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5521. EU Emissions Trading: Challenges and Implications of National Implementation

Author:
Jacqueline Karas and Fiona Mullins
Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Emissions trading is central to the European Union's (EU) strategy to meet its climate change commitments under the Kyoto Protocol. However, implementing the EU Directive on emissions trading ('the Directive') is proving extremely challenging for the governments involved. In particular, governments have to prepare National Allocation Plans (NAPs) for distributing emissions allowances to industry within a very tight timeframe. More than 12,000 industrial installations across the EU and accession countries will participate in the trading system.
Topic:
Climate Change, Markets, and Treaties and Agreements
Political Geography:
Europe

5522. Angola's Future

Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Angola is no longer at war except in its Cabinda province. This report summarizes the British-Angola Forum 2003 conference which focused on whether there was a peace dividend and what the post-conflict priorities for reconstruction and development should be. The opportunities and challenges are many, but many speakers emphasized how slow post-conflict democratic change is. Key issues examined in the British-Angola Forum's 2002 conference were as pertinent as ever. The confrontation between transparency and sovereignty continues to resonate especially.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution and Development
Political Geography:
Africa and Europe

5523. France's Double-Talk on Globalization

Author:
Sophie Meunier
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
French Politics, Culture Society
Institution:
Conference Group on French Politics Society
Abstract:
France has become a worldwide champion of anti-globalization. French intellectuals have long denounced the cultural and economic shortcomings of US-led globalization, while French politicians, on the Left as on the Right, load their speeches with rhetoric critical of a phenomenon that gets a lot less attention in other European countries and in the United States. Yet, at the same time, France is a country whose economy and society have adapted well to this much-criticized globalization. Why this double-speak? Why this disjuncture between words and actions? This article explores this paradox, analyzes the role that France's double discourse on globalization has played in producing the surprising outcome of the 2002 elections, and reflects on the options open to the main political parties today.
Topic:
Economics
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and France

5524. Between a Rock and a Hard Place: How the US-EU Battle over Article 98 Played Out in Croatia and Macedonia

Author:
Kristina Balalovska and Mieczyslaw P. Boduszynski
Publication Date:
09-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Wilson Center
Abstract:
In the first half of 2003, postcommunist East European countries became pawns in two disputes between the European Union (EU) and the United States (US). The first, broadly covered by the Western media, was the clash over the US-led invasion of Iraq. The second was over the jurisdiction of the newly established International Criminal Court (ICC). Although the latter skirmish was less noticed in the wider world, it was in many ways the more significant of the two. In both cases, the small states of East and Central Europe were forced to choose between the conflicting demands of the EU and US. Unlike the battle over the Iraq war, EU member states were united on the point of not granting the US immunity in the ICC. Moreover, it was impossible to walk a tightrope between Europe and the US in the ICC case because it required decisive action, whereas on the question of whether or not to invade Iraqi, some postcommunist countries were able to lend tacit support to both sides. Finally, a lot more was at stake in the ICC issue, since both the US and the EU threatened defecting countries with concrete sanctions.
Topic:
Government, International Organization, Politics, War, and Sanctions
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, Europe, and Macedonia

5525. Armament and Disarmament in the Caucasus and Central Asia

Author:
Zdzislaw Lachowski, Björn Hagelin, Sam Perlo-Freeman, Petter Stålenheim, Dmitri Trofimov, and Alyson J. K. Bailes
Publication Date:
07-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
Abstract:
The international attention paid to the nations of the South Caucasus region and Central Asia—a group of post-Soviet states beyond Europe's conventional frontiers but included in the Conference on/Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE/OSCE)—has been fitful at best over the past decade. During the last years of the 20th and at the start of the 21st century, after the conflicts in Georgia and Nagorno-Karabakh became (at least partly) 'frozen', security concerns about the regions tended to decline and to become overshadowed both by 'oil diplomacy' and by concern about developments within Russia itself, in Chechnya and Dagestan. In 2002–2003 a constellation of changes in the outside world has started to reverse this pattern. Chechnya is no longer a regular topic of high-level political debate between Russia and the West, and President Vladimir Putin has played the anti-terrorist card with some success to secure his freedom to deal with it as an internal security matter. The factors prompting greater international attention to Russia's south-western and southern neighbours, by contrast, have the potential to undermine—perhaps for good—any Russian pretension to decisive influence or an exclusive droit de regard in these regions. At the time of writing, however, this latest shift could again be called in question by a new diversion of focus to the 'greater Middle East' following hostilities in Iraq.
Topic:
Defense Policy and Arms Control and Proliferation
Political Geography:
Russia, Iraq, Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, Middle East, Chechnya, and Georgia

