Report to Congress ... (NSM-20)
In a world grappling with escalating geopolitical tensions and the human cost of armed conflict, understanding the responsible transfer of military aid is paramount. This book provides an unprecedented look into the complexities of U.S. security cooperation, highlighting the vital balance between supporting allies and partners while upholding international law and mitigating civilian harm. By shedding light on real-world examples and analyzing the challenges faced in ensuring accountability, this report serves as a critical resource for anyone invested in promoting global security and safeguarding human rights.This closely watched report stopped short of defining Israel's actions in Gaza since the Hamas attack on October 7 as genocide.This annotated edition illustrates the capabilities of the AI Lab for Book-Lovers to add context and ease-of-use to manuscripts. It includes several types of abstracts, building from simplest to more complex: TLDR (one word), ELI5, TLDR (vanilla), Scientific Style, and Action Items; essays to increase viewpoint diversity, such as Grounds for Dissent, Red Team Critique, and MAGA Perspective; and Notable Passages and Nutshell Summaries for each page.
Answers to the Labour Question
This book explores how and why nations with shared characteristics nevertheless developed strikingly different answers to "the labour question."
Tanzania's Land Rush
After the global financial crisis of 2008, a new trend in foreign direct investments (FDI) emerged: investors' rising interest in farmland in developing nations. This 'land rush' was a marker of increased land commodification and agricultural financialization, but has also been associated with global narratives of agricultural modernization, and development through FDI of 'cheap, unproductive and/or idle' farmland. Yet, as this book demonstrates, global investment dynamics are dictated by complex economic, political, socio-historical dynamics in any host country. Focusing on the land rush in Tanzania, the contexts of six investment projects in the nation are examined and unpacked, helping to understand the ways in which political struggles over land, capital and authority all feed into determining the goals - and eventually the outcomes - of the 'farmland investment game'.
Bad Cop
Where will Dutton lead the Coalition?Who is Peter Dutton, and what happened to the Liberal Party? In Bad Cop, Lech Blaine traces the making of a hardman - from Queensland detective to leader of the Opposition, from property investor to minister for Home Affairs. This is a story of ambition, race and power, and a politician with a plan.Dutton became Liberal leader with a strategy to win outer-suburban and regional seats from Labor. Since then we have seen his demolition of the Voice and a rolling campaign of culture wars. What does Peter Dutton know about the Australian electorate? Has he updated Menzies' Forgotten People pitch for the age of anxiety, or will he collapse the Liberals' broad church? This revelatory portrait is sardonic, perceptive and altogether compelling."Dutton doesn't need to become prime minister to redraw the battle lines of Australian politics. His fight with Albanese over the suburbs and regions was always going to drag the political conversation rightwards: on race, immigration, gender and the pace of a transition away from fossil fuels ... Dutton's raison d'礙tre? Make Australia Afraid Again. Then he will offer himself as the lesser of two evils. A serious strongman for the age of anxiety."-Bad Cop, Lech BlaineThis issue also contains correspondence discussing Quarterly Essay 92, The Great Divide, from Nicole Haddow, Joseph Walker, Judith Brett, Brendan Coates & Joey Moloney, Mark Walker, Peter Tulip, Nicholas Reece, Pete Wargent, Peter Mares, Saul Eslake, Stephen Smith, Evan Thornley & Jane-Frances Kelly, and Alan Kohler.
Abusing The Public Trust
In Kansas, sexual offenders are classified as an extreme danger, per the procedures in the KSVPA. This occurs at the end of there prison sentence. At some point, these individuals will be released from under the KSVPA. Reintegration is the first stage in this release procedure. This book details the entire process of reintegration. Dustin Merryfield, as confined SVP, has a Associates and Bachelor's degree in Theology, a Paralegal Degree, and Diplomas in PC Repair, Accounting, and Criminal Justice.
Performing Statecraft
The crafts of governance and diplomacy are spectacular, theatrical, and performative. Performing Statecraft investigates the performances of states, their leaders, and their citizens on an expanded field of the global arts of statecraft to consider the role of performance in the domestic and international affairs of states, and the interventions into global politics by artists, scholars, and activists. Treating theatre as both an art form and a practice of political actors, this book draws together scholarship on the embodied dimensions of governance, the stagecraft of revolution, arts activism on the world stage, sports performance by heads of state, the performativity of national dress, speechmaking and colonialism, war and medicine, singing diplomats, indigenous sovereignties, and performed nationalisms. It brings the perspective and methods of performance studies to bear on global politics, offering exciting new insights into encounters between states, sovereigns, and people. Whether one is watching a campaign speech, a nightly news broadcast, a sacred dance, or a play about global conflict, these chapters make clear the importance of performance as a tool wielded by amateurs and professionals to articulate the nation in global spaces.
The ABC of the United Nations General Assembly, Navigating Global Challenges in a Fragmented World
Simon Pascal Alain Handy's seminal book takes a deep dive into the history of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) from its origin in 1946 as a global platform dedicated to the "Glory of God and in Prayer for Peace on Earth." Operating under the principle of one country, one vote, the UNGA is often characterized by entrenched positions and a lack of consensus leading to inaction and inertia. Handy argues that the UNGA is still essential and offers groundbreaking proposals to revamp it. These include a seventh committee that integrates high-tech companies to regulate surveillance capitalism, Al, and the global economy in the face of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.Handy calls for a reformed General Assembly that embraces the Global South amid a second wave of independence in Africa, and advocates to redress the imbalance of power among member states, prioritizing cooperation over conflict resolution. He outlines a renewed role for NATO in its dealings with the UNGA and provides a comprehensive peace plan to resolve the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.By recalling the original vision and realigning its founding principles, Handy asserts that the UNGA can effectively address the pressing challenges of our fragmented world.SIMON PASCAL ALAIN HANDY served as a UN official for 23 years in various capacities, including political analyst, special advisor to four UN special representatives, chief technical advisor in crisis prevention at the UN Development Programme, associate expert on disarmament at the UN HQ in New York, and chief of the party for the Haiti Transition Initiative. His extensive career in global affairs has addressed complex humanitarian emergencies and high-level political negotiations in conflict zones across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and the Caribbean.He is a senior executive fellow at Harvard University Kennedy School of Government, a visiting fellow at the EU Institute for Security Studies, and a visiting scholar at York University's Department of Politics in Toronto. He holds postgraduate degrees in political science, strategic studies, and international relations, and is completing his Ph.D. in political science.Handy is currently the CEO of the HCCP Global Think Tank in Brussels, which strives to build collaborative political and cultural relationships between Africa and the rest of the world.
Covid-19 "Humanitarianism"
What motivates states to assist other countries in need? Focusing on Chinese, Russian, and American decisions about COVID-19 aid, this book illuminates the role of historically contingent ideas in donors' decisions. Drawing on the theoretical insights of the critical geopolitics tradition, it advances and tests explanations for aid-related decisions on a novel global dataset of COVID-19 aid. Rigorously theorized, meticulously researched, and accessibly written, this book illuminates the ways in which China and Russia seek to reshape the humanitarian field consistent with their geopolitical visions. Their competition with the US over approaches to aid has weakened the integrity of humanitarian system.
The Art of Diplomacy
A riveting retelling of diplomatic history with praise from Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Bertie Ahern (Ireland), Tony Blair (UK), Ehud Olmert (Israel), and more. "A magisterial tome on the international negotiations that shaped modern American history.... Grand in scope and grounded in decades of experience, The Art of Diplomacy is a compelling work of political history aimed at the diplomatic negotiators of tomorrow." -Foreword Reviews Commended by Kirkus Reviews, which says Eizenstat writes with "authority and clarity of experience." Inside the greatest diplomatic negotiations of the past 50 yearsIn one readable volume, diplomat and negotiator Stuart E. Eizenstat covers every major contemporary international agreement, from the treaty to end the Vietnam War to the Kyoto Protocols and the Iranian Nuclear Accord. Written from the perspective that only a participant in top level negotiations can bring, Eizenstat recounts the events that led up to the negotiation, the drama that took place around the table, and draws lessons from successful and unsuccessful strategies and tactics. Based on interviews with over 60 key figures in American diplomacy, including former presidents and secretaries of state, and major political figures abroad, Eizenstat provides an intimate view of diplomacy as today's history. The Art of Diplomacy will be an indispensable volume to understand American foreign policy and provide invaluable insights on the art of negotiation for anyone involved in government or business negotiations.
India and Germany in a Turbulent World
India has a multi-dimensional relationship with the Federal Republic of Germany, which is its largest trading partner within the European Union, a major source and destination of foreign direct investment, a significant donor, and an important source of technology. This timely and in-depth book examines the evolution and expansion of India's economic, political, defence, and scientific-technological relationship with Germany from 1947 to the present day. It analyses mutual perceptions, highlights the elements of convergence and divergence, and discusses the challenges and prospects in a world that is in geopolitical flux and disarray. The book argues that India and Germany have an incrementally increasing relationship with more overlapping than conflicting interests. Drawing on extensive English and German language source material, including declassified documents of the German Foreign Office, and interviews with past and present policy-makers/stakeholders, this volume fills a long-felt gap in existing literature.
Geopolitical Shifts and Opportunities
India and Southeast Asian countries share a strong civilisational connect. India's relationship with Southeast Asia is continued to be shaped by the changing geo-political environment. India's engagement with the Southeast Asia is deeply rooted in culture, commerce and connectivity. Both highly value friendship and mutual trust. The relationship between them has truly become multidimensional and has scored an impressive performance over time at bilateral and regional levels. Based on a conference organised by the Indian Council of World Affairs (ICWA) on 20-21 July 2022 to commemorate the thirty years of the ASEAN-India relations, this book sheds light on changing profile of the India-Southeast Asia relations and underlines the desire of the Southeast Asian countries and India to diversify and further strengthen the relations in the challenging times. This book is an important companion for the policymakers, academia, students of international relations and economics, diplomats and the general readership as well.
Foreigners’ Rights in Japan
Do foreigners really have ' human rights' in Japan? This book sheds light on the way Japan views foreigners by examining court cases initiated in the wake of the issuance of deportation orders. ' Special permission to stay' is issued to foreigners who have been given deportation orders when the state finds special circumstances that should be taken into consideration that merit the granting of residence status. A ' residence status' is required for foreigners to live in Japan, and what foreigners can do in Japan varies greatly depending on which status they have. This is the system through which Japan, as a nation, ' evaluates' foreigners and determines the extent to which it will afford them rights. This book closely observes the court records of various cases involving requests for special permission to stay in Japan, and analyzes the decision-making process made by the government. It examines the logic and ideology applied by the state to define the line between ' acceptable' and ' unacceptable' foreigners, shedding light on the structures embedded within Japan that determine who can stay in the country and who cannot.
Beyond States and Spies
Scholars have long viewed intelligence as the preserve of nation states. Where the term 'private sector intelligence' is used, the focus has been overwhelmingly on government contractors. As such, a crucial aspect of intelligence power has been overlooked: the use of intelligence by corporations to navigate and influence the world. Where there has been academic scrutiny of the field, it is seen as a post-9/11 phenomenon, and that a state monopoly of intelligence has been eroded. Beyond States and Spies demonstrates - through original research - that such a monopoly never existed. Private sector intelligence is at least as old as the organised intelligence activities of the nation state. The book offers a comparative examination of private and public intelligence, and makes a compelling case for understanding the dangers posed by unregulated intelligence in private hands. Overall, this casts new light on a hitherto under investigated academic space.
The Kazakh Spring
How can a de-institutionalised protest movement disrupt a solidified, repressive and extremely resilient authoritarian regime? Using the context of the Kazakh Spring protests (2019-ongoing), Diana T. Kudaibergen focuses on how the interplay between a repressive regime and democratisation struggles define and shape each other. Combining original interview data, digital ethnography and contentious politics studies, she argues that the new generation of activists, including Instagram political influencers and renowned public intellectuals, have been able to de-legitimise and counter one of the most resilient authoritarian regimes and inspire mass protests that none of the formalised opposition ever imagined possible in Kazakhstan. 'The Kazakh Spring' is the first book to detail the emergence of this political field of opportunities that allowed the possibility to rethink the political limits in Kazakhstan, essentially toppling the long-term dictator in unprecedented mass protests of the Bloody January 2022.
Bulwark of the Old Regime
In 1740, the French King Louis XV granted his Swedish-led forces the title of Royal Swedish Regiment, for which it received the same privileges as all royal regiments, including the protection of the king, new flags, and ordinance. Louis XV acted to fulfill a request of King Fredrik I of Sweden and to demonstrate his satisfaction with the great value shown by the regiment in battle. This intriguing book traces the history of this storied regiment throughout its service, including during the American War of Independence, and up to the time of the French Revolution of 1789.
The Kazakh Spring
How can a de-institutionalised protest movement disrupt a solidified, repressive and extremely resilient authoritarian regime? Using the context of the Kazakh Spring protests (2019-ongoing), Diana T. Kudaibergen focuses on how the interplay between a repressive regime and democratisation struggles define and shape each other. Combining original interview data, digital ethnography and contentious politics studies, she argues that the new generation of activists, including Instagram political influencers and renowned public intellectuals, have been able to de-legitimise and counter one of the most resilient authoritarian regimes and inspire mass protests that none of the formalised opposition ever imagined possible in Kazakhstan. 'The Kazakh Spring' is the first book to detail the emergence of this political field of opportunities that allowed the possibility to rethink the political limits in Kazakhstan, essentially toppling the long-term dictator in unprecedented mass protests of the Bloody January 2022.
Frustrated Nationalism
The nation-state is seen by many today as the key unit of analysis for international organization and cooperation in the modern age, but not all groups that want to make up and control their own nation-state are able to do so: historical factors, domestic politics, and international relations often prevent them from obtaining sovereign power. Groups that have tried to create a nation-state and failed to do so can be referred to as being "frustrated." Frustrated Nationalism offers case studies by an international collection of scholars who describe the efforts of many of those groups to achieve sovereign status, or at least to obtain greater control over the policies that affect them, their strategies, and their outcomes.
Passages
Passages: On geo-analysis and the aesthetics of precarity is a multi-genre and transdisciplinary text addressing themes such as colonialism, nuclear zones of abandonment, migration control regimes, transnational domestic work, the biocolonial hostilities of the hospitality industry, legal precarities behind the international criminal justice regime, the shadow-worlds of the African soccerscape, and immunity regimes related to the COVID-19 pandemic. This book invites inquiry into today's apocalyptic narratives, humanitarian reason, and international criminal justice regimes, as well as the precarity generated by citizen time and 'consulate time'. The aesthetic breaks emerging from the book's image-text montage draw attention to the ethics of encounter and passage that challenges colonial, domestic, and nation-statist sovereignty regimes of inattention.
The Fragility of China
Dennis Unkovic asserts that China is, contrary to popular belief, not poised to take over from the United States as the world's pre-eminent superpower.Chinese President Xi Jinping believes his country is destined to displace the United States as the world's top military and economic power. Every policy that Xi has put forth since assuming power in 2013 has been carefully crafted with this end goal in mind. Nearly four decades of meteoric economic growth have convinced many in the West that modern China is indeed an invincible regime, and that Xi's grand plan will come to fruition. Closer examination reveals that China is not invulnerable, but in fact is far more fragile than it outwardly appears. In this book, Dennis Unkovic coins the term MaxTrends(R) to identify critical factors and developments that have the potential to derail Xi's aggressive ambitions for China. These MaxTrends(R) include alarming demographic shifts, cracks in the global supply chain, an accelerating global arms race, and the Taiwan conundrum, all of which indicate that China's strength may be more illusion than reality. Unkovic warns that the world's democracies must take increasingly aggressive steps to exploit China's vulnerabilities if they hope to blunt Xi's ambitions. Right now China and the United States find themselves competing in a tight race to the top. In today's unprecedented arena of economic, military, and political challenges, the nation that acts more quickly and prudently will win.
The Invention of Tradition in China
In China, heritage projects are sprouting across the countryside carrying the promise of Xi Jinping's "Chinese dream" as a call for the great revival and rejuvenation of the nation. This book unravels the workings behind these promises through the story of remaking Meili, a Dong ethnic minority village nestled along the margins of China, into a "Traditional Village" heritage site. In a past riven by deep political and societal disruptions, Meili becomes a medium for contesting, mediating and continuously inventing representations of tradition that aligns with the Chinese Communist Party's mission towards continuity and stability. The outcome is an original depiction of the compromises that shape heritage-making in a rural ethnic corner of China. Filled with rich, fine-grained narrative and analysis, Suvi Rautio offers a unique lens to the politics of inventing tradition and its far-reaching consequences in steering China's national identity under Xi Jinping rule.
Understanding Maritime Security
A concise introduction to the history and evolution of security at sea. Whether it is pirates, smugglers, illicit fishing, or disputes in the South China Sea, the oceans are of increasing importance in international security. In Understanding Maritime Security, Christian Bueger and Timothy Edmunds provide a concise introduction to the history of security at sea and explain the core frameworks of analysis that professionals use to understand and tackle challenges to maritime order. They discuss key issues within the maritime security agenda, including inter-state disputes, terrorism, piracy, smuggling, trafficking, and illicit fishing, and examine how states have responded. Bueger and Edmunds analyze future trends and show how maritime security is impacted by the critical infrastructure agenda, emerging technologies, cyber security, climate change, biodiversity loss, and the renaissance of geopolitics. Comprehensive and incisive, this primer of maritime security is essential reading for maritime security professionals and students of this increasingly important issue.
Asad’s Autocratic Dynasty in Syria
In 2011, the diplomatic and expert consensus was that Bashar al-Asads regime would fail, causing Syria to disintegrate into several ethnic enclaves or mini-states. A decade later and Bashar is still in control, having defeated the rebels and gained the support of Russia. The years of internal warfare have brought about changes in the spectrum of parties involved in the Syrian state, and the final outcome is inevitably going to be shaped by geo-politics. The Alawi minority still in large measure controls the Sunni-Muslim (Arab) majority. The other players are a gallery of ever changing allegiances: ISIS, Jabhat al-Nusra, and many other radical Islamic groups; the Muslim Kurdish and Christian Arab communities; as well as Shii Lebanese Hizballah. External horizon players are Iran; Sunni Turkey and Saudi Arabia; Jewish Israel; the United States and Russia. This study aims to analyze the agendas, actions, and interrelations of these various actors from 2011 until the present. It will discuss their ongoing politics and assess forthcoming developments. Both Iran and Russia continue to support Bashar, but compete for political, military, and economic influence. The US has greatly reduced involvement, keeping only 900 troops in northeastern Syria, to protect its Kurdish allies and fight against ISIS. Turkey still occupies parts of northern Syria, with the aim of eliminating the Kurdish forces. Syrian and Russian military attempts to conquer this area continue sporadically. The Israeli air force has attacked Iranian and Hizballah positions with the tacit approval of Russia. However, Russias war on Ukraine in February 2022 may result in restricting Israeli interdictions and instead enhance cooperation with Tehran in order to counter the US and NATO. Both Russia and Iran have been incapable of reconstructing the massively destroyed Syrian infrastructure; the US and Europe are reluctant to contribute due to Bashars continued Alawi minority-based autocratic and corrupt rule.
Nuevas Perspectivas Desde/Sobre Am矇rica Latina: El Desaf穩o de Los Estudios Culturales
El tema de la violencia es connatural a la historia de Am矇rica Latina y, por lo mismo, resulta inagotable en cualquiera de sus m繳ltiples manifestaciones materiales y simb籀licas, desde los or穩genes coloniales hasta la actualidad. A nivel continental, la praxis y el discurso de la violencia pueden perseguirse desde la penetraci籀n de la depredaci籀n colonizadora con que Am矇rica Latina es inscrita en el desarollo cultural de Occidente hasta llegar a las m獺s recientes y sutiles formas asumidas por la violencia de Estado, pasando por las instancias de imposici籀n de modelos culturales y econ籀micos que el las distintas 矇pocas impactaron radicalmente las culturas criollas y vern獺culas. Am矇rica Latina ha sufrido as穩, hist籀ricamente, las consecuencias de una violencia fundacional, que la condenara a una posici籀n perif矇rica con respecto a sistemas globales cuyos centros han difundido en sus correspondientes 獺reas de influencia, la 'racionalidad' de su propia reproducci籀n cultural, pol穩tica y econ籀mica. De esta manera, la trama social que resultara de la matriz colonialista registr籀 desde el comienzo las huellas imborrables de la violencia que se manifestara tanto a nivel racial como econ籀mico, tanto en lo referido a las pol穩ticas de g矇nero como en lo relacionado con la distribuci籀n geocultural del poder, en todos sus niveles. Las 'dolorosas rep繳blicas hispanoamericanas' de que hablara Mart穩 se han debatido desde entonces contra las formas naturalizadas de la violencia de la exclusi籀n y el autoritarismo, la miseria interna y la depredaci籀n imperialista, la penetraci籀n cultural las intervenciones pol穩ticas, siempre amparadas en la ret籀rica legitimadora que las clases dominantes esgrimieran en cada caso para perpetuar su poder.El presente vol繳men que compila trabajos que fueran presentados y discutidos en la Segunda Conferencia Internacional de Estudios Culturales Latinoamericanos que se llevara a cabo en la Universidad de Pittsburgh en marzo del a簽o 2000, tiene como foco principal una articulaci籀n espec穩fica en torno al tema de la violencia contempor獺nea: la que analiza los cruces y formas espec穩ficas en que la violencia se manifiesta teniendo como escenario principal los centros urbanos de Am矇rica Latina, y las modalidades a partir de las cuales el fen籀meno de la violencia es recogido y re-presentado por los medios de comunicaci籀n de masas, tanto como por la cultura popular, el arte, la literatura y otras formas de discurso letras y la 'alta cultura'. The theme of violence is natural to the history of Latin America and, therefore, it is endless in any of its multiple material and symbolic manifestations, from its colonial origins to the present. At a continental level, the praxis and discourse of violence can be traced back to the spread of the colonising voracity that conditioned Latin America within the cultural development of the West, followed by the most recent and subtle forms assumed by state violence, including the instances of imposition of cultural and economic models that, at the different times, radically impacted the Creole and vernacular cultures. Thus, Latin America has historically suffered the consequences of a founding violence which condemned it to a peripheral position in relation to global systems which centres have spread in their corresponding areas of influence, the 'rationality' of their own cultural, political and economic replication. In this way, the social fabric resulting from the colonialist matrix has recorded from the beginning the indelible traces of violence that are displayed both at racial and economic levels, both in terms of gender policies and in terms of the geocultural distribution of power, at all levels. The 'painful Spanish-American republics' of which Mart穩 spoke, have since fought against the normalisation of the violence of exclusion and authoritarianism, the internal misery and imperialistic greed, the cultural colonisation and political actions always condoned by a legitimising r
The French Anarchists in London, 1880-1914
This book is a study of political exile and transnational activism in the late-Victorian period. It explores the history of about 500 French-speaking anarchists who lived in exile in London between 1880 and 1914, with a close focus on the 1890s, when their presence peaked. These individuals sought to escape intense repression in France, at a time when anarchist-inspired terrorism swept over the Western world. Until the 1905 Aliens Act, Britain was the exception in maintaining a liberal approach to the containment of anarchism and terrorism; it was therefore the choice destination of international exiled anarchists, just as it had been for previous generations of revolutionary exiles throughout the nineteenth century. These French groups in London played a strategic role in the reinvention of anarchism at a time of crisis, but also triggered intense moral panic in France, Britain and beyond. This study retraces the lives of these largely unknown individuals - how they struggled to get by in the great late-Victorian metropolis, their social and political interactions among themselves, with other exiled groups and their host society. The myths surrounding their rumoured terrorist activities are examined, as well as the constant overt and covert surveillance which French and British intelligence services kept over them. The debates surrounding the controversial asylum granted to international anarchists, and especially the French, are presented, showing their role in the redefinition of British liberalism. The political legacy of these 'London years' is also analysed, since exile contributed to the formation of small but efficient transnational networks, which were pivotal to the development and international dissemination of syndicalism and, less successfully, to anti-war propaganda in the run up to 1914.
Lost Decade
Lost Decade is an essential guide for understanding the historic shift to Asia-centric geopolitics and its implications for America's present and future. Across the political spectrum, there is wide agreement that Asia should stand at the center of US foreign policy. But this worldview, first represented in the Obama Administration's 2011 "Pivot to Asia," marks a dramatic departure from the entire history of American grand strategy. More than a decade on, we now have the perspective to evaluate it in depth. In Lost Decade, Robert Blackwill and Richard Fontaine--two eminent figures in American foreign policy--take this long view. They conclude that while the Pivot's strategic logic is strong, there are few successes to speak of, and that we need a far more coherent approach to the Indo-Pacific region. They examine the Pivot through various lenses: situating it historically in the context of America's global foreign policy, revealing the inside story of how it came about, assessing the effort thus far, identifying the ramifications in other regions (namely Europe and the Middle East), and proposing a path forward. The authors stress that the US has far less margin for foreign policy error today than a decade ago. As the international order becomes more unstable, Blackwill and Fontaine argue that it is imperative that policymakers fully understand what the Pivot to Asia aimed to achieve--and where it fell short--in order to muster the resources, alliances, and resolve to preserve an open order in Asia and the world. Crafting an effective policy for the region, they contend, is crucial for preserving American security, prosperity, and democratic values.
From Tribal Society to Nation-State
This book provides a systematic introduction to the century-old history of the making of Nigeria and the related theoretical issues. The introduction is devoted to the unique significance of the writing of country-specific histories of modern African countries and the theoretical issues related to the studies on the historical process of state-building and development in modern African countries. In two broad dimensions, that is, the vertical historical presentation and horizontal structural description, the chapters in the main body systematically review how Nigeria has developed from a traditional tribal society to a modern state over the past century; the political changes, economic growth, social transformation, and cultural reconstruction it has undergone; as well as its achievements, setbacks, problems, and prospects. The author of this book has been observing the state-building and development of African countries for an extended period. The book is a unique, well-structured, and informative work that combines fieldwork with theoretical reflections and empirical experiences with theoretical analysis to explain the growth of young African countries in contemporary times.
Children's Rights in Crisis
This book rigorously investigates the contemporary state of children's rights and the multifaceted challenges facing children, uncovering the complexities at their core. In 1989, the United Nations introduced the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), ratified by 196 nations, promising a world where children's rights would reign supreme. In practice, however, realising these rights proves intricate and often precarious. Policies may shine on paper, but their implementation grapples with the challenges posed by global governance structures, national strategies, and local factors. Over three decades since the CRC's inception, this book scrutinises the true efficacy of international commitments, shedding light on underexplored issues and revealing shortcomings in both discourse and actions. With diverse, interdisciplinary perspectives, it recognises the profound influence of global and transnational forces in generating outcomes that impact children's rights and welfare.An electronic edition of this book is freely available under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND) licence.
The Revolution in Strategic Affairs
It is argued that since the US and its allies appear unbeatable when fighting on their own terms, future opponents will fight differently. The West will therefore face opponents who will follow strategies that contradict the Western Way of Warfare.The challenge for the West is not how to prevail, but how to do so in an acceptable manner.
Future-Ready Governance: Perspectives on Singapore and the World
How can governments prepare for the future as economies and societies transform?In this collection of essays written for Singapore's leading news organisations, policymaker turned academic Terence Ho examines how Singapore is grappling with technological disruption, climate change, social stresses, leadership transition and fiscal sustainability, among other key issues. Tackling these challenges requires nimbleness in policy adaptation and innovation. This entails anticipating change, developing resource buffers and policy options, and taking measured risks. The essays in this collection draw on the Singapore experience to shed light on wider issues of governance and leadership that are critical for the long-term success of any nation.
Politics and Social Visions
The starting point of this book is the 'civil war' of ideas that broke out during the early 2010s about the purpose and even the desirability of the European Union as a polity, with a number of right-wing populist formations openly advocating for exiting the Union. The sovereign debt crisis triggered a spiral of ideological decommunalization: national leaders seemed to have lost that sense of 'togetherness' and mutual bonds that had been laboriously developed over decades of integration. Politics and Social Visions explores this politically disruptive process from an ideational perspective, on the assumption that symbols and visions play a crucial role. In processes of polity formation, ideologies offer competing partisan views, but tend to converge along the 'communal' dimension, which defines the nature and boundaries of the emerging polity. This convergence has been a challenge for the EU since its origins, as it has required the construction of a coherent and acceptable image of Europe as a compound polity of nation-states with a divisive past. Maurizio Ferrera offers a reconstruction of how the main ideological currents have struggled - and often failed - to reconfigure their horizontal profiles (i.e. their images of the national within Europe) into a new vertical profile (i.e. an image of the European within the national). The challenge has been especially demanding for European left-wing parties, which have been largely unable to forge a shared and recognizable 'social vision' of the European Union. Only during the COVID pandemic have the seeds of a novel communal consensus emerged that might prove capable of defeating the anti-communal views of Eurosceptic ideologies and free market technocrats.
Russian Westernizers and Change in International Relations
Russian Westernizers and Change in International Relations summarizes the Westernizing trend in Russian thought from the early nineteenth century to the present day.
The Foreign Office and Foreign Policy, 1919-1926
The Foreign Office and Foreign Policy, 1919-1926 tells of the administrative changes of the post-war period and of the senior permanent officials, their personalities and cast of mind, who advised the foreign secretary and carried out his policies. The book goes beyond existing accounts of changes taking place after the Great War, and provides examples of the FO machine in action as seen from King Charles Street, and the uneasy relationship between 10 Downing Street and the Foreign Office.
Making Punches Count
In Making Punches Count, the first comprehensive account of legislative floor violence and its consequences, Nathan Batto and Emily Beaulieu focus on recent episodes from a wide variety of countries, including Turkey, South Korea, Taiwan, Ukraine, Mexico, Uganda, and others. What do cultures of legislative brawling tell us about the health of democracy in a given country? Are the brawls mere fits of passion, or is there a deeper logic at work? Bacchus and Batto argue that legislative brawls are, in fact, calculated acts that serve the interests of the legislators who engage in them. Beginning from the incentives driving lawmakers in different party systems and drawing on both signaling theory and theories of contentious politics, they develop a powerful explanation of why individual legislators choose to brawl. As they show, brawls are more common in younger democracies, particularly ones with high levels of corruption, but sometimes there are contextual factors that make violence an attractive strategy even to legislators in long-established democracies. Ultimately, brawls should be seen as calculated acts of political violence initiated by legislators to advance their careers. Legislators can strategically use brawling to send costly signals to the actors--both opponents and allies--who will have the most influence over their political fortunes. A genuinely novel account of why conflict can reach such extreme levels in democracies, the book also sheds light on the structural mechanisms that drive politicians to violence in settings where we least expect it.
Challenging Anthropocene Ontology
Using the recent turn to ecology as a starting point, Hannah Richter and Elisa Randazzo bring ecological thinking into contact with Critical Indigenous Studies, in which awareness of the necessity for sustainable relations between humans and non-humans has long preceded Western Anthropocene discourse. Currently, the drastic ecological changes labelled as 'the Anthropocene' not only increasingly shape the political awareness and the priorities of citizens and governments, but also inform a large body of social scientific scholarship. Indigenous scholarship and practice, in particular ecological adaptability, is intrinsically related to power structures and political struggle - hence indigenous understanding of Anthropocene discourses are intertwined with discourses of colonialism and political contestation. This book problematises the depoliticising character of Western Anthropocene discourses in relation to indigenous ecologies. The authors reveal how the anti-colonial struggles of Indigenous communities and the unequal distribution of responsibilities for and suffering from ecological change, are concealed and devalued in Western discourses of the Anthropocene.
Diasporas and Ethnic Identities in Africa
Despite the enormous work on diasporas relating to Africa, the majority of this work focuses on trade diasporas located in West African groups, only mentioning the pre-colonial period in passing. Therefore, there is a need to redirect research on diasporas from within Africa to include non-economic diasporas during this time period. Diasporas and Ethnic Identity in Africa: The Edo ne Ekue among the Northeast Yoruba, 1485-1995 fills a gap by discussing the existence of diasporas in pre-colonial Africa that have been neglected by African scholars. Using the Edo ne Ekue as a case study, Uyilawa Usuanlele examines Edo people by shedding light on their political institutions, trading networks, and associations as autonomous and distinct within the Benin Kingdom. This book also discusses how the Edo ne Ekue simultaneously linked their institutions with the royal court of the Benin Kingdom at the expense of the local rulers of their host communities. Throughout this study, Usuanlele provides a better understanding of ethnic identity, state by state relations and their members outside their territorial boundaries to discover the dynamics of political, economic, and social changes within and between communities during and after pre-colonial times.
The Afterworld
COVID-19 sparked the largest global crisis of the 21st century, extending well beyond public health. For some, the impact was swift and dramatic, with the pandemic pushing tens of millions into poverty and creating extreme food insecurity; for others, the transformations are still bubbling under the surface. Efforts to arrest the spread of COVID-19 entailed far-reaching forms of government intervention and the extensive use of new technologies. Questions thus remain as to whether the societal changes brought about by COVID-19 will endure in the post-pandemic period. The return of geopolitics, along with the war in Ukraine and tensions in Asia, have further complexified an already complex global situation. Since March 2020, there has been an explosion of analyses about the short-term impacts and future global consequences of COVID-19. Parallels to the 1930s collapse of Europe have been made, as recounted by Stefan Zweig in his famous memoir, The World of Yesterday. While most commentators are pessimistic, some are looking for positive change. Faced with this unprecedented crisis, we have been propelled to think about how, in the "next world," we can strengthen economic prosperity, social justice, the environment, gender relations, public health, and political institutions--or at least ensure that these features of our world do not continue to deteriorate. In The Afterworld, 50 professors from four Montreal universities, among the foremost experts in their fields, propose progressive, pragmatic, and social science-based ideas with the potential to improve international cooperation, security, human rights, and sustainable prosperity beyond the pandemic.
Space Warfare
This book considers military space strategy within the context of the land and naval strategies of the past. This second edition has been updatead and revised throughout.
The Un Community Liaison Assistants and the Politics of Translation
This book explores how the United Nations (UN) attempts to stabilise and justify an ambivalent meaning of protection and its socio-political roles in the Protection of Civilians agenda. Negotiating between different notions of translation, the research takes the Community Liaison Assistants (CLAs) as an analytical prism to complexify the efforts to construct representations of protection. Created alongside the United Nations Stabilisation Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO), the CLAs are local staff tasked with improving the mission's engagement with the local population, given their supposed linguistic-cultural skills. The CLAs are also part of the stabilisation turn in UN doctrine, adhering to counterinsurgency tactics and instrumentalising language and culture to obtain intelligence and support of the local population. Following a poststructuralist and postcolonial approach inspired mainly by the works of Jacques Derrida and Homi Bhabha, this book proposes deconstructing the representations applied to the CLAs by analysing the discourses presented in the UN reports and doctrinal documents.
Good Governance and Economic Development
Good governance is a prerequisite to development, improving the quality of life, health and ensuring equity. This book examines the interdependency of good governance and economic development by exploring perspectives from the Global North and Global South.
Mughal Administration
Mughal Administration provides a complete treatise on the administrative system of the Mughal empire, its theory and practice, its root principles and aims, and their effect in actual operation.
Europe as Ideological Resource
How did the far right go from illegitimate fringe to contender for public office, and did Europe have anything to do with it? Europe as Ideological Resource argues that European integration functioned as an ideological resource for far right parties looking for legitimation because it enabled them to refashion their political message in a more acceptable form, while maintaining the allegiance of their existing supporters. Drawing on the qualitative analysis of over 400 documents produced by the Movimento Sociale Italiano/Alleanza Nazionale in Italy (1978-2009) and the Rassemblement National in France (1978-2019), Lorimer identifies the core concepts and discourses the parties used to talk about Europe, and the legitimation mechanisms associated with them. The book's narrative is developed through the analysis of four key concepts: the concept of identity, which enabled the parties to transnationalise their message and create a positive association between themselves and Europe; the concept of liberty, which made it possible for them to foster an image of actors holding uncontroversial positions; the concept of threat, which helped them promote the idea that 'desperate times call for desperate measures; and the concept of national interest, which helped them stress commitment to core principles in their ideology. Ever since its re-emergence on the European political scene, scholars have sought to explain the mainstreaming of the far right. By understanding how the process of European integration facilitated its transition from the margins to the mainstream, this book adds one piece to the puzzle of far right legitimation.
Political Ecologies of the Far Right
This volume engages with the alarming convergence of far right thinking and the ecological crisis in contemporary society. Growing out of the first international conference on political ecologies of the far right, the volume gathers crucial insights from authorities in the field as well as promising early career researchers. With cases ranging from ethnographical accounts of fossil fuel populist protest, historical analysis of the evangelical support for fossil fuels to interrogations of the settler colonial identities and material conditions defended by far right actors around the world, the book provides scholars, students and activists with ways to understand and counter these developments. An electronic edition of this book is freely available under a Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND) licence.
Modern Forms of Government
Originally published in 1959, this book discusses both the formal constitution and the actual working of the government in 20 countries of the world and deals with principles as well as facts.
The New Local Government System
Originally published in 1968, this book was a successor to the highly respected volume by J. H. Warren English Local Government System. This book is more than just a study of law and administration, focussing on the contemporary interest in the political and sociological aspects of local government.
Delegation in Local Government
Originally published in 1956, this book outlines the history of delegation in local government since the establishment of county councils in 1888. It describes the use made of delegation over a wide range of council services.
The Profession of Government
Originally published in 1959, and using material collected from eight languages, much of which was previously unpublished, this is a genuine comparative study, not merely describing each country separately, but an analysis of the most important questions facing 20th century public administration.
Introduction to French Local Government
Originally published in 1953, this was the first post-War study in either English or French of the institutions and law relating to French local government and on the practice of French local administration.
