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1301. US public diplomacy in the Asia-Pacific: Opportunities and challenges in a time of transition

Author:
Sarah Ellen Graham
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
Two key themes stand out within current US government reports and foreign policy commentaries on American public diplomacy. These are: firstly, that US efforts to attract 'hearts and minds' in the Middle East were inadequate before and immediately after the 11 September 2001 attacks on America and must be improved, and secondly that the administration of public diplomacy has required major reform in order to meet the challenge of engaging Arab and Muslim audiences into the future. This paper assesses US public diplomacy in a regional context that has not been subject to significant scrutiny within the post-11 September debates on US public diplomacy: the Asia–Pacific. This oversight is lamentable, given Washington's significant security and economic interests in the Asia–Pacific, and because the Asia–Pacific is a region undergoing significant economic, diplomatic and political shifts that are likely to complicate Washington's ability to bring about desired outcomes in the future. This paper demonstrates, furthermore, that the Asia–Pacific represents an important case study from which to reflect on the administrative and substantive questions raised in recent critiques of US public diplomacy at a general level.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Development, Diplomacy, and Government
Political Geography:
America, Middle East, and Australia/Pacific

1302. Understanding emotions in world politics: Reflections on method

Author:
Roland Bleiker and Emma Hutchison
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
Although emotions play a significant role in world politics they have so far received surprisingly little attention by international relations scholars. Numerous authors have emphasised this shortcoming for several years now, but strangely there are still no systematic inquiries into emotions nor even serious methodological discussions about how one would go about doing so. This article explains this gap by the fact that much of international relations scholarship is conducted in the social sciences. Such inquiries can assess emotions up to a certain point, as illustrated by empirical studies on psychology and foreign policy and constructivist engagements with identity and community. But conventional social science methods cannot understand all aspects of phenomena as ephemeral as those of emotions. Doing so would involve conceptualising the influence of emotions even when and where it is not immediately apparent. The ensuing challenges are daunting, but at least some of them could be met by supplementing social scientific methods with modes of inquiry emanating from the humanities. We advance three propositions that would facilitate such cross-disciplinary inquiries: 1) the need to accept that research can be insightful and valid even if it engages unobservable phenomena, and even if the results of such inquiries can neither be measured nor validated empirically; 2) the importance of examining processes of representation and communication, such as visual depictions of emotions and the manner in which they shape political perceptions and dynamics; and 3) a willingness to consider alternative forms of insight, most notably those stemming from aesthetic sources, which, we argue, are particularly suited to capture emotions. Taken together, these propositions highlight the need for a more open-minded and sustained communication across different fields of knowledge.
Topic:
International Relations, Diplomacy, and International Cooperation
Political Geography:
Australia/Pacific

1303. Obstinate or obsolete? The US alliance structure in the Asia-Pacific

Author:
William T. Tow and Amitav Acharya
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
The longstanding US security network of bilateral alliances in the Asia–Pacific, also known as the 'San Francisco System', has reached a historical crossroads. Its purpose is becoming more questionable as the United States, its allies and friends and other key Asian security actors engage in an increasingly complex set of regional security relationships. This paper argues that while the San Francisco System will not be dissolved over the near-term, it must adapt to rapidly changing structural and politico-economic conditions in the region if its utility is to be sustained and its eventual conversion into a more relevant and effective network of Asia–Pacific order-building. It argues that 'alliance mutuality' is the essential element in any such conversion process.
Topic:
International Relations and Diplomacy
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, Iraq, South Asia, and Australia/Pacific

1304. Fighting irrelevance: An economic community 'with ASEAN characteristics'

Author:
John Ravenhill
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) enters its fifth decade of economic cooperation in more favourable circumstances than those experienced at the time of its thirtieth anniversary. Paradoxically, and contrary to expectations at the time, the financial crises of 1997—98 may have strengthened ASEAN. The backlash against what was perceived as an unsympathetic Western response to East Asian difficulties put ASEAN at centrestage in new regional cooperative arrangements. Moreover, rivalry between China and Japan for regional leadership has led them both to seek to negotiate regional partnerships with ASEAN as a whole. ASEAN, however, faces new challenges—particularly from rapid economic growth in China and India, and from the proliferation of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) (including a large number involving individual ASEAN members). ASEAN has made only slow progress in economic cooperation. The complete removal of tariffs has fallen behind schedule and is not due to be realised until 2010. The private sector makes little use of ASEAN's preferential arrangements because they afford little advantage over most-favoured-nation tariffs—certainly not sufficient to offset the costs of complying with paperwork, and the consequent delays experienced. ASEAN has made little progress on 'deeper integration' issues—the removal of 'beyond border' barriers to trade. Some of the bilateral PTAs that ASEAN countries have negotiated with extra-regional partners go further in removing barriers than ASEAN's own arrangements. ASEAN members continue to eschew binding commitments within their own economic collaboration despite making them within the World Trade Organization and in some of their bilateral PTAs. Liberalisation under ASEAN's auspices has not been sufficiently significant to encourage business groups to invest substantial resources in lobbying for deeper integration.
Topic:
International Relations and Economics
Political Geography:
Japan, China, India, Israel, East Asia, and Australia/Pacific

1305. Case studies in Chinese diplomacy

Author:
Stuart Harris
Publication Date:
12-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
This paper aims to examine China's changing diplomacy. To do this it considers how China is approaching its diplomacy in a number of specific contexts. The examples chosen to illustrate its more nuanced diplomacy are the US—China relationship; China's relations with Latin America; the Six-Party-Talks over North Korea's nuclear ambitions; China's concerns about energy security and its relations with 'unsavoury' regimes; and China's relations with its neighbours.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and Diplomacy
Political Geography:
China, Israel, East Asia, Asia, and Latin America

1306. What security makes possible: Some thoughts on critical security studies

Author:
Anthony Burke
Publication Date:
06-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
It has become commonplace to accept that security is a 'contested concept'. How contested, however, seems to be what is at stake for critical approaches to security. With the US Congress poised to ask for a National Intelligence Estimate on the security impacts of human-induced climate change; with terrorism, people movements and disease the focus of national security policy; and with various conceptualisations of human security informing national policy and new global norms, we are well into the 'broadening and deepening' phase once seen as revolutionary. At the same time, state-centric discourses of security remain very powerful, and global patterns of insecurity, violence and conflict are getting more destructive and uncontrollable.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Defense Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
United States

1307. Osirak Redux?

Author:
Whitney Raas and Austin Long
Publication Date:
04-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
The use of military force to halt or reverse nuclear proliferation is an option that has been much discussed and occasionally exercised. In the 1960s, for example, the United States considered destroying China's nuclear program at an early stage but ultimately decided against it. More recently, the key rationale for the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was the threat posed by Iraq's suspected inventory of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Although significant evidence of WMD was not found in the Iraq case, the potential utility of military force for counterproliferation remains, particularly in the case of Iran. The possibility of military action against Iranian nuclear facilities has gained prominence in the public discourse, drawing comments from journalists, former military officers, and defense analysts. This makes the Iranian nuclear program a potential test case for military counterproliferation.
Topic:
International Relations, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Nuclear Weapons
Political Geography:
United States, China, Iran, and Asia

1308. Why Is Liberal Peace-building So Difficult?

Author:
Sabine Kurtenbach
Publication Date:
09-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
The termination of war is mostly seen as a basis not just for recovery but for a fundamental transformation or change in development paths towards peace, stability and development. The Central American peace processes of the last decades were one of the first laboratories for the liberal peace-building paradigm which assumes that the threefold transformation to peace, democracy and market economy is a self-strengthening process leading to sustainable development. Although none of the three countries slipped back into war, serious deficits remain. This paper introduces an analytical framework that aims at interrelating the threefold transformation with the impact generated by four processes. These include the repercussions generated by the international system on a country's society, its historical, cultural and social foundations, the legacies of violence and the peacebuilding initiatives the country concerned has witnessed. The comparative analysis of changes in the public security sector, the political system, conflict resolution and the use of resources show why there is so much path dependency that can explain the deficits of transformation.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Relations, and Peace Studies
Political Geography:
America and Central America

1309. HAMBURG BLEIBT ZENTRUM DER NAHOST-FORSCHUNG

Publication Date:
08-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
In Hamburg existierte eine der größten Spezialbibliotheken Deutschlands zum Nahen Osten; sie umfasst ca. 37.000 Bände und war bis Ende 2006 dem Verbund GIGA German Institute of Globaland Area Studies angeschlossen. Besitzer ist die Deutsche Orient-Stiftung, die begonnen hat, die Bibliothek aus Hamburg abzutransportieren. Die Deutsche Orient-Stiftung hat bislang nicht erklärt, ob und wod ie Bibliothek, die über Jahrzehnte mit öffentlichen Mitteln aufgebaut wurde, wieder der Öffentlichkeit zugänglich gemacht werden wird. Das GIGA German Institute of Global and Area Studies ist empört, wie die Deutsche Orient-Stiftung mit dieser wissenschaftlich einzigartigen Sammlung von Fachliteratur zum Nahen Osten umgeht. Für den Wissenschaftsstandort Hamburg entsteht hierdurch ein großer Schaden.
Topic:
International Relations
Political Geography:
Europe, Middle East, and Germany

1310. Crises, Hegemony and Change in the International System: A Conceptual Framework

Author:
Dirk Nabers
Publication Date:
05-2007
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Global and Area Studies
Abstract:
The paper tries to shed light on the conceptual link between international crises like the one following September 11, 2001, the Asian financial crisis of 1997/1998, the end of the Cold War or major international conflicts, and processes of change in the international system. It argues that cultural structures rest on their continuous instantiation through social practices, thereby making them coterminous with process. Process is constituted by meaningful acts of social agents, and can thus only be grasped by analysing meaning. Meaning is transmitted by language. Meaningful language is never reducible to individual speakers; it is a social act. In the paper, I call this process discourse. Linking Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) with the theory of hegemony developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, I will finally be able to show how hegemonic discourses serve as the nexus between crises and cultural structures and how they make cultural change possible.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and Development
Political Geography:
Asia