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3251. Farewell to Conscription? The Case of Denmark

Author:
Pertti Joenniemi
Publication Date:
04-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This contribution probes the essence of Denmark as a political project by using conscription as an inroad and employing it as a lens that provides insight into the way some of the key constitutive relationships underpinning Denmark have been unfolding over time. Conscription is approached by focusing on its discursive features, those furnishing it with – or depriving it of – ideational power.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Security, and Politics
Political Geography:
Europe and Denmark

3252. Regional Histories of Development and Security: Seguridad a la Americana

Author:
Fiona Wilson
Publication Date:
02-2005
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
The argument of this paper is that there is nothing new about the political connection made between development and security. This has characterized US relations with Latin America grounded in the Monroe Doctrine (giving the US right to intervene) that dates back to 1823. The focus here is on the 1960's, the aftermath of the Cuban Revolution, when the securitydevelopment complex was put firmly in place through the build-up of the region's armed forces militaries and an aggressive, anti-communist ideology under the aegis of the US military. In this context, the paper revisits a visionary paper written by the Brazilian economist Celso Furtado in 1966 when in exile, giving his (Latin American) analysis of the securitydevelopment complex and need to react against US economic hegemony, an important strand in dependency theory.
Topic:
Security, Development, and Regional Cooperation
Political Geography:
United States, Brazil, Cuba, and Central America

3253. Recommendations for Improving the United Nations Counter-Terrorism Committee’s Assessment and Assistance Coordination Function

Author:
Alistair Millar, Jason Ipe, George A. Lopez, Tona Boyd, Linda Gerber, and David Cortright
Publication Date:
09-2005
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Fourth Freedom Forum
Abstract:
The effectiveness of the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee (CTC) depends on its ability to keep pace with transformations in the global security environment. When the CTC was established in the wake of the September 2001 terrorist attacks, the primary target was understood to be Al Qaeda and its international network of related terrorist groups. In order to secure its central role and relevance among multilateral counter-terrorism efforts, the CTC must find more creative ways to collect, assess, and disseminate information about current counter-terrorism capacities and to facilitate the provision of needed technical assistance by potential donors in a timely and sustainable manner.
Topic:
Security, United Nations, and Counter-terrorism
Political Geography:
Global Focus

3254. European Homeland Security Post-March 11th and Transatlantic Relations

Author:
Didier Bigo, Jeremy Shapiro, and Andrei Fedorov
Publication Date:
10-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for European Policy Studies
Abstract:
In the oral presentation of their papers, Didier Bigo, Jeremy Shapiro and Andrei Fedorov generally highlighted their respective region's specificities rather than dwelling on the elements of commonality. Although this was in part a consequence of the European Security Forum's modus operandi – with its differentiated European, American and Russian perspectives, rarely in our meetings has the contrast been so clearly highlighted.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Europe, and Asia

3255. The challenge of United Nations reform

Author:
Christian Reus-Sumit, Marianne Hanson, Hilary Charlesworth, and William Maley
Publication Date:
11-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Australian National University Department of International Relations
Abstract:
The first half of the twentieth century saw multiple crises in the expanding international system, characterised most tragically and dramatically by two world wars, the Great Depression, and the Holocaust. In response, the international community engaged in history's most ambitious program of international institution building, a program that centred on the creation of the United Nations, the Bretton Woods institutions, and a plethora of functional regimes governing everything from arms control to the prohibition of genocide. Despite the impediments imposed by four decades of Cold War, these institutions have evolved into a complex global architecture of institutions which can claim partial yet significant credit for the decline in traditional interstate warfare, the containment of nuclear proliferation to a handful of states, management of the world economy, and the prosecution of an ever more comprehensive humanitarian agenda.
Topic:
Security, Development, Economics, and United Nations

3256. Making New International Norms: The Small Arms Case

Author:
Denise Garcia
Publication Date:
04-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
This paper focuses on a significant puzzle in international security today: why did small arms control become prominent on the international agenda during the 1990s? And why did the international community attempt to regulate these weapons? This paper illustrates the emergence of small arms and light weapons on the international agenda and draws some parallels with the land mines case. Moreover, I outline how norm building processes is a fruitful research guide to examine these pressing questions of land mines and small arms proliferation management. The creation of international norms and the setting of widely agreed upon standards to control small arms and light weapons is central to the multilateral coordination of international responses to tackle the problems associated with their proliferation.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Defense Policy, and Arms Control and Proliferation

