliferation Studies report calls on the United States and other concerned countries to adopt tighter controls to stem the flow of nuclear-related goods to Iran, North Korea, and other states of proliferation concern. Even modest improvements across the spectrum of today’s nuclear technology controls could greatly strengthen overall international efforts to constrain illicit nuclear procurement networks, the study found. The now available report, Countering Nuclear Commodity Smuggling: A System of Systems, was prepared by Leonard S. Spector and Egle Murauskaite. The study was supported by the US Department of Defense.
Topic:: Nuclear Weapons, Science and Technology, Nuclear Power, Nonproliferation, and Illegal Trade
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, Asia, and North Korea

39574. Journal of Advanced Military Studies: Fall 2014

Author:: David Zvijac, Jason J. Morrissette, Douglas A. Borer, and Brian J. Ellison
Publication Date:: 09-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Advanced Military Studies
Institution:: Marine Corps University Press, National Defense University
Abstract:: In Marine Corps Vision & Strategy 2025, the 34th Commandant of the Marine Corps, General James T. Conway, laid out his vision of the Corps: “Marines must be agile, capable of transitioning seamlessly between fighting, training, advising, and assisting—or performing all of these tasks simultaneously. . . . Future operational environments will place a premium on agile expeditionary forces, able to act with unprecedented speed and versatility in austere conditions against a wide range of adversaries.” Just as the nature of warfare has changed over time, so too has our need to assess future operations and the ever-evolving environment in which our forces must act.
Topic:: Security, Agriculture, Water, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:: Afghanistan, China, South Asia, Korea, and United States of America

39575. Journal of Advanced Military Studies: Spring 2014

Author:: Vernie Liebl, Alessandra Pinna, Aylin Ünver Noi, and Gayane Novikova
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Advanced Military Studies
Institution:: Marine Corps University Press, National Defense University
Abstract:: U.S. armed forces must react and interact in a variety of situations, proving the importance of not just experience but also of an educational foundation that supports today’s military, one confronting tighter budgets and a constricted force structure, utilizing greater technology, and facing increased ambiguity and international crises. Professional military education means more than fostering leadership in our best and brightest. Our goal at Marine Corps University is to serve as a dynamic institution capable of educating joint and combined forces to handle the complex realities of the twenty-first century. Several of these current realities, as well as past incidents that influence the present, are the focus of this issue of the Marine Corps University Journal. United States has extended the American idea of democracy so far afield that its reach can be felt across the globe. ere are those who argue that we have stretched our resources and our forces beyond their limits, while others claim that our interactions with other cultures enrich both domestic and foreign populations. As evidenced by situations such as the Bizerte Incident in Tunisia and the Arab Spring, we still have much to learn from our global interactions today and in the not-so-distant past.
Topic:: Democratization, History, Military Affairs, and Transatlantic Relations
Political Geography:: Caucasus, Middle East, North Africa, North America, and United States of America

39576. Thinking About Return Migration to Africa: Theories, Praxes, General Tendencies & African Particularities

Author:: Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: The simplest definition of return migration construes it as the move back from a place of sojourn to a place of origin by a migrant who then settles down. But return could be temporary or permanent. It could be volitional or compelled. There could also be secondary and repeat migration. Regardless of the contemporary worldwide concern about the meanings, implications, significance and consequences of return migration, return migration is yet to be subjected to as much scholarly research as other aspects of the migration phenomenon. Eborka in this volume rightfully points out that the gap in scholarly knowledge on this subject is even more profound in the case of Africa, and there is a dearth of statistics, as Essien, Setrana and Tonah indicate. Through her analysis of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah, Idowu-Faith also alerts us to the theoretical contributions of literary exploration of migration and especially return migration. This volume on return migration to Africa therefore contributes to discourses and research on the subject and in doing so, also contributes significantly to filling the gap in scholarly knowledge.
Topic:: Migration and Literature
Political Geography:: Africa

39577. Fictionalizing Theory, Theorizing Fiction: The Stylistics of Return Migration in Chimamanda Adichie's Americanah

Author:: Bimbola Oluwafunlola Idowu-Faith
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: This paper is a stylistic investigation of Americanah (2013) Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s latest novel. Whereas Americanah is the melting pot where love and romance collide and comingle with hair politics and the shifting meanings of skin color, Adichie employs migration as the window through which these issues are projected. Beyond Adichie’s juxtaposition of binary migratory terms of “Americanah” and “American” and her protagonist’s choice of the former, the novelist’s preoccupation is to critically engage international migration theories, and to chart a new migration story, where return migration is the quintessential closure.
Topic:: Migration, International Affairs, Literature, and Novels
Political Geography:: Africa

39578. "Afie ni Afie" (Home is Home): Revisiting Reverse Trans-Antlantic Journeys to Ghana and the Paradox Return

