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7401. Panama Canal Transition: The Final Implementation

Author:
C. Richard Nelson, Jr. Gillespie, Brandon Grove Jr., and David E. McGiffert
Publication Date:
07-1999
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
The implications of the transfer of the Panama Canal go well beyond U.S. relations with Panama. This complex transition provides an important lesson for Latin America and the rest of the world on how countries of vastly different size and outlook can work together. The success of this 20 year process lies mainly in first identifying the primary common interest of the United States, Panama and the major canal users: access to an open, safe and efficient canal. Important but secondary concerns, including U.S. military access to facilities in Panama, were addressed during the process but never were allowed to displace the primary interest. By focusing on this clear, compelling key objective, both Panama and the United States were able to accommodate fundamental changes in the political, economic and security context, including several changes in administrations, tough negotiations and even a military confrontation.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States and Latin America

7402. Building an Asia-Pacific Security Community: The Role of Nuclear Weapons

Author:
C. Richard Nelson, James E. Goodby, Tomohisha Sakanaka, W. Neal Anderson, Tomohide Murai, and Shinichi Ogawa
Publication Date:
05-1999
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
The main challenge for Asia is to build a security community that transforms a legacy of military competition into security cooperation. This transformation will be difficult because of the high level of distrust among the states and considerable uncertainty about future relations. Asia lacks the kinds of developed, institutionalized multilateral security arrangements that contribute to transparency, confidence-building and long-term stability. Furthermore, a “ business as usual ” approach that focuses on managing bilateral relationships is unlikely to result in a security community. More attention needs to be devoted to multilateral security efforts. Without the reassurance of a network of cooperative arrangements, including verifiable arms limitations, potential adversaries may place their hopes in achieving unilateral military advantages. Such efforts could foster fears of regional domination and, in turn, a potential arms race that includes nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
Topic:
Security and NATO
Political Geography:
United States, Israel, East Asia, and Asia

7403. An Appropriate Role for Nuclear Power in Meeting Global Energy Needs

Author:
Donald L. Guertin, Richard E. Balzhiser, Christian Gobert, William J. Dirks, Joy C. Dunkerley, and Stephen P. Pettibone
Publication Date:
02-1999
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Atlantic Council
Abstract:
Despite the recent global economic slowdown, the demand for energy services is bound to increase over the long term in order to provide improved living standards for growing populations, in particular in developing countries. In recognition of its unique characteristics, the demand for electricity will rise even faster than total energy. Several studies present scenarios that show a doubling of global installed capacity over the next twenty years.
Topic:
Energy Policy and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
United States and Asia

7404. The Geopolitics of Energy Development in the Caspian Region: Regional Cooperation or Conflict?

Author:
Vadim Rubin
Publication Date:
12-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
The Caspian Basin has emerged in recent years as a major focus of international affairs for a combination of political, economic, and geostrategic reasons. In the immediate aftermath of the Soviet Union's dissolution in the early 1990s the region's newly independent states were overshadowed by Russia and attracted little Western and U.S. attention. But over the past several years this region has attracted growing attention from Western policymakers and scholars, as well as the media and the private sector. One of the main reasons for this new focus on the Caspian is its sizable energy reserves. In addition to its potential as a significant oil producer, however, it is also the Caspian's geostrategic location, its diverse mix of ethnic groups, and its unsettled intrastate and interstate conflicts that make it both an enticing and challenging region.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Democratization, Development, Energy Policy, and International Cooperation
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Caspian Sea

7405. The Cox Committee Report: An Assessment

Author:
Michael M. May, Alastair Iain Johnston, W.K.H. Panofsky, Marco Di Capua, and Lewis R. Franklin
Publication Date:
12-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
The Cox Commission of the U.S. Congress was established in June 1998 to investigate concerns over Chinese acquisition of sensitive U.S. missile and space technology in connection with the launching of U.S. civilian satellites using Chinese launchers on Chinese territory. The investigations were broadened in October 1998 to include alleged security problems and possible espionage at the U.S. nuclear weapons laboratories. Some conclusions were released in January 1999 by the White House together with the administration's response. The full declassified (redacted) version of the report of the Cox Commission was released on May 25, 1999.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
United States, China, and Asia

7406. The U.S. Military and Civil Infrastructure Protection: Restrictions and Discretion under the Posse Comitatus Act

Author:
Gregory D. Grove
Publication Date:
11-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
This article sets out the constraints of the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 (the “Act”), which generally prohibits active enforcement of civilian laws by the military, and describes the discretion of the military commander to assist civilian law enforcement in protecting America's information infrastructure against computer—assisted attack. A primary purpose of this article is to help legal advisors to commanders and DoD civilian officials better understand the boundaries of command discretion so that commanders and officials can feel free to exercise proper command discretion to assist law enforcement according to military interests and their professional and personal ethics and ideals. Another primary purpose of the article is to appraise Congress of the Act, its prohibitions, and its application to assist in framing the policy debate about how to constrain or expand the discretion of commanders and other officials to most productively serve the American public.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Government
Political Geography:
United States

7407. The Nonproliferation Regime under Siege

Author:
George Bunn
Publication Date:
09-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
The nuclear nonproliferation regime was challenged in 1998 by nuclear-weapon tests in India and Pakistan, by medium-range missile tests in those countries and in Iran and North Korea, by Iraq's defiance of UN Security Council resolutions requiring it to complete its disclosure of efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction, and by the combination of “loose nukes” and economic collapse in Russia. Additional threats to the regime's vitality came in 1999 from the erosion of American relations with both China and Russia that resulted from NATO's 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia—with additional harm to relations with China resulting from U.S. accusations of Chinese nuclear espionage and Taiwan's announcement that it was a state separate from China despite its earlier acceptance of a U.S.-Chinese “one China” agreement. Major threats to the regime also came from the continued stalemate on arms-control treaties in the Russian Duma and the U.S. Senate, from a change in U.S. policy to favor building a national defense against missile attack, and from a Russian decision to develop a new generation of small tactical nuclear weapons for defense against conventional attack.
Topic:
International Relations, Arms Control and Proliferation, Economics, Government, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Russia, United States, China, Europe, Iran, South Asia, Middle East, Israel, East Asia, Asia, and Korea

7408. Commercialization of Russian Technology in Cooperation with American Companies

Author:
David Bernstein
Publication Date:
06-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC), Stanford University
Abstract:
The Soviet Union placed a high priority on science and technology and built a huge assembly of research institutes, educational programs, design bureaus, and production enterprises embodying some measure of science and/or technology. This assembly concentrated over—whelmingly on military applications. Approximately three—quarters of this complex was located in Russia, but essential elements of many programs were located in other republics. The nature, structure, size, and operation of this military—industrial complex (MIC) as well as its decline and change during the Gorbachev and post—Soviet periods of economic transition have been documented in the literature.
Topic:
Industrial Policy, International Cooperation, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, Asia, and Soviet Union

7409. The Competitive Advantage of Hollywood Industry

Author:
Luc Veron
Publication Date:
03-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Studies, University of Southern California
Abstract:
The author is very grateful for the support, both material and intellectual, which he received during his stay at the University of Southern California. He is particularly appreciative of the many conversations he had with colleagues at the School of International Relations, the Center for International Studies, the Marshall School of Business and the Department of Economics of USC as well as at UCLA's School of Public Policy and Social Research which greatly helped him to formulate the ideas presented here. Although the author is currently employed by the European Commission, the ideas expressed in this paper are purely personal and do not reflect the views of any institution.
Topic:
Globalization, Industrial Policy, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and California

7410. Hollywood and Europe: A Case of Trade in Cultural Industries, the 1993 GATT Dispute

Author:
Luc Veron
Publication Date:
03-1999
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for International Studies, University of Southern California
Abstract:
The heated dispute that erupted at the end of the GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) negotiations between the United States (US) and the European Union (EU) on audio-visual services is fairly representative of the cultural argument in trade. Culture is often proclaimed to oppose full liberalisation of international exchanges of goods and services. In 1989, after the liberalisation of US film import in Korea, angry Koreans directors in some Seoul theatres showing US movies released poisonous snakes Japan traditionally opposed rice imports on the basis that it would endanger Japanese culture. The United States claimed that the "potato-potato-potato rhythm at idle and the staccato beat at cruising speeds" of a Harley-Davidson was part of the American culture with the obvious aim to ridicule any notion of culture, or more precisely of national culture. German director Wim Wenders replied to the latter by provocatively reminding that the essence of US national culture being trade the Americans have no sense of any possible contradiction between trade and culture. When, to justify the remarkable work of the Australian Film Commission, experts came up with a tentative definition of Australian culture, the simple evocation of Crocodile Dundee generated outrage, especially among the feminists. It is uneasy to find an acceptable and workable definition of national culture to analyse its impact on trade.
Topic:
Globalization, Industrial Policy, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, Japan, Europe, Germany, Australia, and Korea

7411. Disposing of Weapons-Grade Plutonium

Author:
Robert E. Ebel and John Taylor
Publication Date:
03-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
This panel report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies considers an issue of critical importance to U.S. national security interests: Is the United States now pursuing a well-conceived and effective program of working with Russia to dispose of the vast amounts of separated plutonium that have become excess to the nuclear weapons needs of the two countries?
Topic:
Security, Energy Policy, Nuclear Weapons, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
Russia and United States

7412. The Role of the Private Sector in the Evolution of US Technology Policy

Author:
Judith Mariscal and John B. Horrigan
Publication Date:
01-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas
Abstract:
Technology policy in the United States has undergone a dramatic transformation in the past ten to twelve years, as the government has increasingly played an active role in the high-tech sector and as the sector itself has faced growing competition from foreign competitors. Truths (or apparent truths) which once were unquestioned—that the U.S. government should only intervene in technology for national security reasons, that entrepreneurial high-tech firms operate best as "lone rangers" in the marketplace—have been closely scrutinized. The result of such scrutiny is that government and industry have changed their perceptions about their roles in a world in which the economic and competitive environment shifts rapidly. Another outcome is that technology policy has taken on increasing importance in U.S. policy circles. We see in the Clinton Administration plans to promote the information superhighway, proposals to overhaul the way in which the telecommunications industry is regulated, support for government-industry research consortia, closer linkage of trade and technology policy, and in general a much closer industry government relationship with the high-tech sector.
Topic:
Economics, Government, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
United States

7413. Strategic Images: Perceptions of Russia in the USA and of America in Russia

Author:
Dag Hartelius and Natasha Randall
Publication Date:
11-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
EastWest Institute
Abstract:
Over the last year we have witnessed a deteriorating climate in Russian-Western relations - or at least this has been the perception. The Russian financial crisis has accelerated the trend in Russia to blame the West - in particular the US - for their troubles. In America and Europe a new debate has been spawned on what kind of Russia we are now dealing with. Old truths, or old perceptions, are being questioned and relations are being reassessed.
Topic:
International Relations and Economics
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, America, Europe, and Asia

7414. How Will the European Union Meet the 21st Century

Author:
Pal Dunay
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The story of post-World War 2 European integration had started before integration theory gained popularity. One has to bear in mind, however, that the idea of European integration was launched with modest objectives in the 1950s. Except for some visionary statesmen, like Jean Monnet and some others, both the subject matters to be covered by integration and the geographical scope was limited. Six countries aimed at establishing a free trade zone and not much else was on their "plate" when they signed the Rome Treaty on 25 March 1957.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7415. Muddling Through? A Strategic Checklist for the United States in the Post-Cold War World

Author:
John Lewis Gaddis
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The single most striking feature of the post-Cold War environment is the diffusion, not the disappearance, of threats. The half-century extending from 1941 to 1991 was, for the United States, one in which threats were both focused and obvious. From the time of the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor until the final collapse of the Soviet Union exactly fifty years later, we knew who our enemies were, or at least might be. As a consequence, we abandoned the isolationism that had characterized most of our history in favor of an unaccustomed but - as it turned out - highly effective internationalism.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7416. Prospects for Europe and the Atlantic Alliance at Century's End

Author:
William I. Hitchcock
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
Ever since the end of the Cold War, analysts have engaged in long discussions about what sort of international order would replace it. Though these discussions have ranged widely in their assessments, they usually took as their starting point a common assumption: that the Cold War order and the basic structure of international relations it represented, was over and done for. From 1989 until about 1995, this assessment seemed accurate: the alliance was falling apart, war broke out in Europe, the western economies were in a tailspin, and the delicate architecture that bound Germany to the states of Western Europe seemed to be in jeopardy, overburdened by the arrival of a united, powerful Germany. Whatever order we had, it didn't seem like anything we had seen before.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7417. Security Issues for Russia in the New International Context

Author:
Yuri Nazarkin
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The starting point for this paper is the National Security Blueprint of the Russian Federation approved by Presidential Decree No. 1300 dated 17 December 1997. As the Blueprint itself clarifies, it is "a political document reflecting the aggregate of officially accepted views regarding goals and state strategy in the sphere of ensuring the security of the individual, society and the state from external and internal threats of a political, economic, social, military, man-made (technogennyy), ecological, information or other nature, in the light of existing resources and potential." It is a conceptual document of a general nature which is intended to be the basis for the elaboration of specific programmes and organisational documents in the sphere of ensuring the national security of the Russian Federation.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7418. Conflict Management and European Security: The Problem of Collective Solidarity

Author:
Fred Tanner
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The dynamics of European security has become considerably more difficult to comprehend in recent years. This is due primarily to two sets of developments. First an "amorphous threat-free post-Cold War security setting" has replaced the distinct Alliance-wide threat from the Soviet Union. Second, new risks and threats have increasingly affected European security from regions immediately adjoining Western Europe. Conflicts and notorious instability loom in the Caucasus, Central Asia, the Balkans and the Mediterranean region, including North Africa and the Middle East. As a consequence, security cooperation in Europe currently struggles to cope with these risks of non-military nature and ambiguous threat scenarios from the "out-of-area".
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7419. New Security Challenge or Old? Russia's Catch—22

Author:
William C. Wohlforth
Publication Date:
08-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
Abstract:
The most important security threat Russia faces, and the main threat it poses to the rest of the world, is its own implosion. If traditional security has to do with the manipulation and managment of the use of military force by states, then Russia's major contemporary problems must be understood under the "new security" rubric. Because the world has never before had to deal with the breakdown of a nuclear superpower, the security challenges Russia presents are certainly novel. But if "new security" is supposed to encompass problems that are transnational in nature and challenge state-centric analysis, then it too does not capture today's Russian question. For at the root of Russia's security problems is the absence of an effective government. To be sure, all of these problems are made more complicated by globalization. Many of them would continue to pester world politics even if Moscow had a capable government. But the root of these problems and the reason they present such great potential dangers is the absence of a capable state in Russia.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and NATO
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Europe

7420. Ideas, Culture and Political Analysis Workshop

Author:
Thomas Risse, Sarah Mendelson, Neil Fligstein, Jan Kubik, Jeffrey T. Checkel, Consuelo Cruz, Kathleen McNamara, Sheri Berman, Frank Dobbin, Mark Blyth, Ken Pollack, George Steinmetz, Daniel Philpott, Gideon Rose, Martha Finnemore, Kathryn Skikkink, Marie Gottschalk, John Kurt Jacobsen, and Anna Seleny
Publication Date:
05-1998
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Social Science Research Council
Abstract:
The last decade or so has witnessed a resurgence in scholarship employing ideational and cultural factors in the analysis of political life. This scholarship has addressed political phenomena across a variety of national and international settings, with studies of European politics being particularly well represented. For example, the work of scholars like Peter Hall (1993), Peter Katzenstein (1996), Ronald Inglehart (1997), Robert Putnam (1994) and Daniel Jonah Goldhagen (1995) has improved our understandings of European polities, societies and economies. Yet despite a recent rise in interest, ideational and cultural explanations still meet with skepticism in many quarters of the discipline. Some scholars doubt whether non-material factors like ideas or culture have independent causal effects, and others, who accept that such factors might matter, despair of devising viable ways of analyzing their impact on political life.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Relations, Security, Democratization, Economics, Government, Human Rights, International Cooperation, Nationalism, and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, France, and Latin America