3257. Analyzing the Issue of Curbing the Unrestricted Availability and Proliferation of Small Arms and Light Weapons: Some Implications for the Study of International Relations and for Education in Defense and Security

Author:
Denise Garcia
Publication Date:
04-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
This paper addresses one of the key issues in the international security agenda today: the control of the proliferation and availability of small arms and light weapons. It shows how the topic has become one of concern to the international community. It also indicates who the main actors involved in this process are. In addition, this paper examines the reasons why there is so much availability of small arms in the world today. These reasons are connected to changes in the international arms trade patterns after the Cold War. It seeks to demonstrate some implications of the rise of the issue of small arms into the international agenda, for the study of international relations and for education in defense and security. I am especially interested in the literature on norms and ideas that helps to explain the advancement of normative change. The present paper utilizes transparency as a case study with two aims. First, I want to illustrate how the rise of the norm of transparency sheds light on the study of norms in international relations. Second, I will contend that the rise of the small arms issue has also contributed to fostering the norm of transparency.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, Defense Policy, and Arms Control and Proliferation

3258. The Russian Debate on the Nonproliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction and Delivery Vehicles

Author:
Vladimir Dvorkin
Publication Date:
04-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
In the first paragraphs of their declaration at the Evian Summit in early June 2003, the G8 leaders stated, .We recognize that proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their means of delivery poses a growing danger to us all. Together with the spread of international terrorism, it is the pre-eminent threat to international security.
Topic:
Security, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Asia

3259. Deterring Conflict in the Taiwan Strait: The Successes and Failures of Taiwan's Defense Reform and Modernization Program

Author:
Micheal D. Swaine
Publication Date:
07-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
THE TAIWAN STRAIT IS ONE OF THE TWO PLACES in the Asian Pacific where a major war could break out; the other place is the Korean Peninsula. For over fifty years, the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC, or Taiwan) have maintained an uneasy peace across the Strait, punctuated by brief periods of limited conflict or by occasional military displays. The PRC insists that Taiwan is a part of China and asserts that the island must one day be reunited with the mainland. Until the early 1990s, the ROC government also viewed Taiwan as an integral part of China and insisted on eventual reunification, albeit under the Chinese Nationalist flag. But in recent years, with democratization opening the system to native Taiwanese, public support for independence has grown, as has the alarm in Beijing. As tensions have grown and the prospect of the resumption of a cross-Strait understanding regarding Taiwan's status has become more remote, stability has depended primarily on military deterrence. For China, such deterrence aims to prevent the final consolidation of Taiwan's separate status. For Taiwan (and the United States), it aims at preventing China from using force to compel reunification on Beijing's terms.
Topic:
Security and Politics
Political Geography:
United States, China, Taiwan, Beijing, and Asia

3260. Islamists in the Arab World: The Dance Around Democracy

Author:
Graham E. Fuller
Publication Date:
09-2004
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
ARE ISLAM AND DEMOCRACY COMPATIBLE? And are Islamists willing to accept a democratic order and work within it? Debate has swirled around these two grand questions for decades and has produced a broad variety of responses, often quite polarized. Whatever we may think about Islamists, the topic matters vitally because in the Middle East today they have few serious ideological rivals in leading opposition movements against a failing status quo. These Islamist movements are characterized by rapid growth, evolution, change, and diversification. In the Arab world the only ideological competition comes from Arab nationalism, the left, and liberal democracy, in diminishing order of size and importance. More significantly, since the Al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, and the declaration of the Bush administration's war on terrorism, Arab nationalists and the left increasingly share a common cause with the Islamists in the face of growing political confrontation with the United States. This rising hostility shows no abatement as yet and permits political Islam (Islamism) to gain ever greater ground.
Topic:
Security, Terrorism, and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and Arabia