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3422. Africa: Confronting Complex Threats
- Author:
- Kwesi Aning
- Publication Date:
- 02-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute (IPI)
- Abstract:
- Africa is grappling with several difficult security challenges. These difficulties result not only from the magnitude of these challenges, but also from the lack of capacity of African states and organizations to respond quickly and effectively to them. While wide swathes of Africa are compelled to deal with problems in an ad hoc manner, there are indications that some states, Regional Economic Communities (RECs) and the African Union (AU) are undertaking promising steps to respond. Some of Africa's core security challenges are (a) the legacy of historic notions of state sovereignty; (b) the rise of regionalism in the absence of common regional values; (c) the difficulty of managing hegemonic regionalism; (d) elitism in the form of regional integration occurring only at the level of leaders without permeating the consciousness of the people; (e) the creation of institutions with little or no capacity to manage them, resulting in a merely formal regionalism; and finally (f) the perception of regionalism as an externally driven project.
- Topic:
- Conflict Prevention, Development, and Economics
- Political Geography:
- Africa
3423. Asia: Towards Security Cooperation
- Author:
- Michael Vatikiotis
- Publication Date:
- 02-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute (IPI)
- Abstract:
- Asia has enjoyed a remarkable climate of peace and security in the post-Cold War era. However, there is much that could have gone wrong. Tensions on the Korean peninsula, in the Taiwan Straits, between China and India, India and Pakistan – the hot spots and fault lines of tension are well known and warily watched. Rarely has serious conflict erupted, though. The last major 'conventional' conflict in Asia was the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, though smaller wars have been fought between states in Kashmir and along the Chinese border with Vietnam. The region is also wracked by protracted internal disputes that generate sustained fears for internal security and destabilized inter-state relations. All the same, for a region that lacks the kind of sophisticated collective security arrangements that have kept the northern hemisphere at peace for the past sixty years, Asia's security environment is remarkably benign.
- Topic:
- Security, Development, and International Cooperation
- Political Geography:
- Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, India, Taiwan, Asia, Soviet Union, Vietnam, Kashmir, Korea, and Korean Peninsula
3424. Central Asia and the Caucasus: A Vulnerable Crescent
- Author:
- Anna Matveeva and Thomas de Waal
- Publication Date:
- 02-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute (IPI)
- Abstract:
- The Caucasus and Central Asia – eight countries of the former Soviet Union stretching to the south of Russia and to the west of China – form a chain of weak states, vulnerable to conflict, extremism, and spillover from potential instability in the Middle East, Iran and Afghanistan. Once on the path of the Silk Road, these countries are still transit routes in the world economy rather than major economic players. The overarching problem for the Caucasus countries situated on the eastern fringe of Europe – Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, as well as the Russian North Caucasus – is unresolved conflicts that hamper development and poison politics. The Caucasus has become a field for latter-day Great Power battles of influence, in which competing policy agendas, sometimes even from within the same state, make for a fragmented international response that hampers regional integration and development. The autocratic states of Central Asia by contrast risk isolating themselves from the wider world, becoming a source of danger because of their deliberate remoteness. Here the globalized threats of drug trafficking and militant Islam are the biggest potential source of instability. Multilateral organizations such as the UN are still struggling to articulate a coherent response to the two regions as a whole, tending to make more narrow interventions that have limited impact.
- Topic:
- Security and Development
- Political Geography:
- Afghanistan, Russia, China, Europe, Iran, Central Asia, Asia, Soviet Union, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia
3425. Europe: Crises of Identity
- Author:
- Shada Islam
- Publication Date:
- 02-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute (IPI)
- Abstract:
- The European Union's emergence as a leading global political and economic actor is an important, exciting and inspiring development in modern history. The signature in 1957 of the EU's founding Treaty of Rome, creating the European Atomic Energy Community (EURATOM) and the European Economic Community (EEC) has been followed rapidly by a spate of initiatives designed to draw EU members into an ever closer economic and political union.
- Topic:
- International Relations, Development, and Nationalism
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Rome
3426. Divergence and Convergence in Eastern Europe Eurasia: One Transition Path Or Two?
- Author:
- Robyn Murphy and Ron Sprout
- Publication Date:
- 02-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United States Agency for International Development
- Abstract:
- This paper attempts to assess the transition “divide” between Eastern Europe and Eurasia by examining and updating trends across the economic, political, and social transition dimensions. Is there evidence that the transition to market-oriented democracies between the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) countries and Eurasia is diverging along these dimensions? To what extent are the CEE countries taking one transition path and the Eurasian countries an alternative one?
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- Eurasia and Eastern Europe
3427. Labor Markets in Eastern Europe and Eurasia
- Author:
- Robyn Murphy, Ron Sprout, and Ayo Heinegg
- Publication Date:
- 01-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- United States Agency for International Development
- Abstract:
- This research attempts to look systematically at the available data regarding labor market characteristics of the transition in Eastern Europe and Eurasia. A primary focus is the examination of the data in light of a World Bank working hypothesis that “there are signs of an emerging divide between labor markets in the transition economies of Eastern Europe and those of low-income Eurasian countries.” We find significant labor market gaps and differences between the CEE countries (particularly the Northern Tier CEE) and Eurasia but mixed evidence at best that these gaps are growing. We also find that there remain some key challenges and adverse trends in labor markets even among the Northern Tier CEE countries.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- Eurasia and Eastern Europe
3428. India's Future: It's About Jobs
- Author:
- Geoffrey N. Keim and Beth Anne Wilson
- Publication Date:
- 11-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
- Abstract:
- Projections of sustained strong growth in India depend importantly on the utilization of the huge increase in India's working-age population projected over the next two decades. To date, however, India's economic growth has been concentrated in high-skill and capital-intensive sectors, and has not generated strong employment growth. In this paper, we highlight the tension between India's performance in output and employment, describe the characteristics of India's demographic dividend, and discuss impediments to India's shift away from agriculture.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- South Asia and India
3429. The Role of China in Asia: Engine, Conduit, or Steamroller?
- Author:
- Beth Anne Wilson, Jane T. Haltmaier, Shaghil Ahmed, Brahima Coulibaly, Ross Knippenberg, Sylvain Leduc, and Mario Marazzi
- Publication Date:
- 09-2007
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System
- Abstract:
- This paper assesses China's role in Asia as an independent engine of growth, as a conduit of demand from the industrial countries, and as a competitor for export markets. We provide both macroeconomic and microeconomic evidence. The macroeconomic analysis focuses on the impact of U.S. and Chinese demand on the output of the Asian economies by estimating growth comovements and VARs. The results suggest an increasing role of China as an independent source of growth. The microeconomic analysis decomposes trade into basic products, parts and components, and finished goods. We find a large role for parts and components trade consistent with China playing an important and increasing role as a conduit. We also estimate some regressions that show that China's increasing presence in export markets has had a negative effect on exports of some products for some other Asian economies, but not for other products, including those of the important electronic high-technology industry.
- Topic:
- Development, Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- United States, China, and Asia
3430. Water, Conflict, and Cooperation: Lessons From the Nile River Basin
- Author:
- Patricia Kameri-Mbote
- Publication Date:
- 01-2007
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Wilson Center
- Abstract:
- In 1979, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat said: “The only matter that could take Egypt to war again is water.” In 1988 then-Egyptian Foreign Minister Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who later became the United Nations' Secretary-General, predicted that the next war in the Middle East would be fought over the waters of the Nile, not politics. Rather than accept these frightening predictions, we must examine them within the context of the Nile River basin and the relationships forged among the states that share its waters.
- Topic:
- Conflict Resolution, Security, Development, and Environment
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Egypt