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48781. (Information) Revolution in One Country

Author:
Anthony Olcott
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
Speaking in China on November 16, 2009, President Barack Obama said, “I think that the more freely information flows, the stronger the society becomes, because then citizens of countries around the world can hold their own governments accountable. They can begin to think for themselves” [video—transcript]. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton quoted most of the same phrase two months later in her own ringing endorsement of Internet freedom, delivered in a speech at the Washington, DC, Newseum on January 21, 2010.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Globalization, International Security, and Power Politics
Political Geography:
China and Washington

48782. Strategies—Good and Bad—for Navigating Information Hyperabundance

Author:
Anthony Olcott
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
Dr. Fingar made the comment above to highlight the challenges that “the explosive growth of the amount of information that is out there” now present to the analytic and policymaker communities—as illustrated by the fact that official People's Republic of China (PRC) statistics from 2003, the last year they were published, put the number of China's periodicals at 11,193. However, although Fingar did not say so, there is some chance that his project thirty-one years before may have been driven, in part at least, by the intelligence community's recognition that there was already too much information.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Intelligence, Science and Technology, and Communications
Political Geography:
China

48783. All That Is Solid Melts Into Air

Author:
Anthony Olcott
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
It is eerie to reread The Communist Manifesto while contemplating the profound and deeply unpredictable effects of the new information revolution. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels saw dialectical materialism and the iron laws of history as driving change, not the Internet and the digitization of information, but their jeremiad, that “all that is solid melts into air,” looks startlingly prescient in regard to huge swaths of the information industry. Book publishing, TV network news, newspapers, and even traditional universities are, if not melting into air, then at least finding their revenue bases eroding, their customer bases migrating, and the positions of prestige they once occupied shrinking toward nothingness.
Topic:
Demographics, Economics, Industrial Policy, Science and Technology, Social Stratification, and Culture

48784. Institutions and Information: The Challenge of the Six Vs

Author:
Anthony Olcott
Publication Date:
04-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
Humans have always wanted information, but technological limitations have always made information difficult and costly to create, transmit, and retain. The consequences of those limitations are among the factors driving the formation of large administrative entities, primary among them states. Addressing and redressing the information shortage that physical reality mandated gave states the opportunity to control and channel information, in all manner of ways.
Topic:
Economics, Intelligence, Politics, Science and Technology, and Communications

48785. Delegitimizing Nuclear Weapons: Examining the Validity of Nuclear Deterrence

Author:
Ward Wilson, Ken Berry, Nikolai Sokov, Patricia Lewis, and Benoît Pélopidas
Publication Date:
05-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies
Abstract:
The study on ―Delegitimizing Nuclear Weapons: Examining the Validity of Nuclear Deterrence‖ by Ken Berry, Patricia Lewis, Benoît Pélopidas, Nikolai Sokov and Ward Wilson was commissioned by the Swiss Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and undertaken by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, the Monterey Institute of International Studies.
Topic:
Security, Arms Control and Proliferation, Nuclear Weapons, Peace Studies, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United Nations

48786. US-Vietnam: New Strategic Partners Begin Tough Trade Talks

Author:
Raymond Burghardt
Publication Date:
02-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
East-West Center
Abstract:
Vietnamese and Americans joined together in Hanoi last December for a happy celebration, commemorating the tenth anniversary of the entrance into force of the US-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement signed in December, 2001. The gathering of current and former trade negotiators, diplomats, and business leaders exchanged witty anecdotes about who had been the toughest negotiator. However, the main focus for both American and Vietnamese participants was on the positive prospects for future US-Vietnam relations across the spectrum of trade and strategic common interests.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Cold War, International Trade and Finance, and Bilateral Relations
Political Geography:
United States, America, Vietnam, and Southeast Asia

48787. From the Editor

Author:
Rashid I. Khalidi
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
IN THIS ISSUE, JPS addresses many elements of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Palestine question that appeared to be immutable certainties but have recently come into question. One such element is the feasibility, and indeed the desirability, of a two-state resolution to the conflict. Many of those who feel that such an outcome is desirable have come to the conclusion that it has been rendered moot by Israel's ceaseless creation of facts on the ground in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. This growth of new thinking about Palestine and Israel is reflected in this issue's Open Forum section, which contains two pieces, one by a Swedish diplomat and another by an Israeli academic, that offer new alternatives and modifications to the well-known one- and two-state models for a resolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict.
Political Geography:
Israel, Palestine, and Arabia

48788. From Law and Order to Pacification: Britain's Suppression of the Arab Revolt in Palestine, 1936-39

Author:
Matthew Hughes
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
This article examines British human rights abuses against noncombatants during the 1936-39 Arab Revolt in Palestine, contextualizing brutality in Palestine within British military practice and law for dealing with colonial rebellions in force at the time. It shows that the norms for such operations, and the laws that codified military actions, allowed for some level of systemic, systematic brutality in the form of "collective punishments" and "reprisals" by the British army. The article also details the effects of military actions on Palestinian civilians and rebels and describes torture carried out by the British on Palestinians. Finally, it highlights a methodological problem in examining these sorts of abuses: the paucity of official records and the mismatch between official and unofficial accounts of abuse during counterinsurgency.
Topic:
War
Political Geography:
Palestine and Arabia

