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1301. The U.S. and Transatlantic Relations: On the Difference between Dominance and Hegemony

Author:
David P. Forsythe
Publication Date:
06-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
It is important to distinguish hegemony from dominance, as various authors like Machiavelli, Gramsci, and Nye have argued. This distinction allows one to appreciate that the first Bush Administration attempted to be a dominant power rather than a hegemonic one. A long list of assertions of essentially unilateral dominant power projections is actually buttressed by two pillars: primary of hard power but also American exceptionalism. By comparison to Europe, the George W. Bush version of American exceptionalism emphasizes traditional and absolute U.S. state sovereignty, a corresponding depreciation of international law and organization, parochialism, and non-muscular multilateralism. Because of all this the U.S. is largely responsible for the crisis in Atlanticism. The Europeans, however, have made their own contributions to this crisis. The crisis needs to be resolved, as the management of various international problems requires trans-Atlantic cooperation. Fortunately there are signs of movement toward this cooperation, although the signals are mixed on the U.S. side.
Topic:
International Relations, Diplomacy, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

1302. Global Governance Initiative

Publication Date:
01-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Brookings Institution
Abstract:
In September 2000, at the Millennium Summit of the United Nations, the world's leaders gathered to commit themselves and their countries to a vital global agenda. In the Millennium Declaration adopted that month, and in a host of other widely accepted treaties and declarations, nearly every government pledged to devote serious efforts to ending the scourge of war, reducing the dire poverty and hunger that afflict hundreds of millions, stabilizing the global environment and ensuring the basic rights of all. Such steps are not mere pious aspirations. They are the fundamental building blocks of global stability in what has become a tightly interconnected world.
Topic:
Civil Society, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, and Peace Studies

1303. Between Europe and a Hard Place: French Financial Diplomacy from 1995 to 2002

Author:
Daphne Josselin
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
French Politics, Culture Society
Institution:
Conference Group on French Politics Society
Abstract:
In the mid-1990s, a series of financial crises placed international financial stability and North-South dialogue once again very firmly on the agenda of economic diplomacy. These had long been pet topics for the French: back in the 1960s, President Charles de Gaulle had famously clamoured for the establishment of a new monetary order; the summitry set up, on French initiative, in 1975, had been largely focused on exchange rate stability and North-South relations; in the 1980s, President Mitterrand had made repeated appeals for a "new Bretton Woods." One could therefore expect the French to contribute actively to debates on how best to reform the international financial architecture.
Topic:
Diplomacy
Political Geography:
Europe and France

1304. Through Economy to Democracy and Security? An Integrated Approach to Stability in South East Europe - 7th Workshop of the Study Group "Regional Stability in South East Europe"

Author:
Frederic Labarre
Publication Date:
01-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Austrian National Defence Academy
Abstract:
In contrast to the Central European transition countries, the economies of South East Europe (SEE) have been facing complex and interrelated political and economic problems. The dissolution of Yugoslavia combined with market losses, war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, sanctions finally culminating in the Kosovo conflict were the main causes of political and economic instability in the whole region. Taking into account these factors, output recovery has been much slower in SEE than in the Central European countries. Measured in purchasing power standards, Croatia is the best performer in the region, with its GDP at about 38% of the EU average. Next comes Bulgaria (32%), whereas the respective values for Serbia and Montenegro and Albania range between 15-17%. Looking at the economic performance in the 1990-2002 period, Croatia and Romania reached almost 94% of their pre-transitional level in 2002, followed by Bulgaria and Macedonia (about 88% each). Serbia and Montenegro, the worst-affected, reached only about half of what it was in 1990. The cumulative output decline there was one of the largest among all the Central and East European countries.
Topic:
NATO, Diplomacy, Economics, Political Economy, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
Europe, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Kosovo, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Balkans, and Romania

1305. Russia and Europe: A Finnish View

Author:
Henrikki Heikka
Publication Date:
12-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Finnish Institute of International Affairs
Abstract:
In recent months, several prominent Finnish politicians have criticized the Finnish government for lack of vision in its foreign policy. Liisa Jaakonsaari, Chairman of the Parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee and a prominent social democrat), has argued that the government “lacks one thing, and with it, everything: a vision”. Member of the European Parliament Alexander Stubb (the Conservative party's vote puller in the last EP elections) has publicly called contemporary Finnish foreign policy as “pitiful tinkering” (säälittävää näpertelyä). Editorial writers have begun to recycle the old the term “driwftwood” (ajopuu), a term originally coined to describe Finland's flip-flopping during World War II, in their attempts to find an appropriate label for the present government's foreign policy.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Democratization, Diplomacy, and International Cooperation
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, Finland, and Asia

1306. Strategic Surprises for a New Administration

Author:
Jason R. Wisniewski
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
The Institute for the Study of Diplomacy's Schlesinger Working Group met during the fall of 2004 to discuss potential strategic surprises that could confront a new administration. The group focused on identifying candidate surprises and scenarios that could appear early in its term. Some examples of events the group sought to anticipate included trend reversals, out-of-the blue surprises, or second-order surprises caused by currently “visible” possibilities. During its first meeting, held shortly before the presidential election, the group discussed over a dozen possible scenarios in political, military, economic, and environmental fields. This list was further developed in intensive discussion in early December. This report draws on those discussions whose purpose was not to predict but to think “outside the box,” and concludes with a set of policy recommendations for the second Bush Administration.
Topic:
International Relations, Diplomacy, and Government
Political Geography:
United States

1307. How Terrorism Affects American Diplomacy

Author:
Thomas O. Melia
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
Interviews with several dozen senior American diplomats-including ambassadors and others currently serving abroad-indicate that the daily conduct of U.S. diplomacy has recently been altered in significant ways by the elevated threat of terrorism against American interests made manifest on September 11, 2001; the worldwide War on Terror declared by President George W. Bush in consequence; and the prosecution of the war in Iraq, on which diplomats are as divided as other Americans regarding whether it is or is not part of the global War on Terror.
Topic:
International Relations, Diplomacy, and Government
Political Geography:
United States, Iraq, and America

1308. Challenging the Red Line between Intelligence and Policy

Author:
James E. Steiner
Publication Date:
03-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
Abstract:
The “red line” is a warning to intelligence officers that, in order to maintain credibility with the policy community, they need to limit their role to informing policy discussions rather than expressing a policy preference. If they were to advocate a certain policy, the logic went, intelligence officers could be accused of distorting intelligence to bolster their policy preference.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Terrorism

1309. (Re)Writing the "National Security State"

Author:
David Grondin
Publication Date:
12-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Raoul Dandurand Chair of Strategic and Diplomatic Studies, Université du Québec à Montréal
Abstract:
Hans Morgenthau once said that “the intellectual lives in a world that is both separate from and potentially intertwined with that of the politician. The two worlds are separate because they are oriented towards different ultimate values… truth threatens power, and power threatens truth” (Morgenthau, quoted in Hill and Beshoff, 1994: xi). For Christopher Hill and Pamela Beshoff, this means that, as international relations practitioners and theorists, “Like it or not, we are 'intellectuals in politics' and 'the study of international relations is not an innocent profession'”
Topic:
International Relations, Development, Diplomacy, and National Security

1310. 9-11 Commission Final Report

Publication Date:
07-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
Abstract:
We present the narrative of this report and the recommendations that flow from it to the President of the United States, the United States Congress, and the American people for their consideration. Ten Commissioners—five Republicans and five Democrats chosen by elected leaders from our nation's capital at a time of great partisan division—have come together to present this report without dissent.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, and Government
Political Geography:
United States