Author:: Kwame Essien
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: This article traces different waves of reverse migrations to the Gold Coast, now Ghana, which began in the early nineteenth century. The article explores external motivations for pursuing these journeys and factors internal to Ghanaian history that facilitated reverse migrations. Both contributed to the contradictions of return and the paradox of freedom or the illusion that their physical presence in Ghana would fulfil their fantasy. Part of the article chronicles the stories of individuals, family groups, and the transatlantic communities they created: Brazilian-Africans (Tabom), Caribbean Africans and American-Africans. The article focuses on themes of slavery, emancipation, abolition, reverse migrations and Pan-African activities in Ghana. This article maintains that literature on reverse migrations should extend beyond the narrow focus of the New World back to Africa. I assert that there are other reverse migratory paths from West Africa to Brazil (after liberated Brazilian-Africans settled in Africa in the early 1800s) and between Nigeria and Ghana that have been overlooked by scholars in their study of reverse migrations to Ghana and West Africa in general. In the end, this article shows similarities in reverse migrations and shared cultural kinship as members of the returnee communities in Lagos-Nigeria (the Aguda) and Accra-Ghana (the Tabom) crisscrossed the West African Atlantic and created various identities.
Topic:: Migration, Slavery, and Literature
Political Geography:: Africa, Nigeria, and Ghana

39579. Diary of an American Woman: First Part of a Three-Part Story Called This Africa in my Dream

Author:: Chinyere G. Okafor
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: The Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) was adopted in Nigeria after unsustainable foreign indebtedness caused grave economic crisis, which spun off political and social turmoil. Its adoption in 1986 by the Babangida military regime, was pushed by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), as the only viable solution to Nigeria’s problems. Rather than provide relief, the adoption of SAP imposed extreme neoliberal austerity policies that pushed many middle class families into poverty, causing some to migrate both within the country and abroad. “Diary of an American Woman” is the story of three characters, Ola, Love, and Fakar. The story presents an account of three migrations: internal migration within Nigeria, external migration to America, and patrilocal movement from parental to marital abodes. Ola keeps a journal about her immigrant experience in America, which unfortunately is lost with her luggage in Nigeria. Fakar discovers the journal in his workplace and begins to read it. Ola’s immigrant experience in America as recalled in her diary reveals the underbelly of life of a Nigerian in America to the hotel janitor.
Topic:: Debt, International Political Economy, World Bank, Military Affairs, Literature, and IMF
Political Geography:: Africa and Nigeria

39580. Return Migrants and the Challenge of Reintegration: The Case of Returnees to Kumasi, Ghana

Author:: Mary Boatemaa Setrana and Steve Tonah
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: This paper describes the nature of migrants’ return to Kumasi, Ghana’s second largest city, and the strategies employed by the returnees to establish links with their relatives and friends, as well reintegrate into their neighbourhoods, and participate fully in city life. Using interviews and observations carried out among 30 return migrants and some migrant associations, the paper concludes that return migration is a negotiated process among family members. Migrants face several challenges including finding accommodation and jobs, establishing contacts with former colleagues and friends, meeting the high expectations of extended family members, and adjusting to the poor infrastructural facilities in the city. Return migrants are able to surmount these difficulties with support from family members, friends, colleagues, and a host of social organizations and networks.
Topic:: Migration, Urban, and Social Groups
Political Geography:: Africa and Ghana

39581. The Politics of Gender, Water and Migration in Ghana: Implications for WASH Sector

Author:: Afia Serwaa Zakiya
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: This paper explores the broad issues of Gender, Water and Migration among rural dwellers in Ghana. Particular emphasis is paid to women who seek to improve their life chances and reduce their level of poverty through out-migration from their indigenous homeland primarily to urban and small town enclaves. It updates research on migratory trends in Ghana and examines the socio-economic and health conditions of rural women as a consequence of poor access to water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH). The politics of water access and impact of globalization and disasters, among other factors, are raised to highlight how such phenomena linked to issues of climatic change and migration, can lead to loss of indigenous knowledge (IK) in rural communities. The paper ends with an overview of how one organization, WaterAid Ghana (WAG), is attempting to alleviate rural women’s poverty by providing sustainable WASH services delivery and advocating for WASH as a basic essential service and right. The use of culturally appropriate and endogenous development is proposed, with the right requisite levels of local and government leadership and financing, to reduce WASH related poverty, support rural development and reduce migration of men and women to overburdened cities where slums are developing without adequate WASH services and negative health outcomes.
Topic:: Development, Gender Issues, Globalization, Migration, Poverty, Water, Women, and Rural
Political Geography:: Africa and Ghana

39582. Development Impact of Return Migration in Nigeria: Myth or Reality?

Author:: Kennedy Eborka
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Research Paper
Institution:: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:: This paper is an attempt to examine the nexus between return migration and development in Nigeria. The paper reveals that the bulk of return migrants in the country are the repatriated, while the rate of return of professional migrants is low. It was observed that the ability of migrants to contribute to homeland development is influenced by their destination; those from Europe and North America are more likely to act as agents of change than their counterparts within Africa. A major obstacle to the return of professionals is the unfavorable living and investment conditions in the country. The paper concludes that for efforts to stimulate return of innovative migrants to succeed, genuine attempts must be made, to provide an enabling environment to make return a worthwhile endeavor for migrants.
Topic:: Development, Migration, and Investment
Political Geography:: Africa and Nigeria

39583. Lübnan 2014 | Lebanon 2014

Author:: Ayşe Selcan Özdemirci
Publication Date:: 12-2014
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Sakarya University (SAU)
Abstract:: 2014 yılında Lübnan’ın genelde Ortadoğu bölgesine hâkim olan kargaşanın özelde ise Suriye’nin yarattığı kaosun etkisinde kalmayı sürdürdüğü gözlemlenmiştir. Bu bağlamda ülkede 2014 boyunca kaydedilen gelişmeler büyük ölçüde Suriye’de yaşanan iç savaştan etkilenmiştir. Bu yazıda Lübnan’ın 2014 yılı gelişmeleri; iç siyasette bir krize dönüşen cumhurbaşkanlığı seçimleri, ekonomik problemler, uluslararası ilişkiler ve dış aktörlerin ülkeye etkisi alt başlıkları ile ele alınmıştır. Lübnan 2014 yılını, sayıları ülke nüfusunun yarısına yaklaşan Suriyeli sığınmacılardan kaynaklanan ekonomik problemler, iç siyasetteki istikrarsızlık ve Lübnan ordusu askerlerinin rehin alınmasına kadar varan silahlı eylemler ile artan toplumsal huzursuzluk atmosferinde geçirmiştir. Son tahlilde uluslararası aktörlerin müdahaleleri ile siyaset arenasında yaşanan güç savaşı toplumun tüm katmanlarına yayılan huzursuzluğun ve kutuplaşmanın artmasına sebep olmuştur. | Throughout the 2014, Lebanon faced with various crises in relation to the civil war in Syria. This study is a brief analysis of these problems that the country confronted. It will particularly focus on the presidential election which created a serious domestic crisis among the political actors in the country. In addition to this, the paper will analyze economic problems and the effects of external actors in Lebanon. The study argues that political developments in Lebanon are deeply effected from the Syrian conflict and its actors. The Syrian crisis continued to have a direct impact on Lebanon in 2014, particularly with regards to the issue of Syrian refugees. In addition to these problems, intervention and the power struggle of the international actors in Lebanon’s politics resulted with increasing social unrest and political instability. This situation increased the political polarization in the country.
Topic:: Refugee Issues, Syrian War, and Hezbollah
Political Geography:: Middle East, Lebanon, and Syria

39584. Libya 2014

Author:: Bilal Yıldırım
Publication Date:: 12-2014
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Sakarya University (SAU)
Abstract:: Bu makale, 2014 yılı içerisinde Libya’da yaşanan gelişmeleri ele almakta ve bu gelişmeleri Siyasi İstikrarsızlık ve Güvenlik Problemi, Petrol ve Hükümet Kriz(ler)i ve Çatışmalar ve Genel Seçim: (Olmayan) Otoritenin Parçalanışı adlı üç başlık altında analiz etmektedir. Bu amaçla, özellikle bağımsız haber kaynaklarında çıkıp ülke içi ve bölgesel dinamikleri konu edinen haberlerden yararlanılmıştır. Netice itibariyle, yukarıda değinilen üç bağlam içerisinde gerçekleşen olaylar, neden sonuç ilişkisi içerisinde değerlendirilmekte ve Libya siyasetini anlamaya yönelik ülke içi ve yapısal unsurlar tespit edilmektedir. | This article discusses the developments appeared in Libya throughout 2014 and analyses these developments with three sub-titles named as Political Instability and Security Problem, Oil and Government Crisis, Conflicts and General Elections: Distortion of (Non-Exist) Authority. The study, with this aim, benefits from the news which raises the domestic and regional dynamics and especially from independent media sources. As a result, events happened in above mentioned contexts are examined in a causality relation and domestic and structural elements which lead to understand the policy of the Libya are identified.
Topic:: Elections, Democracy, Constitution, Political stability, Conflict, and Militias
Political Geography:: Middle East, Libya, and North Africa

39585. Irak 2014 | Iraq 2014

Author:: Rıdvan Kalaycı and Recep Tayyip Gürler
Publication Date:: 12-2014
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Sakarya University (SAU)
Abstract:: Irak için 2014, birçok alanda kaosun, krizin ve şiddetin hüküm sürdüğü bir yıl olmuştur. IŞİD’in saldırıları, muhalif Sünnilerin hükümete karşı silahlanması, Şii milislerin savaşa aktif olarak geri dönmesi ve ABD öncülüğündeki koalisyon saldırıları nedeniyle Irak toprakları tam bir savaş alanına dönmüştür. Hem çatışmalar hem de düşen petrol fiyatları nedeniyle Irak ekonomisi 2014 yılında da beklenen gelişmeyi gösterememiştir. Diğer yandan gergin bir atmosferde gerçekleşen 30 Nisan parlamento seçimlerinin ardından sekiz yıllık Nuri el-Maliki dönemi sona ermiş ve Haydar el-Abadi başbakan olmuştur. Yeni yönetimle birlikte Ankara ile Bağdat arasındaki resmi temaslar da hızlanmış ve ilişkiler gelişmeye başlamıştır. | 2014 was a year of chaos, crisis and violence in many areas for Iraq. Because of ISIS’s attacks, arming of opponent Sunnis, returning of Shiite militias to struggle actively and the US-led coalition attacks, Iraq territories were transformed into a battlefield. Due to these conflicts and falling of oil prices, Iraq’s 2014 economy was worse than the previous year. On the other hand, as a result of April 30 general elections, eight year Maliki government ended and Haydar Abadi rulership began. Thanks to new government in Iraq, official visits increased and relations between Ankara and Baghdad began to develop.
Topic:: Government, Islamic State, Conflict, and Militias
Political Geography:: Iraq, Turkey, and Middle East

39586. A Temporary Marriage of Convenience: Transnational Jihadists in Proxy Warfare

Author:: Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: Cecily G. Brewer of the U.S. Department of State defines proxy wars as “inter-state conflicts fought via intra-state means.” She notes that traditionally in such conflicts, “the intra-state symptoms of the conflict draw attention,” while the inter-state driver — the support an actor receives from outside the country — “is ignored.” A prototypical example, albeit one where outside support given to the non-state actors at the heart of the conflict has received copious attention, is the Afghan-Soviet war. Not only did the Afghan mujahedin force the powerful Soviet Union to withdraw from Afghanistan following a costly and humiliating defeat, but the conflict also gave birth to the preeminent transnational jihadist group, al-Qaeda. This article examines how proxy warfare functions in the context of jihadist groups that share al-Qaeda’s transnational outlook, arguing that they create more difficulties for the state attempting to exploit them than do traditional proxies. Pakistan’s policies, and the resulting costs inflicted upon the Pakistani state, provide a powerful case study in the dangers involved in relying on jihadist proxies. The Afghan-Soviet war was a key event in shaping Pakistan’s self-destructive use of proxies. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 quickly became notorious throughout the Muslim world. The invasion triggered stiff resistance from Afghan mujahedin, and encouraged both state and non-state actors to support the various mujahedin factions. In the Cold War context, the United States perceived the Soviet invasion as an opportunity to give the U.S.S.R. its own Vietnam War, according to President Carter’s national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski.[2] The mujahedin thus became a proxy of the United States, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, each with their own somewhat divergent interests in supporting these factions. The largest U.S. covert aid program since Vietnam, with American support (totaling around $3 billion) matched dollar for dollar by Saudi Arabia, flowed to the anti-Soviet fighters. American and Saudi aid was routed through Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence directorate (ISI).
Topic:: Security, Cold War, Conflict, Transnational Actors, Jihad, and Proxy War
Political Geography:: Afghanistan, Soviet Union, and United States of America

39587. Multiplayer Great Game: 19th Century Maneuvers on the Chessboard of Afghanistan

Author:: Peter John Brobst
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: Nineteenth and early twentieth century strategists of the British Empire called their long struggle for mastery in the borderlands of Central and South Asia the ‘Great Game. Their Russian adversaries styled it the ‘Tournament of Shadows’. Each phrase tends to elide as much as it evokes. The Boy’s Own flair obscures, even diminishes, the underlying geopolitics and high stakes involved. Nothing less was at issue, at least from the British point of view, than the balance between global sea power, on one side, and consolidated land power based in the heart of Eurasia on the other. War between the principals frequently seemed in the offing. It erupted in the Crimea in 1854. However, as suggested by the phrase ‘Tournament of Shadows’, the competition between Britain and Russia over Asia and the Middle East played out largely through indirect means. Proxy warfare figured prominently in the informal imperialism of the Great Game. For their part, the British relied heavily on their time-tested, European strategy of ‘guineas and gunpowder’— subsidies and arms transfers — to delineate spheres of influence, buffer states, and ‘anti-routes’ in the marches of India. Lines of clientage were blurred if not invisible. This afforded plausible deniability, but the advantage was double-edged. Abdur Rahman, Afghanistan’s ‘Iron Amir’ between 1882 and 1901, offers a prime example of the dilemma. His internal wars to consolidate the Afghan state, assisted by British subsidies, helped to staunch the subcontinent’s northern frontier against Russia; they also rattled nerves in British India and a host of its smaller client states in the mountainous reaches west of the upper Indus.
Topic:: Imperialism, History, Proxy War, and Great Game
Political Geography:: Afghanistan, South Asia, and Central Asia

39588. Princes, Patriots and Proxies: Great Power Politics and the Assertion of Afghan National Sovereignty

Author:: C. M. Wyatt
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: Despite the well-worn cliché, the relationship between proxy and sponsor is seldom as simple as that between puppet and master. Overlooking internal trends and ruptures, an outside great power may find itself incapable of maintaining the careful balance that ensured its dominance. Actors within a proxy state who have become independent from a sponsor’s largesse may be prepared to strike out on their own when shifts in world politics provide an opportunity. Modern Afghanistan is currently caught up in a struggle that will determine both the shape of the state and its relationships with outside powers, once the dust of recent decades of upheaval settles. Those inside and outside the state considering the wisdom of re-forging old bonds or establishing new ones would do well to consider the lessons of an earlier period of Afghan history, the “Great Game”, when the British began losing control of Afghanistan due to that state’s shifting internal dynamics, and subsequently choose to give up the struggle due to major shifts in their own external calculations. Afghanistan’s status as a regional British proxy began to unravel during the latter stages of the reign of Amir Habibullah Khan. Afghanistan’s foreign relations since 1880 had been controlled by the Government of India, which was an instrument of the British government led by an appointed viceroy and responsible for the empire’s policies on India’s neighborhood. Habibullah maintained his father’s policy of accepting that arrangement. This policy was opposed by both conservatives at court, who were anti-British, and modernizers, who wanted outright independence. At times the interests of the two camps coincided and at others they did not. Their positions on foreign policy evolved based on the ways they saw the world, which were also reflected in domestic politics. Before the Afghan state could promote an independent foreign policy, a shift at the domestic level that undermined support for the British had to take place...
Topic:: Imperialism, Sovereignty, History, Power Politics, and Great Game
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and South Asia

39589. Ukraine - Europe's New Proxy War?

Author:: Geraint Hughes
Publication Date:: 06-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: Ukraine - Europe's New Proxy War? Dr. Geraint Hughes | 22 May 2014 DOWNLOAD PDF On February 27 and 28, 2014, shortly after the revolution in Kiev that toppled Viktor Yanukovych’s government, the Autonomous Republic of Crimea was taken over by thousands of masked and armed Russian troops, backed by armor and attack helicopters. In an unconvincing attempt to hide their origin, the soldiers wore no insignia and passed themselves off as a ‘self-defense’ militia drawn from the ethnic Russian majority of the peninsula, which until 1954 had belonged to Russia itself. In fact, this occupation force consisted either of personnel from the Black Sea Fleet (BSF) based in Crimea or troops sent from the Russian Federation. Russia’s parliament subsequently voted to grant President Vladimir Putin powers to order further interventions in Ukraine to ‘protect ethnic Russians’, whilst a ‘referendum’ held in Crimea on March 16 produced an overwhelming vote in favor of union with the Russian Federation. Three days later, Russian troops and ‘self-defense’ militias forcibly evicted Ukrainian naval personnel from their own bases, formalizing the annexation of Crimea. This landgrab by Russia, and the separatist turmoil it is currently inciting in Eastern Ukraine, constitutes the most serious crisis in Europe since the Georgian war of August 2008. Although the post-Yanukovych government in Ukraine has acted cautiously and focused on mustering diplomatic support, the country has become the location of a diplomatic confrontation between Russia and the West (the United States, its NATO allies, and member states of the European Union) that could potentially deteriorate into a military clash between Kiev and Moscow. There are repeated instances in history where states have resorted to proxy warfare rather than the overt use of force, using non-state para-military actors to subvert and undermine an adversary. In the process, sponsor states have armed, equipped, trained, and sheltered proxies, and have at times even reinforced them with advisors and special forces personnel, as is the case with Russian military intelligence (GRU) and special forces (spetsnaz) troops reportedly reinforcing local ‘separatists’ in the ‘Donetsk People’s Republic’. Proxy warfare has also sometimes preceded an overt military intervention. Given both Putin’s threats to ‘defend’ ethnic Russians and the mobilization of Russian army and air force units over the past two months, this remains a very real possibility in Ukraine. The overall objectives of a sponsor state usually involve the coercion of an adversary, its disruption, or the attainment of a transformative objective, which in turn can involve the successful encouragement of separatism, the annexation of territory, or regime change. Allowing for the absence of solid information on Russian aims it is likely that Moscow’s present reasons for destabilizing Ukraine involve an opportunistic combination of these three outcomes. Putin may well hope that the turmoil he is inciting in the East of the country will forestall the forthcoming elections on May 25 and will force Kiev to subordinate its foreign policy to Russian interests. It is likely that he may consider the takeover of more Ukrainian territory if its government persists in its efforts to forge closer ties with the United States and EU.
Topic:: Security, History, Conflict, and Proxy War
Political Geography:: Europe and Ukraine

39590. When Proxies Fail, Force Must Prevail U.S.-Iran Relations

Author:: Jonathan Ruhe
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: For decades, the United States and Iran have pursued fundamentally incompatible strategic objectives. Yet despite having expansive goals and minimal mutual interests, each side has recognized that direct confrontation would jeopardize its ultimate goal. Thus competition between the two countries often has taken less decisive, but also less risky, forms of behavior, namely: diplomacy, sanctions, and the use of proxy forces. Given the stakes involved, however, relying entirely on such measures to convey the seriousness of one’s intentions is insufficient. Indeed, the United States has been most successful influencing Iranian policy when it has demonstrated its own willingness to use force or supported actors using military force directly against Iran – and conversely, least successful when it has failed to do so. The two countries have long held mutually exclusive aims. The United States wants to remain predominant in the Middle East to ensure the free flow of natural resources and the security of its allies, even as it withdraws troops after more than a decade of war and faces an uncertain fiscal future. The Iranian regime pursues nuclear weapons capability to protect against its perceived danger from a U.S.-supported overthrow, provide an umbrella under which it can project unmatchable power against its neighbors, and validate its continuing right to rule, among other goals. Both objectives are highly ambitious and in direct conflict with each other. Therefore the lethargy of peace suits both rivals well, as neither side feels it can afford an overt rupture. For the United States, direct conflict would critically endanger its efforts to maintain regional stability with a receding regional footprint. For Iran, it would seriously delay its approach to a nuclear weapons capability. There is little middle ground for diplomacy to secure, given the two countries’ ultimately irreconcilable goals.
Topic:: Security, Bilateral Relations, Conflict, and Proxy War
Political Geography:: Iran, Middle East, and United States of America

39591. Fear and Loathing in Mexico Narco-Alliances and Proxy Wars

Author:: Irina Chindea
Publication Date:: 05-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: In December 2012, Enrique Peña Nieto took the helm of Mexico’s Presidency after running on an electoral agenda in which he distanced himself from the Calderón Administration’s (2006-2012) security policies against organized crime. These policies have received substantive criticism over the past years for leading to a direct increase in violence in the country. The total number of homicides for the Calderón Presidency doubled, reaching approximately 120,000, over those recorded during the previous administration of Vicente Fox Quesada (2001-2006). The number of organized crime style executions – over 60,000 – associated with Felipe Calderón’s war on drugs significantly surpassed the threshold of 1,000 battle-related deaths within a twelve months period – the definition of war according to the Correlates of War Project. The levels of violence in this internal conflict have been comparable to those in war zones such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Additionally, Calderón’s war against the drug cartels had another unintended effect. It transformed Mexico into the most dangerous country for journalists in the Western Hemisphere – and the eighth worldwide – with 67 journalists murdered and 14 disappeared since 2006. Last but not least, for three consecutive years (2008, 2009, and 2010) Ciudad Juarez, the second largest metropolitan area on the border with the U.S., registered the highest rate of homicides worldwide, earning the nickname “Murder City.” Today, more than one year into the new Peña Nieto Presidency, violence in Mexico has not significantly subsided, and the country has witnessed an increase in kidnappings, forced disappearances, and extortion. Despite the promises made on the campaign trail, the 18-month old Peña Nieto Administration still has not been able to carry out the security measures that it intended, such as creation of a new security force under the guise of a national gendarmerie. On the contrary, its security policies have de facto remained the same as those of the previous administration. Equally, they have contributed to the festering of the narco-violence problem that the country has been facing over the past seven years, and that has resulted in the rise of the self-defense forces across the country, particularly in rural areas and the state of Michoacán.
Topic:: Narcotics Trafficking, Non State Actors, Violence, and Proxy War
Political Geography:: North America and Mexico

39592. Insights of Intelligence Insiders on (Non-) Sharing Intelligence Behaviors

Author:: Musa Tüzüner
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: This study surveys the Turkish intelligence community’s (non-) sharing intelligence behavior. The factors affecting failures to share intelligence and how to increase intelligence sharing practices are examined based on the views of Turkish intelligence insiders. These insiders’ views reveal that the complexity of bureaucratic structures, lack of trust, compartmentalization, power, egoism, fear, informal groupings, lack of reciprocity and lack of feedback are the causes for non-sharing of intelligence. Policy solutions for shifting from non-sharing towards intelligence sharing behaviors is discussed in a new framework including respective government willingness, enhancing capacity of intelligence collection, building intelligence aquariums, creating rules for establishing new intelligence sharing, opening up new communication channels, training, and support for sharing culture. This framework argues that policy change should start first at the agency level, then at the community level and finally at the international level.
Topic:: Security, Intelligence, Reform, and Intelligence Sharing
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

39593. Causes and Consequences of the Recent European Crisis: Can Polanyi help us understand problems of the Eurozone?

Author:: Mine Kara
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: By evoking economic turmoil in Europe, the global crisis of 2007-2008 had important impacts on the economic and political integration of the European Union (EU), leading to a reassessment of the relationship between the core– periphery countries and the model of the ‘democratic European welfare state.’ Most studies that address this problem in the EU focus on the fiscal mismanagement and welfare policies of the non-core or periphery countries (i.e. Greece) as the main culprit. Unlike the mainstream ideas, this paper explains the recent European crisis as a result of the liberalization and deregulation process that started with the second globalization wave in the 1970s. This paper also questions whether the recent radical nationalist trend in the EU countries can be explained as a byproduct of the crisis, using Polanyi’s notion of “double movement”.
Topic:: Globalization, European Union, Eurozone, and Economic Crisis
Political Geography:: Europe

39594. ‘Via Media’ vs. the Critical Path: Constructivism(s) and the Case of EU Identity

Author:: Zeynep Arkan
Publication Date:: 07-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: The European Union’s international identity is a theme that has attracted great scholarly interest in the last two decades, parallel to the increasing role of the Union as a global actor. This period has also witnessed the rise of constructivism as an approach in International Relations with a specific focus on the social nature of and ideational factors in international affairs. Many of the works published in this time frame have approached the topic of European Union identity from a constructivist perspective that focused on the outcomes of the identity construction process within the Union, drawing parallels between the processes of identity construction and dissemination in nation states and at the European level. This study, by differentiating between the critical and conventional constructivist accounts of identity, offers a discursive analysis of the European Union’s identity that concentrates instead on the building blocks and evolution of the identity construction process within the Union. To this aim, it explores the ways in which the identity of the European Union has been represented in the foreign policy discourse originating from the Union’s various institutions and leaders, based on a particular conception of ‘Europe.’
Topic:: European Union, Media, Constructivism, and Identity
Political Geography:: Europe

39595. Revisiting the Theory and Practice Debate in International Relations and Foreign Policy and an Idea for a Joint Venture

Author:: Yönet C. Tezel
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: The relationship between theory and practice in international relations and foreign policy has been addressed by many on both sides. Despite helpful observations, the exploration has not produced much in the way of conclusive outcomes. This result is not surprising given the fact the theory-practice debate in foreign affairs is inevitably associated with the broader debate about how to properly study organized political/social life when focusing on the role of culture, structure, and choice in international relations. Although juxtaposing the theoretical study of international relations and foreign policy against the practice of foreign/international policy has its discipline-specific traits, it cannot be divorced from the larger ontological and epistemological debates. This essay reminds the reader of several facets of the narrower debate as it relates to the broader one and offers a perspective and ensuing observations from a ‘part taker’ in foreign policy. The essay also includes an idea for a research project that could be used to help overcome some of the putative shortcomings of the field.
Topic:: International Relations, Foreign Policy, and Political Science
Political Geography:: Turkey and Global Focus

39596. Babies, Parks, and Citizen Dissatisfaction Social Protests in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Turkey and their Long-term Effects

Author:: Soeren Keil and Trish Moore
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: 2013 was a year of social unrest in the regions of the Mediterranean and southeastern Europe. From Bulgaria to Slovenia, and from Egypt to Syria, there were new waves of citizen unrest, violent clashes, and civil-war-like escalations. This paper looks at the social protests in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Turkey. The protests in the two countries started because of concrete examples of public mismanagement: In the case of Bosnia because of the failure to pass a new law on identity numbers, which resulted in the inability of a baby to receive medical support abroad, and in the case of Turkey because of the decision to replace Gezi Park with a new shopping centre in Istanbul. However, both protests are also symbolic of deeper sentiments of citizen dissatisfaction. What started out as protests to save a park in Turkey, and change the law on identity numbers in Bosnia, became a wider movement to demand substantial reforms and changes to the current style of politics in both countries. This paper will look at the long-term effects of these protests. While in the short-term they have resulted in relatively few changes, it will be demonstrated that there might be long-term effects that will significantly impact the social contract in Bosnia and Turkey.
Topic:: Protests, Social Contract, Civil Unrest, and Identity
Political Geography:: Bosnia, Turkey, Middle East, and Eastern Europe

39597. Buying Trouble? The Impact of Foreign Assistance on Conflict in Direct and Indirect Rivalry Situations

Author:: Peter Rudloff and James M. Scott
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: States provide foreign assistance for many reasons, including their achievement of strategic goals. Previous research suggests that rivalries exert a meaningful impact on foreign aid allocations, not only in direct rivalry situations (i.e., rivals are less like to receive aid), but also in indirect rivalry situations (i.e., potential recipients located near rivals or with rivalries in common with the donor are more likely to receive aid). What happens as a consequence of such strategic aid allocations? In this paper, we examine the effect of foreign aid on conflict within direct and indirect rivalry situations. Specifically, we identify and develop two contending arguments about the likely consequences of foreign aid and conflict in indirect rivalry situations. To test these arguments, we examine foreign assistance by the United States and the conflict history of recipient states from 1962 to 2000. Our results indicate that when foreign aid recipients and donors are rivals with a third state, increased foreign aid to the recipient leads to increased conflict between the recipient and the third-party rival
Topic:: Conflict, Rivalry, and Foreign Assistance
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

39598. The Geopolitical Origins of Turkish-American Relations: Revisiting the Cold War Years

Author:: Ayşe Ömür Atmaca
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: Critical geopolitics provides ways of looking at the world and questioning the role of geopolitics in foreign policymaking processes, as opposed to accepting them as objective and natural. From this theoretical perspective, this article aims to apply critical geopolitics to the case of Turkish-American relations with respect to how the United States (US) viewed Turkey’s geography and how the Turkey-US alliance has been shaped by the foreign and security policies of the latter. The article argues that the alliance was a product of the US’ Cold War geopolitical discourse, wherein the US considered Turkey to be a strategic ally against Soviet expansion. Thereafter, the declaration of the Truman Doctrine on March 12, 1947, led to increased US military ties with Turkey and became the basis for Turkey’s inclusion in NATO in 1952. As a consequence, Turkey began to be defined as the anchor of NATO’s strategic southern flank and a barrier against the communist threat in the Middle East and the Mediterranean throughout the Cold War. Turkey has also been a major recipient of American military equipment and was a supplier of important military facilities for monitoring the Soviet Union. The paper also argues that while Turkey generally fits within the US’ geopolitical designs and that these two countries cooperated on numerous efforts during the Cold War, the Cyprus problem in that period revealed the limits of US geopolitical discourse.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Cold War, Bilateral Relations, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:: Turkey and United States of America

39599. Turkey’s New Vision for “Man’s Best Hope for Peace”: United Nations Reform and Reorganization of the Security Council

Author:: C. Akça Ataç
Publication Date:: 01-2014
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: Despite its present reputation as weak, inefficient, and discreditable, the United Nations is one of humanity’s most noble endeavors. Although the structure of the Security Council prevents its decision-making procedures from being more democratic, the UN still seeks to suppress aggression, respect self-determination, and promote human rights and well-being. Furthermore, political cosmopolitans’ proposals for comprehensive UN reform, which goes far beyond increasing the number of permanent members of the Security Council, give us hope for substantial improvement. Nevertheless, the UN is still the sum of the states it is comprised of and UN reform depends on the broader and ambitious project of state reform as both concept and practice. Within this context, this paper argues that focusing exclusively on the Security Council and the geographical distribution of permanent membership only harms the comprehensiveness of the analyses seeking to reform the UN from a larger perspective. The fact that the success of a UN reform is closely related with the enhancement of member states’ ethical capacities should also be taken into consideration. The next round of debates for a proper solution to the UN impasse takes place in 2015, and Turkey is emerging as an enthusiastic voice for further reform and for its own potential permanent membership in the Security Council. However, Turkey has also developed a significantly anti-UN discourse unprecedented in its foreign policy, which now runs the risk of curtailing the country’s capacity to partake in substantial change in UN decision-making procedures. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu currently acts as a statesman, insisting on a statist reform (which focuses more on states’ individual interests) of the Security Council. Interestingly, in the 1990s, when Davutoğlu was a university professor, his views of the UN tended to be more cosmopolitan and suggested a civilization-based solution. This paper, while elaborating on the discussions of reforming the UN from a cosmopolitan perspective, also probes Davutoğlu’s conflicting approaches to the issue. It thus seeks to argue that Turkey, instead of pushing for a purely statist model, should consider supporting pluralistic, multilevel, and more-complex participation in the UN’s decision-making procedures.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, United Nations, Reform, UN Security Council, and Ahmet Davutoğlu
Political Geography:: Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

39600. Conceptual Framework of the Active Ageing Policies in Employment in the Czech Republic

Author:: Lucie Vidovićová
Publication Date:: 03-2014
Content Type:: Special Report
Institution:: Center for Social and Economic Research - CASE
Abstract:: In this paper the author presents a general assessment of the labour market situation of older workers in the Czech Republic, starting with a more general overview of the demographic situation and emphasizing the generational differences among the young-old and older cohorts, underlying a number of different problems as well as solutions. Further in the paper she addresses the impact of the recent economic situation on employment levels, showing that the recovery in terms of employment has not yet begun and that the impact on older workers is (at least) two-fold: firstly, for older workers it is very difficult to find a new job once unemployed; secondly, if employed, the pressure on workability and the increasing demands of workplaces may be harder to bear for the older the worker. She describes a National Action Plan Supporting Positive Ageing (2013-2017) and other examples of good and transferable praxes which address some of the active ageing issues in an innovative way. The second part of this report examines the issues of employability, workability and age-management as perceived by some of the key actors. The report goes into greater detail on the topic of paid work after retirement, which is considered an important part of the Czech economy, despite the fact that the employment of sizable groups of older workers after retirement is undeclared. Self-entrepreneurship and independent work in later life are another realm of employment that is increasing in importance in the Czech economy; however, as consulted experts argue, it is not to be taken as an unproblematic solution to late-life careers. In the last chapter the author turns her attention to the lifelong learning of older workers and to their up-skilling/retraining. In the concluding remarks, she reemphasizes the need to address the heterogeneity of the older workforce, in the sense of age/generational affiliation, health, socio-economic and other characteristics.
Topic:: Demographics, Employment, Social Policy, Aging, Social Services, and Labor Market
Political Geography:: Europe, Eastern Europe, and Czech Republic

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COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS