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671. The OSCE Between Crisis and Reform: Towards a New Lease on Life

Author:
Victor-Yves Ghébali
Publication Date:
11-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
In the post-Cold War landscape of European security, four quite different type of multilateral institutions are operating with partially intersecting mandates: NATO, the European Union, the Council of Europe and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). As a direct offspring of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE), or the Helsinki process, the OSCE certainly illustrates a most original creation of multilateral security diplomacy. Its institutional identity is characterised by a number of features which actually represent proper assets.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, and Development
Political Geography:
Europe

672. New Trends in Policing in Western Europe: The Challenges for Bosnia and Herzegovina

Author:
Dominique Wisler
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
While there is a wide consensus today on the basic principles of democratic policing there is no blueprint of international standards of policing or internationally accepted organisational scheme to which a police in transition looking for guidance could simply seek to conform. Beyond many differences originating from history and political regimes, what exists instead - and can serve as guidance - are best policing practices as well as trends in organising a police service. In fact, as I would like to argue, Western police are experiencing dramatic changes since two decades, changes that affect the organization and the practices profoundly. Police services are indeed reorganized using the conceptual framework of “processes and services” rather than the traditional silos of exclusive competencies between various police branches. Starting from services such as local security, rapid intervention, crowd control and the fight against serious, complex and organized criminality, the architecture of police forces is being remodelled by reformers. Judiciary competencies have ceased to be the basis of a rigid division between the judiciary police and the uniformed police, but, as we will see below, the uniformed police are tasked today with new competencies as a result of a process-oriented reorganisation. This led to a 180 degree shift in the policing architecture: once conceived vertically in hermetic silos of competencies, services are conceptualized more horizontally, process-oriented, cross-cutting competencies.
Topic:
Security, Development, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe, Bosnia, and Herzegovina

673. The Process from Authoritarianism to Democracy in Spain: the Impact of the 1981 Failed Cup

Author:
José A. Olmeda
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new (Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince, Chapter 6).
Topic:
Security, Development, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe and Spain

674. Increasing Military Influence in Danish Civil-Military Relations

Author:
Henning Sørensen
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
This chapter pursues developments of Danish civil-military relations to identify changes in the degree of military influence. Two case studies are put forward. The first case deals with long-term change processes in the field of civil-military relations. In this case study, four major areas are investigated: the personnel composition of the Danish defence, its expenditures per capita, its organisational structure, and military participation in defence commissions. Changes in all four areas are pursued over the last-half century revealing increased military influence in Danish civil-military relations. A striking indicator of this development is the case of top military disobedience in 2001, which constitutes the second case study entitled 'Military disobedience of the Danish defence commander'. The consequences of the major military influence for three actors: 'politicians', 'media', and the 'armed forces' are discussed and it is argued that neither of them gains from the increased military influence, not even the professional soldiers. The reported extreme of military behaviour contrasts many examples of military respectful democratic decision-making. Reasons for the military disobedience may be explained by the distinction 'to have' or 'to exercise' democratic control, where the former is the proper type of democratic control of the armed forces and not the latter as wrongfully perceived by the former Danish Joint Chief of Staff (JCS).
Topic:
Security, Civil Society, and Development
Political Geography:
Europe

675. Providing Security. The Division of Labour. Armed Forces, Gendarmerie, Police

Author:
Alain Faupin
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
This topic is quite uneasy as the security tasks of all three organizations, namely armed forces, police and gendarmerie, are either very different, or very intermingled. The only common point is the primacy of the civilian authority, a rule of good governance and of democracy scrupulously applied and overseen.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Government, and Governance
Political Geography:
Europe

676. Police and Gendarmerie Reform in Belgium: from Force to Service

Author:
Denis Bergmans
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
It is for me, as a representative of the Gendar merie, the Belgian federal police, a great honour to be invited as a speaker for this seminar.
Topic:
Security, Development, and Education
Political Geography:
Europe and Belgium

677. Convergence of European Security Systems

Author:
Willem van Eekelen
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
The decision of the European Council to start negotiations in 2005 for the entry of Turkey into the European Union constituted an important landmark in a long-term process, ongoing since 1963. This decision concerned full membership and not some lesser special relationship and made clear that Turkey would not be treated differently from other candidates for EU membership. Both sides recognised that the negotiations will take considerable time during which attention will be given to a monitoring process.
Topic:
Security, NATO, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

678. A Congo Action Plan

Publication Date:
10-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
More than two years into the transition in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the peace process remains at risk. As many as 1,000 people a day still die from war-related causes -- mainly disease and malnutrition, but also continuing violence. While the main belligerent leaders are all in the transitional government, their corruption and mismanagement threaten stability during and after the forthcoming national elections, now postponed from June 2005 to March 2006. The international community needs to maintain pressure on a wide front, making specific security sector reform, transitional justice and good governance measures prerequisites for the elections, not allowing them to be postponed until there is a new government.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, and United Nations
Political Geography:
Europe and Democratic Republic of the Congo

679. Here There Be Dragons: The Shanghai Cooperation Organization

Author:
Benjamin Goldsmith
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Defense Information
Abstract:
In the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, the task of wiping out radical Islamist groups and their support networks gained a new urgency for the United States. U.S. attention landed squarely on Afghanistan and Central Asia, the home base of Al Qaeda, the Taliban, and several other radical Islamic groups. The war in Afghanistan created the need for large number of U.S. troops in the region and a base from which to operate, while the newly proclaimed “War on Terror” created a strategic interest in maintaining this presence to suppress further Islamic radicalism.
Topic:
Security and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Europe, and Asia

680. U.S. and European Counterterrorism Efforts from September 11 to the London Bombings

Author:
Michael Jacobson and Emily Hunt
Publication Date:
08-2005
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy
Abstract:
The following is a preview of a forthcoming Washington Institute monograph focusing on U.S., British, and German counterterrorism efforts from September 11 to the London bombings, written by former Institute Soref fellow Michael Jacobson. Current Soref fellow Emily Hunt offers excerpts from Mr. Jacobson's timely book, along with commentary of her own. The London bombings served as an unpleasant reminder that Britain remains a primary target of the global Islamist terrorist movement. Michael Jacobson's forthcoming book on legal and law enforcement changes in the United States and Europe is particularly pertinent in light of such attacks. The following excerpts from his analysis challenge popular misperceptions about U.S. and European approaches to counterterrorism and highlight their common ground. They also shed light on the way in which the "security vs. civil liberties" debate is playing out on both sides of the Atlantic.
Topic:
Security and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United Kingdom, Europe, Middle East, and Poland