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Begin New Search Topic International Relations Publishing Institution Brown Journal of World Affairs Publication Year within 5 Years Publication Year within 10 Years

1. The Cartographic Constitution Of International Politics

Author:
Jeppe Strandsbjerg
Publication Date:
03-2019
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Our current system of international politics is built on a cartographic real- ity of space. Te legal attachment of sovereignty to territory requires a particular cartographic representation of space. By this I mean that our system of states— being territorially defned—implicitly requires a geography that is mapped in a way that is compatible with our notion of sovereignty. Te cartographic image of state territory enables us to maintain the idea of territorial integrity even when the reality on the ground corresponds very little with the fundamental principles of the UN Charter: Sovereignty (Article 2:1) and Territorial Integrity (Article 2:4).1 When UN operations map the Democratic Republic of Congo it is represented as an integrated territory, and Iraq and Syria maintain their coherent cartographic-territorial representation even when both countries have been divided in all but formal name. Although these are obvious examples of the territorial ideal disagreeing with the power relations on the ground, they actually capture a general logic where the territorial order represented by the map precedes the order on the ground.
Topic:
International Relations, Geopolitics, International Relations Theory, and Cartography
Political Geography:
Global Focus

2. The Modern Political Map of Our Ocean Planet

Author:
Coalter G. Lathrop
Publication Date:
03-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
On land, the political map of the world has been relatively stable since the end of World War II: with some significant exceptions, most countries are, spatially, as they were in 1945 or shortly thereafter. Land borders are mostly set, and the major state-to-state territorial disputes that persist today are—again, with some notable exceptions—disputes over relatively small areas, mostly tiny insular features with negligible inherent value.
Topic:
International Relations, Geopolitics, Navy, Oceans and Seas, and Cartography
Political Geography:
Global Focus

3. Maps Of War And Peace: Rethinking Geography In International Affairs

Author:
Luis da Vinha
Publication Date:
03-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
In his memoirs of his final years as one of the United States’ most prominent foreign policy decision-makers, Henry Kissinger offers an anecdote involving President Nixon and the Prime Minister of Mauritius, Seewoosagur Ramgoolam. As part of the celebration of the UN’s twenty-fifth anniversary, Ramgoolam was invited to dine with Nixon at the White House on 24 October 1970. The gathering nearly created a diplomatic faux pas due in large part to the admin- istration’s confusion regarding the geography of Africa. According to Kissinger, the national security staff mistook the country of Mauritius—U.S. ally and island nation located in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar—for Mauritania, a northwestern African nation that had broken diplomatic relations with the United States in 1967 as a result of U.S. support for Israel during the Six-Day War.
Topic:
International Relations, War, Geopolitics, Peace, and Cartography
Political Geography:
United Nations and Global Focus

4. Leadership And Policy-Making: Lessons From The U.S. Government

Author:
Prudence Bushnell
Publication Date:
03-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
On 6 April 1994, the airplane carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Bu- rundi was shot out of the sky over Kigali, Rwanda. Within hours of the crash, Rwanda’s fragile power-sharing agreement negotiated in the 1993 Arusha Peace Accords became history. Fighting erupted in the streets among forces of the Hutu-dominated Rwandan interim government military and the largely Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). Moderate members of the Hutu opposition and Tutsi political figures and citizens became the first targets for slaughter.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Geopolitics, and Leadership
Political Geography:
United States, Rwanda, and Burundi

5. Spies, Election Meddling, and Disinformation: Past and Present

Author:
Calder Walton
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Spies, election meddling, disinformation, influence operations, data har- vesting: at present, it seems barely a moment passes without another intelligence scandal breaking on our news feeds. Following Russia’s “sweeping and systematic” attack on the 2016 U.S. presidential election—which was intended to support Moscow’s favored candidate, Donald J. Trump, and undermine his opponent, Hillary Clinton—the media frequently labeled the operation “unprecedented.” The social-media technologies that Russia deployed in its cyber-attack on the United States in 2016 were certainly new, but Russia’s strategy was far from unusual. In fact, the Kremlin has a long history of meddling in U.S. and other Western democratic elections and manufacturing disinformation to discredit and divide the West. Russia’s leader, Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer, has reconstituted and updated the KGB’s old Cold War playbook for the new digital age. This paper, an exercise of applied history, has two aims: first, to understand the history of Soviet disinformation, and second, to make sense of Western efforts to counter it during the Cold War. Doing so provides policy-relevant conclusions from history about countering disinformation produced by Russia and other authoritarian regimes today.
Topic:
International Relations, Cold War, Espionage, and Disinformation
Political Geography:
Russia and United States of America