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42801. Iran: a revolutionary republic in transition

Author:
Rouzbeh Parsi (ed)
Publication Date:
02-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
This Chaillot Paper examines recent domestic developments in the Islamic Republic of Iran. It presents an in-depth assessment of the profound changes that the Iranian state and Iranian society have undergone in the past three decades, with a particular focus on the last tumultuous five years. In its exploration of this theme it not only shows the growing rift between the official discourse and self-image of the ruling elite and the society they govern, but also highlights the fact that external observers have many misperceptions about Iran.
Topic:
Democratization, Islam, Nuclear Weapons, Political Economy, Governance, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:
Iran and Middle East

42802. Engaging African diasporas for peace: cornerstones for an emerging EU agenda

Author:
Judith Vorrath
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
Over the last decade, researchers and policy-makers have paid increasing attention to diasporas. They have focused on diasporas not merely as a challenge, but as a source of largely untapped potential. Their transnational nature and peculiar position as non-state actors linking host and home countries has been identified as an important basis for engagement. Diaspora groups from sub-Saharan Africa in Europe, which according to a 2008 Council of Europe parliamentary report on immigration are roughly estimated to comprise between 3.5 and 8 million people, are not only a relevant force, but often come from homelands that have experienced or are still facing armed conflict. Against this background, this Occasional Paper addresses the question of what contribution diaspora communities can make to promoting peace in their homelands and how the European Union can engage with African diasporas in the field of peace and security.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, Migration, Diaspora, and Immigration
Political Geography:
Africa and Europe

42803. The EU and Mindanao: innovative avenues for seeking peace

Author:
Alistair MacDonald and Gabriel Munuera Viñals
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
The confrontation between Muslim and Christian inhabitants of Western Mindanao, between the 'Moros' and the Philippine State, belongs to that category of 'forgotten conflicts' of which most international relations practitioners are often only vaguely aware. The conflict has historical roots that reach back centuries and has evolved with many twists and turns, culminating in an equally long and no less convoluted peace process. However, this conflict has important international ramifications and is one in which the international community is today actively involved, with facilitating and monitoring mechanisms involving states as well as non-state actors. In particular the European Union has been playing an increasingly important role, including in relation to diplomatic efforts aimed at finding a lasting solution to the conflict, based on its holistic approach to crises and interaction with European NGOs.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Islam, and Religion
Political Geography:
Europe, Israel, Philippines, and Australia/Pacific

42804. The EU's and China's institutional diplomacy in the field of climate change

Author:
Pietro De Matteis
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
European Union Institute for Security Studies
Abstract:
This Occasional Paper aims at providing a new perspective on the relevance of climate change for the EU's external action. Considering its linkages with various areas such as energy security, economic growth and diplomacy, and indeed its importance in terms of future political stability, climate change is a major 'game-changer' in international relations. The issue of climate change, and how to deal with it, therefore presents governments with a significant opportunity to reshape the international order in the light of the major global transformations currently underway. The development of the climate change regime presents the EU with both an opportunity and a threat, in as much as it may either accelerate Europe's decline as a foreign policy actor or, on the contrary, reinvigorate its diplomatic ambitions.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Diplomacy, Environment, and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
China, Europe, and Asia

42805. The Catholic Church, Elections and Democracy In Colombia, 1830–1930

Author:
Eduardo Posada-Carbó
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
By focusing on its electoral role, this paper revises some of the prevailing views regarding the Catholic Church's impact on the politics of Colombia between 1830 and 1930. To this aim, the paper offers a brief general overview of the Church during the period, in an attempt to locate its sources of power. Then, I look at the place the religious cleavage had in the formation of the party system that emerged in the republic by the mid-nineteenth century. Next, I examine the various ways in which the Church was involved in the electoral process both before and after the emergence of the party system. Finally, the concluding section considers the wider implications that such involvement might have represented for the history of democracy in Colombia. Overall, the paper addresses the following questions: What had the historical role of the Catholic Church been in the politics of Colombia since independence? How did the Church—the hierarchy, the clergy and the laity—relate to the electoral history and partisan divisions of the country? And to what extent did the involvement of the Church in electioneering enhance or hinder the process of democratization over this century?
Topic:
Democratization, Development, Politics, and Religion
Political Geography:
Colombia and Latin America

42806. Elections in Latin America 2009–2011: A Comparative Analysis

Author:
Manuel Alcántara
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This paper addresses from a comparative perspective the national elections (legislative and presidential) held between 2009 and 2011 in seventeen Latin American countries. There are five key issues that guide this analysis: the institutional conditions of electoral competition, the electoral offer, election results, party systems, and post-electoral executive-legislative relations. The political consequences of these electoral processes—except perhaps in the cases of Honduras and Nicaragua, where some minor negative trends have arisen—reveal a pattern of apparent normality and political alternation, with a change in the presidential elite and winning proposals that were articulated via institutions. The paper concludes by outlining how countries in the region have successfully overcome challenges of a varying nature and importance, that until recently generated a degree of uncertainty in their respective political systems.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, Development, Political Economy, and Politics
Political Geography:
Latin America, Nicaragua, and Honduras

42807. Networked Justice: Judges, the Diffusion of Ideas, and Legal Reform Movements in Mexico

Author:
Matthew C. Ingram
Publication Date:
06-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Existing research shows that the ideas of judges matter for judicial behavior both on the bench (decision making) and off the bench (lobbying and mobilization for institutional change). Yet there is little empirical evidence regarding the content and distribution of these ideas and even less evidence and fewer theoretical propositions regarding the manner in which ideas transfer or diffuse among judges. Addressing these empirical and theoretical gaps, I survey judges in the Mexican state of Michoacán and apply techniques of network analysis. The project makes four main contributions: (1) original data on the attitudes of judges regarding prominent institutional and jurisprudential changes shaping the legal landscape in Mexico; (2) egocentric data on network structure for the sampled judges; (3) sociocentric data on network structure at the level of judicial district, state supreme court, and entire state generated by aggregating the egocentric data; and (4) a mixed-methods analysis of the causal relationship between network features and judicial attitudes, drawing on egocentric methods, sociocentric methods, and personal interviews with focal individuals. Complementing literatures on political socialization, policy diffusion, and complex systems, the analysis clarifies our understanding of the role of judicial networks in strengthening democracy and the rule of law.
Topic:
Civil Society, Democratization, Development, Political Economy, Governance, Law Enforcement, and Law
Political Geography:
Latin America and Mexico

42808. Pakistan: No End to Humanitarian Crises

Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
With three years of devastating floods putting the lives and livelihoods of at least four million citizens at risk, and military operations against militants displacing thousands more in the conflict zones of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), Pakistan's humanitarian crises need urgent do-mestic and international attention. Since the democratic transition began in 2008, some progress has been made, but much more is needed to build the federal and provin-cial governments' disaster and early recovery response. Efforts to enhance civilian ownership and control have also had mixed results, particularly in the conflict zones, where the military remains the dominant actor. To effectively confront the challenges, the most urgent tasks remain to strengthen the civilian government's capacity to plan for and cope with humanitarian crises and to prioritise social sector and public infrastructure development. It is equally important that all assistance and support be non-discrimi-natory and accompanied by credible mechanisms for citi-zens to hold public officials accountable.
Topic:
Democratization, Development, Disaster Relief, and Humanitarian Aid
Political Geography:
Pakistan and South Asia

42809. Assessing Turkey's Role in Somalia

Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Turkey is the newest country to intervene in Somalia and its involvement has produced some positive results. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's courageous visit to Mogadishu in August 2011 at the height of the famine and his decision to open an embassy gave fresh impetus to efforts to establish lasting peace. Widespread Somali gratitude for Turkish humanitarian endeavours and the country's status as a Muslim and democratic state established Turkey as a welcome partner. Ankara has signalled it is in for the long haul. However, it must tread prudently, eschew unilateralism and learn lessons to avoid another failed international intervention. Over twenty years, many states and entities have tried to bring relief and secure peace in Somalia, often leaving behind a situation messier than that which they found. Ankara must appreciate it alone cannot solve the country's many challenges, but must secure the support and cooperation of both the Somali people and international community. Trying to go solo could backfire, hamper ongoing efforts and lose the immense good-will it has accumulated.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Foreign Policy, Islam, Peace Studies, and Fragile/Failed State
Political Geography:
Africa, Central Asia, Turkey, and Somalia

42810. Afghanistan's Transition Meltdown

Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
Plagued by factionalism and corruption, Afghanistan is far from ready to assume responsibility for security when U.S. and NATO forces withdraw in 2014. That makes the political challenge of organising a credible presidential election and transfer of power from President Karzai to a successor that year all the more daunting. A repeat of previous elections' chaos and chicanery would trigger a constitutional crisis, lessening chances the present political dispensation can survive the transition. In the current environment, prospects for clean elections and a smooth transition are slim. The electoral process is mired in bureaucratic confusion, institutional duplication and political machinations. Electoral officials indicate that security and financial concerns will force the 2013 provincial council polls to 2014. There are alarming signs Karzai hopes to stack the deck for a favoured proxy. Demonstrating at least will to ensure clean elections could forge a degree of national consensus and boost popular confidence, but steps toward a stable transition must begin now to prevent a precipitous slide toward state collapse. Time is running out.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Corruption, Ethnic Conflict, War, Insurgency, Fragile/Failed State, and Governance
Political Geography:
Afghanistan and Central Asia

42811. Towards efficient early action: The EU needs a regional focus and proactive tools to prevent and manage conflicts

Author:
Tanja Tamminen
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
The Lisbon Treaty and the European External Action Service provide the EU with an excellent framework for comprehensive and effective crisis prevention and crisis management work. They just need to be utilised to the full. The security and development nexus can only be enhanced through long-term perspectives. Rather than renewing its general security strategy, the EU's focus should be on preparing tailor made and institutionally endorsed regional approaches and strategies, where the broad objectives would be operationalized into more concrete goals. In conflict-prone regions, goal-setting should be carried out through full participation with the beneficiary countries and their civil societies. Dialogue and mediation are perfect tools for achieving reconciliation and stability, and need to be utilized at every stage of comprehensive crisis management and at different levels of society. Comprehensive EU activities in the field of crisis prevention and crisis management should be duly evaluated, as only by looking at the bigger picture can lessons truly be learned and endorsed.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Conflict Prevention, Security, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe and Lisbon

42812. Not just another arms deal: The security policy implications of the United States selling advanced missiles to Finland

Author:
Charly Salonius-Pasternak
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
Finland's decision to acquire advanced semi-stealthy Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missiles (JASSM) from the United States is much more than an arms deal – it has significant political and regional military implications. Finland is only the second country to be approved for JASSM. No NATO country has ever received such approval. This suggests something about the closeness of the relationship between the United States and Finland, as well as something about how the United States sees European and regional defence arrangements. In the web of multilateral, multinational and bilateral relationships that Finland is weaving to enhance its security, the US relationship is a key cable The JASSM acquisition significantly changes Finland's ability to disrupt enemy activities, both within Finland and beyond its borders. Despite being a conventional weapon, it will serve as a deterrent. Finnish decision-makers have a responsibility to understand both the implications of the new capabilities, and to ensure that the continued development of the Finnish Defence Forces is not inhibited due to misunderstandings of what a modern defence requires and consists of.
Topic:
Defense Policy, NATO, Arms Control and Proliferation, Weapons of Mass Destruction, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and Finland

42813. The electoral trap: Why the EU should think beyond Belarus's parliamentary election

Author:
Anaïs Marin
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
One should not expect the 23 September election to comply with democratic standards. The current legislation in Belarus does not guarantee a free and fair process. The institutional setting prevents a transparent vote count and the election of opposition candidates. Yet, in sending a full-fledged observation mission to Belarus, the OSCE again appears to be giving official Minsk the benefit of the doubt. Breaking the vicious circle of external regime legitimation would require consistency and restraint in giving this periodic electoral farce any credence whatsoever. Imitating procedural democracy brings regime consolidation for Lukashenka: enticing the opposition forces – and their Western supporters for that matter – into the electoral trap is a preemptive scheme to disqualify them. Decapitated, divided, distrusted, the opposition is incapable of carrying out regime change. The regime's repressive build-up also dissuades Belarusians from mobilising to contest the predictable fraud – for now. They are nonetheless expressing increasing demands for independent election monitoring. In view of the 2015 presidential elections, the EU should invest more in the capacity-building and training of civil society actors, notably domestic election observers. Turning voters into reliable rule of law watchdogs could raise awareness in, and demand for democracy in Belarus.
Topic:
Civil Society, Corruption, and Democratization
Political Geography:
Europe and Belarus

42815. Human Rights and the Environment: Where Next?

Author:
Alan Boyle
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The relationship between human rights and environmental protection in international law is far from simple or straightforward. A ne w attempt to codify and develop international law on this subject was initiated by the UNHRC in 2011. What can it say that is new or that develops the existing corpus of human rights law? Three obvious possibilities are explored in this article. First, procedural rights are the most important environmental addition to human rights law since the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development. Any attempt to codify the law on human rights and the environment would necessarily have to take this development into account. Secondly, a declaration or protocol could be an appropriate mechanism for articulating in some form the still controversial notion of a right to a decent environment. Thirdly, the difficult issue of extra-territorial application of existing human rights treaties to transboundary pollution and global climate change remains unresolved. The article concludes that the response of human rights law – if it is to have one – needs to be in global terms, treating the global environment and climate as the common concern of humanity.

42816. Global Public Goods amidst a Plurality of Legal Orders: A Symposium

Author:
Fabrizio Cafaggi and David D. Caron
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
A public good (an example is a lighthouse) can be produced by private parties. However, they rarely are. Rather, such goods are generally thought of in economics as a type of commodity that government often provides and maintains because government can overcome the otherwise strong incentive to free ride on the efforts of others. This symposium issue is concerned with the global analogies to municipal public goods. As in the domestic context, global public goods are viewed as essential goods. But globally there is not a government. Instead, we observe a plurality of legal orders arrayed both horizontally and vertically, both publicly and privately. It is this mix of significance and complexity that is the subject of this symposium.

42817. What's in a Concept? Global Public Goods, International Law, and Legitimacy

Author:
Daniel Bodansky
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Although the terminology of global public goods may be new to international law scholarship, many of the principal features and implications of global public goods are familiar: global public goods are externalities writ large; they create incentives to free ride; and in many cases, they require international governance to provide. Nevertheless, the global public goods literature has been valuable in highlighting that global public goods come in different types, with different 'production technologies'. Some depend on the aggregate effort of the entire group, while others depend on a 'single best effort' or on the 'weakest link'. These different types of global public goods raise different governance issues and hence different challenges for international law.

42818. International Law and Global Public Goods in a Legal Pluralist World

Author:
Gregory Shaffer
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The world faces multiple challenges in producing global public goods, such as climate change mitigation, financial stability, security from nuclear terror, knowledge production, and the eradication of infectious diseases. International law scholarship, in the meantime, takes a turn towards celebrating pluralism without sufficiently accounting for institutional variation to address different contexts. Those writing on global public goods challenges, at the same time, tend to come from disciplines other than law. So what is international law's role in the production of global public goods? Where are greater international legal constraints and international institutions needed, and where should international law retain slack? Three analytic frameworks (global constitutionalism, global administrative law, and legal pluralism) have been advanced to address international law's place in global governance, but these frameworks have not explicitly addressed the challenges of producing global public goods. This article breaks down different types of global public goods, and explores how these different frames apply to them. Grounded in pragmatism, the article shows why there is no single best approach. Rather, legal policy should be tailored to the type of global public good at stake in light of comparative, real world, institutional trade-offs.

42819. Transnational Private Regulation and the Production of Global Public Goods and Private 'Bads'

Author:
Fabrizio Cafaggi
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The article focuses on the role of private regulators in the production, access regulation, and protection of global public goods (GPGs). It addresses transnational private regulation (TPR) as a public good in itself and as an instrument to produce and protect GPGs. It makes three major claims: (1) private actors have incentives to produce and protect GPGs, thereby challenging the conventional partition between markets, producing private goods, and states producing public goods; (2) the production and protection of GPGs has to combine procedural and substantive features, making private governance a determinant of the club or public nature of the global good; and (3) ownership, both individual and collective, and contracting can be used to produce and protect GPGs. The article analyses in particular the proliferation of regulatory agreements between private actors or between private and public to regulate production, protection, and access, and shows that their limited legal enforceability is often functional to alternative compliance mechanisms devised through innovative private governance. It concludes by suggesting that the increasing role of private actors in the production of GPGs requires governance reforms of public–private cooperation at transnational level.

42820. Public and Private in the International Protection of Global Cultural Goods

Author:
Francesco Francioni
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The idea of cultural heritage as an 'international public good' can be traced back to the Preamble to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, according to which 'damage to cultural property belonging to any people whatsoever means damage to the cultural heritage of all mankind, since each people makes its contribution to the culture of the world'. But how can this idea of cultural heritage as a global public good be reconciled with the infinite variety of cultural expressions and with the role of art as a medium essentially devoted to giving form to the plurality and diversity of tastes, beliefs, and inclinations of the different societies in which it is produced? In this article I will examine the issue of pluralism and legal interaction within three perspectives: (1) the plurality of different meanings of cultural property and cultural heritage; (2) the plurality and interaction between different legal regimes of protection – international and domestic, private and public, peacetime and wartime; and (3) the plurality and interaction between different mechanisms of enforcement at the international and domestic levels.

42821. Free Lunches? WTO as Public Good, and the WTO's View of Public Goods

Author:
Petros C. Mavroidis
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The WTO can be viewed as a public good in that it provides a forum for negotiations which also produces the necessary legal framework to act as a support for agreed liberalization. To avoid any misunderstandings, in this article the discussion focuses on the WTO as a forum and a set of agreements, not on free trade. Since the legal agreements coming under its aegis are for good reasons incomplete, the WTO provides an additional public good by 'completing' the original contract through case law. The importance of this feature increases over time as tariffs are driven towards irrelevance. In turn, the WTO has no particular attitude towards public goods provided by its Members.

42822. Bilateralism at the Service of Community Interests? Non-Judicial Enforcement of Global Public Goods in the Context of Global Environmental Law

Author:
Elisa Morgera
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The interaction between bilateral and multilateral action is evolving in the context of 'global environmental law' – a concept that is emerging from the promotion of environmental protection as a global public good through a plurality of legal mechanisms relying on a plurality of legal orders. The notion of global public goods can thus help one better to understand recent bilateral initiatives aimed at supporting the implementation of multilateral environmental agreements and the decisions of their compliance mechanisms. Innovative linkages between the compliance system under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species and bilateral trade agreements recently concluded by the European Union and the US provide an example. Innovative opportunities for bilateral initiatives supporting the implementation of the 2010 Nagoya Protocol on Access and Benefit-sharing are likely to lead to even more complex inter-relationships between different legal orders. This new approach to bilateralism that aims to support the interests of the international community can be assessed in the context of earlier debates on unilateralism, with a view to emphasizing the role of international law in the identification and delivery of global public goods, and the role of global environmental law in understanding the interactions among a plurality of legal orders.
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

42823. International Adjudication of Global Public Goods: The Intersection of Substance and Procedure

Author:
André Nollkaemper
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
This article, based on the non-controversial proposition that the way and degree in which international courts can contribute to the protection of a public good depends, in part, on the procedural law of such courts, sets out to expose the plurality of connections between procedure and substance. Procedures can further the substantive values of public goods but can also serve interests of their own and can even work against such substantive values. This article articulates the normative choices that courts inevitably have to make and reflects on the question of whether, and to what extent, the shaping of these connections is properly part of the international judicial function, taking into account problems of legitimacy that may arise when judge-made procedures undo state-made substantive law.

42824. Roaming Charges: Moments of Dignity: Waitresses at Rest at the Toufuya Restaurant by the Isuzu River, Ise, Japan

Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
We deal in EJIL with the world we live in – often with its worst and most violent pathologies, 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 scholarly 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.
Political Geography:
Japan

42825. State Identity, Continuity, and Responsibility: The Ottoman Empire, the Republic of Turkey and the Armenian Genocide

Author:
Vahagn Avedian
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
By studying the continuity between the Ottoman Empire and its succeeding Turkish Republic, this article aims to address one crucial aspect of the denial of the Armenian genocide by the Turkish state, namely the issue of state responsibility. There are psychological barriers in Turkey which have largely suppressed the memories of possible wrongdoings during World War I and the ensuing 'Independence War'. However, the barrier that is created by the issue of state responsibility is identified here as the fundamental obstacle for genocide recognition by the Turkish state. This article aims to apply some of the existing legal principles and theories of international law in order to test their applicability to the two Turkish states and the issue of internationally wrongful acts committed during World War I and the ensuing years. In addition to the Turkish Republic bearing the identity of the Ottoman Empire, this article suggests that the Republic not only failed to stop doing the wrongful acts of its predecessor, but it also continued the very internationally wrongful acts committed by the Young Turk government. Thus, the insurgent National Movement, which later became the Republic, made itself responsible for not only its own wrongful acts but also those of its predecessor, including the act of genocide committed in 1915–1916. The issue of possible liability has ever since the creation of the Republic formed the denialist policy which is Turkey's to this day.
Political Geography:
Turkey

42826. State Identity, Continuity, and Responsibility: The Ottoman Empire, the Republic of Turkey and the Armenian Genocide: A Reply to Vahagn Avedian

Author:
Pulat Tacar and Maxime Gauin
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
We have been asked by the European Journal of International Law to write a reply to an article entitled 'State Identity, Continuity and Responsibility: The Ottoman Empire, the Republic of Turkey and the Armenian Genocide'. The article accuses Turkey of 'practising a denialist policy' with regard to 'the act of genocide committed during 1915–1916', demanding that it 'make itself responsible for its own internationally wrongful acts committed against Armenians and other Christian minorities', and also accuses it of 'expanding the massacres beyond its borders into the Caucasus and the territories of the independent Republic of Armenia'. According to the same article, there is a state succession and continuation of responsibility from the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic, and the Republic must assume full responsibility for and should also repair the injury caused by the Ottoman Empire.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

42827. The Peremptory Norms of the International Community

Author:
William E. Conklin
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
This article claims that the quest for the identity of peremptory norms in terms of sources is misdirected. Instead of the identity of a discrete rule or right of international law, one needs to examine why a peremptory norm is binding. The latter issue addresses the referent of the identity issue: namely, the international community as a whole. Various significations of the latter are recognized and found wanting. The article examines three general forms of the international community: the community as an aggregate of inter-dependent states, the community as a rational construction, and the community as a social-cultural ethos independent of members and yet for the members. The first two forms are found wanting. First, they presuppose that a state is a self-creative author expressing its own will. Secondly, the community is reified vis-à-vis the social-cultural ethos in which the community is immersed. Thirdly, the community is exclusionary. The three problems take for granted that a territorial-like boundary separates outsiders from between insiders. The article concludes that the notion of an international community needs excavation before jurists can be assured that peremptory norms exist and why they exist.

42828. Peremptory Norms of the International Community: A Reply to William E. Conklin

Author:
Alexander Orakhelashvili
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Professor Conklin's analytical effort to explain the nature of jus cogens is not only highly impressive, but also very timely. It demonstrates the continuing relevance of jus cogens as it increasingly arises in multiple areas of international law, regardless of doctrinal calls from the 1980s onwards that it should have faded away. Since then, there have been those who have suggested that jus cogens does not make sense and should be abandoned, those who suggest that jus cogens has merely aspirational relevance and does not make a difference on the ground, and those who argue that jus cogens is merely 'primary' law, not to be applied in the area of enforcement. What happens interestingly – and problematically – is that doctrinal debates on the conceptual rationale of jus cogens and on its more specific effects are often pursued separately. Conklin's contribution is a gentle reminder of the crucial issues of the background and essence of jus cogens that both writers and practitioners often tend to overlook when addressing the implications of jus cogens in specific areas of international law.

42829. The Peremptory Norms of the International Community: A Rejoinder to Alexander Orakhelashvili

Author:
William E. Conklin
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Alexander Orakhelashvili has generously responded to my 'The Peremptory Norms of the International Community' with an understanding which requires a clarification on my part. On the one hand, consistently with my argument, he urges the departure from the '“cut and paste” repetition' of the sources of law. Such sources offer an 'ordinary, or mainline, justification' which is 'insufficient or irrelevant' to justify peremptory norms. On the other hand, he insists that 'none of this is meant to challenge positivist foundations of international law'. Although he emphasizes public policy as an important factor in that foundation, he also highlights fundamental values and the will, choices and universality of an international community. Orakhelashvili adds that the international social ethos, which I privileged, was 'a correct premise for jus cogens, but not a sufficient one'. What is also needed, he advises, is that the ethos be given 'a legal expression' or language. When the nature of such a legal language is addressed, one is advised that the language remains a 'consensual positivism'. Public policy is emphasized as such an expression commonly accepted in domestic and international legal discourses, we are advised.

42830. Lessons of Imperialism and of the Law of Nations: Alberico Gentili's Early Modern Appeal to Roman Law

Author:
Andreas Wagner
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
This review discusses two recent publications – a critical edition of a primary source and a collection of essays – around the Theory of International Law of Alberico Gentili (1552–1608). On the one hand it examines Gentili's interest in ancient Rome and how he used it as a paradigmatic case of imperial order. But on the other, it questions our own interest in Gentili's work. In line with Gentili's own focus on questions of justice, it not only shows that Gentili presents us with his own complex blend of political responsibility and natural law, but highlights structural features and possible blind spots of his 'natural/private law' paradigm that might apply also to current suggestions of how to organize international law.

42831. Sundhya Pahuja. Decolonising International Law. Development, Economic Growth and the Politics of Universality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Pp. 303. £65.00. ISBN:9780521199032.

Author:
Muin Boase and Mansur Boase
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The book under review, which was awarded an ASIL Certificate of Merit, critically examines international law in the period following decolonization. Engaging both legal history and philosophy, the gnawing question which motivates this work, and risks getting lost under the wealth of scholarship, is: ‘Why has international law failed the Third World?’. The author claims that in order to answer this question, we must trace how a development thesis has been universalized and expose the transformative dynamic of a new ruling rationality based on the twin concepts of development and economic growth. The outcome is a regulatory framework, universally applied, which has subsumed the creative promise of international law. The claim is not that international law has shifted the operation of power, but rather that international law has itself become a new mode of power. Despite affirming political equality, the Third World, by avowing economic backwardness, unwittingly endorsed a rhetoric of development and a separation of the economic from the political. Once institutionalized through the Bretton Woods Institutions and the United Nations respectively, this disembedding of economics from politics, which we know from Polanyi’s The Great Transformation (1944) can only ever be an illusion, has facilitated a new imperialism of international economic law in the national arena. The historical repercussions are well known: the ever-expanding reach of an international technical law positioned as superior to national law, intervening, often violently, to maintain an unfavourable and asymmetric status quo in the name of idealized economic, political, and social models that cast themselves as universal. This pattern is well documented in Anghie’s Imperialism, Sovereignty and the Making of International Law (2004). Anghie argues that the branding of the ‘other’ as uncivilized and particular does not emerge from universals, but rather animates their formation. International law, by this account, was motivated by a civilizing mission, which Anghie terms ‘the dynamic of difference’, and this dynamic endures under very distinctive styles of jurisprudence from 16th century naturalism to 19th century positivism to modern-day pragmatism predicated on an assumed initial consent. Pahuja looks at the most recent form of this dynamic, not so much regarding its consequences as the legal and philosophical reasons for its endurance and even stabilization into the present.

42832. Individual Contributions to Fault Lines of International Legitimacy

Author:
Ekaterina Yahyaoui Krivenko
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Legitimacy has become a popular subject in international law and international relations in the last decade. If previously the issue of legitimacy was addressed only subsidiarily to other issues, today books and articles taking the issue of legitimacy as their main subject abound. The books under review illustrate this trend. They all address 'legitimacy', but approach the notion from different perspectives.

42833. National Courts and the International Rule of Law

Author:
Giuseppe Cataldi
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The book under review concludes research on the practice of domestic courts begun by the author over 10 years ago as part of a project entitled International Law in Domestic Courts. As pointed out in the preface, international doctrine lacked a systematic analysis of the domestic judicial application of international law, one based not on a theorization of relations between domestic law and international law but on an accurate analysis of data emanating from the decisions of domestic courts.

42834. World Trade Law after Neoliberalism. Re-imagining the Global Economic Order.

Author:
Michael Fakhri
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Accounts of trade law usually are written in a technical style or focus on the WTO's legitimacy. Nevertheless, an increasing number of scholars are asking theoretical questions regarding why WTO law is structured as it is and operates the way it does. Some look to political or economic theory to answer the question. Lang, like some others, focuses more on social dynamics.

42835. Freeing the Global Market: How to Boost the Economy by Curbing Regulatory Distortions

Author:
Shanker A. Singham
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Council on Foreign Relations
Abstract:
The U.S. economy faces major challenges competing internationally. One of the most worrisome is the growing use in China and other advanced developing countries of anticompetitive market distortions (ACMDs)—including regulatory protection that privileges specific companies—which put foreign competitors at a disadvantage. ACMDs are government actions that give certain business interests artificial competitive advantages over their rivals, be they foreign or domestic, to the detriment of consumer welfare. These market distortions are especially damaging to the industries in which the United States enjoys the greatest comparative advantages, but they are also harmful to the long-term prosperity of developing economies and cost the global economy trillions of dollars. To combat ACMDs, the conventional trade policy approach of focusing on the The U.S. economy faces major challenges competing internationally. One of the most worrisome is the growing use in China and other advanced developing countries of anticompetitive market distortions (ACMDs)—including regulatory protection that privileges specific companies—which put foreign competitors at a disadvantage.1 ACMDs are government actions that give certain business interests artificial competitive advantages over their rivals, be they foreign or domestic, to the detriment of consumer welfare. These market distortions are especially damaging to the industries in which the United States enjoys the greatest comparative advantages, but they are also harmful to the long-term prosperity of developing economies and cost the global economy trillions of dollars.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, China, India, and Brazil

42836. And Africa Will Shine Forth: A Statesman's Memoir

Author:
Jean Ping
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
International Peace Institute
Abstract:
Everyone knows that Africa, cradle of humanity, land of the Pharaohs and human civilization, and vast reservoir of human and natural resources, is not doing well. She crosses the deepest crisis that has shaken her since the end of colonial times. The specter of chaos lurks everywhere. She is now seen as the continent of “collapsing states” and “zombie nations”; the continent of extreme poverty, misery, and injustice; the continent of horrors, of the Rwandan genocide and of the worst atrocities committed in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Darfur and elsewhere. This brutal reality has been, for quite some time now, analyzed by most observers and experts with certain fatalism, as testified by these book titles with pessimistic or even alarmist tones: “Black Africa Started on the Wrong Foot” (René Dumont), “Can Black Africa Take Off?” (Albert Meister); “And What If Africa Refused Development” (Axelle Kabou); “Africa Down” (Jacques Giri). By now, it is just a chorus of permanent lamentations about the “lost continent,” the “damned continent,” or the “cursed continent” whose past is not passing. And the rest of the world, which sees us as negligible, even contemptible (“all corrupt and all dictators,” they say), consider that henceforth, they no longer need us.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Economics, Post Colonialism, Natural Resources, Fragile/Failed State, and Neoimperialism
Political Geography:
Kenya, Africa, Darfur, Liberia, and Sierra Leone

42837. Jean d'Aspremont. Formalism and the Sources of International Law. A Theory of the Ascertainment of Legal Rules. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011. Pp. 266. £60. ISBN:9780199696314 Jörg Kammerhofer. Uncertainty in International Law. A Kelsenian Perspective. Oxon New York: Routledge, 2011. Pp. 288. £85. ISBN:9780415577847.

Author:
Mónica García-Salmones
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
The two books reviewed here invite international lawyers to mobilize. Jean D'Aspremont's Formalism calls for a renewal of the practice of formally ascertaining international legal rules. D'Aspremont attempts to develop a theory for this endeavour to be employed in an age of pluralized normativity. Essentially this theory is grounded in a social thesis with robust Hartian support. Jörg Kammerhofer's Uncertainty in International Law, for its part, argues in favour of a much more theoretical approach to international law, one that is normativist and, more specifically, Kelsenian. Both texts are original and challenging in their effort to draw our attention to new ways of thinking about form. In d'Aspremont's view, the most problematic aspect of the ascertainment of law is the absence of social consciousness in law-applying authorities. He views the absence of a subjective (community) commitment to formalism – that is a commitment to respect the necessity of legal boundaries – as more of an obstacle in the objective production of law than fragmentation. The remedy proposed for this problem is the elaboration of written linguistic indicators which ensure the identification of international legal acts – as distinct from informal mechanisms such as the intent of the law-maker. D'Aspremont regards the written linguistic indicators generally as more suitable to the reality of our times, where informal law-making procedures abound, but nevertheless the need to distinguish law from non-law remains. According to d'Aspremont, what is at stake in the issue of formalism is not just an elementary respect for the rule of law, but also the possibility of critique of international legal rules. Kammerhofer dissects important aspects of the positive international legal order: self-defence, customary international law, interpretation and modification, conflicts of norms, and the idea of a constitution, following Kelsen's Pure Theory. The author devotes the larger part of the book to showing the impossibility of avoiding uncertainty in current international law. The climax is reached in the last chapter with a call to rethink the need for the Grundnorm (Kelsen's famous basic norm) in international legal theory. As Kelsen famously put it, the cognition of a norm as norm, rather than as a psychological or sociologico-empirical reality, is possible only if the norm has a presupposed Grundnorm, because to deny the dichotomy of Is and Ought means to deny the nature of (international) norms. According to Kammerhofer we need, and will always need, to return to the Grundnorm. In essence – and here is the gist of Kammerhofer's formalism – this means to accept the distinction between reality and value. Kammerhofer's insight that the Grundnorm does nothing but restate the idea of normativity reveals his reading of Kelsen and, more generally, his familiarity with the Vienna School of Law. But rather than in taking the Vienna School further, his contribution lies in using some of the theories developed in that school to think about current positive international law. Formalism and the Sources of International Law and Uncertainty in International Law both consider that the rules which determine the law-making powers of any given authority have an existence autonomous from the actual relations of power. In that sense, they constitute useful texts for gaining insights into the latest developments in positivist international legal theory.

42838. Osama bin Laden is Dead

Author:
Gregory Shaffer
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Abstract:
Osama bin Laden is dead. Killed by the Americans in Abbottabad, a garrison town in the night on a skillful raid, photographed dead, but without the pictures released, dumped at sea in debated accordance with debated scripture, from an un-debated carrier, it seems.
Political Geography:
America

42839. Editor's Note

Author:
Sikander Kiani and Michael Brannagan
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
No abstract is available.
Topic:
Politics and Non State Actors
Political Geography:
United Kingdom, Middle East, India, and Belgium

42840. Introduction

Author:
Eric Langenbacher
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
The relationship between language and international affairs is crucial and operates on several levels. This issue's Forum investigates the intersection between language, culture, identity and politics.

42841. The Arab Digital Vanguard: How a Decade of Blogging Contributed to a Year of Revolution

Author:
Jillian York
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
In 1991, just four years after Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali rose to power as president, Tunisia became the first country in the Arab world to connect to the Internet. The public had access by 1996, though its vast democratizing benefits were to be short-lived. That same year, the L'Agence Tunisienne d'Internet (Tunisian Internet Agency, or ATI) was established. Among its first mandates was the introduction of censorship. Over the course of the next decade the region began to trickle online, with Saudi Arabia and Syria amongst the last to connect. Swept up by the global technology bubble, in Cairo and Beirut, Amman and Abu Dhabi, entrepreneurs, seeing the communicative potential of the pre-Web 2.0 Internet, began developing email services, job-search sites, and perhaps most importantly, web forums. Such forums became sources of unreported news, discussion, social commentary, and political debate, paving the way for the region's future bloggers. In countries where political discussion was taboo and crossing red lines—such as discussion of the ruling family, or debates about Islam—resulted in persecution of journalists, web forums created new spaces, outside of society, where political discussion was relatively safe…
Topic:
Islam
Political Geography:
Saudi Arabia and Syria

42842. Disintegration Theory

Author:
Jan Zielonka
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
In the midst of crisis, the EU stands at a pivotal moment in its brief history. With both abrupt disintegration and a transition into federalism on the table, a third path—one embracing a new medievalism – potentially provides a cure for that which ails Europe.
Political Geography:
Europe

42843. The Sino-Vietnamese Standoff in the South China Sea

Author:
John D. Ciorciari and Jessica Chen Weiss
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
The past summer was a tempestuous one for Sino-Vietnamese relations. In May and June 2011, Vietnam accused China of deliberately cutting the cables of oil exploration vessels in the western Spratly Islands, calling the second incident a “premeditated and carefully calculated” attack. China responded by accusing Vietnam of “gravely violating” its sovereignty by conducting “invasive activities.” Both sides flexed their muscles by holding naval exercises in the disputed area, and Chinese state-owned media warned Vietnam of possible military “counterstrikes.” In July, Vietnam reported that Chinese forces beat a Vietnamese fishing captain and drove his ship out of disputed waters. In Hanoi and Ho Chih Minh City, protesters vented anger at China in a series of rare public demonstrations. Tensions arguably reached their most dangerous level since the two former Cold War adversaries normalized relations in 1991. Both China and Vietnam have sought to mobilize diplomatic support abroad and manage rising nationalism at home. Vietnam has been more successful at courting international support, but in broadcasting its grievances it has aroused nationalist forces at home and abroad that could jeopardize a negotiated solution. China is also constrained, criticized for its “assertive” behavior abroad while facing domestic demands to take a harder line. Both states recently agreed to return to the negotiating table, but they remain far apart on questions of territorial sovereignty, and the dispute continues to feed into powerful currents of nationalism and popular frustration in both countries. These domestic forces exacerbate the difficult task of forging a peaceful resolution to the complex multi-party dispute in the South China Sea.
Topic:
Cold War
Political Geography:
China

42844. Ethnic Federalism in Nepal: Risks and Opportunities

Author:
Dev Raj Dahal and Yubaraj Ghimire
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
Some groups within Nepal have advocated for a federal system of governance based on ethnic divisions. The authors argue that ethnic federalism is not a suitable solution for the country. Instead, they recommend a model of federalism based on inclusiveness and cooperation that would guarantee the mutually beneficial coexistence of Nepalis.
Political Geography:
Nepal

42845. NGOs, IGOs and International Law: Gaining Credibility and Legitimacy through Lobbying and Results

Author:
Sigfrido Burgos Cáceres
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
In an age of fragmented normative governance, NGOs have come to play an increasingly important role in the determinations of more traditional legal authorities. By working in conjunction with states and IGOs, they continue to gain legitimacy as global actors and redefine the standards for international law and operation.
Topic:
International Law and Governance

42846. The United States' First Brain Drain

Author:
Vivek Wadhwa
Publication Date:
03-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Institution:
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs
Abstract:
Given the poor health of its economy and the rise of competitors like China and India, the United States needs high-skilled immigrants more than ever. After all, it is these immigrants who have fueled the country's technology boom and boosted its global advantage. Yet, American political leaders are so deeply embroiled in debates about the plight of low-skilled workers who have entered the country illegally, that immigration itself has become a political quagmire. There is a complete stalemate on immigration reform. Meanwhile, the number of high-skilled immigrants in the United States who are waiting to gain legal permanent residence now exceeds one million. The wait time for new immigrants from India in this category is now estimated to be seventy years. The result is that fewer high-skilled workers are coming to the United States, and the country is experiencing its first brain drain. The economic growth that could be taking place in the United States is now occurring in India and China. Consider that of all engineering and technology companies established in the United States between 1995 and 2005, 25.3 percent had at least one immigrant as a key founder. In Silicon Valley, this proportion was 52.4 percent. More than half of these founders initially came to the United States to study. Very few, 1.6 percent, came for the sole purpose of starting a company. They typically founded companies after working and residing in the United States for an average of thirteen years. This means that with the backlog of skilled workers waiting for legal permanent residence today, immigrants who would be starting companies are instead caught in “immigration limbo.” The temporary work visas these immigrants hold actually restrict them from working for the companies they start.
Political Geography:
United States, China, America, and India

42847. Security sector governance (SSG) and conflict management in Indonesia: The Aceh case

Author:
Rizal Sukma
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
Abstract:
This paper examines the evolution of security sector governance (SSG) in Indonesia, focusing in particular on the effects of security sector reform (SSR) on the management of the secessionist conflicts in the country. It discusses the military's use of force as an instrument of conflict management in the years immediately following Indonesia's Independence, arguing that while it is possible to suppress conflicts through military force, such a strategy brings about several problems. The underlying causes of the conflicts may remain unaddressed, and military impunity could increase. These could lead to rising resentment, and eventually escalation of conflicts, as occurred in Indonesia in the late 1990s. This paper argues that to resolve such conflicts, SSR is vital, and it illustrates this through the case of Aceh as an instance of successful resolution of conflict achieved against a backdrop of reform of the military sector.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Political Violence, Development, Post Colonialism, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
Indonesia

42848. Is China's outward investment in oil a global security concern?

Author:
Ilan Alon and Aleh Cherp
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
The motivations prompting China's dramatic increase in outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) are not always clear, especially regarding OFDI by state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in energy and natural resources. First, both commercial and governmental interests are intertwined, although not necessarily in lock-step. Chinese SOEs listed in the West may worry about the reputational risks to their global corporate citizenship, while government stakeholders may instead focus on diplomatic international relations. Second, subsidies for oil investments may be viewed as serving Chinese national interests and threatening the national security of the host countries. Whether China's OFDI will benefit or harm global energy security, economic development and diplomatic relations is still hotly contested.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, Energy Policy, International Trade and Finance, Oil, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
China

42849. State-controlled entities as "investors" under international investment agreements

Author:
Jo En Low
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
A review of the definition of “investor” and investor-state dispute resolution clauses in 851 international investment agreements (IIAs) reveals that, except in two, state controlled entities (SCEs) (sovereign wealth funds and state-owned enterprises (SOEs)) have equivalent standing to their purely private counterparts as investors under such IIAs.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Foreign Direct Investment

42850. Absent from the discussion: The other half of investment promotion

Author:
Lise Johnson
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
As UNCTAD highlighted over a decade ago and again recently in its Investment Policy Framework for Sustainable Development, home-country measures (HCMs), like host-country commitments regarding the protection of foreign investors, are tools of promoting foreign investment. Nevertheless, the vast bulk of investment treaties, which state the promotion of foreign investment as their objective, overlook the potential role of HCMs and focus rather singularly on setting out the obligations of host countries regarding the treatment of foreign investors. Even recent agreements and model investment treaties that should represent “next generation” practices incorporating accumulated learning about the impacts and effectiveness of these treaties remain relatively devoid of any obligation for governments to facilitate or promote the quantity and quality of outward investment that many countries want and need for sustainable development.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Emerging Markets, International Trade and Finance, Markets, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment