Search

Begin New Search Topic Sovereignty

191. Unilateral Separation as Roadmap Insurance

Author:
Gerald M. Steinberg
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs
Abstract:
The record of formal efforts to negotiate peace in protracted ethno-national conflicts (Balkans, N. Ireland, Sri Lanka, etc.) is not encouraging. Israel needs a serious insurance policy, in the form of unilateral separation, to minimize vulnerability to another and potentially more deadly terror campaign, should the "roadmap" fail. The construction of a separation barrier is supported by over 70 percent of the Israeli public, representing a broad consensus from across the political spectrum that favors a physical barrier blocking access to Israeli cities in order to prevent a resumption of the Palestinian terror campaign of the past three years. Political separation will also promote a two-state solution, allowing Israel to remain a culturally Jewish and democratic society while fostering Palestinian sovereignty. Key policy issues concern the pace of construction and the route to be taken for the remaining sections. While options range from a minimalist 300 km line to a 600 km alternative that would include most Israeli settlements, a pragmatic middle route including settlement blocs like Ariel and Gush Etzion may provide the optimum mix under present circumstances. If the Palestinian security framework proves its capabilities in preventing terror, and political negotiations on borders progress, the barrier can be relocated.
Topic:
Security, Religion, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Middle East, Israel, Sri Lanka, Palestine, Arabia, Balkans, and Ireland

192. Autonomy and Ethnic Conflict: Experiences from the Caucasus

Author:
Svante Cornell
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:
Ethnopolitical conflict has, especially since the early 1990s, been a growing source of concern in the international arena. Having grown since the 1960s, it culminated after the cold war with the eruption of conflict in the former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia. Ethnic mobilization among minority populations in multiethnic states has often led to demands for self-rule or to secession. Especially in defined geographical areas where minorities are compactly settled, the creation of a separate state is seen as a feasible goal and control over territory often becomes a chief issue of conflict. Many theorists have found that solutions involving regional autonomy are effective in dealing with ethnic conflict. Ted Gurr, for example, has argued that "negotiated regional autonomy has proved to be an effective antidote for ethnopolitical wars of secession in Western and Third World States." Regional autonomy implies the introduction of ethnoterritoriality - linking territorial control to ethnicity. This is the case either when a region is explicitly created as a homeland for an ethnic group or when a minority group constitutes a large majority of the population of an autonomous state structure and perceives it as its own. Advocates of ethnofederalism argue that autonomy solutions are effective conflict-resolving mechanisms and that further federalization of multiethnic states along ethnic lines will help prevent ethnic conflict. In some of the literature, ethnofederalism has been characterized as what David Meyer terms a "cure-all prescription" for ethnic tensions. There is, however, considerable reason to argue that the institution of territorial autonomy may be conducive not to interethnic peace and cooperation but may in fact foster ethnic mobilization, increased secessionism, and even armed conflict.
Topic:
Ethnic Conflict and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Europe, Caucasus, Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia

193. Biological Weapons Threats from the Former Soviet Union

Author:
Sonia Ben Ouagrham
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination, Princeton University
Abstract:
Since September 11th, the American anthrax-laced letters and the war in Afghanistan have revived the interest of government officials, researchers and the general public to the state and security of former biological weapon (BW) facilities in the Former Soviet Union (FSU). In the popular press, reports of the general economic crisis and the political unrest that characterize FSU countries tend to emphasize the proliferation threat from these countries. Very little is said, however, about the nuances of this threat, its nature and degree of probability. Some reports tend to overestimate the number of employees at former BW facilities, thus inflating the risks of brain drain. While at the same time, other major sources of proliferation, such as the diversion of pathogens or the illicit transfer of specialized equipment are usually ignored. The present paper aims to characterize more precisely the threat stemming from former BW facilities in the FSU by determining what type of resources are available at former BW facilities and to what extent they are accessible to states of concern or terrorist groups. Although the existing open source information enables us to determine more clearly the categories of personnel, the type of equipment and material that pose the greatest proliferation threat, it does not measure properly the extent of the threat, i.e. an inventory of past and present facilities, expertise, equipment and material. Nevertheless, we can conclude that specialized knowledge, equipment and dangerous pathogens are available at former BW facilities in the FSU and can become accessible to state or non-state actors wishing to start or develop covert BW programs. This is particularly true in Central Asia, where economic and security factors, associated with the geographic characteristics of this region all converge to form a chain of proliferation: seekers of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their related technologies, potential suppliers and deliverers.
Topic:
Sovereignty and Weapons of Mass Destruction
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Russia, America, and Central Asia

194. Relics of Cold War: Europe's Challenge, Ukraine's Experience

Author:
Oleksiy Melnyk, Ian Anthony, and Alyson J. K. Bailes
Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Stockholm International Peace Research Institute
Abstract:
In 1989, the year when the death knell sounded for the Communist bloc in Europe and for the 'cold war' which it had pursued with the West, a total of 6–7.6 million personnel depending on the method of counting (2.5–3.7 million from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO, and 3.5–3.9 million from the Warsaw Treaty Organization, WTO) stood in arms within the European theatre. This included some 915 000 forces stationed outside their national borders inter alia from Canada, the Soviet Union and the United States. In the same area there were 80 400 main battle tanks, 76 300 armoured combat vehicles (ACVs), 67 700 heavy artillery pieces, 11 160 combat aircraft and 2615 attack helicopters—as well as many millions of smaller and lighter weapons. Aimed at each other as part of the East–West strategic confrontation, the USA and the USSR in 1990 deployed 10 563 and 10 271 strategic nuclear warheads respectively, while the United Kingdom possessed 300 and France 621. In addition, significant proportions of European territory (especially in the 'front-line' states such as the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, GDR) were taken up by military bases, exercise areas and other facilities such as airfields and pipelines. Large sectors of industry and of scientific, technological, and research and development (R) work were devoted to the needs of military defence. The resources involved were shut out from peaceful, civilian use more emphatically than would normally be the case today, because the bitterness of the strategic confrontation—and the associated risks of espionage and subversion—imposed a degree of secrecy often creating a situation where the citizens of a given state did not know what was happening on their own territory.
Topic:
NATO, Politics, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

195. Reversing the Decline in the Balkans: Recommendations for Western Policy

Publication Date:
10-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Public International Law Policy Group
Abstract:
The results of Serbia's December 2003 parliamentary elections accelerated concerns that the situation in the Balkans is seriously deteriorating. On 2 March 2004 the Public International Law Policy Group and The Century Foundation convened a roundtable of sixteen people deeply involved in Balkan issues from the region, Europe, and the United States to review the general situation in the Balkans and examine the approach of the United States and European Union (EU) to the region.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Politics, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Serbia, and Balkans

196. The United States, China, and Taiwan: A Future With Hope

Author:
James Lilley
Publication Date:
10-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Public International Law Policy Group
Abstract:
You have clearly worked over the complicated relationship between Taiwan and China. I can only try to build on what Dr. Lin Chong--pin and Mr. Rostow have already described so lucidly. I would like to point out first that China chooses, for both tactical and emotional reasons, to place a special heavy emphasis on its relationship with Taiwan and to its point that Taiwan is part of China. Emotional, because this stirs up nationalism among a skeptical Chinese elite who have lost ideology. Tactical, because driving home the unity and sovereignty themes forces the U.S. on the defensive, i.e., the U.S. interferes in China's internal affairs, a cardinal sin in China's own lexicon. In reality, however, China has been practical. For almost fifty years Chinese propaganda has focused on Taiwan as a pure target, but objective circumstances have changed and so has China's strategy. China took over the Ta Chen Islands peacefully in 1954, its last significant territorial acquisition in the Taiwan Strait. Its later more militaristic approach against a well--defended Quemoy (Chin men) failed in 1958, and China retreated with much bluster and firing of cannons, many of them empty.
Topic:
Politics and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
United States, China, Taiwan, and Asia

197. What is Sovereignty? The Cases of Taiwan and Micronesia

Author:
Peter R. Rosenblatt
Publication Date:
10-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Public International Law Policy Group
Abstract:
The title of my contribution to this discussion raises a point that is easy to overlook in discussions relating to the legal status of the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan. The range of options across the Strait is not confined, as the title of this conference suggests, to the reunification of China or Taiwan's independence, although either of these is obviously a possibility. A more likely option, in my judgment, is some future status for the ROC which involves neither incorporation into the People's Republic of China nor the challenging step of a declaration of “independence” as the Republic of Taiwan. This third option embraces a multiplicity of status shadings involving a continuing evolution of the ROC's current status of de facto independence. It is this option that I would like to address.
Topic:
Politics and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
China, Taiwan, and Asia

198. Mexico and Drug Trafficking: The Sovereignty Dilemma

Author:
Jorge Chabat
Publication Date:
02-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas
Abstract:
Sovereignty is a concept that is debated every day in international politics. In many respects, sovereignty is the foundational concept of the international system as we know it. The word is used frequently by most countries in the world, often with a defensive purpose in mind. At the same time, the concept is a subject of considerable debate in the academic literature, as well as in international for a. the discussions about the relationship between sovereignty, autonomy, human rights, and the role of the international community are abundant and challenging. However, it seems that not all states hold a similar concept of sovereignty, and not all of them practice (or suffer) a similar concept. Even more, the concept differs not only from state to state, but from one period of historical time to another. As Fowler and Bunck point out: "the concept of sovereignty has been used not only in different senses by different people, but in different senses by the same person in rapid succession."
Topic:
International Relations, Civil Society, Politics, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Mexico

199. Iraq: Building a New Security Structure

Publication Date:
12-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
For the foreseeable future, Iraq's security will be in the hands of Coalition forces. As a result, how the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) chose to deal with the country's former military and how it is now going about starting up a new army may not have immediate security implications. But both courses have decisive political implications, and both appear, at a minimum, to have been poorly thought out and recklessly implemented. They heighten the risk that the Sunni population will be further alienated, that the military will be perceived as a prolongation of, rather than a substitute for, the occupation and that, far from helping to forge a new collective national identity, it will become an arena for renewed internal political, sectarian and ethnic conflict. A significant course correction is required in order to lay the foundations for a stable, and stabilising, indigenous security structure.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Foreign Policy, Politics, Sovereignty, and Population
Political Geography:
Iraq and Arabia

200. Iraq's Constitutional Challenge

Publication Date:
11-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Crisis Group
Abstract:
As attacks against the occupying forces and suicide bombs against civilian targets intensify, the need for a new political formula that will increase the powers, legitimacy and representative quality of Iraqi governing institutions is becoming more urgent than ever. The response to date, reflected in United Nations Security Council Resolution 1511, has been to tie the transfer of the exercise of sovereignty to the drafting of an Iraqi constitution, its adoption in a referendum and ensuing national elections.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Ethnic Conflict, Government, Politics, Religion, and Sovereignty
Political Geography:
Iraq, Arabia, and United Nations