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Begin New Search Publishing Institution Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University

111. Low Carbon Shanghai Avoiding Carbon Lock-In through Sustainable Urbanization

Author:
Wing Ho Tom Cheng, Gautam Kamath, Kevin Rowe, Eleanor Wood, and Taisen Yue
Publication Date:
08-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Shanghai will lock in a future of high energy costs and worsening air pollution if it does not change current policies for the planning, construction, and operation of new urban developments, particularly transportation systems, and buildings. This report assesses the policy frameworks for these systems and their implications for Shanghai's prospects as a low carbon city. The major obstacles to efficient, low carbon development are the fragmented planning system for land use and transportation, the insufficiently stringent building energy efficiency codes and the lack of investment in opportunities to encourage efficient consumer behavior. Carbon lock-in occurs when infrastructure projects, or other developments with long lifetimes, are designed with high-carbon characteristics that are difficult to reverse later. This issue is par¬ticularly acute for rapidly-urbanizing Shanghai, where there is an emphasis on keeping project costs low and completion times short. This report was prepared as a case study for the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), a prominent government-affiliated think tank in China. The recommendations are addressed to the Shanghai Municipal Government. Many recommendations hold relevance for the governments of other fast-growing Chinese cities facing similar carbon lock-in challenges to Shanghai.
Political Geography:
China and Shanghai

112. Cutting Too Deep: The Obama Administration's Proposals for Nuclear Security Spending Reductions

Author:
Matthew Bunn, Nickolas Roth, and William H. Tobey
Publication Date:
07-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
The substantial nuclear security budget cuts proposed by the Obama administration for fiscal year (FY) 2015, if approved, would slow progress toward preventing the essential ingredients of nuclear bombs from falling into terrorist hands. Many of the proposed cutbacks are not the result of completing projects under the four-year effort to secure vulnerable nuclear materials or putting the mixed oxide (MOX) fuel program for plutonium in cold standby. The drop in funding would result in real and significant cuts to important ongoing nuclear security programs. Congress should act to reduce the scale of the proposed cut for nuclear security programs by at least $100 million, and should consider other substantial increases in funding for nonproliferation programs.

113. "The Lessons of 1914 for East Asia Today: Missing the Trees for the Forest"

Author:
Todd H. Hall and Jia Ian Chong
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
A century has passed since the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo set in motion a chain of events that would eventually convulse Europe in war. Possibly no conflict has been the focus of more scholarly attention. The questions of how and why European states came to abandon peaceful coexistence for four years of armed hostilities—ending tens of millions of lives and several imperial dynasties—have captivated historians and international relations scholars alike.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Middle East, and East Asia

114. "Domestic Coalitions, Internationalization, and War: Then and Now"

Author:
Etel Solingen
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
The sources of World War I are numerous and widely studied. Some scholars have argued that they are underdetermining individually but overdetermining collectively. The purpose of this article is not to fuel the battle among theories claiming complete explanatory power, but rather to examine some lessons for contemporary international relations. Much of the recent commentary on the war's centenary evokes similarities between Germany in 1914 and China in 2014, and between globalization then and now. There are crucial differences on both accounts, however.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
China and Germany

115. "Better Now Than Later: The Paradox of 1914 as Everyone's Favored Year for War"

Author:
Jack Snyder
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
One reason why Europe went to war in 1914 is that all of the continental great powers judged it a favorable moment for a fight, and all were pessimistic about postponing the fight until later. On its face, this explanation constitutes a paradox. Still, each power had a superficially plausible reason for thinking this was true.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
Europe

116. "Dead Wrong? Battle Deaths, Military Medicine, and Exaggerated Reports of War's Demise"

Author:
Tanisha M. Fazel
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Several recent books argue that war is on the decline. In Winning the War on War, for example, Joshua Goldstein lauds the recent successes of the peacemaking community in countries such as Sierra Leone, Liberia, and Ivory Coast. In The Better Angels of Our Nature, Steven Pinker writes that not only war but violence in general has become much less common, as the civilizing forces of literacy and modern government have tempered our baser instincts and allowed our "better angels" to prevail.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and East Asia

117. "Delegitimizing al-Qaida: Defeating an 'Army Whose Men Love Death'"

Author:
Jerry Mark Long and Alex S. WIlner
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Al-Qaida has established a metanarrative that enables it to recruit militants and supporters. The United States and its allies can challenge its ability to do so by delegitimizing the ideological motivations that inform that metanarrative.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and East Asia

118. "Ethnofederalism: The Worst Form of Institutional Arrangement…?"

Author:
Liam Anderson
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Critics of ethnofederalism— a political system in which federal subunits reflect ethnic groups' territorial distribution—argue that it facilitates secession and state collapse. An examination of post-1945 ethnofederal states, however, shows that ethnofederalism has succeeded more often than not.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and War
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, and East Asia

119. Delegitimizing al-Qaida: Defeating an 'Army Whose Men Love Death'

Author:
Jerry Mark Long and Alex S. WIlner
Publication Date:
09-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Deterring terrorism is no longer a provocative idea. Whereas U.S. President George W. Bush was emphatic that "unlike the Soviet Union the terrorist enemies... cannot be deterred," the emerging consensus among both academics and policy practitioners today is that under certain conditions deterrence theory can be applied to terrorists and terrorism. Scholars have begun to propose, test, and refine a variety of theories for influencing terrorist behavior, and core elements of these new approaches have found their way into U.S. strategic doctrine, evident in the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review Report , the 2010 Department of Defense Nuclear Posture Review Report , and the 2011 National Strategy for Counterterrorism . Thus, despite some initial skepticism, the logic of coercion is being used to shape the behavior of terrorists, insurgents, and other violent nonstate actors.
Political Geography:
United States

120. Ethnofederalism: The Worst Form of Institutional Arrangement...?

Author:
Liam Anderson
Publication Date:
09-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Security
Institution:
Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Whether it is termed ethno-, ethnic, plurinational, or multinational federalism, the design of federal subunit boundaries to conform to the territorial distribution of ethnic groups continues to generate controversy among scholars of institutional design.For some, it is an effective means of alleviating deep ethnic divisions that can help to hold together the common state; for others, it is an insidious institutional recipe for the inevitable disintegration of the common state.The vitality of the debate between advocates and critics of this form of federal arrangement should not obscure the fact that hostility toward ethnic federalism is generally more widespread than is sympathy for it. Philip Roeder, for example, finds the enthusiasm on the part of nongovernmental organizations and practitioners for "ethnofederalism" as a solution to conflicts "remarkable," given that it runs "headlong into a substantial body of prior expert opinion warning against this." For Roeder, at least, the "imprudence" of ethnofederal arrangements is beyond dispute. Precisely why the collective wisdom of scholars conflicts with practitioners on this point is an important question, because it implies a worrying disconnect between academics and practitioners that has serious real-world implications. It is, of course, possible that practitioners are systematically ignorant of the contents of political science journals, but it is also possible that the "substantial body of prior expert opinion" referred to by Roeder is less substantial than it first appears.