48789. Reflections on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict in U.S. Public Discourse: Legitimizing Dissent

Author:
Sara Roy
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
This essay argues that the climate of intimidation and fear surrounding a more critical discussion of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the United States has begun to change. Despite the obstacles that still remain, a counterdiscourse challenging dominant conceptualizations and understandings of the conflict, particularly Israel's role, has not only emerged but also gained growing legitimacy and weight. These changes can be found in academia (at all levels of the educational hierarchy), civil society, and policy circles. Some of the most dramatic changes have occurred within the U.S. Jewish community in which an oppositional movement-in part, generational-has grown increasingly strong and well organized, ending any notion of a Jewish consensus on Israel.
Topic:
Civil Society and Climate Change
Political Geography:
United States, Israel, and Palestine

48790. One Land, Two States? Parallel States as an Example of "Out of the Box" Thinking on Israel/Palestine

Author:
Mathias Mossberg
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
In recent years, faced with a stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace process and Israel's continued creation of facts on the ground, many have started to question whether it is still possible to implement a viable two-state solution, which is the peace process's stated goal. A number of alternative ways forward in the conflict have therefore been suggested that go beyond the usual one-state solution. As part of an exercise of "thinking outside the box," JPS is running two essays that suggest unconventional frameworks for dealing with the conflict.
Topic:
War
Political Geography:
Israel and Palestine

48791. The Israeli-Palestinian Union: The "1-2-7 States" Vision of the Future

Author:
Lev Grinberg
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
IMAGINATION IS A NECESSARY but insufficient precondition for political change. Equally crucial are the political capacity to negotiate and compromise, a relatively even balance of power, and the authority (and popular support) to implement agreements. In addition to a lack of any shared vision, all these elements were absent in the Israeli-Palestinian "peace process" of 1993- 2000. Two charismatic leaders allegedly committed to the two-state solution, Yitzhak Rabin and Yasir Arafat, failed to agree on borders, postponed negotiations, and neglected to take steps to start decolonization. Their failure, compounded by subsequent developments on the ground, critically jeopardized the two-state solution's future chances of success. The one-state scenario on the other hand has not even reached the table. In light of the obstacles in the way of these two most commonly mentioned solutions, this essay suggests an alternative vision of how to contain the conflict in the absence of reaching a "solution".
Topic:
Democratization, Post Colonialism, and International Security
Political Geography:
Israel and Palestine

48792. "Quo Vadis Israel?" The Second IPS-Mansour Armaly MESA Conference Panel, 2009

Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
This November, the Institute for Palestine Studies (IPS) was privileged to host the second IPS-Mansour Armaly panel on Palestine at the annual conference of the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) held in Boston. Dr. Armaly (1927-2005) was a world renowned pioneer in the treatment of glaucoma; according to the Archives of Ophthalmology, he "substantially changed the way glaucoma is conceptualized, evaluated and treated," with his contributions having become "such an integral part of medical practice that their revolutionary nature may no longer be apparent." Though the recipient of the medical field's highest honors, he never forgot his roots in Shafa 'Amr, Palestine. In the last few years of his life, he was the chairman of the Friends of the Institute for Palestine Studies. Dr. Armaly's family decided to honor his commitment to Palestine through these panels.
Political Geography:
Middle East and Palestine

48793. The Goldstone Report: Excerpts and Responces

Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Whatever the ultimate fate of the Goldstone report's recommendations, the report itself, in the fierce emotions and controversy it has unleashed, will stand as a fitting coda to the event it investigates. Operation Cast Lead (OCL), Israel's military assault on the Gaza Strip launched 27 December 2008 with the avowed intention of stopping Hamas rocket fire on southern Israel, left some 1,400 Palestinians (mostly civilians) and 13 Israelis (including 3 civilians) dead. In the weeks and months that followed the operation's end on 18 January 2009, numerous human rights organizations published investigations of violations of human rights and humanitarian law committed during the conflict, principally on the Israeli side, but none was awaited with such anticipation or attracted such attention as the report of the UN Fact-Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict, otherwise known as the Goldstone report.
Political Geography:
Palestine

48794. Monterescu and Rabinowitz: Mixed Towns, Trapped Communities: Historical Narratives, Spatial Dynamics, Gender Relations and Cultural Encounters in Palestinian-Israeli Towns

