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17972. Why Intelligence Fails: Lessons from the Iranian Revolution and the Iraq War
- Author:
- Loch K. Johnson
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Political Science Quarterly
- Institution:
- Academy of Political Science
- Abstract:
- Anything on intelligence written by Robert Jervis is worth reading. This volume is certainly no exception. In this instance, he takes on the difficult job of trying to understand why the United States, despite spending $80 billion on intelligence each year, still makes mistakes in predicting the trajectory of world affairs.
- Political Geography:
- United States and Iraq
17973. Newcomers, Outsiders and Insiders: Immigrants and American Racial Politics in the Early Twenty-First Century
- Author:
- Rodolfo O. De La Garza
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Political Science Quarterly
- Institution:
- Academy of Political Science
- Abstract:
- The nationʼs demographics have dramatically changed since its founding. Since the 1960s, immigration has transformed a society almost completely populated by Europeans into a multi-religious, polyglot, majority-minority nation. Political science, except for notable exceptions, such as Lawrence Fuchʼs encyclopedic The American Kaleidoscope, is new to the study of how these immigrants have transformed the polity. Rather than target immigrationʼs effects directly, political analyses have targeted the impact of immigration via studies of Latino and Asian ethnic politics. This work, however, has not tested or produced theoretical insights into how immigration affects the nationʼs racial political processes, which is the goal of Newcomers, Outsiders and Insiders.
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Asia
17974. Going Local: Presidential Leadership in the Post-Broadcast Age
- Author:
- Martin Johnson
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Political Science Quarterly
- Institution:
- Academy of Political Science
- Abstract:
- This ambitious book focuses on presidential activities in the contemporary political environment that Jeffrey Cohen characterizes as marked by polarized political parties in Congress and fragmented mass media. Building on his own work (for example, the recent The Presidency in the Era of 24-Hour News) and the contextual theory that Samuel Kernell develops in the classic Going Public, Cohen connects presidential behavior to the organization of Congress and the mass media. As the shift from congressional institutional pluralism(which Cohen identifies as prevailing 1953–1969 [p. 43]) to individual pluralism (1970–1988) helps explain presidentsʼ increased emphasis on public activities covered by national media, so more-recent changes in political context have affected presidentsʼ public behavior. Cohen argues that congressional polarization and media fragmentation (1989–present) help explain recent presidential efforts to more narrowly target constituencies via interest groups and local media. As an example of this tactical shift, Cohen notes President George W. Bushʼs schedule of domestic travel to circumvent his “national Pooh-Bahs” (p. 2) and build support for legislative initiatives.
- Political Geography:
- United States, China, Israel, Soviet Union, and Egypt
17975. Inside Insurgency: Violence, Civilians, and Revolutionary Group Behavior
- Author:
- Paul R. Pillar
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Political Science Quarterly
- Institution:
- Academy of Political Science
- Abstract:
- Insurgent movements worldwide exhibit a wide range of conduct. Their behavior toward civilian populations under their control ranges from brutal to benevolent. Such variation poses a problem for theories of insurgency, and of how to counter it. How can any single theory account for such major differences in how insurgent groups treat noncombatants?
17976. Demystifying the Arab Spring
- Author:
- Lisa Anderson
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- In Tunisia, protesters escalated calls for the restoration of the country's suspended constitution. Meanwhile, Egyptians rose in revolt as strikes across the country brought daily life to a halt and toppled the government. In Libya, provincial leaders worked feverishly to strengthen their newly independent republic. It was 1919. That year's events demonstrate that the global diffusion of information and expectations -- so vividly on display in Tahrir Square this past winter -- is not a result of the Internet and social media. The inspirational rhetoric of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points speech, which helped spark the 1919 upheavals, made its way around the world by telegraph. The uprisings of 1919 also suggest that the calculated spread of popular movements, seen across the Arab world last winter, is not a new phenomenon. The Egyptian Facebook campaigners are the modern incarnation of Arab nationalist networks whose broadsheets disseminated strategies for civil disobedience throughout the region in the years after World War I. The important story about the 2011 Arab revolts in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya is not how the globalization of the norms of civic engagement shaped the protesters' aspirations. Nor is it about how activists used technology to share ideas and tactics. Instead, the critical issue is how and why these ambitions and techniques resonated in their various local contexts. The patterns and demographics of the protests varied widely. The demonstrations in Tunisia spiraled toward the capital from the neglected rural areas, finding common cause with a once powerful but much repressed labor movement. In Egypt, by contrast, urbane and cosmopolitan young people in the major cities organized the uprisings. Meanwhile, in Libya, ragtag bands of armed rebels in the eastern provinces ignited the protests, revealing the tribal and regional cleavages that have beset the country for decades. Although they shared a common call for personal dignity and responsive government, the revolutions across these three countries reflected divergent economic grievances and social dynamics -- legacies of their diverse encounters with modern Europe and decades under unique regimes.
- Topic:
- Government
- Political Geography:
- United States, Libya, Arabia, Egypt, and Tunisia
17977. Understanding the Revolutions of 2011
- Author:
- Jack A. Goldstone
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- Revolutions rarely succeed, writes one of the world's leading experts on the subject -- except for revolutions against corrupt and personalist "sultanistic" regimes. This helps explain why Tunisia's Ben Ali and Egypt's Mubarak fell -- and also why some other governments in the region will prove more resilient.
- Topic:
- War
- Political Geography:
- Soviet Union, Egypt, and Tunisia
17978. The Heirs of Nasser
- Author:
- Michael Scott Doran
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- Not since the Suez crisis and the Nasser-fueled uprisings of the 1950s has the Middle East seen so much unrest. Understanding those earlier events can help the United States navigate the crisis today -- for just like Nasser, Iran and Syria will try to manipulate various local grievances into a unified anti-Western campaign
- Topic:
- Cold War
- Political Geography:
- United States and Middle East
17979. The Fall of the Pharaoh
- Author:
- Dina Shehata
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- Mubarak's ouster was the natural outgrowth of his regime's corruption and economic exclusion, the alienation of Egypt's youth, and divisions among the country's elites. How those elites and the young protesters realign themselves now will determine whether post-Mubarak Egypt emerges as a true democracy.
- Topic:
- World Bank
- Political Geography:
- Egypt
17980. The Black Swan of Cairo
- Author:
- Mark Blyth and Nassim Nicholas Taleb
- Publication Date:
- 05-2011
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Foreign Affairs
- Institution:
- Council on Foreign Relations
- Abstract:
- The upheavals in the Middle East have much in common with the recent global financial crisis: both were plausible worst-case scenarios whose probability was dramatically underestimated. When policymakers try to suppress economic or political volatility, they only increase the risk of blowups.
- Topic:
- War
- Political Geography:
- Middle East and Egypt