5526. NATO Decisionmaking: Au Revoir to the Consensus Rule?

Author:
Leo L Michel
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Abstract:
It should come as no surprise that North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) officials are fond of citing Mark Twain's retort to doomsayers that reports of his death were greatly exaggerated. Having survived many rough tests since its birth, the 54-year-old alliance is still working to recover from a bruising disagreement among its members over the decision by some to oust Saddam Hussein's regime. Its services, however, are still very much in demand: About 37,000 NATO-led military personnel remain on crisis management duty in the Balkans. NATO recently launched its first out-of- Europe operation, taking command of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. In July 2003, the Senate voted unanimously to encourage the Bush administration to seek help from NATO in Iraq. Several prominent Members of Congress and nongovernmental experts have called for a NATO peacekeeping mission between Israelis and Palestinians.
Topic:
Security, NATO, and International Organization
Political Geography:
Iraq, Europe, North Atlantic, Israel, and Balkans

5527. Monitoring of the Norwegian Secret Services

Author:
Leif Mevik
Publication Date:
05-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
In Norway, monitoring of the secret services (EOS services) is carried out by a parliamentary monitoring body, the Committee for Monitoring of Intelligence, Surveillance and Security Services. The Committee conducts continuous monitoring of the Norwegian Police Security Service, the Norwegian Intelligence Service and the Norwegian National Security Authority (NoNSA). The monitoring arrangement is independent of the EOS services and the remainder of the administration. The Committee's members are elected by the Storting (the Norwegian parliament), and the Committee reports to the Storting annually. The arrangement was established in 1996. The continuous monitoring takes the form of regular inspections of the secret services. The Committee also deals with complaints from private individuals and organizations that believe the secret services have committed injustices against them.
Topic:
Security, Government, and Human Rights
Political Geography:
Europe

5528. Oversight and Guidance: the Relevance of Parliamentary Oversight for Security Sector Reform

Author:
Hans Born and Philip Fluri
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
There is a widespread belief that security policy is a 'natural' task for the executive as they have the requisite knowledge and ability to act quickly. The decision to go to war, to contribute troops to multinational peace support operations, to conclude international treaties or to raise defence spending, to mention just some of the most important governmental security responsibilities, are regarded to be executive decisions. The stubborn perception exists that parliaments should be kept out of these decisions. Parliament tends to be regarded as a less suitable institution for dealing with security issues, especially given its often time-consuming procedures and lack of full access to the necessary expertise and information. Additionally, parliaments are regarded as ill-suited institutions for keeping classified information secret. However, this is a misperception. The past teaches us that parliaments do play a major role in matters of security in democratic states, both in times of war and peace. In the times of the Roman Republic, the Dutch Republic in the sixteenth century, Great Britain in the Second World War, or, more recently at the outbreak of the Second Gulf War, Parliaments across the globe have debated, influenced and exercised oversight over security policy and security sector reform, even in the middle of war.
Topic:
Security, Defense Policy, and Government
Political Geography:
Europe, Romania, and Dutch

5529. Practical Confidence-Building Measures: Does Good Governance of the Security Sector Matter?

Author:
Heiner Hänggi
Publication Date:
01-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
Good governance of the security sector, when considered from a disarmament perspective, indicates linkages between two principal issue-areas in contemporary international politics, i.e. those of 'security' and 'governance'. These two issue-areas are closely intertwined, contributing to evolving definitions of the terms themselves. During the bipolar period, security was generally defined in 'hard' military terms. Following the end of the Cold War, the concept was broadened to include 'soft' and human security concerns. This was paralleled by a broadening of the concept of confidence-building measures to include, inter alia, the role of security forces in the society. The fundamental principles of good governance include transparency and accountability of the exercise of state power. The implementation of good governance of the security sector (including military, paramilitary, internal security forces, police, border guards, and intelligence services) is a long and often difficult process, and whether this can be achieved is dependent on the capability and willingness of the individual countries.
Topic:
Security, Civil Society, Government, and Peace Studies
Political Geography:
Europe

5530. Security Sector Reform in Bulgaria

Author:
Velizar Shalamanov
Publication Date:
01-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance (DCAF)
Abstract:
Security Sector Reform (SSR) is an essential part of transformation of the totalitarian states to democratic ones. Security was motive, tool and excuse for the Communist Parties to control totally the state, economy and society at all. As a result security sector - named Armed Forces was extremely large, powerful, secret (un-transparent), under communist party control and separated from society even using all the resources of the society, including young men for 2-3 years.
Topic:
Security, Democratization, and Government
Political Geography:
Europe and Bulgaria