Author:
Elizabeth Faier
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
This edited collection of essays examines how processes of modernity and nationalism intersect in the production and shaping of urban spaces. By focusing on "mixed towns" in Israel/Palestine, the authors illuminate the varied ways in which individuals and groups articulate identity, conflict, collective memory, nationalism, and daily life. Unlike much literature on the Middle East that favors homeland/Holy Land dichotomies or other static models, this volume eschews such tidy frameworks and instead reveals what the editors describe as "a fascinating array of contradictions, overlaps, collusions, protrusions" (p. 2) that characterize interpersonal and structural interactions between Jewish and Palestinian urbanites in both historical and contemporary contexts. Strikingly, the chapters demonstrate how the realization of one set of national goals comes directly in the face of "the other," often involving processes of erasure that rewrite the city. As editors Daniel Monterescu and Dan Rabinowitz argue, the "competition over space, including urban space, was part and parcel of reality from the initial stages of the bifurcated national effort".
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

48795. Yacobi: The Jewish-Arab City: Spatio-Politics in a Mixed Community

Author:
Nimer Sultany
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
The Palestinian citizens of Israel live mostly in separate Arab communities. Only a minority lives in so-called "mixed cities." Thus, one would think that if there was any actual, or any hope for potential, coexistence inside Israel between the Jewish majority and the Palestinian minority it would be found in these cities. But what does the notion of "mixed city" really signify?
Political Geography:
Palestine and Arabia

48796. Seward: Jerusalem's Traitor: Josephus, Masada, and the Fall of Judea

Author:
Keith W. Whitelam
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Desmond Seward, who normally specializes in popular historical works on medieval and early modern European history, has set out to provide an account of the life and work of Josephus, the first century C.E. Jewish historian, for general rather than academic readers. This departure was inspired by his father's experiences as a British Royal Air Force pilot in Palestine during World War I, which instilled in him a love of William Whiston's translation of Josephus's The Jewish War (London, 1736) and "a respect for the fighting qualities of the Jews in both ancient and modern times".
Political Geography:
Europe and Palestine

48797. Schanzer: Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine

Author:
Khaled Hroub
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Hamas vs. Fatah: The Struggle for Palestine belongs to that genre of sensational and populist journalism that eschews objective analysis and has no use for academic rigor. Packaging prejudice and hatred against Palestinians under the guise of academic work, Jonathan Schanzer, a director of policy at the Jewish Policy Center and counterterrorism analyst at the U.S. Department of Treasury, aims to build an anti-Palestinian polemic whose vulgarity would stun many readers, including many mainstream Israelis. Anti-Palestinianism infests the book from cover to cover as the author recycles every tired Zionist misconception about the Palestinians in a new disguise: the Hamas-Fatah rivalry. Thus, we read that the PLO and its factions "became the preeminent model for terrorism in the modern era" and that "violence in the name of Palestinian nationalism has led to death and destruction in nearly every territory that the Palestinians have inhabited" (p. 8). All military activities against Israel and its armed forces are naturally labeled "terrorist attacks," but Israeli atrocities, say, against the unarmed village of Samu' in November 1966, in which "more than 70 people" (p. 18) were killed, is not.
Political Geography:
Israel and Palestine

48798. Azani: Hezbollah: The Story of the Party of God: From Revolution to Institutionalization

Author:
Kristian P. Alexander
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
The "Hizballah model" has become synonymous with a militarily successful, politically astute, and strategically flexible organization that has managed to garner wide popular support in the Arab world, if not respect, for most of its actions and social services. Given its staying power and influence, Hizballah has been heralded as an exemplary model for others to emulate. How has this social movement-cum-political party managed to survive and morph into one of the most influential Islamic organizations over the years?
Topic:
Islam
Political Geography:
Arabia

48799. Hoffman: My Happiness Bears No Relation to Happiness: A Poet's Life in the Palestinian Century

Author:
Khaled Furani
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
In telling the story of Taha Muhammad Ali, Adina Hoffman captures with remarkable sensitivity the sadness, hilarity, mysteries, absurdities, and absences that have made up the life of an extracanonical Palestinian poet, whose reputation in English surpasses his reputation in the Arab world. Born in 1931, Taha, as Hoffman refers to him, hails from the vanquished village of Saffuriyya and for decades sold trinkets to Christian pilgrims, only a few kilometers from his obliterated birthplace, in Nazareth, where he and his family made their home after a brief refuge in Lebanon.
Political Geography:
Palestine and Lebanon

48800. Laidi-Hanieh: Palestine, rien ne nous manque ici

Author:
Sarah A. Rogers
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Palestine Studies
Institution:
Institute for Palestine Studies
Abstract:
Palestine, rien ne nous manque ici is a collection of memoirs, poetry, short prose, interviews, and reproductions of photographs, art, and posters. Some contributions have been previously published; others are translated from Arabic and English into French; and many represent leading Palestinian writers, artists, and intellectuals working in the occupied territories and its diasporas with a select number of foreign authors in the mix. Together, the pieces document the vibrant steadfastness of Palestinian cultural production, one that significantly refrains from a tone of either uncritical celebration or victimization. Instead, the compilation presents a complex glimpse into the emotional, ethical, and sociopolitical issues at stake in the contemporary conditions of Palestinians and the ways in which these larger issues inflect individual experience.
Political Geography:
Palestine