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10001. Statement

Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Council of American Ambassadors
Abstract:
The Council of American Ambassadors is a nonpartisan, professional organization established in 1983 that endeavors to educate the public about policy issues affecting the national interest. It also supports the role of the ambassador and the embassy team in carrying out US foreign policy in countries around the world.
Political Geography:
America

10002. "The Rise of Afghanistan's Insurgency: State Failure and Jihad"

Author:
Seth G. Jones
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
In 2001 approximately 100 Central Intelligence Agency officers, 350 U.S. Special Forces soldiers, and 15,000 Afghans overthrew the Taliban regime in less than three months while suffering only a dozen U.S. fatalities. They were supported by as many as 100 U.S. combat sorties per day. Some individuals involved in the operation argued that it revitalized the American way of war. This initial success, however, transitioned into an insurgency, as the Taliban and other insurgent groups began a sustained effort to overthrow the Afghan government. The fighting, which began in 2002, had developed into a full-blown insurgency by 2006. During this period, the number of insurgent-initiated attacks rose by 400 percent, and the number of deaths from these attacks by more than 800 percent. The increase in violence was particularly acute between 2005 and 2006, when the number of suicide attacks quintupled from 27 to 139; remotely detonated bombings more than doubled from 783 to 1,677; and armed attacks nearly tripled from 1,558 to 4,542. Insurgent-initiated attacks rose another 27 percent between 2006 and 2007. The result was a lack of security for Afghans and foreigners.
Topic:
Political Violence, Government, and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, Asia, and Taliban

10003. "No Sign until the Burst of Fire: Understanding the Pakistan-Afghanistan Frontier"

Author:
Thomas H. Johnson and M. Chris Mason
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
By 1932, British troops had been waging war of varying intensity with a group of intractable tribes along and beyond the northwestern frontier of India for nearly a century. That year, in summarizing a typical skirmish, one British veteran noted laconically, “Probably no sign till the burst of fire, and then the swift rush with knives, the stripping of the dead, and the unhurried mutilation of the infidels.” It was a savage, cruel, and peculiar kind of mountain warfare, frequently driven by religious zealotry on the tribal side, and it was singularly unforgiving of tactical error, momentary inattention, or cultural ignorance. It still is. The Pakistan- Afghanistan border region has experienced turbulence for centuries. Today a portion of it constitutes a significant threat to U.S. national security interests. The unique underlying factors that create this threat are little understood by most policymakers in Washington.
Topic:
Foreign Policy and Terrorism
Political Geography:
Pakistan, Afghanistan, United States, Washington, and Asia

10004. "What Terrorists Really Want: Terrorist Motives and Counterterrorism Strategy"

Author:
Max Abrahms
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
The strategic model—the dominant paradigm in terrorism studies—claims that terrorists are rational actors who attack civilians to achieve political goals. To defeat terrorism, policymakers have sought to decrease its political utility by adhering to a no concessions policy, engaging in political accommodation, and promoting democracy. The evidence suggests, however, that terrorists are not motivated primarily by a desire to achieve political objectives. Rather, they use terrorism to develop strong affective ties with fellow terrorists. Counterterrorism strategies must therefore find ways to diminish the social utility of terrorism.
Topic:
Terrorism

10005. "Postconflict Reconstruction in Africa: Flawed Ideas about Failed States"

Author:
Pierre Englebert and Denis M. Tull
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Africa has the highest percentage of failed states in the world, making it a top priority for external donors engaged in state reconstruction. Yet such efforts have a poor record of success because of three flawed assumptions shared by many donors: first, Western state institutions can be transferred to Africa ; second, donors and African leaders have the same understanding of failure and reconstruction; and third, donors are capable of rebuilding Africa states. In contrast, Uganda and Somaliland have succeeded in rebuilding and without external assistance. This success suggests that donors should shift their efforts toward encouraging indigenous state-building efforts and constructive bargaining between local groups and the governments of failed African states.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
Uganda and Africa

10006. "Partitioning to Peace: Sovereignty, Demography, and Ethnic Civil Wars"

Author:
Carter Johnson
Publication Date:
03-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Partitioning states along ethnic lines is a debatable solution to solving ethnic civil wars. Advocates argue that partition offers the best chance for lasting peace, while opponents claim that it takes a huge toll on the populations involved and that its effectiveness has yet to be proven. The evidence suggests that only partitions that completely separate the warring groups succeed in creating peaceful states. Policymakers should thus consider partition as an option only where populations are already separated or where population transfers can be accomplished safely. Partitioning Kosovo into distinct ethnic districts could lead to lasting peace, whereas partitioning Iraq would most likely increase human suffering and violence.
Political Geography:
Iraq

10007. The Promise of Economic Rights and the Welfare State

Author:
Zehra F. Kabasakal Arat
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Human Rights and Human Welfare - Review Essays
Institution:
Josef Korbel Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver
Abstract:
The International Bill of Rights, which includes the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR, 1948), the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR, 1966), and the International Covenant of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR, 1966), embodies a wide range of human rights. The universalism, interdependency, and indivisibility of these rights have been reaffirmed at the World Conferences on Human Rights, organized by the United Nations (U.N.) and held in Teheran (1968) and Vienna (199 3), and in various U.N. resolutions. Yet, there has been resistance to accepting the full scope of human rights articulated in international documents, and civil and political rights have been privileged. Economic, social and labor rights tend to take a back seat in international discourse in many countries, including Western democratic states that often present themselves as the flagship of human rights.
Topic:
United Nations
Political Geography:
United States and Canada

10008. Moving Beyond Markets and Minimalism: Democracy in the Era of Globalization

Author:
Richard Burchill
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Human Rights and Human Welfare - Review Essays
Institution:
Josef Korbel Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver
Abstract:
When the term globalization comes up in general conversation, the press or academic writing, it is given a range of meanings and is either loathed or celebrated. Globalization is subject to a variety of interpretations and descriptions. Debates about its merits or shortcomings are often muddled, as it is never clear if the antagonists are talking about the same thing at the same time. Globalization, in a broad sense, refers to “the expanding scale, growing magnitude, speeding up and deepening impact of transcontinental flows and patterns of social interaction” (Held and McGrew 2002: 1). While globalization describes a whole range of human activity, its main thrust and orientation has come to be associated with global economic activity that is in turn heavily influenced by, if not synonymous with, neoliberal ideology.
Topic:
Democratization, Globalization, International Law, and Markets

10009. Memory and Violence in Israel/Palestine

Author:
K.M. Fierke
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Human Rights and Human Welfare - Review Essays
Institution:
Josef Korbel Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver
Abstract:
In 2008, Israel will turn sixty. Landmark birthdays often give rise to reflection on the past. In this case, questions about memory, and whose memory to privilege or commemorate, may have consequences for the future of the region. For the Israelis, the object of memory, and the vehicle of its birth, was the 1948 “War of Independence,” where like David and Goliath, a numerically smaller but technologically and culturally superior power, faced down a larger but inferior one. Following just a few years after the Holocaust in Europe, Israel's military victory offered, in the words of Nahum Goldman, an American Zionist leader, “a glorious contrast to the centuries of persecution and humiliation, of adaptation and compromise” (Shlaim 2000: 40). For Palestinians, and Arabs more generally, the Israeli narrative is not merely offensive but a source of humiliation itself, given the “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians that occurred during al Nakba (the Catastrophe), with the dispossession of over 750,000 indigenous inhabitants of Palestine and their descendents. For Palestinians, the failure of the Israeli state to ac knowledge 1948 as an ethnic cleansing continues to underpin the conflict.
Political Geography:
America, Europe, Middle East, Israel, and Palestine

10010. Rights and the Hijâb: Rationality and Discourse in the Public Sphere

Author:
Howard Adelman
Publication Date:
01-2008
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Human Rights and Human Welfare - Review Essays
Institution:
Josef Korbel Graduate School of International Studies, University of Denver
Abstract:
When I took my family to France for one of the hottest summers on record, we went to a local municipal pool in Beaune. After paying the en trance fee and entering the pool area, we were informed that my children would not be allowed to swim wearing their North American boxer-style swimming shorts. “Public health” required that they wear speedo-type suits. No reason or evidence was offered to explain the policy. The officials simply said it was French law. The swimming pool administration generously provided washed speedos. My children had a great time. The next day, my youngest son developed an itch in his crotch. When we took him to the doctor, he was diagnosed with a serious skin infection most likely contracted from the borrowed swim suit.
Topic:
Civil Society, Islam, and Nationalism
Political Geography:
Europe, France, and North America