Publishing Institution: - CIAO Search Results

43901. Turkey's Role in Defusing the Iranian Nuclear Issue

Author:: Aylin Gürzel
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Washington Quarterly
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: In May 2010, while the United States and other Western powers in the UN Security Council were drafting a resolution on further sanctions to pressure Iran over its controversial nuclear program, Turkey and Brazil — then non-permanent members of the Security Council — announced a fuel-swap deal with Iran. The Tehran Declaration, as it was called, stipulated that 20-percent-enriched nuclear fuel was to be provided to Iran for its use in the Tehran Research Reactor, which produces medical isotopes, in exchange for the removal of 1,200 kilograms of 3.5-percent-low-enriched uranium (LEU) to Turkey. Initial reactions to the deal varied, but there was fear that the 20-percent-enriched fuel would enable Iran to further enrich uranium and attain the level necessary to construct a nuclear weapon more rapidly.
Political Geography:: United States, Iran, Turkey, Brazil, and United Nations

43902. Turkey's Eroding Commitment to NATO: From Identity to Interests

Author:: Tarık Oğuzlu
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Washington Quarterly
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: Turkey's view concerning its commitment to NATO is changing. NATO has always been the most prestigious institution binding Turkey to the West, but Turks are beginning to question whether NATO is still indispensable to Turkey's foreign and security policies. During the Cold War, Turkey's commitment to NATO was largely identity-driven. Membership in NATO suited Turkey's goal of pursuing a Western/European identity, and was justified by the Westernization goals of the founders of the Republic. Even though NATO's primary purpose at its inception was to help secure the territorial integrity of its members against the Soviet Union, the Alliance also symbolized the unity of nations which embrace liberal—democratic norms at home and abroad; it offered a security blanket under which European allies could intensify their supranational integration process and turn Europe into a Kantian security community. Joining NATO in 1952 was therefore a logical follow-up step to Turkey's membership in the Council of Europe (1949), and helped Turkey legitimize the claim that it was a Western/European country, representing the Western international community in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Political Geography:: Europe and Turkey

43903. Myanmar: The Politics of Economic Reform

Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: International Crisis Group
Abstract:: Myanmar has embarked on an ambitious program of sweeping reforms to end its isolation and integrate its economy with the global system. Closely entwined with its dramatic political transition, the end of longstanding Western sanctions is supporting this reconfiguration. If the reforms are done well, many across the country stand to benefit, but those who profited most from the old regime's restrictions and privileges will lose access to windfall profits and guaranteed monopolies. The crony businessmen, military and party elite will still do well but will need to play by new rules, meet domestic and foreign competition and even pay taxes. Perhaps recognising the opportunities a more vibrant economy in a fast-growing region will bring for all, there is no major pushback to these changes, rather attempts to adapt to the new economy. The challenges and risks are numerous for a government with little experience juggling the many changes required, but it cannot resist the pent-up political pressure for change it has already unleashed.
Topic:: Democratization, Economics, Globalization, Government, International Trade and Finance, and Politics
Political Geography:: Southeast Asia and Myanmar

43904. International polarity and America's polarization

Author:: Joseph Bafumi and Joseph M Parent
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: There is a growing consensus that the United States is undergoing a period of political polarization, particularly among elites. The causes of this polarization remain under-researched. We argue that shifts in the international distribution of power influence America's polarization. To demonstrate the argument, this article analyzes changes in power and polarization quantitatively and qualitatively from 1945 to 2005. A key finding is that greater relative power on the world stage substantially increases polarization and some of its correlates, like income inequality. The argument also measures the extent of international influence on domestic polarization and makes novel predictions on when and why polarization will fall.
Political Geography:: United States and America

43905. Humanitarian intervention – What's in a name?

Author:: Beate Jahn
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Why has the term humanitarian intervention experienced such a meteoric rise into the core of academic as well as public political discourse? An investigation of classical theory shows that the use of force to help citizens of other states has been regularly contemplated and practiced in the past. The concept of humanitarian intervention therefore does not describe new policies; instead it serves to hide the political nature of these policies today and functions as a 'doctrinal advance guard' for a new international order. It is the political conjuncture that requires a new name for old policies and its radical political content that explains the timing, speed and impact of this term.

43906. The domestic politics of international hierarchy: Risk management and the reconstitution of international society

Author:: William Clapton and Shahar Hameiri
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Recent work has identified new hierarchical relationships within international society. However, few scholars have provided a satisfactory account of what informs their formation, reproduction or constitutional effects for international society. We argue that underpinning the emergence of a more hierarchical international society is a new social logic of risk, which constructs illiberal and/or fragile states as potentially dangerous sites of instability and disorder that pose particular security risks for Western states. We proceed to argue that such risk-based hierarchies are transformative of both inter-state and intra-state relations, by stripping equal political agency from 'risky' actors within and without the state. We demonstrate these claims by drawing on examples of international state building in Southeast Asia and the Southwest Pacific.
Topic:: Politics

43907. NATO and India: The politics of strategic convergence

Author:: David Scott
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: In this article, I argue that after having experienced a distinctly cool relationship throughout most of the post-war period and for the 10 years following the end of the Cold War, India and North Atlantic Organization (NATO) are now gradually moving towards each other. Indeed, during the past decade, NATO's 'out-of-area' operations have taken it eastwards from the Mediterranean, while India's 'extended neighbourhood' framework has brought it westwards from the Indian subcontinent. This has created a geopolitical overlap between these two actors, most notably in Afghanistan but also elsewhere in the Indian Ocean. Common advocacy of liberal democracy and overt concerns over jihadist destabilization have brought these two actors together. In NATO's post-Cold War search for relevance and India's post-Soviet search for partners, they have found each other. Unstated potential concerns over China are also a feature in this strategic convergence. However, while NATO has adopted a flexible range of 'Partnership' frameworks, India's sensitivity on retaining 'strategic autonomy' will limit their cooperation to informal ad hoc arrangements.
Topic:: NATO and Cold War
Political Geography:: Afghanistan, China, India, and Soviet Union

43908. Arbitrating the Israeli–Palestinian territorial dispute

Author:: Asaf Siniver
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article presents the case for arbitrating the territorial dispute over the West Bank between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. After nearly two decades of intense intermediary activity but with still no signs of progress, and against the inability of the parties themselves to move towards reconciliation, the article argues that as a method of conflict resolution, mediation has exhausted its primary objective – namely the establishing of direct channels of communication between the disputants – and it is now time to examine alternative methods to conflict resolution. The article debunks the myths surrounding the success of American mediation in the conflict, and uses the historical case of the Taba arbitration between Israel and Egypt to demonstrate under what terms the arbitration of the West Bank dispute might be presented, while taking into consideration its advantages and drawbacks compared with the more established method of mediation in this conflict.
Political Geography:: America, Israel, Palestine, and Egypt

43909. Towards a strong NATO narrative: From a 'practice of talking' to a 'practice of doing'

Author:: Trine Flockhart
Publication Date:: 01-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The article contributes to the growing theoretical scholarship on NATO by developing a theoretical framework that demonstrates the complex relationship between doing and being, identity and action, and knowledge and practice. The article addresses the puzzle that NATO in the past decade has been busier than ever, yet has not managed to construct a strong narrative and maintain ontological security. The article presents a framework, which assumes that ontological security is influenced by identity and narrative construction processes, which are themselves reinforced or undermined by practical action, conceptualized as 'functional action' and 'rhetorical action'. By analyzing NATO's current and past narratives, practices, and action patterns, the article shows that NATO's recent crisis is not just a deeper and more serious crisis because Afghanistan is a difficult mission, but that the depth of the crisis is the result of changes in NATO's established practices and new fundamentally different patterns of action.
Topic:: NATO
Political Geography:: Afghanistan

43910. Critical international political economy: Renewing critique and ontologies

Author:: Owen Worth and Claes Belfrage
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This special issue critically assesses the development of 'Critical International Political Economy' (IPE) and seeks to expand upon its theoretical foundations in order to ensure the discipline's openness and diversity. This introduction will set the stage for this endeavour by conceptualising the historical development of critical IPE and by outlining the challenge ahead.

43911. Accumulating the critical spirit: Rosa Luxemburg and critical IPE

Author:: Owen Worth
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article introduces Rosa Luxemburg's work on dialectics and the international and argues that its ontological foundations have been neglected within critical International Political Economy (IPE). Whereas other critical Marxists such as Gramsci have played key roles in instigating critical enquiry, Luxemburg's work has largely gone neglected. Although this article acknowledges some serious shortcomings in some of the 'left infantilism' inherent within her work, it nevertheless argues that Luxemburg's dialectical ontology significantly contrasted with the orthodoxy that was emerging from Marxist circles at the time. This article explores some of these and argues that the dialectical method that Luxemburg employed to understanding the international provides us with a new avenue for critical IPE to pursue. In particular, it suggests that Luxemburg's articulation of critique provides us with fresh openings that both compliment and add to neo-Gramscian and neo-Polanyian accounts, and allows us to understand trends and practices within the global political economy in new critical ways.
Topic:: Political Economy

43912. For a critical engagement with aesthetics in IPE: Revitalizing economic imagination in times of crisis

Author:: Claes Belfrage
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Advanced capitalism is at a historical conjuncture in which aestheticization and financialization combine to intensify and deepen the 'cult of capitalism' at the expense of economic imagination. International Political Economy (IPE) is, however, not only poorly equipped to understand the implications of these closely linked transformations, it also avoids considering them by shunning aesthetics. To contribute to the rejuvenation of economic imagination, IPE must explicitly aim at both understanding these processes and their confluences, and engaging with them. Rescue cannot come from orthodox IPE because of its embededdness in the reified 'Kantian Desire', which promotes the neglect of recognition in aesthetics and the complexities of human agency under financialization. Critical IPE is more apt at grasping related struggles, which it has shown in for instance research on the financialization of everyday life. Nevertheless, its engagement with aesthetics remains modest and inadequate. Critical IPE concerned with financialization should see it as one of its core tasks to turn to and engage with aesthetics as a means to contribute to critical economic imagination. To this end, the article outlines a critical IPE approach to aesthetics, inspired by Frankfurt School Critical Theory.
Topic:: Political Economy

43913. The relevance of Nicos Poulantzas for contemporary debates on 'the international'

Author:: Ian Bruff
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article argues that in many cases the theoretical resources for a revived and enriched 'critical International Political Economy' already exist, and we would do well to revisit earlier works when seeking to intervene in contemporary debates. Through an initial engagement with the recent plethora of contributions on 'the international', I contend that Nicos Poulantzas' later writings deserve a rereading. In particular, his work on the historicity of territory and the internationalisation of capital constitutes a series of rich and suggestive commentaries. The significance of his remarks are later illustrated via a consideration of Germany, where I argue that the changes wrought by the growing imbrication of the German economy with transnational circuits of capital have been taking place through, and not necessarily against, the historicity of German capitalism's emergence and evolution.
Topic:: International Political Economy
Political Geography:: Germany

43914. The global and gendered dimensions of citizenship, community and 'cohesion'

Author:: Daniela Tepe and Jill Steans
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: In this article we draw upon both critical and feminist international political economy (IPE) approaches in order to interrogate processes of change effecting specific localities in the context of neoliberal global restructuring. We give a closer focus to our interest in the global/local nexus by concentrating on issues of citizenship, community and discourse and practice on community cohesion. After setting out our framework, we develop a critique of community cohesion policies and practices in contemporary Britain. We then briefly review some of the current literature on gender and citizenship paying particular attention to how issues of material inequality, poverty and exclusion currently figure in academic debates. We conclude that gender inequality must be taken seriously if strong and cohesive communities are to be realised and that there is a need for further research that connects critical and feminist IPE to emerging critical literatures on community and citizenship.
Topic:: International Political Economy
Political Geography:: Britain

43915. Where is the study of work in critical IPE?

Author:: Phoebe V Moore
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The British school of International Political Economy (IPE) has been highly innovative in encouraging inter-disciplinary work, revealing – while allowing for – an eclecticism of research and investigation that stands in clear contrast to its American counterpart. Critical theorists in the British school of IPE in particular have been highly prolific in recent years and have introduced research on a wide range of contemporary issues in the global political economy. However, this school tends to overlook two very important areas of analysis: work and employment. More thus needs to be done. This article argues that researchers from seemingly autonomous fields can teach critical IPE a lesson: inter-disciplinarity is not a fantasy. The analysis suggested here is of how governmental policy idealises a particular subjectivity wherein workers are not employed, but are employable. Not only would a focus on this problem enhance existing research in critical IPE: it is also essential if we are to address the needs of humanity in the increasingly unstable and flexibilised world of work. The British school of critical IPE is the forum within which this conversation could and should be continued.
Topic:: International Political Economy
Political Geography:: Britain

43916. Re-thinking scales and culture: Rome and the city in and beyond IPE

Author:: Nana Rodaki
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The article argues that critical International Political Economy can benefit from a trans-disciplinary approach to the role of cities as socio-economic actors in the global political economy. The constitution and exercise of agency is far from an automatic response to the global restructuring of capitalist social relations, but the product of historically and context-specific economic and extra-economic social processes and social struggles. Cities (re)emerge as subjects and objects of governance and intervention and seek to become (dis)embedded in multi-scalar networks of economic and symbolic power. In this process, they become active co-producers of the global political economy, in ways that cut across spatial scales and narrow geographical imaginations.
Topic:: International Political Economy and Culture
Political Geography:: Rome

43917. Christian 'Renewalism' and the production of global free market hegemony

Author:: Kyle Murray
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Charismatic and Pentecostal elements of global Christianity serve key roles in the production of free market hegemony within and between states, societies and markets across the world. While many of the institutions of these Christian social forces are fiercely decentralised, this popular global movement has converged on key elements of a shared conception of the world which links core, semi-peripheral and peripheral societies across national boundaries and class distinctions. These activities highlight the necessity of linking the emergent narratives on 'global religious economy' with the larger narratives of Critical IPE. It is argued here that Gramsci provides us with useful conceptual tools with which we may contextualise specific transnational religious movements and social forces within the framework of globalisation and the production of neoliberal hegemony within and between specific states, societies and markets.

43918. The relevance of understanding code to international political economy

Author:: David M Berry
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article argues that international political economy (IPE) needs to engage in a close reading of computer code. This, I argue, will open up IPE to a very important resource for understanding and explaining many of the forces of capitalism operating today and which are instantiated and reflected within computer code. I also suggest a way in which the 'global', particularly in relation to financial markets and systems, might be read from within the new space of flows represented by computer code and software. There is no doubt at all that software is a hugely important global industry, and that software is critical to the functioning of multinational companies, governments and non-governmental institutions. Therefore, it is curious that so little attention is paid to code itself as an empirical object within IPE. In this article, I want to introduce some of the main contours of the debate and introduce some important concepts for why a close reading of code could be useful to IPE scholars.
Topic:: International Political Economy

43919. Horsemen of the apocalypse? Jihadist strategy and nuclear instability in South Asia

Author:: Andrew Phillips
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Since 9/11, counter-terrorism officials have fretted over the possibility of jihadist terrorists obtaining and deploying a nuclear weapon. Although acknowledging that such anxieties are well grounded, I offer here a reconceptualisation of the jihadist terrorist nuclear threat that focuses alternatively upon the remote but real possibility that jihadist terrorists may seek to advance their goals by trying to provoke an Indo–Pakistani nuclear confrontation. Such a confrontation would serve jihadist goals by aggravating religious polarisation on the sub-continent while dramatically weakening the Pakistani state. The system-destabilising consequences of such a catastrophe would likely also offer the jihadists their best opportunity to revive their faltering movement, which otherwise appears fated to terminal decline. In the light of this assessment, I argue that a higher priority must be accorded towards strengthening Indo–Pakistani crisis stability and advancing regional reconciliation if the risk of a jihadist-provoked nuclear exchange is to be minimised.
Political Geography:: Pakistan, South Asia, and India

43920. Rethinking China's grand strategy: Beijing's evolving national interests and strategic ideas in the reform era

Author:: Feng Zhang
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The question of China's grand strategy is of great importance for understanding the international impact of China's rise. Both Western and Chinese scholars dispute whether China has developed a coherent grand strategy in the reform era. The main reason for the controversy seems to lie as much in theoretical and methodological assumptions about defining and analyzing grand strategy as in empirical validity. This article contributes to the debate by adopting a novel theoretical approach to analyzing grand strategy by seeing it as the conjunction of national interests and strategic ideas. It examines China's evolving national interests and strategic ideas in the reform period in order to clarify the exploratory, evolutionary and adaptive nature of policy change. China cannot be said to have developed a premeditated grand strategy during this period. Even though one may still be able to rationalize elements of China's foreign policies into a grand strategy, it comes at the cost of missing their changing nature.
Political Geography:: China

43921. Regional threats and global management of conflicts in regions: The case of the US in the Middle East

Author:: Benjamin Miller
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article addresses the following two questions: First, how does the United States (US) manage regional war and peace, especially in the Middle East (ME)? It will show that the strategies the US has adopted in conflict management in the ME over the last several decades have shown considerable variations, both in the goals of its involvement – between trying to shape the regional balance of power and to reorder the domestic regimes in the regional states, and in the means of involvement – between a unilateral and a multilateral strategy. Second, it seeks to explain these variations in the US regional patterns of involvement.
Political Geography:: United States and Middle East

43922. The end of the cold war and soviet collapse – the limits of realism and liberalism: A reply to Wohlforth, Deudney and Ikenberry

Author:: Campbell Craig
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: William Wohlforth and Daniel Deudney and John Ikenberry provide strong Realist and Liberal analyses, respectively, of the End of the Cold War. Both interpretations, however, beg larger conceptual and historical questions, which cannot be answered without making the nuclear revolution central to explaining Soviet collapse.
Topic:: Cold War
Political Geography:: Soviet Union

43923. Arbitrating the Israeli–Palestinian territorial dispute: A riposte

Author:: Amnon Aran
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Breaking the current deadlock in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict has thus far proved impossible. However, the suggestion that arbitration should replace negotiations is flawed.
Political Geography:: Israel and Palestine

43924. Statement by Col. Joseph Felter (Ret.) before the U.S. House Armed Services Committee

Author:: Joseph Felter
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:: My testimony draws on experience and perspective gained during my career as a US Army Special Forces officer with deployments to Afghanistan most recently in 2010- 2011 as commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) Counterinsurgency Advisory and Assistance Team (CAAT) deploying experienced counterinsurgency advisors across all five ISAF regional commands and reporting directly to COMISAF. It is also informed by participation in efforts to build host nation security force capabilities in the Philippines and elsewhere as well as by scholarly research on the effective employment of state security forces to combat insurgency.
Topic:: Conflict Resolution, Security, Terrorism, War, and Law Enforcement
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and United States

43925. A History of KEDO 1994-2006

Author:: Joel Wit, Robert Carlin, and Charles Kartman
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:: When the South Korean fast ferry Hankyoreh sailed out of North Korean waters into the cold wind and waves of the East Sea on the morning of 8 January 2006, it carried a sad and somber group of South Korean workers, ROK officials, and personnel from the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO). These were all that remained of a decade long multinational effort transforming what in 1994 had been only a paper notion into a modern construction complex of steel and concrete. KEDO's profile on the North Korean landscape was unmistakable, its impact on Pyongyang profound. Yet, real knowledge and understanding about the organization in public and official circles in South Korea, Japan, and the United States was terribly thin at the beginning, and remains so to this day.
Topic:: Development, Energy Policy, International Cooperation, and Nuclear Power
Political Geography:: United States, Japan, Israel, South Korea, and North Korea

43926. Can North Korea nuclear crisis be resolved?

Author:: Siegfried S. Hecker
Publication Date:: 03-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:: I thank Kyungnam University and the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for inviting me to present my views on the situation in North Korea. My area of expertise is in the nuclear arena and that is primarily what I will address in my paper. However, it is not possible to solve the nuclear crisis without addressing the underlying fundamental political issues, so I will offer my views, as a non-expert in this area, at the outset.
Topic:: Conflict Resolution, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:: Israel and North Korea

43927. Contract Spending by the Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development

Author:: David J. Berteau, Guy Ben-Ari, Gregory Sanders, Priscilla Hermann, and David Morrow
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: This report examines the budgetary trends and trends in contract spending in the Department of State (DoS) and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The report is divided into six sections, including the introduction and an appendix. Unless Otherwise noted, all dollar figures are in constant 2010 dollars and all years are fiscal years.
Topic:: Development, Government, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:: United States

43928. The FY2013 Defense Budget, Sequestration, and the Growing Strategy-Reality Gap

Author:: Anthony H. Cordesman
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: The US may not face peer threats in the near to mid term, but it faces a wide variety of lesser threats that make maintaining effective military forces, foreign aid, and other national security programs a vital national security interest. The US does need to reshape its national security planning and strategy to do a far better job of allocating resources to meet these threats. It needs to abandon theoretical and conceptual exercises in strategy that do not focus on detailed force plans, manpower plans, procurement plans, and budgets; and use its resources more wisely. The US still dominates world military spending, but it must recognize that maintaining the US economy is a vital national security interest in a world where the growth and development of other nations and regions means that the relative share the US has in the global economy will decline steadily over time, even under the best circumstances. At the same time, US dependence on the security and stability of the global economy will continue to grow indefinitely in the future. Talk of any form of “independence,” including freedom from energy imports, is a dangerous myth. The US cannot maintain and grow its economy without strong military forces and effective diplomatic and aid efforts. US military and national security spending already places a far lower burden on the US economy than during the peaceful periods of the Cold War, and existing spending plans will lower that burden in the future. National security spending is now averaging between 4% and 5% of the GDP -- in spite of the fact the US has been fighting two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan -- versus 6 - 7% during the Cold War.
Topic:: Security, Defense Policy, Economics, and Government
Political Geography:: Afghanistan and Middle East

43929. Religious Movements, Militancy, and Conflict in South Asia: cases from india, pakistan, and afghanistan

Author:: Robert D. Lamb, Liora Danan, Joy Aoun, Sadika Hameed, Kathryn Mixon, and Denise St. Peter
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: The top headlines of the past year have made increasingly clear to U.S. government officials the central—but complicated—roles that religion plays in many of the most strategically important engagements of the United States.
Topic:: Political Violence, Peace Studies, and Religion
Political Geography:: Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, South Asia, and India

43930. The Best Scenario: Japan's Political Crisis as a Reform Driver

Author:: Kiyoaki Aburaki
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: “Decide when it is time to decide, draw a conclusion, don't postpone; this is the type of politics I want to create.” Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda made this declaration in a press conference on June 26 immediately after the passage of the consumption tax-hike bill in the Lower House of the Diet. Noda's conviction to pass a tax increase had a political cost: 57 lawmakers of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) voted against the bill, while 15 DPJ members abstained. Former DPJ president Ichiro Ozawa, who leads the anti-tax-hike movement, and his followers created a deep rift within the ruling party over the tax legislation and subsequently damaged Noda's political power base by defecting from the party on July 2.
Topic:: Democratization, Government, and Politics
Political Geography:: Japan and Israel

43931. Balancing Tradition and Modernity: The Future of Retirement in East Asia

Author:: Richard Jackson, Neil Howe, and Tobias Peter
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: As the world's societies age, governments and businesses are trying to look ahead and anticipate the needs of tomorrow's growing elderly populations. Nowhere is this more difficult to do than in emerging East Asia.
Topic:: Demographics, Economics, and Health
Political Geography:: Israel and East Asia

43932. U.S.-India Defense Trade

Author:: S. Amer Latif
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: Over the past decade, the United States and India have built the foundations of a partnership that has the potential to be one of the more consequential relationships of the twenty-first century. Since President Bill Clinton's visit to India in 2000, the two countries have forged a relationship that is now defined by five pillars of cooperation that include strategic issues, energy and climate change, education and development, economics and trade, and science and technology. It is a wide-ranging partnership that holds the promise of collaboration on issues that are not only important to these two countries, but to many other countries as well.
Topic:: Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:: United States, South Asia, and India

43933. Iran and the Gulf Military Balance II: The Missile and Nuclear Dimensions

Author:: Anthony H. Cordesman and Alexander Wilner
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: Iran's potential acquisition of nuclear weapons or other weapons of mass destruction, and Iran's future ability to arm its missiles and aircraft with such weapons, pose s critical risk s that shape every aspect of US, Arab, Israeli and other military competition with Iran . In the near term, they could trigger a major confrontation or war in the Gulf. In the mid to long - term, they could trigger a nuclear arms race in the region, coupled to the search for missile defenses and an accelerated arms race to improve conventional, asymmetric, and proxy forces as well.
Topic:: Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:: Iran and Middle East

43934. Gender-Based Violence and HIV

Author:: Janet Fleischman
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: The dual global epidemics of HIV/AIDS and gender - based violence (GBV) exert a destructive and disproportionate impact on women and girls, especially in high HIV - prevalence countries in Africa. Yet despite bipartisan political consensus on the intersection between HIV and GBV, efforts to address this area have not attracted the attention or resources necessary to drive the program innovation that could demonstrate progress. However, new momentum is now being brought to this agenda with the U.S. President ' s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief ' s (PEPFAR) GBV initiative. Although still early in implementation and facing many challenges, the GBV initiative has the potential to yield important lessons about synergies and cost - effectiveness in reducing GBV and HIV, with clear implications for U.S. global health investments.
Topic:: Gender Issues, Globalization, and Health
Political Geography:: United States

43935. The Last Domino to Fall: Australia, Uranium, and the India Deal

Author:: Sharon Squassoni and Talitha Dowds
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Policy Brief
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: In late 2011, Australia decided to allow uranium exports to India, creating an exception from its long-standing policy of exporting uranium only to countries with full-scope safeguards. Australia was one of a handful of countries that had not moved quickly to cash in on Indian nuclear trade. With its huge uranium resources (it is the third-largest producer of uranium ore and holds 40 percent of known uranium reserves), one would expect Australia to be seriously bullish on nuclear energy and active in export promotion. Yet for decades this significant nuclear supplier has struggled to balance domestic and foreign priorities in the nuclear area. This essay explores Australian nuclear trade policy and the decision to supply India.
Topic:: Arms Control and Proliferation, International Trade and Finance, Nuclear Weapons, and Natural Resources
Political Geography:: India and Australia/Pacific

43936. Iraq After US Withdrawal: US Policy and the Iraqi Search for Security and Stability

Author:: Anthony H. Cordesman and Sam Khazai
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: Iraq is in an ongoing struggle to establish a new national identity, and one that can bridge across the deep sectarian divisions between its Shi'ite s and Sunnis and the ethnic division s between its Arabs and its Kurds and other minorities. At the same time, it must build a new structure of governance, economic, and social order after a period of dictatorship, war, sanctions, occupation and civil conflict that began in 1979 and has continued ever since. It must cope with a steadily growing population, and diversify an economy that is so dependent on petroleum exports that they provide some 95% of its government revenues. This struggle can still end in a new round of serious civil conflict and even in the division of the country. At the same time, Iraq does have great potential and its political divisions and ongoing low - level violence do not mean it cannot succeed in establishing stability, security, and a better life for its people.
Topic:: Democratization, Peace Studies, War, Counterinsurgency, and Self Determination
Political Geography:: Iraq, Middle East, and Arabia

43937. Religion and Militancy in Pakistan and Afghanistan

Author:: Mariam Mufti
Publication Date:: 06-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: The importance of studying the rise of Islamic radicalism in Afghanistan and Pakistan cannot be overemphasized. First, both Afghanistan and Pakistan have experienced serious threats from radical Islamic groups. In Afghanistan, coalition forces led by the United States were successful in overthrowing the Taliban regime after the terrorist attacks of 9/11, but since then there has been a resurgence in violence that is being perpetrated by a combination of the Taliban who have regrouped, the Haqqani Network (HQN) and Hizb-e-Islami (HiG). Foreign groups such as al Qaeda are also implicated in the violence. In Pakistan, most of the militant activity has occurred in the frontier region between Afghanistan and Pakistan, known as the FATA. But other parts of Pakistan, especially Punjab, have also been subject to bomb attacks. These attacks have not only targeted Pakistanis but also foreigners, including U.S. government facilities.
Topic:: Political Violence, Islam, Religion, Armed Struggle, and Counterinsurgency
Political Geography:: Pakistan and Afghanistan

43938. Enhancing U.S. Trade and Cooperation Relations with Middle-Income Countries

Author:: Daniel F. Runde and Amasia Zargarian
Publication Date:: 06-2012
Content Type:: Working Paper
Institution:: Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:: Justifying traditional U.S. assistance to middle-income countries is an increasingly difficult proposition, and refocusing limited U.S. government development resources away from middle-income countries offers an efficient way to identify savings in the foreign assistance budget. This is not the first time that the U.S. government has faced such questions, and it can draw upon past transitions—not all successful—for a variety of valuable lessons for repurposing the United States' relationship with middle-income countries.
Topic:: International Relations, Development, International Trade and Finance, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:: United States

43939. Russia in the new international order: Theories, arguments and debates

Author:: Roger E Kanet
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Throughout the Cold War, studies of Soviet foreign policy were generally 'atheoretical'. In so far as they were based on theoretical models from international relations, those models tended to be some version of 'realism' or 'neorealism'. Over the past two decades, since the end of the Cold War, other approaches – especially those based on 'constructivism' – have challenged the domination of the 'realist' framework in studies of Russian foreign policy. The articles in this special issue of International Politics examine the strengths and weaknesses of the various theoretical frameworks employed to explain Russian policy.
Topic:: Foreign Policy and Cold War
Political Geography:: Russia and Soviet Union

43940. Conceptualizing sovereignty in Russian foreign policy: Realist and constructivist perspectives

Author:: Charles E Ziegler
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Russia's approach to sovereignty reflects a close linkage between the recentralizing project domestically, and reassertion of Russia's position as a great power on the international scene. This article assesses the relative utility of constructivist and realist approaches in Russian readings of sovereignty. A constructivist approach is found to be more useful in treating sovereignty - it directs our attention toward the problem of developing a new post-Soviet identity, the role of culture and historical interpretation in foreign policy, Russian concepts of the hostile Other and domestic ideas linked to Russian concepts of federalism - all critical factors in understanding Russian foreign policy behavior. The major ideological construct of the post-communist period - sovereign democracy - insists that both sovereignty and democracy are socially and culturally determined, and therefore clash with Western interpretations of these concepts. The emergence of a new, post-modern and Western-dominated set of global norms limiting sovereignty is closely linked to continued tensions between Russia and the West.
Political Geography:: Russia and Soviet Union

43941. Applying constructivism to understanding EU–Russian relations

Author:: Joan DeBardeleben
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The improved relations between Russia and the European Union (EU) in the 1990s were followed by a rise in tension since 1999. This article argues that constructivism can provide important insights into the basis of continuing difficulties. Drawing on the nature of the two actors, the author argues that the foreign policy identities of both actors are in a formative process, and thus the construction of inter-subjective meanings has the potential to be a particularly transformative element in the relationship. Both the Russian Federation and the EU are relatively new as regional and global actors, and both are in the process of forming their foreign policy identities, although in quite different contexts. Neither the EU nor Russia has developed a strategic conception for the relationship, and political discourse often obstructs communication rather than furthering the generation of inter-subjective meanings. The article argues that a constructivist analysis can help to expose the deep interconnections between normative disagreements, conflicting constructions of interests and differing concepts of governance.
Topic:: Foreign Policy
Political Geography:: Russia and Europe

43942. Russia's foreign policy towards Poland: Seeking reconciliation? A social constructivist analysis

Author:: Valentina Feklyunina
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Russia's relations with Poland in the post-Soviet period have been greatly affected by their divergent historical narratives that have shaped their dominant identities and have been further promoted by the political elites to maintain these identities. However, Moscow's attempts to project a more positive image in Poland in recent years have involved re-articulating some elements of the official narrative. Drawing on social constructivism, this article presents a theoretical framework that can be applied to an analysis of Russia's foreign policy, and illustrates its benefits by examining Russia's policy towards Poland.
Topic:: Foreign Policy
Political Geography:: Russia, Poland, Soviet Union, and Moscow

43943. The problem of 'the international' in Russian identity formation

Author:: Richard Sakwa
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: A new era in international politics is gradually taking shape in which the legacy of the Cold War is gradually fading, but in which new lines of division are emerging. The major institutions of the Cold War period are undergoing a long decay although the political processes associated with them are becoming increasingly dysfunctional. New forms of multi-polarity are taking shape accompanied by the struggle between defenders of the status quo and those ready to adapt to the structural revisionism inherent in the new pattern of international politics. In all of this, Russia acts as the bellwether, developing as a distinct and separate pole in the international system rather than joining the Western constellation, as was anticipated after the end of the Cold War. Russia's great power identity in the international system is accompanied by domestic systemic specificities, which reinforce differentiation at the structural level. Russia's neo-revisionism does not repudiate the present balance in international order, but seeks to create what it considers to be a more comprehensive and equal system. This can be seen in its various forms of interaction and modes of engagement with 'the international'. In methodological terms, the attempt to analyse these changes through a Cold War lens is a categorical error that perpetuates anachronistic paradigms. By disaggregating Russia's engagement with the international into a number of distinct processes, we can delineate more clearly the interaction of structural and systemic factors that sustain Russia's neo-revisionism.
Topic:: Cold War
Political Geography:: Russia

43944. Russian foreign policy in the making: The linkage between internal dynamics and the external context

Author:: Maria Raquel Freire
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Russian foreign policy is both an expression of Moscow's internal political dealings around the presidential administration and the bureaucracies that support it, with their focus on the shaping and making of foreign policy, as well as its implementation, which is grounded in Russia's stated goal of its reassertion in the international system as a major power. This is a process that is embedded in continuous interaction between different levels of agency and the construction of understandings and perceptions, both at the domestic and the international level. Looking at foreign policy as a process, the article argues that the study of foreign policy should go beyond strictly positivist assumptions, as relations between the different actors and the foreign policy approaches that these suggest are embedded in structural, material and ideational dimensions. Departing from this conceptual frame, the article looks at Russian foreign policy, seeking to understand how the internal/external linkages take place in the process of policy construction, looking in particular at socialisation processes and normative adaptation.
Topic:: Foreign Policy
Political Geography:: Russia and Moscow

43945. Do leaders still decide? The role of leadership in Russian foreign policymaking

Author:: Licínia Simão
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This article looks at Russian foreign policy from the perspective of the individuals responsible for decision making. The focus on the individual level of analysis aims to shed light on the evolving dynamics of Russian foreign policymaking and complement existing analysis on the role of ideas, world views and influential groups in foreign policy analysis, with insights from neo-classical realism and constructivism. Whereas the former sees the state as the transmission belt between international power distributions and political action, the latter underlines the roles of ideas and norms to explain agency. In this context, the article is well placed to deal with the evolving relationship between leaders' views and situational constraints, including other actors involved in setting foreign policy priorities and the external environment. How are decisions taken in the context of Russia's foreign policy under President Putin and Medvedev? What is the role of the presidents from both a legal (constitutional) and a practical perspective? The article maps Russian political leaders' decisions, under Putin and Medvedev, using two case studies: Putin's decision to support the US-led post-9/11 war on terror and Medvedev's decision to go to war with Georgia in 2008.
Topic:: Foreign Policy
Political Geography:: Russia and United States

43946. Interest groups in Russian foreign policy: The invisible hand of the Russian Orthodox Church

Author:: Nikita Lomagin
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: Among the domestic interest groups that play a role in influencing Russian foreign policy the Russian Orthodox Church has become an important actor. Its most important role has been that of supporting the emergence of a new nationalist Russian identity to undergird Russian policy. On specific policy issues, it has advocated the political reunification of Eastern Slavic Orthodox peoples, the emergence of a multipolar international system and the restatement of traditional values as the foundation for the pursuit of global human rights.
Topic:: Foreign Policy and Human Rights
Political Geography:: Russia

43947. Using the neo-classical realism paradigm to predict Russian foreign policy behaviour as a complement to using resources

Author:: Bertil Nygren
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: This essay presents the argument that analysts, crystal ball readers and general future-tellers generally should to a much higher extent rely on claimed interests of great powers than on resources alone in predictions of future behaviour of great powers. Analysts should analyse what states want to do given what they could do, as much as analyse what states could do based on their resources, or analysts should analyse state policy intentions as much as state policy resources.
Topic:: Foreign Policy
Political Geography:: Russia

43948. Geopolitics and Russian foreign policy

Author:: John Berryman
Publication Date:: 07-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Politics
Institution:: Palgrave Macmillan
Abstract:: The article provides a broad overview of the fluctuating connections between the controversial and ambiguous field of modern geopolitics and Russia. Given the pivotal significance of the Russian challenge within the early hypotheses of Mahan and Mackinder, the article first explores those distinctive geographical and spatial considerations that helped shape the development of the Russian Empire. The place of geopolitics in the Cold War is then reviewed, including both its policy orientation and the exchanges between the proponents of geopolitical realism and liberal internationalism. In conclusion, the article examines the post-Cold War renaissance of geopolitics, reviewing both theoretical developments and policy implications for Russian foreign policy.
Topic:: Foreign Policy and Politics
Political Geography:: Russia

43949. Is the European Convention Going to Be 'Supreme'? A Comparative-Constitutional Overview of ECHR and EU Law before National Courts

Author:: Giuseppe Martinico
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: The aim of this article is to answer the question, 'are national judges extending the structural EU law principles (primacy and direct effect) to the European Convention on Human Rights'? This article does not intend to examine the broader issue of the rapprochement between the legal systems of the EU and the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) but it concentrates on how national judges treat the norms of the ECHR compared with their treatment of EU law. I have structured this article in three parts. The first part offers a first look at the 'constitutional variety' existing in terms of constitutional provisions devoted to the impact of the ECHR and EU laws on the national systems. In the second part I will move to analyse the relevant case law of the domestic judges on three factors of potential convergence: consistent interpretation, disapplication of national law conflicting with European provisions, and emergence of a counter-limits doctrine. Finally, in the third part I will offer some concluding remarks on the convergence issue.
Political Geography:: Europe

43950. Sustainable Development in International Law: Nature and Operation of an Evolutive Legal Norm

Author:: Virginie Barral
Publication Date:: 05-2012
Content Type:: Journal Article
Abstract:: The wide dissemination of sustainable development in international law has generated considerable academic interest. However, because of the evasive and flexible content of what has been termed by the ICJ a concept in the Gabcˇíkovo-Nagymaros case, and more recently an objective in the Pulp Mills case, academic commentary has often struggled to ascertain sustainable development's legal nature, which has proved a notion defying legal classification. One attractive thesis has been Lowe's analysis of sustainable development as an interstitial or modifying norm which exerts its normative influence as an interpretative tool in the hands of judges. Its interpretative function is certainly very significant. Judicial bodies have used it to legitimize recourse to evolutive treaty interpretation, as a rule of conflict resolution, and even to redefine conventional obligations. However, beyond this convenient hermeneutical function, by laying down an objective to strive for in hundreds of treaties, sustainable development primarily purports to regulate state conduct. As an objective, it lays down not an absolute but a relative obligation to achieve sustainable development. Such obligations are known as obligations of means or of best efforts. Legal subjects are thus ultimately under an obligation to promote sustainable development.

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COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS