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211. Good Governance Improving Quality of Life

Author:
Fikret Toksöz
Publication Date:
06-2008
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
The word ‘governance’ became common currency everywhere including Turkey. This concept which entered our vocabulary with 1996 İstanbul Habitat II Conference, encountered great resistance. Certain people claim it was unnecessary to create a new term such as governance where there is already a corresponding word for that concept, that is government. Etymological reasons are put forward to support these claims. Others claim that ideologically speaking, governance is the imposition of the forces of globalization. It is normal for such new terms to encounter great objections. If, on top of that, the meaning and content of the term is not clearly understood, these objections prove even more resilient. Good governance is a new approach that includes all the principles necessary for the consolidation of democratic management. These principles can be stated as participation, transparency, accountability, effectiveness, consistency, fairness and rule of law. Lately, many segments of society including public managers and intellectuals and even political representatives suggested using the principles of governance for solving problems encountered in public administration. Besides them, individuals and civil society organizations try to get information from public authorities and try to hold them accountable. For them, good governance is the ultimate principle that will make these organizations more important actors in social life. Seeing the common usage of good governance, TESEV decided to change the content of the book prepared initially to publicize the results of our project “Good Governance: Improving Quality of Life”. Consequently, there emerged this study which comprises of two books. The first part of the book is made up of three parts. In the first part, the meaning of governance is explained. In the second part, the transition from government to governance in Turkey is depicted. In this section, the modern government is assumed to have emerged with Tanzimat and the passage to governance is explained in two stages. The first stage is the period from Tanzimat to the Republic. In this stage, the formation process of civil society is evaluated as well as the consolidation of public authority. With the same method, the period from the Republic to the present day is also evaluated. At the end of the first book, problem areas related to governance and new developments are mentioned. The second book comprises of the explanation and the results of TESEV’s “Good Governance: Improving Quality of Life” project. The details related to the development of project tools namely “Socio-economic Development Maps, Public Spending Analysis and Social Satisfaction Surveys” are shared. This study was prepared as a manual for local authorities, civil society organizations and citizens interested in the topic with an aim to make the term clearer and to facilitate the debate on the concept. For this reason, the methodology developed for scientific studies were not employed in this book. To facilitate an easy reading of the book, extensive bibliographies and footnotes were evaded. While preparing the book, all the relevant literature in Turkish was surveyed. There are many valuable studies on the historical development pattern. The sources and the internet sites used were mentioned at the end of the book.
Topic:
Governance, Reform, Accountability, Transparency, and Sustainability
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

212. The UN Secretary-General and Moral Authority: Ethics and Religion in International Leadership

Author:
Kent J. Kille
Publication Date:
10-2007
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
The office of the UN secretary-general has been described as a needed voice in an international arena where moral principles are often seen as subservient to concerns over power and interest. In fact, because the secretary-generalship is a relatively constrained position lacking in traditional forms of power, those who analyze the position tend to see the moral authority of an officeholder as vital to the operation of the office. Such moral authority is often viewed as dependent on the personal qualities of individual officeholders. As one observer notes, “If it is a moral authority, one may ask, whence does this moral authority derive? It derives from the personality of the Secretary-General himself and not just from the office he holds.” It is therefore appropriate to inquire into the religious and moral values of those who hold the office. If a secretary-general's “own morality . . . must forbid him certain policies,” and presumably encourage other policies, then one should be able to trace the decision-making implications of these values across the activities of the officeholders.
Topic:
International Relations, Religion, United Nations, and International Affairs

213. Power and Principle: Human Rights Programming in International Organizations

Author:
Joel E. Oestreich
Publication Date:
06-2007
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
In 1979 the Polish delegation to the United Nations proposed that the international community consider a new charter on children's rights. The Polish proposal came during the International Year of the Child, and it was meant to build on the publicity being generated for children's welfare around the world. The then-communist Polish delegation's proposal for the charter also had overtones of Cold War propaganda; it emphasized the sort of “positive” rights that were favored by socialist states (e.g., the right to health care or adequate housing) and that were used to embarrass those Western states that tended to promote more “negative” rights (e.g., free speech and freedom of religion).
Topic:
Human Rights, International Organization, and Non-Governmental Organization

214. Building State and Security in Afghanistan

Author:
Wolfgang Danspeckgruber
Publication Date:
11-2007
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:
Afghanistan represents one of the most unique combinations a country and its society may offer. It is a country with a challenging and unforgiving but majestic geography which favors independence both to the central authorities in the capital but also to potential intruders from the outside. It holds a unique geopolitical location south and east of the Hindukush connecting Central Asia to South Asia, and the Middle East to each of them. It is home to a proud, independent people with a history of ages-old religions and diverse cultures, but also of conflict and war. The Afghans and their country stand out in terms of drama, disadvantages and sometimes even simple suffering, witnessing nearly three decades – an entire generation – of warfare and civil strife. Afghanistan too is home to one of the most archaic societies north of the Indian Ocean. It has very little transportation or energy infrastructure, one of the world's highest rates of poverty, and some of the lowest levels of literacy, health care and GDP per capita. However, Afghanistan is today the world's most important opium producer and is centrally located in a region marked by high population and poverty with tendencies toward fundamentalist religious expression. Afghanistan itself became a base of Islamic militancy.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Political Violence, Civil Society, and War
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Central Asia, and Middle East

215. Transforming U.S. Intelligence

Author:
Jennifer E. Sims and Burton Gerber
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
Intelligence failures prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the “missing” weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq have reminded Americans that good intelligence is crucial for national security. Indeed, the report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States led quickly to the enactment of legislation restructuring the intelligence community, underscoring both the capacity of American citizens to change their most secretive governmental institutions and their appreciation of the importance of the intelligence mission. The families of the victims of September 11 recognized their opportunity to reform the U.S. government's intelligence service and, remarkably, they did so. At the end of 2004 President George W. Bush signed into law the first strategically significant changes in the American intelligence system since it was created at the end of World War II.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Defense Policy, Terrorism, Insurgency, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:
United States

216. For All Peoples and All Nations: The Ecumenical Church and Human Rights

Author:
John S. Nurser
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
In this new century, born in hope but soon thereafter cloaked in terror, many see religion and politics as a volatile, if not deadly, mixture. For All Peoples and All Nations uncovers a remarkable time when that was not so; when together, those two entities gave rise to a new ideal: universal human rights. John Nurser has given life to a history almost sadly forgotten, and introduces the reader to the brilliant and heroic people of many faiths who, out of the aftermath of World War II and in the face of cynicism, dismissive animosity, and even ridicule, forged one of the world's most important secular documents, the United Nations's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These courageous, persistent, visionary individuals—notable among them an American Lutheran Seminary professor from Philadelphia, O. Frederick Nolde—created the Commission on Human Rights. Eventually headed by one of the world's greatest humanitarians, Eleanor Roosevelt, the Universal Declaration has become the touchstone for political legitimacy. As David Little says in the foreword to this remarkable chronicle, "Both because of the large gap it fills in the story of the founding of the United Nations and the events surrounding the adoption of human rights, and because of the wider message it conveys about religion and peacebuilding, For All Peoples and All Nations is an immensely important contribution. We are all mightily in John Nurser's debt." If religion and politics could once find common ground in the interest of our shared humanity, there is hope that it may yet be found again. - See more at: http://press.georgetown.edu/book/georgetown/all-peoples-and-all-nations#sthash.GJp0Kv8T.dpuf
Topic:
Human Rights and Religion

217. Freedom from Want: The Human Right to Adequate Food

Author:
George Kent
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
Each year, more than 10 million children die before their fifth birthdays, about half of them from causes associated with malnutrition. This is a silent holocaust, repeated year after year. Malnutrition leads to death, illness, and a significantly reduced quality of life for hundreds of millions of people. This book's central concern is that very many people do not get adequate food, in terms of quantity or in terms of quality.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Law, and Food

218. Protecting Human Rights: A Comparative Study :- (Appendix B IGOs and INGOs)

Author:
Todd Landman
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Book
Abstract:
The data analysis employed two measures of “organizational” inter- dependence. The first is the number of international governmental organizations (IGOs) of which each country is a member. The second is the number of international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) with a registered office in each country. Both sets of numbers come from the Union of International Associations (UIA), which publishes statistical yearbooks with membership figures. In both cases, the analysis uses the total number of organizations across the different categories. Although the IGO data come from the UIA, Bruce Russet at Yale University kindly provided the tabulated figures by country. The INGO numbers were obtained from the UIA year- books and input into the data set by Gemma Mackman, a researcher at the University of Essex who worked on this study in 2003.
Topic:
Human Rights, International Law, Non-Governmental Organization, and United Nations

219. The Democracy Makers: Human Rights and the Politics of Global Order

Author:
Nicolas Guilhot
Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
Columbia University Press
Abstract:
Has the international movement for democracy and human rights gone from being a weapon against power to part of the arsenal of power itself? Nicolas Guilhot explores this question in his penetrating look at how the U.S. government, the World Bank, political scientists, NGOs, think tanks, and various international organizations have appropriated the movement for democracy and human rights to export neoliberal policies throughout the world. His work charts the various symbolic, ideological, and political meanings that have developed around human rights and democracy movements. Guilhot suggests that these shifting meanings reflect the transformation of a progressive, emancipatory movement into an industry dominated by “experts” ensconced in positions of power. Guilhot’s story begins in the 1950s when U.S. foreign policy experts promoted human rights and democracy as part of a “democratic international” to fight the spread of communism. Later, the unlikely convergence of anti-Stalinist leftists and the nascent neoconservative movement found a place in the Reagan administration. These “State Department Socialists,” as they were known, created policies and organizations that provided financial and technical expertise to democratic movements and also supported authoritarian, anti-communist regimes, particularly in Latin America. Guilhot traces the intellectual and social trajectories of key academics, policymakers, and institutions, including Seymour M. Lipset, Jeane Kirkpatrick, the “Chicago Boys,” influenced by Milton Friedman, the National Endowment for Democracy, and the Ford Foundation. He examines the ways in which various individuals, or “double agents,” were able to occupy pivotal positions at the junction of academe, national, and international institutions, and activist movements. He also pays particular attention to the role of the social sciences in transforming the old anti-communist crusades into respectable international organizations that promoted progressive and democratic ideals, but did not threaten the strategic and economic goals of Western governments and businesses. Guilhot’s purpose is not to disqualify democracy promotion as a conspiratorial activity. Rather he offers new perspectives on the roles of various transnational human rights institutions and the policies they promote. Ultimately, his work proposes a new model for understanding the international politics of legitimate democratic order and the relation between popular resistance to globalization and the “Washington Consensus.”
Topic:
International Relations, Globalization, Human Rights, and Democracy
Political Geography:
Global Focus
Publication Identifier:
9780231504195
Publication Identifier Type:
ISBN

220. Dangerous Strait: The U.S.-Taiwan-China Crisis

Author:
Nancy Bernkopf Tucker
Publication Date:
03-2005
Content Type:
Book
Institution:
Columbia University Press
Abstract:
Dangerous Strait provides fresh perspectives on the complex political, economic, and strategic issues of the Taiwan Strait. Essays examine a variety of topics, which include the movement for independence and its place in Taiwanese domestic politics, the underlying weaknesses of democracy in Taiwan, and the significance of China and Taiwan's economic interdependence. In the area of security, contributors provide incisive critiques of Taiwan's incomplete military modernization, the strains in U.S.-Taiwan relations and their differing interpretations of China's intentions, and the misguided inclination to abandon Washington's traditional policy of strategic ambiguity.
Topic:
International Security
Political Geography:
China, Taiwan, and Asia-Pacific
Publication Identifier:
9780231509633
Publication Identifier Type:
ISBN