Content Type: Journal Article / Political Geography: Global Focus / Publication Year: 3 selected / Topic: Diplomacy

1. INFORMING GLOBAL HEALTH DIPLOMACY: EXAMINING HEALTH AND PEACE THROUGH THE LENS OF THE GLOBAL BURDEN OF DISEASE

Author:: Tomislav Mestrovic, Driton Kuqi, and Goran Bandov
Publication Date:: 07-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Liberty and International Affairs
Institution:: Institute for Research and European Studies (IRES)
Abstract:: In this study, we aimed to examine the interconnectedness of health and peace, recognizing its significance within global health diplomacy, international relations, and human rights. For that purpose, we used the results from previous and ongoing Global Burden of Disease studies, which represent a comprehensive systematic appraisal of health problems and risks affecting populations worldwide. This paper could use its methodological underpinnings to analyze the impact of war, conflict, and terrorism on mortality and overall human health. In 2000, war and conflict were responsible for an estimated 310,000 deaths globally, compared to 2019, when this number decreased to 69,000. Recent findings reinforced the association between war, conflict, and increased all-cause mortality. Interpersonal violence also significantly contributed to human health loss resulting from disrupted peace. In Europe, disability-adjusted life years due to injury – including those caused by conflict – declined between 2000 and 2019. As we prioritize global health, peace-building initiatives, and global health diplomacy, big data will increasingly play a substantial role in accurately predicting and describing the health effects related to conflicts.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Health, Terrorism, Conflict, Peace, and Disease
Political Geography:: Global Focus

2. Stepping Up Our Climate Diplomacy

Author:: Charles Ray
Publication Date:: 02-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: At the opening of the COP27 summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on November 7, 2022, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres told the representatives of the countries attending that they faced a choice: work together to cut greenhouse gas emissions or condemn the planet to climate catastrophe. “Humanity has a choice,” Guterres said. “Cooperate or perish. We are on a highway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator.” Guterres called for the world’s richest and poorest countries to work together to speed up the transition from fossil fuels, and for the wealthy to help with funding to enable poor countries reduce emissions and deal with the negative impacts that they have already suffered due to climate change. “The two largest economies—the United States and China—have a particular responsibility to join efforts to make this pact a reality,” he went on to say. Left unsaid, but understood by most, is that China and the U.S. are also the world’s two largest emitters of greenhouse gases. While the U.S. and much of the rest of the world are still preoccupied with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, rampant inflation, energy shortages, and the fallout from the Covid pandemic, the existential problem of climate change cannot be ignored.
Topic:: Climate Change, Diplomacy, and Carbon Emissions
Political Geography:: China, Global Focus, and United States of America

3. How Climate Diplomacy is a Pillar of Efforts to Address Climate Change

Author:: Robert Blake
Publication Date:: 05-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: People around the world are experiencing first-hand the growing impacts of climate change – more frequent and destructive hurricanes in Florida and the U.S. Gulf coast; devastating floods in Pakistan; accelerated melting of glaciers in the poles and mountain ranges around the world, to name just a few. The science confirms these trends, but the world is still not doing enough to combat climate change. In this article, I will describe where we are in global efforts to limit global warming; the important role of the private sector in those efforts; the vital role U.S. and other diplomats are playing to catalyze action; and how we might better institutionalize climate diplomacy at the State Department.
Topic:: Climate Change, Diplomacy, and Natural Disasters
Political Geography:: Global Focus

4. The Role of US Diplomacy in a Changing World

Author:: David Satterfield
Publication Date:: 08-2023
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: In the 1933 movie Dinner at Eight, Jean Harlow’s character notes to her society grande dame hostess that she had read an author who asserted technology would soon take the place of every profession. The hostess eyes her platinum blonde guest and responds with the classic line “My dear, that’s something you need never worry about.” And neither do we in our line of work. There is an enduring critical role for diplomacy—personal and institutional—in a world that is always changing. Today’s diplomacy is facilitated by technology in terms of access to information and communication within Washington, from Washington agencies, between DC and overseas posts, and among our missions to an extent unimaginable when I entered the Foreign Service in 1980. The days of the airgram are long past, of waiting for encrypted teletype messages to be deciphered and printed, of mastering Wang computers and the art of producing documents on daisy wheel printers—and good riddance to all!
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Public Service
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

5. The Strategic Implications of the Tashkent Conference

Author:: Urs Unkauf
Publication Date:: 01-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Baku Dialogues
Institution:: ADA University
Abstract:: This essay is devoted to a consideration of a matter of fundamental geopolitical importance that has gone largely unnoticed in the West, to its detriment. The trigger event, so to speak, was a remarkable conference that took place not in Washington, Brussels, or Moscow—but in Tashkent. On 15‑16 July 2021, Uzbekistan’s capital hosted delegations from nearly 50 countries, among them China, Russia, India, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and all the Central Asia countries, at the level of foreign ministers or above. To understand the issues at play and the consequences thereof, we will need to spend some time discussing what actually took place during the conference itself, which was entitled “Central and South Asia: Regional Connectivity: Challenges and Opportunities.” In addition to relating the explicit agenda of the conference, we will also examine its broader agenda (whether intended or not) and conclude with an examination of its potentially far‑reaching geostrategic implications. The Tashkent conference was geared not only to government officials, but also towards leading scholars, experts, and media representatives from all over the world who follow developments in at least one of these two regions. In his opening address, Uzbekistan’s President Shavkat Mirziyoyev affirmed his country’s readiness to take up new leadership responsibilities in the region, which aligns with the domestic economic and social reform agenda he launched upon coming to power following the death of his predecessor, Islam Karimov, in September The Strategic Implications of the Tashkent Conference 2016. The host’s speech was followed by opening statements from Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani and Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan, whose delegations also exchanged informal views during the conference. Here a somewhat digressive remark is in order. When the conference was in its planning stage, the fall of the Ghani government in Afghanistan had not been anticipated. Still, one of the conference’s working group sessions was devoted to the devolving situation in Afghanistan. By that stage, the conference’s more astute participants were seeing the writing on the wall. Those who could not, of course, came to their senses less than a month later. Either way, the Taliban’s takeover of the country has put both Central and South Asia more firmly on the international geopolitical agenda— the recent events in Kazakhstan, which began as this issue of Baku Dialogues was being finalized, have also played a role in drawing attention back to the Silk Road region. But to come back to Mirziyoyev’s opening address. In the context of announcing a new, open foreign policy strategy for the country, Uzbekistan’s President made it clear that his country is centrally focused on strengthening regional connectivity. His announcement stressed that the focus would be on further deepening economic and cultural cooperation between Central Asia and South Asia—two regions that are linked historically as well as economically yet have not so far been able to transform this inherited potential towards proper policymaking in recent years. The Tashkent conference was advertised as being about enhancing regional interconnectivity, trade, and cooperation between Central Asia and South Asia—as well as presenting the host country’s new cross‑regional foreign policy strategy. But as Edward Lemon wrote in the Fall 2021 edition of Baku Dialogues, the conference also served to demonstrate that the emerging regionalism—a topic raised by the concerning countries themselves and not from outside—will be a leitmotif for future geostrategic developments in the Silk Road region.
Topic:: Diplomacy, International Trade and Finance, Infrastructure, Geopolitics, and Silk Road
Political Geography:: Global Focus

6. Building Bridges between Dependency Theory and Neo-Gramscian Critical Theory: The Agency-Structure Relation as a Starting Point

Author:: Rafael Alexandre Mello
Publication Date:: 04-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Contexto Internacional
Institution:: Institute of International Relations, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro
Abstract:: Finding common ground between theories that have never or seldom spoken is a necessary first step to bridge-building, particularly concerning their foundational bases. This article proposes to develop such a footing for a dialogue between the Marxist version of Latin American Dependency Theory (MDT) and Robert Cox’s neo-Gramscian Critical Theory (NCT). The onto-methodological debate around the agency-structure relation offers a possible starting point for a discussion of (in)compatibilities, in particular by deciphering how each understands the relation; but also by asking whether they bring particular social ontologies that need to be addressed.
Topic:: Development, Diplomacy, Hegemony, and International Relations Theory
Political Geography:: South America, Latin America, North America, and Global Focus

7. The Importance of the English Language in Public Diplomacy and International Relations

Author:: Mirvan Xhemaili
Publication Date:: 02-2022
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal of Liberty and International Affairs
Institution:: Institute for Research and European Studies (IRES)
Abstract:: The primary language of international relations and diplomacy is English. The representatives of international bodies communicate in the English language. It is vital to establish English as the official language for international organizations in facilitating more efficient collaboration internationally. English dominance in international communication becomes increasingly apparent. This study aimed at gaining a more in-depth understanding of the significance of the English language. It also aimed at identifying, describing, and explaining the importance of the English language in public diplomacy and international relations. The researcher used the descriptive research method in the study, notably; secondary data were used for collecting reliable conclusions for the research. The findings suggested that the adoption of formulaic language, particularly, idioms and idiomatic expressions to further embellish the phrases used in the arena of international relations or policy is a peculiarity of the English language. The study concluded that formulaic language and the adoption and usage of idioms is a distinguishing feature that diplomats and those who have a career in international law and international relations should master.
Topic:: International Relations, Diplomacy, Law, Language, and Public Diplomacy
Political Geography:: Global Focus

8. Fall 2020 edition of Strategic Visions

Author:: Alan McPherson
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Strategic Visions
Institution:: Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, Temple University
Abstract:: Contents News from the Director Fall 2020 Lecture Series ……………2 Fall 2020 Prizes …………………….3 Funding and the Immerman Fund ….3 Note from the Davis Fellow …………4 Temple Community Interviews Dr. Joel Blaxland …………………5 Dr. Kaete O’Connell ……………….6 Jared Pentz ………………………….7 Brian McNamara …………………8 Keith Riley …………………………9 Book Reviews Kissinger and Latin America: Intervention, Human Rights, and Diplomacy Review by Graydon Dennison …10 America’s Middlemen: Power at the Edge of Empire Review by Ryan Langton ……13 Anthropology, Colonial Policy and the Decline of French Empire in Africa Review by Grace Anne Parker ...16 Latin America and the Global Cold War Review by Casey VanSise ……19
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Human Rights, Military Intervention, and Empire
Political Geography:: United States, France, Latin America, and Global Focus

9. Kyoto-2: The Lame Duck of West European Climate Diplomacy: Lessons Learned From the International Climate Process

Author:: O. Shamanov
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: International Affairs: A Russian Journal of World Politics, Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:: East View Information Services
Abstract:: Issues concerning global climate change – by objective criteria, one of the most serious environmental threats of our time – have for many years been filling the top slots of the international agenda, and the political tem- perature of debates on this topic remains at the highest degree. Soon a new milestone will be reached on the thorny path of the inter- national climate process: on December 31, 2020, the Doha Amendment to the kyoto Protocol of the united nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (unFCCC) comes into force.1 this document extends the time frame of the kyoto Protocol from 2013 to 2020 (hence its unofficial title, kyoto-2) and contains a whole set of amendments to the kyoto guidelines, including updated quantitative criteria for greenhouse gas emission reductions for developed countries. Climate activists will probably schedule their next mass marches for this date, in order to mark this "historic" stage in the fight against global warming. Leaders from a number of states are expected to make bold new calls to “set the bar high” for the sake of averting a global climate col- lapse. But what remains hidden behind the scenes? What are the root caus- es of such a paradoxical situation, in which kyoto-2 is going into effect at the very end of its second commitment period?
Topic:: Climate Change, Diplomacy, Environment, International Cooperation, and United Nations
Political Geography:: Global Focus

10. International Society and Its Institutions in Refugee Protection during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Revisiting the Solidarism/Pluralism Debate in English School

Author:: Nihal Eminoglu, K. Onur Unutulmaz, and M. Gokay Ozerim
Publication Date:: 01-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:: International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:: This study aims at discussing the vulnerability of the Global Refugee Protection Regime (GRPR) during crises by applying the ‘international society’ concept within the English School of International Relations theory to the COVID-19 pandemic. We analyze the efficiency of the international society institutions on GRPR through the policies and practices of states as well as organizations such as the United Nations, European Union and Council of Europe. The GRPR has been selected because the ‘vulnerability’ of this regime has become a matter of academic and political debate as much as the vulnerability of those persons in need of international protection, specifically during times of crisis. Our analysis reveals that GRPR-centric practices and policies by the institutions of international society during the first four months afte
Topic:: Diplomacy, International Law, Pandemic, COVID-19, and Health Crisis
Political Geography:: Global Focus

11. Transitions in Global Health Diplomacy: Views of Donors During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Author:: Cynthia Buckley, Ralph Clem, and Erik Herron
Publication Date:: 12-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Fletcher Security Review
Institution:: The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:: Sickening and killing people worldwide, the COVID-19 pandemic is disrupting national and international economies and creating enormous human suffering. Current and future geopolitical implications are substantial, requiring long term attention by national security policymakers in the United States and elsewhere.245 Central among these foreign policy concerns is the capacity of states across the globe to deliver health care (and other services) to their populations and the role of health and human security in promoting national security.246 Prior to the pandemic, interest in Global Health Diplomacy (GHD) as a foreign policy tool was growing, reflecting the recognition of border crossing health concerns and the effectiveness of health-focused development aid. Health assistance provided through GHD enables improvements in the quality of life, expansion of infrastructure, and strong donor-recipient ties, each of which can contribute to recipient state capacity. Emerging impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic increase the importance of international health assistance.247 The value of health assistance in generating grassroots aid recognition, thereby capturing “hearts and minds,” is a potent means of building international recognition of both a state’s humanitarian mission and building a positive reputation in recipient state public opinion. In the American context, the four years of the Trump administration were marked by a decline in American bilateral and multilateral engagement in terms of GHD, specifically its stated intention to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO).248 Importantly, this coincided with a period of rising efforts in this area by China and Russia. These changes highlight the importance of understanding how changes in GHD participation emerge and enable stronger linkages between GHD studies and global rivalries (more common in the field of International Relations).249 We set out to explore how transitioning patterns of GHD engagement inform the positioning priorities of the United States, Russia, China, and multinational organizations such as the European Union. How have the acute health, economic, and in some cases political crises of the global COVID-19 pandemic altered donor engagement in GHD? What are the effects of changes in the perceptions of their engagement in recipient states? We incorporate data from three strategically important post-Soviet countries—Estonia, Ukraine, and the Republic of Georgia—to illustrate how major players in GHD are viewed on the ground. Situated on a long arc from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea and beyond to the Caucasus, these states neighbor Russia proper. Proximity to Russia itself implies a core national security problem: Moscow has actively undermined the territorial integrity of Georgia and Ukraine, seizing parts of both via kinetic warfare while causing massive infrastructure damage (including healthcare infrastructure), thousands of deaths, and the internal displacement of millions.250 Estonia has been the target of cyberattacks emanating from Russia, and all three countries must cope with relentless disinformation campaigns intended to destabilize their governments and societies. These three cases provide insights into how citizens in recipient states view GHD engagement in a time of crisis.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Pandemic, COVID-19, Donors, and Global Health
Political Geography:: Global Focus

12. The Interactions of International Relations: Racism, Colonialism, Producer-Centred Research

Author:: Deep K. Datta-Ray
Publication Date:: 07-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:: Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:: The racial hierarchy underscoring colonialism persists, organises core-periphery interactions and so undermines International Relations’ (IR’s) purpose of accounting and explaining to mitigate violence. Despite IR’s awareness of its colonialism, it reconstitutes in the hermeneutic’s deductive and inductive method via aphasia (calculated forgetting) about its heuristic: diplomacy. The result, analytic-violence or the core’s heuristic corrupting interaction with the periphery. Yet, its evasiveness testifies to a meaningfulness beyond IR’s hermeneutic. Irretrievably corrupted by its heuristic, IR’s hermeneutic is ejected for an altogether new hermeneutic: Producer-Centred Research (PCR). Eschewing deduction and induction, and so colonialism, PCR initiates with abduction or a problem arising from theory and practice to resolve it in terms of rationality because of its, and the problem’s, significance. Changing “rationality” to “rationalities” registers the core’s rationality as colonialism while preventing it from contaminating PCR’s collection and assessment of peripheral practices to determine if they cohere into another rationality. Moreover, treating peripheral practitioners authoritatively, as capable of rationalising themselves and thus equal to rationality, further protects PCR from aphasia. Verifying efficacy shows PCR’s decolonisation of the hermeneutic is not entirely replicated externally, amongst IR scholars. The core engages PCR, but it incites violence in the periphery which defends rationality and so is colonialism’s bastion, now.
Topic:: International Relations, Diplomacy, Colonialism, Eurocentrism, Racism, and Hermeneutics
Political Geography:: India and Global Focus

13. The Digital Technology Agenda at the Summit for Democracy

Author:: Eileen Donahoe
Publication Date:: 03-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Ambassadors Review
Institution:: Council of American Ambassadors
Abstract:: The United States plans to host a Summit for Democracy to advance President Joseph Biden’s stated priority for national security of revitalizing democracy. Digital technology must be a focal point of the Summit. The future of democracy depends, in large part, on the ability of democracies to confront the digital transformation of society – to address the challenges and to capitalize on its opportunities. Over the past decade, democracies have struggled to meet this test, while authoritarians have used technology to deepen repression and extend global influence. To combat the digital authoritarian threat, democracies must be rallied around a shared values-based vision of digital society and a joint strategic technology agenda. The Summit tech agenda should revolve around five core themes: 1) Democracies must get their own tech policy “houses” in order; 2) To win the normative battle, democracies must compete and win the technology battle; 3) Technological transformation necessitates governance innovation; 4) To win the geopolitical battle for the soul of 21st century digital society, democracies must band together; 5) Technology must be reclaimed for citizens and humanity.
Topic:: Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Democracy, and Summit
Political Geography:: Global Focus

14. When Anarchy Spills Across Borders

Author:: Edward Marks and Marshall Adair
Publication Date:: 11-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s Note: American Diplomacy Journal asked several foreign policy commentators to address the significance of growing chaos in many parts of the world, as failed and failing states are increasingly unable to perform the fundamental functions of the sovereign nation-state. This is one of five articles looking at those concerns. The first two decades of the 21st century have seen explosive international terrorism, accelerating climate change, degradation of the oceans, expansion of illegal narcotics production and consumption, and a deadly worldwide pandemic. None of these respects national borders. All of them cause terrible human suffering, weaken national governments, undermine cultural integrity, and threaten peaceful relations between states. We have not seen such widespread anarchy in the West since the Thirty Years War in Europe half a millennium ago. Out of that experience came the development of the nation-state, an institution required to fulfill two functions: to project authority over its territory and peoples and to protect its national boundaries. Now, the legitimacy of the Westphalian nation-state system is being challenged, as is the current international system which is its descendent. National sovereignty was the foundation of the Westphalian system, and it is still sacrosanct in our international system. Governments that fail to protect their populations are nothing new in history, and for hundreds of years, the risks of intervening in the affairs of nation states generally outweighed the benefits. Today, however, what happens in one country – intentionally or by accident – increasingly affects immediate neighbors, more distant nations, continents and international human intercourse. This is destabilizing and can lead to international conflict. To mitigate that destabilization, the international community needs to become more active and adept at intervening with sovereign states to resolve anarchic pressures before they spill across national borders. The international community does, more than ever, have a “responsibility to protect.”
Topic:: Diplomacy, Sovereignty, Borders, State, and Responsibility to Protect (R2P)
Political Geography:: Global Focus

15. A Collapsing World?

Author:: György Schöpflin
Publication Date:: 11-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s Note: American Diplomacy Journal asked several foreign policy commentators to address the significance of growing chaos in many parts of the world, as failed and failing states are increasingly unable to perform the fundamental functions of the sovereign nation-state. This is one of five articles looking at those concerns. Historically, the world always has been unstable. Colonialism, the Cold War and the Hyperpower decade (the 1990s) created an illusion of global stability. That moment has gone, hence strategies have to be reconfigured. Global connectivity, the autonomy of capital movement, the uneven spread of technology, the rise of resentful elites – resentful of the West’s hegemony – all combine to resist human rights, the democracy agenda, gender mainstreaming and much else dear to liberals. To complicate matters, two tiers of states have the capacity to resist liberalism. There are the civilisation states – China, Russia, India, which make up their own rules, and large regional powers each believed to be responsible for generating one percent of the world’s GDP. Brazil, Turkey, Mexico, Indonesia, South Africa are in this category. Japan is in a category of its own. Also relevant here is the economic success of non-liberal states as role models, Singapore, most obviously. This is very hard for the West to accept. The legacy of hegemony and empire live on, above all as a kind of low-grade civilising mission. Those who would thus be civilised do not take kindly to this at all. But they may be open to negotiation if treated with parity of esteem. Stability is not just a Western goal, though its definition can vary. The sense of superiority exists in the non-West just as much as in the West. There are non-Western civilising missions too.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Globalization, Political stability, and Crisis Management
Political Geography:: Global Focus

16. Multilateral Training and Work at Foreign Ministries

Author:: Kishan S. Rana
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s note: The author was India’s Permanent Representative to the UN Environment Program and to UN Habitat at Nairobi, 1984-86. In foreign ministries, as in all organizations, training has risen to the top of the institutional agenda.[1] ‘Life-long training’ has taken root. In the past, most foreign ministries believed that diplomats needed training on entering the profession, and thereafter learnt on the job. In the past 20 years, at least 30 foreign ministries have established training institutes, including the British Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, which had managed without one for over two centuries.[2] Thanks to increased work demands (new issues on the international agenda, the range of official and non-official partners involved, and concepts like public and diaspora diplomacy), the pace of work, especially multilateral, is more frenetic, complexified. Another question comes up: is multilateral work a speciality, or is it just a different diplomatic setting, compared with work in a bilateral embassy or consulate? For most countries, around 85 to 90% out of the diplomatic staff based abroad (as distinct from those in the foreign ministry), engage in bilateral work, also working in embassies and consulates, i.e. handling relations with individual foreign states. The balance are to be found in ‘multilateral missions’, accredited to international or regional organisations. But this is an oversimplification. At around 20 capitals, find the headquarters of multilateral and regional organizations, and the diplomatic missions at such places double as permanent missions accredited to that entity; examples: Addis Ababa (AU), Brussels (EU, NATO), Jakarta (ASEAN), Manilla (ADB), Nairobi (UNEP, Habitat) Paris (OECD, UNESCO), Rome (FAO), Vienna (IAEA, UNIDO). At the headquarters, multilateral and regional affairs may occupy around 10 to 15%. In this essay, we will subsume regional work with multilateral affairs. Other questions come up. How should diplomats be trained for multilateral work? Who should be selected for this work? What are the contemporary trends? We look also at senior management at the US State Department, and professionalization, related to multilateral work. These issues are interconnected.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Multilateralism, Training, and State Department
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

17. Making Change Happen Within the United Nations

Author:: Catherine Bertini
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s note: The author was Executive Director of the United Nations World Food Programme 1992-2002 and United Nations Under Secretary General for Management 2003-2005. President Biden’s nomination of Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield as US Ambassador to the United Nations promises to bring effective leadership, professionalism, and immense knowledge to the role. She is one of only a few American diplomats who have had leadership postings dealing with important UN operations at every level—in countries where she served as a foreign service officer, in Geneva, and in Washington DC. In New York, the ambassador will need to summon all her skills and experience to lead the American team at the US mission to the UN. Along with the USUN ambassador and the Secretary of State, US multilateral efforts are led by the Assistant Secretaries of the Bureau of International Organizations and the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration and the Permanent Representatives to the UN in Geneva, Rome, Vienna, and Nairobi. The president should nominate people for these positions who have in-depth knowledge of the system and related issues, solid judgment, and strong interpersonal skills. The diplomats must be strategic, prepared, creative, goal oriented, and personally engaging. Process oriented micro-managers will not accomplish much.
Topic:: Diplomacy, United Nations, and Multilateralism
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

18. Promoting Peace and Prosperity Through the United Nations

Author:: Thomas R. Pickering
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s note: The author was U.S. Ambassador to the UN 1989-1992. Franklin Roosevelt knew a good thing when he saw it. In 1943, in the midst of a military campaign for American survival in the Pacific and clawing our way back against Nazi Germany in the Atlantic, Roosevelt put bright people to work to shape what would come next. International cooperation under the League of Nations had twice failed – the U.S. resolved to stay out and the League’s weakness led to World War II. To fix it, Roosevelt took the name for the victory coalition of that great crusade – the United Nations – and fashioned an international organization to promote peace and prosperity through cooperation. Isolationist opposition in the U.S. endured, but many leaders of both parties had the vision and perspicacity to know that friends and allies working together made sense in achieving both objectives. Failure dogged the pursuit, but in Korea, the Gulf, Afghanistan, and the Balkans the organization made a real difference in war and peace. Americans have now been through four years of disdain and disparagement about the United Nations and the Trump administration’s failure to understand or make good use of it. Chinese and Russian opposition did not help. The Biden team comes to power with the challenge – how can we use more effectively Roosevelt’s vision to promote peace and prosperity on the planet?
Topic:: Diplomacy, United Nations, History, and Peace
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

19. Can the U.S. Still Be an Example to the World?

Author:: Renee M. Earle
Publication Date:: 02-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Between January 6 and January 20, disbelieving viewers in America and throughout the world watched two weeks of American history, unlike any before, cascade across their TV screens like a 33vinyl record played at 78 RPMs. Cameras recorded the dizzying transformation of the Capitol from take-for-granted placidity, to unimaginable desecration, and finally to a stage festooned to welcome the inauguration of a new president. Foreign Service friends and colleagues in Washington, DC and abroad wondered what the world would take away from these images. We had often encountered military and armed police patrolling cities in other countries—but never in OUR capital. A Department of Justice colleague worried that our work abroad, such as justice system reform in countries from Colombia to Afghanistan, might now be at risk. After witnessing the January 6 events on Capitol Hill, would our overseas partners embrace us with as much confidence? The Constitution and citizen participation in a democracy played a large role in my career abroad as a public diplomacy foreign service officer with the State Department. In the years after the Berlin Wall and Iron Curtain fell, supported by the FAS (Freedom Support Act) and SEED (Support for East European Democracy) Congressional appropriations, helping the people of Central Europe and the former Soviet Union construct, or reconstruct, democratic institutions and practice was an important focus for our embassies in East and Central Europe. These programs were broadly welcomed by our host countries.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Democracy, and January 6
Political Geography:: North America, Global Focus, and United States of America

20. The Impact of Climate Change on U.S. Foreign Policy and the National Interest

Author:: John Harbeson and Keith P. McCormick
Publication Date:: 05-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Editor’s note: In September 2020 the DACOR Bacon House Foundation invited climate experts from government, science, diplomacy, the academy, and media as well as an audience of foreign affairs professionals to examine the current state of knowledge on climate change and its impacts on U.S. foreign policy and the national interest. A summary of the conference proceedings follows.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Climate Change, and Diplomacy
Political Geography:: North America, Global Focus, and United States of America

21. Is Diplomacy Back? Making the Case to the American People

Author:: Mary Thompson-Jones
Publication Date:: 05-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Within hours of being sworn in, President Joe Biden put the United States on track to rejoin the Paris Climate Accord and the World Health Organization. A week later, he signed a new START Accord with Russian President Vladimir Putin, extending the nuclear missile nonproliferation treaty for another five years. These actions—along with many others—were important messages to a world that had grown accustomed to seeing America walk away from treaties. Why would Biden prioritize the international community? Americans are far more concerned about the pandemic, the events of January 6, the faltering economy, and scores of pressing domestic issues. Clearly, the early attention was a chance to give substance to his inaugural promise that “we will repair our alliances and engage with the world once again.” Biden underscored the change of focus in a speech to the State Department in which his now-familiar line, “diplomacy is back,” has become a rallying cry for a crowd eager to resume the day-to-day operations that underpin diplomacy. They can now proceed with the confidence that their work will be valued by the boss.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Treaties and Agreements, International Community, and Joe Biden
Political Geography:: North America, Global Focus, and United States of America

22. Baku Dialogues

Author:: Fariz Ismailzade
Publication Date:: 10-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Baku Dialogues
Institution:: ADA University
Abstract:: “Baku Dialogues” is a series of events featuring leading world personalities who will address subjects of current international interest by presenting their views and participating in discussion of these subjects with interested Azerbaijani and international figures. These presentations and discussions, along with other submissions, will be recorded in the “Baku Dialogues”, ADA University’s new journal of record for academic and policy research.
Topic:: Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Politics, and Conflict
Political Geography:: Global Focus

23. What Do Energy Sanctions Say About the World?

Author:: Aurelie Bros
Publication Date:: 08-2021
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Baku Dialogues
Institution:: ADA University
Abstract:: Statecraft is often understood as the art of conducting state affairs in order to exert a direct influence on other actors in the international system in order to get them to do what they would not do otherwise. To achieve their goals, policymakers are able to employ a variety of levers such as diplomacy, propaganda, military statecraft, and economic statecraft. According to Elizabeth Ellis of the Inter‑ Disciplinary Ethics Applied Centre of the University of Leeds, the latter category encompasses all economic means—including recourse to economic sanctions— that might be used by international actors with the intention of (i) preventing objectionable policy or behavior, (ii) sending a message, or (iii) punishing unlawful policy or behavior. Princeton University’s David A. Baldwin wrote in 1985 that economic sanctions are divided into two main categories: those with a punitive function and those aimed at encouraging or rewarding. He also noted that they impact trade (e.g. embargo, quotas, and (un)favorable tariff discriminations) as well as capital (e.g. aid suspension, controls on imports or exports, and (dis)advantageous taxation), and that they can be used wisely or unwisely, justly or unjustly, depending on the situation at hand. Although economic sanctions have a long history, with origins in Antiquity, they are unequally distributed over time. For example, their use greatly increased during the post‑World War II era, especially in the energy sector. This increasing use of energy sanctions has been particularly noticeable since the early 1970s. Over the past several decades, they have essentially become a way for energy producers and consumers to exert disapproval over one another and to weaken those considered to be morally responsible for objectionable policies (not always related to energy issues). Energy sanctions, therefore, are often paired with non‑energy economic sanctions targeting a large array of goods and services. For example, an oil embargo can take place in tandem with nuclear‑related sanctions aimed at stopping military use of civilian nuclear power technology—as in the Iranian case. Energy sanctions are always deeply rooted in a wider political and economic environment, reflecting the global order of their time. This essay will focus mainly on the bipolar international system led by the United States and the Soviet Union between 1947 and 1991, which was followed by a post‑Cold War international system in which the United States assumed the role of the world’s leading power, supported by Western‑dominated organizations. Nevertheless, this unipolar, rules‑based order is now under pressure, perhaps even duress—some argue it is coming to an end.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Energy Policy, Sanctions, and Conflict
Political Geography:: Global Focus

24. The Influence of Diplomacy on Controversies: A Comparative Study Between Diplomatic Mediation and Armed Conflict

Author:: Cícero Ricci Cavini
Publication Date:: 06-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Institution:: Brazilian Journal of African Studies
Abstract:: International Security developed after the World War II, under the aspect of state protection. Traditional security currents have developed their theories in a Cold War environment, thus, there are epistemological elements of Rationalism and Positivism (Barrinha 2013; Lasmar 2017). The goal of this study is to observe the influence of diplomacy on international controversies, analyze real situations where diplomacy influenced the mediation choice and the armed conflict choice, and finally, deepen the knowledge of the consequences of war and mediation. The article has its theoretical framework on Post-Structuralism, characterized by Lasmar (2017) by the conditioning of the human being as meaning and attributor of the facts (social construction). In the International Security sphere, Post-Structuralism must nominate the threat or the protection as also the means for this. Therefore, it can expose the hidden intentions in the act of political construction (including political speech). The authors and researchers Christer Jönsson and Karin Aggestam question the preference of the states for mediation or war, and, given that, we intend to contribute with analysis under the diplomatic prism. Thus, we can align the revisited theory to the diplomatic actions, collaborating with the international security system.
Topic:: Conflict Prevention, International Relations, Security, and Diplomacy
Political Geography:: Brazil and Global Focus

25. Doing Development Better

Author:: Christopher Datta
Publication Date:: 05-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Across the developing world the United States runs aid programs that have met the laudable goal of reducing infant mortality and maternal death resulting from childbirth. We have done some astonishing things, such as completely eliminating smallpox. Now we are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic by working to equip local communities with the tools needed to fight back against the coronavirus. Effective and inexpensive vaccines are everywhere administered to countless children who would otherwise die or be crippled by disease. More vaccines are on the way, perhaps even one for malaria, one of the biggest killers in the developing world. It is nothing short of a miracle. And yet the impact of these efforts in many countries could well be a legacy of war, famine, misery and the creation of new and even worse diseases.
Topic:: Development, Diplomacy, USAID, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

26. Strengthening the Relationship Between Embassies and U.S. Special Operations Forces: Part 1, the Current Environment

Author:: Carter Wilbur
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: The release of the National Security Strategy (NSS)[i] in 2017 and related National Defense Strategy (NDS)[ii] in 2018 shifted the United States’ strategic focus to what has become known as Great Power Competition (GPC). These strategies acknowledge that the almost 20-year long fight against violent extremist organizations (VEOs) will continue, but add the need to address emerging and enduring threats from near-peer competitors such as Russia and China, and those approaching that status, such as Iran and North Korea. To address these authoritarian competitors requires the seamless integration of all aspects of U.S. power. Specifically, this article seeks to examine the current status of the relationship between U.S. embassies and U.S. Special Operations Forces (USSOF), while Part 2 will propose some specific ways to improve that working relationship.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, National Security, Armed Forces, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

27. Strengthening the Relationship Between Embassies and U.S. Special Operations Forces: Part 2, Five USSOF–Embassy Truths

Author:: Carter Wilbur
Publication Date:: 02-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: As the U.S. shifts its focus to Great Power Competition (GPC), the relationship between USSOF and embassies worldwide must likewise shift to reflect a whole-of-government approach. In Part 1, I took stock of the current relationship between U.S. embassies and U.S. Special Operations Forces (USSOF), which, while good overall, is too often geared to separate efforts rooted in the counter-terrorism context, where a USSOF unit’s narrow mission against a terrorist cell requires minimal coordination with the embassy’s broader political and economic missions. There are more ways embassies and USSOF can support each other than are currently being realized. The next step is for both sides to develop a more symbiotic, institutional relationship. To that end, I propose five points to guide the development of USSOF-embassy relations, based loosely on the “Five SOF Truths” that have summarized USSOF philosophy since 1987.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Armed Forces, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

28. Broadening the Foreign Service: The Role of Diplomats in Residence

Author:: June Carter Perry
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: What is a Diplomat in Residence in 2020? In order to reach out to potential future Foreign Service Officers (FSOs), the Department of State places experienced officers at colleges and universities in sixteen regions of the United States. The FSOs assigned as Diplomats in Residence (DIRs) offer guidance and advice on careers, internships and fellowships to students and professionals in the communities they serve. Although one might compare their roles to those of recruiters for corporations or universities, in fact, the DIR’s responsibilities are much broader. Based on my position as Diplomat in Residence at Howard University 2001-2002, the DIR is a counselor, a teacher, a mentor and sometimes a parent.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Foreign Aid, and Memoir
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

29. International Opinion of the U.S. Slides from Respect to Pity

Author:: Renee M. Earle
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: A few weeks ago, on July 4, we Americans celebrated our country and its freedoms, and we clearly have much to be grateful for – and also much to ponder. Seen both from within the U.S. and from much of the rest of the world, early Massachusetts Colonialist John Winthrop’s idealized “city on the hill” where “the eyes of the people will be upon us,” no longer looks as bright, and this should worry us. Much has been written to lament America’s retreat from the world stage during the current administration, which has been driven apparently by the mistaken notion that the U.S. can escape what affects the rest of the world simply by opting out or by saber rattling to get its way. But the longer the U.S. continues down this path, the question changes from whether the U.S. will want to reassume its 20th century role to whether the rest of the world will be willing to welcome back the America it perceives today. To watchers around the globe the America that led the world to increases in stability, prosperity, democracy, and human rights has disappeared in the trashing of international treaties and trade agreements, riots against racial discrimination, police violence, and our inability to deal effectively with the corona virus pandemic.
Topic:: International Relations, Diplomacy, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

30. Aligning Venus and Mars: Striking the Appropriate Balance Between Diplomacy and Defense in International Affairs

Author:: Charles Ray
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: The issue of militarization of American foreign policy is one that has simmered for decades. The American preference for employment of economic pressure and/or military force as a ‘quick-fix’ to deal with international problems instead of a more nuanced diplomatic approach is not a phenomenon of the 20th or 21st century. The increased militarization of U.S. foreign policy of the last decade is a continuation of a trend that has existed in one form or another for most of the nation’s history. The over-reliance on military power in foreign affairs, the militarization of U.S. foreign policy, dramatically increased with the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, and the 9/11 terrorist attacks. However, almost from the beginning of the founding of the republic, under pressure from business interests concerned with maintaining or increasing their prosperity or groups interested in maintaining their positions of influence or power, American political leaders have often resorted to use of force for a short-term solution.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, International Affairs, History, and Militarization
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

31. The Cardinal Sins of Diplomatic Political Analysis

Author:: Raymond A. Smith
Publication Date:: 08-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: American Diplomacy
Institution:: American Diplomacy
Abstract:: Dr. Smith’s 2011 book, The Craft of Political Analysis for Diplomats offered suggestions for doing political analysis better, from the viewpoint of a foreign service officer who had spent most of his diplomatic career practicing the craft. In this follow-on piece, Smith expands on his original discussion with thoughts on the cardinal sins of political analysis.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Political Analysis
Political Geography:: Global Focus and United States of America

32. American Diplomacy and the Fight Against Authoritarianism

Author:: Benjamin Press
Publication Date:: 09-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Ambassadors Review
Institution:: Council of American Ambassadors
Abstract:: Resurgent authoritarians are putting to the test the old adage that “democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.” Autocrats recognize that they have been losing battles on governance for decades. Liberal countries like the United States have aggressively invested in pro-democracy programming, strengthening civil society, political parties and the rule of law in countries across the world in an attempt to erect barriers against authoritarianism. Moreover, democracies have hammered autocrats on issues ranging from human rights to corruption, lending legitimacy to domestic dissidents and, to a certain extent, discrediting them on the global stage. But that paradigm is beginning to shift. As authoritarian powers—especially Russia and China—have become increasingly assertive in international affairs, they have aimed to legitimize their own governance models and bolster autocrats abroad. And as shown by recent data on the rise of so-called “autocratization,” their approach may be working. The support for authoritarianism abroad embodies a new type of governance strategy: autocracy promotion. In an inversion of traditional democracy promotion, autocracy promotion entails both rhetorical and concrete support for other authoritarians. From Russia offering to send in soldiers to put down protesters in Belarus to China weakening global human rights frameworks, autocracy promoters are seeking to tip the governance landscape in autocrats’ favor. Their direct mechanism for doing so is by helping weaker autocrats by bolstering their legitimacy and expanding their capacity to coerce and coopt domestic actors. By shifting narratives and providing material support, autocracy promoters ultimately aim to “make the world safe for autocracy.”
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Authoritarianism, and Conflict
Political Geography:: Global Focus

33. Recognition of National Football Federations and the Diplomatic Role of FIFA

Author:: Michal Marcin Kobierecki
Publication Date:: 01-2020
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Polish Political Science Yearbook
Institution:: Polish Political Science Association (PPSA)
Abstract:: The paper refers to the category of sports diplomacy and aims to investigate the issue of diplomatic subjectivity of international sports organizations, by the example of FIFA and its prerogative to grant membership to national football federations. Such processes on some occasions are connected to political and diplomatic significance, particularly in relation to states without universal international recognition, for whom participation in international sport is an important tool in their struggle for legitimization. The research question that the author attempts to answer is whether membership of national sports organization in the international sports federations can be meaningful from the perspective of the state’s endeavors toward securing international recognition. The hypothesis stated that the prerogative of international sports bodies such as FIFA to recognize national sports federations enhances their diplomatic subjectivity.
Topic:: Diplomacy, International Cooperation, Sports, Football, and FIFA
Political Geography:: Global Focus

34. Spring 2019 edition of Strategic Visions

Author:: Alan McPherson
Publication Date:: 03-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Strategic Visions
Institution:: Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, Temple University
Abstract:: Strategic Visions: Volume 18, Number II Contents News from the Director ................................2 Spring 2019 Colloquium.........................2 Spring 2019 Prizes...................................2 Diplomatic History...................................3 SHAFR Conference.................................4 Thanks to the Davis Fellow.......................4 Note from the Davis Fellow..........................5 Note from the Non-Resident Fellow...............6 News from the CENFAD Community............8 Spring 2019 Interviews...................................11 Erik Moore..............................................11 Eliga Gould Conducted by Taylor Christian..........13 Nancy Mitchell.......................................15 Book Reviews.................................................18 Jimmy Carter in Africa Review by Brandon Kinney................18 The Girl Next Door: Bringing the Home front to the Front Line Review by Ariel Natalo-Lifotn...........20 Armies of Sand: The Past, Present and Future of Arab Military Effectiveness Review by Brandon Kinney...............23 Jimmy Carter in Africa Review by Graydon Dennison...........25
Topic:: Diplomacy, Gender Issues, Power Politics, Military Affairs, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:: Africa, United States, Middle East, and Global Focus

35. he Importance of Gender Parity in the UN’s Efforts on International Peace and Security

Author:: Nahla Valji and Pablo Castillo
Publication Date:: 08-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:: School of Diplomacy and International Relations, Seton Hall University
Abstract:: This article highlights the continued stark absence of women from key policy spaces and sites of power and restates the case for the importance of gender parity as a fundamental building block of both gender equality and the overall effectiveness of institutions and outcomes. It does so through a focus on the area of international peace and security and the UN’s efforts, highlighting the way in which women’s inclusion is critical for efforts to secure sustainable peace. At a time when both the movement for gender equality and its backlash are ascendant political forces, and the proliferation of armed conflict is testing the credibility of multilateralism, it is significant that the UN is demanding transformation, starting with its own work force; and essential that this focus also include an emphatic insistence on the question of ‘where are the women’ in all areas of peace and security, serving as a model for other international and national actors.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Gender Issues, United Nations, Women, Inequality, and International Community
Political Geography:: United Nations and Global Focus

36. Diplomacy: The Future is Female (Full Journal Issue)

Author:: Meagan Torello, Nahla Valji, Pablo Castillo, Tanya Ansahta Garnett, Kari Øygard, Lina Abirafeh, Catherine Tinker, Renata Koch Alvarenga, Rachel Clement, and Lyric Thompson
Publication Date:: 08-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:: School of Diplomacy and International Relations, Seton Hall University
Abstract:: In the second issue of our 20th volume, the critical diplomatic roles from grassroots advocacy to international negotiations are explored. Nahla Valji and Pablo Castillo open this issue, arguing for the importance, and ultimate necessity, of gender parity for the success of the United Nations’ peace and security efforts. This article discusses the great need for gender parity both within the UN system as well as within its advocacy on the ground. Following, Tanya Ansahta Garnett and Kari Øygard offer a case study on women’s roles in peacebuilding and civic engagement in post-conflict Liberia. They discuss whether or not women’s participation and representation is an effective strategy towards meaningful long-term change. Lina Abirafeh then examines the widespread issue of genderbased violence in the Arab region by outlining several case studies. Abirafeh then considers how it continues to withhold women’s political and legal progress in the region. Changing gears, Catherine Tinker and Renata Koch Alvarenga then survey the successes and continued drawbacks to gender equality in climate finance, offering a call to action for quicker implementation of a genderresponsive approach to mitigating the effects of climate change. Rachel Clement and Lyric Thompson conclude this issue by discussing the theory behind a feminist foreign policy and what it will take to move beyond the definition to a comprehensively feminist approach to foreign policy that is engrained in all sectors of diplomacy while also elevating traditionally unheard voices.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Gender Issues, United Nations, Women, Inequality, and Intimate Partner Violence
Political Geography:: Arab Countries and Global Focus

37. Is the Future of Foreign Policy Feminist?

Author:: Lyric Thompson and Rachel Clement
Publication Date:: 08-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:: School of Diplomacy and International Relations, Seton Hall University
Abstract:: In 2014, Sweden’s Foreign Minister Margot Wallström took the worldby storm when she launched the world’s first explicitly feminist foreign policy. The new policy would be a way of doing things differently in Sweden’s international affairs, organizing its approach to diplomacy, development, and defense under a 3 Rs framework of women’s rights, resources, and representation, the latter of which this journal issue seeks to explore.
Topic:: Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Women, Inequality, and Feminism
Political Geography:: Europe, United Nations, Sweden, and Global Focus

38. An Analysis of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Light of its Form as a Framework Agreement

Author:: Monika Subritzky
Publication Date:: 08-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: The Goettingen Journal of International Law
Institution:: The Goettingen Journal of International Law
Abstract:: Nuclear weapons present a unique problem and risk to global safety and security. The destructive capability of nuclear weapons, which extends beyond intended targets, is what sets these weapons apart from all else; they are sui generis. These weapons are indiscriminate in both their scale of destruction, which cannot be said to involve proportionate force, and in their residual effects of radioactive fallout, which some scholars have equated to the effect of a poisoned weapon.1 The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) was adopted at the United Nations Headquarters on 7 July 2017, with 122 States voting in favour of the final draft, one voting against, and one abstaining.2 As of July 2019, the Treaty has twenty-three parties and seventy signatories.3 It is currently not in force as it requires ratification by a minimum of fifty States in order to come into effect.4 The core prohibitions of the Treaty are set out in its first Article, in which State parties agree to never develop, acquire, use or threaten to use, transfer, or stockpile nuclear weapons. What the Treaty does not do, however, is directly eliminate any nuclear weapons; a challenging task in itself considering that none of the current possessors of nuclear weapons even partook in the negotiation of the Treaty. State parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) have obligations under Article VI to undertake negotiations on effective measures leading to disarmament.5 Against a backdrop of little discernible progress on the implementation of Article VI over the last fifty years, Ireland, on behalf of the New Agenda Coalition, submitted a Working Paper outlining possible pathways to nuclear disarmament in an effort to fulfil the provisions of Article VI.6 These pathways were debated in 2016 during the Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG), which was set up for the purpose of providing a forum for discussion regarding advancing nuclear disarmament. The argument of this paper is that the TPNW has the potential to function radically as a disarmament mechanism. At first glance, the Treaty appears to fit within the second pathway outlined in the Irish Working Paper, effectively functioning as a simple Ban Treaty. However, a careful analysis reveals that it more neatly fits into the third pathway – a framework arrangement. It is this characteristic which makes the TPNW a novel and profound instrument as well as a potential foundational solution to the problem of nuclear weapons. The core section of the paper is divided into two parts. The first delves into the three main pathways discussed in the Irish Working Paper and analyzes how well each of the proposals can address the problem of achieving nuclear disarmament. As suggested by Brazil in the OEWG debates in 2016, three categories are key in establishing the degree to which each pathway can achieve progress in achieving nuclear disarmament – universality, effectiveness, and political viability.7 All nuclear disarmament treaties must intend to be universal in light of the humanitarian consequences of their usage. However, a disarmament treaty can be successful with universality as one of its objectives, rather than a precondition. Widespread support for a treaty also lends to its effectiveness, as do mechanisms for verification and enforcement.8 The political viability of a treaty is key as, without the willing participation of governments, proposals can easily be discarded. The analysis is centred on these categories. The second core part of the paper analyzes the structure of the TPNW with a focus on Articles 4 and 8. It demonstrates that the TPNW surreptitiously functions as a framework agreement and that this attribute has enormous value, both in practice and in shaping norms. The flexibility and adaptability of framework agreements is what makes them the most suitable mechanisms for nuclear disarmament.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, Treaties and Agreements, Military Strategy, and Denuclearization
Political Geography:: Global Focus

39. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW): A further Step Regarding the Unlawfulness of the Use of Nuclear Weapons / Tratado sobre la Prohibición de las Armas Nucleares (TPAN): un paso más en la ilicitud del empleo del arma nuclear

Author:: Elena C. Díaz Galán
Publication Date:: 12-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: Journal on International Security Studies (RESI)
Institution:: International Security Studies Group (GESI) at the University of Granada
Abstract:: The adoption of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which proposes a complete prohibition of this kind of weapons, gives an opportunity to think about the unlawfulness of its use and, where appropriate, the precise identification of the cases in which the use of nuclear weapons would be accepted by the international community. The goal of the TPNW is to eliminate the nuclear weapons in international relations thus this Treaty proclaims the unlawfulness of the use of such weapons. TPNW is a further step, although still insufficient, in prohibiting the use of nuclear weapons in an absolute and complete way in international relations. However, the simple adoption of this Treaty shows the necessity of agreement regarding such prohibition as well as keeping negotiations in order to achieve unanimous agreement on this matter by the international community. Most likely, the use of nuclear weapons should be considered as a specially prohibited case by the international legal order.
Topic:: Defense Policy, Diplomacy, Nuclear Weapons, Treaties and Agreements, Weapons, and Nonproliferation
Political Geography:: Global Focus

40. The “22 vs. 50” Diplomatic Split Between the West and China Over Xinjiang and Human Rights

Author:: Roie Yellinek and Elizabeth Chen
Publication Date:: 12-2019
Content Type:: Journal Article
Journal:: China Brief
Institution:: The Jamestown Foundation
Abstract:: On July 8, 2019, a group of 22 states issued a joint letter to the 41st session of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), which condemned China’s mass detention of Uyghurs and other minorities in the Xinjiang region of northwest China. [1] In the letter, the signatories expressed their countries’ concerns about “credible reports of arbitrary detention in large scale places of detention” in the region and “widespread surveillance and restrictions” targeting Uyghurs and other minorities. The letter (hereafter “First Letter”) called upon the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to uphold its national laws and international commitments, and to “refrain from the arbitrary detention and restrictions on freedom of movement of Uyghurs, and other Muslim and minority communities in Xinjiang” (UNHRC, July 8). Just four days later, on July 12, 2019, another group of 37 states issued a competing letter to the UNHRC that backed the PRC’s policies in the Xinjiang region (Xinhua, July 13). This letter (hereafter “Second Letter”) asserted that “the work of [UNHRC] should be conducted in an objective… non-confrontational and non-politicized matter,” and expressed “firm opposition to relevant countries’ practice of politicizing human rights issues, by naming and shaming, and publicly exerting pressures on other countries.” This Second Letter commended “China’s remarkable achievements” in “protecting and promoting human rights through development.” The letter further “call[ed] on relevant countries to refrain from employing unfounded charges against China,” and urged the UNHRC to approach the Xinjiang situation “in an objective and impartial manner… with true and genuinely credible information” (UNHRC, July 12). One signatory state, Qatar, subsequently withdrew its support. [2] However, by the time the Second Letter was re-issued later in July, representatives of thirteen additional states and the Palestinian Authority had added their support, bringing the total number of signatories to fifty. [3] This letter exchange between 22 critics and 50 supporters of the PRC’s policies in Xinjiang demonstrates how the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has leveraged its economic and political influence over other voting members at the UNHCR to advocate for its own positions, and to weaken legal and procedural frameworks of the international human rights regime.
Topic:: Diplomacy, Human Rights, International Cooperation, and Humanitarian Crisis
Political Geography:: China, Asia, and Global Focus

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COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS