Showing papers on "International relations published in 2002"

Normative Power Europe: A Contradiction in Terms?

Abstract: Twenty years ago, in the pages of the Journal of Common Market Studies, Hedley Bull launched a searing critique of the European Community’s ‘civilian power’ in international affairs. Since that time the increasing role of the European Union (EU) in areas of security and defence policy has led to a seductiveness in adopting the notion of ‘military power Europe’. In contrast, I will attempt to argue that by thinking beyond traditional conceptions of the EU’s international role and examining the case study of its international pursuit of the abolition of the death penalty, we may best conceive of the EU as a ‘normative power Europe’.

The Responsibility to Protect

Abstract: “Never again” we said after the Holocaust. And after the Cambodian Ngenocide in the 1970s. And then again after the Rwandan genocide in 1994. And then, just a year later, after the Srbrenica massacre in Bosnia. And now we’re asking ourselves, yet again, in the face of more mass killing and dying in Darfur, whether we really are ever going to be capable, as an international community, of stopping nation-states from murdering their own people. How many more times will we look back wondering, with varying degrees of incomprehension, horror, anger, and shame, how we could have let it all happen?

Democracies at War

Abstract: Why do democracies win wars? This is a critical question in the study of international relations, as a traditional view--expressed most famously by Alexis de Tocqueville--has been that democracies are inferior in crafting foreign policy and fighting wars. In Democracies at War, the first major study of its kind, Dan Reiter and Allan Stam come to a very different conclusion. Democracies tend to win the wars they fight--specifically, about eighty percent of the time. Complementing their wide-ranging case-study analysis, the authors apply innovative statistical tests and new hypotheses. In unusually clear prose, they pinpoint two reasons for democracies' success at war. First, as elected leaders understand that losing a war can spell domestic political backlash, democracies start only those wars they are likely to win. Secondly, the emphasis on individuality within democratic societies means that their soldiers fight with greater initiative and superior leadership. Surprisingly, Reiter and Stam find that it is neither economic muscle nor bandwagoning between democratic powers that enables democracies to win wars. They also show that, given societal consent, democracies are willing to initiate wars of empire or genocide. On the whole, they find, democracies' dependence on public consent makes for more, rather than less, effective foreign policy. Taking a fresh approach to a question that has long merited such a study, this book yields crucial insights on security policy, the causes of war, and the interplay between domestic politics and international relations.

Why Is There No NATO in Asia? Collective Identity, Regionalism, and the Origins of Multilateralism

Abstract: Regional groupings and regional effects are of growing importance in world politics. Although often described in geographical terms, regions are political creations and not e xed by geography. Even regions that seem most natural and inalterable are products of political construction and subject to reconstruction attempts. Looking at specie c instances in which such constructions have occurred can tell us a great deal about the shape and the shaping of international politics. In the aftermath of World War II, the United States attempted to create and organize both a North Atlantic and a Southeast Asian region. The institutional forms of these regional groupings, however, differed dramatically. With its North Atlantic partners, the United States preferred to operate on a multilateral basis. With its Southeast Asian partners, in contrast, the United States preferred to operate bilaterally. Why? Perceptions of collective identity, we argue, played an underappreciated role in this decision. Shaped by racial, historical, political, and cultural factors, U.S. policymakers saw their potential European allies as relatively equal members of a shared community. America’ s potential Asian allies, in contrast, were seen as part of an alien and, in important ways, inferior community. At the beginning of the Cold War, this difference in mutual identie cation, in combination with material factors and considerations of efe ciency, was of critical importance in dee ning the interests and shaping the choices of U.S. decision makers in Europe and Asia. Different forms of cooperation make greater or lesser demands on shared identities. Multilateralism is a particularly demanding form of international coop

Power and Weakness

Abstract: IT IS TIME to stop pretending that Europeans and Americans share a common view of the world, or even that they occupy the same world. On the all-important question of power -- the efficacy of power, the morality of power, the desirability of power -- American and European perspectives are diverging. Europe is turning away from power, or to put it a little differently, it is moving beyond power into a self-contained world of laws and rules and transnational negotiation and cooperation. It is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative prosperity, the realization of Kant's "Perpetual Peace." The United States, meanwhile, remains mired in history, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and the defense and promotion of a liberal order still depend on the possession and use of military might. That is why on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars and Europeans are from Venus: They ag ree on little and understand one another less and less. And this state of affairs is not transitory -- the product of one American election or one catastrophic event. The reasons for the transatlantic divide are deep, long in development, and likely to endure. When it comes to setting national priorities, determining threats, defining challenges, and fashioning and implementing foreign and defense policies, the United States and Europe have parted ways. It is easier to see the contrast as an American living in Europe. Europeans are more conscious of the growing differences, perhaps because they fear them more. European intellectuals are nearly unanimous in the conviction that Americans and Europeans no longer share a common "strategic culture." The European caricature at its most extreme depicts an America dominated by a "culture of death," its warlike temperament the natural product of a violent society where every man has a gun and the death penalty reigns. But even those who do not make this crude link agree there are profound differences in the way the United States and Europe conduct foreign policy. The United States, they argue, resorts to force more quickly and, compared with Europe, is less patient with diplomacy. Americans generally see the world divided between good and evil, between friends and enemies, while Europeans see a more complex picture. When confronting real or potential adversaries, Americans generally favor policies of coercion rather than persuasion, emphasizing punitive sanctions over inducements to better behavior, the stick over the carrot. Americans tend to seek finality in international affairs: They want problems solved, threats eliminated. And, of course, Americans increasingly tend toward unilateralism in international affairs. They are less inclined to act through international institutions such as the United Nations, less inclined to work cooperatively with other nations to pursue common goals, more skeptical about international law and more willing to operate outside its strictures when they deem it necessary, or even merely useful. (1) Europeans insist they approach problems with greater nuance and sophistication. They try to influence others through subtlety and indirection. They are more tolerant of failure, more patient when solutions don't come quickly. They generally favor peaceful responses to problems, preferring negotiation, diplomacy, and persuasion to coercion. They are quicker to appeal to international law, international conventions, and international opinion to adjudicate disputes. They try to use commercial and economic ties to bind nations together. They often emphasize process over result, believing that ultimately process can become substance. This European dual portrait is a caricature, of course, with its share of exaggerations and oversimplifications. One cannot generalize about Europeans: Britons may have a more "American" view of power than many of their fellow Europeans on the continent. …

Social Construction of International Politics: Identities & Foreign Policies, Moscow, 1955 and 1999

Abstract: Constructivism at home: theory and method -- The Russian nation, new Soviet man, class and modernity: identity relations in Moscow, 1955 -- Identities as social structures: enabling and constraining Soviet alliance choices in 1955 -- Historical, internal, and external others: Russian identity in 1999 -- Re-centering a peripheral Russia in a unipolar world in 1999 -- Identity, foreign policy, and IR theory.

Regions of war and peace

Abstract: In this contribution to the literature on the causes of war, Douglas Lemke asks whether the same factors affect minor powers as affect major ones. He investigates whether power parity and dissatisfaction with the status quo have an impact within Africa, the Far East, the Middle East and South America. Lemke argues that there are similarities across these regions and levels of power, and that parity and dissatisfaction are correlates of war around the world. The extent to which they increase the risk of war varies across regions, however, and the book looks at the possible sources of this cross-regional variation, concluding that differential progress toward development is the likely cause. This book will interest students and scholars of international relations and peace studies, as well as comparative politics and area studies.

All International Politics is Local: The Diffusion of Conflict, Integration, and Democratization

Abstract: How does regional interdependence influence the prospects for conflict, integration, and democratization? Some researchers look at the international system at large and disregard the enormous regional variations Others take the concept of sovereignty literally and treat each nation-state as fully independent Kristian Skrede Gleditsch looks at disparate zones in the international system to see how conflict, integration, and democracy have clustered over time and space He argues that the most interesting aspects of international politics are regional rather than fully global or exclusively national Differences in the local context of interaction influence states' international behavior as well as their domestic attributes In All International Politics Is Local, Gleditsch clarifies that isolating the domestic processes within countries cannot account for the observed variation in distribution of political democracy over time and space, and that the likelihood of transitions is strongly related to changes in neighboring countries and the prior history of the regional context Finally, he demonstrates how spatial and statistical techniques can be used to address regional interdependence among actors and its implications

Power and governance in a partially globalized world

Abstract: 1. Introduction: From interdependence and institutions to globalization and governance Part 1: Interdependence and Institutions 2. International Institutions: Can interdependence work? 3. International Liberalism Reconsidered 4. Hobbe's Dilemma and Institutional Change in World Politics: Sovereignty in international society 5. Risk, Threat and Security Institutions Part 2: Law 6. International Relations and International Law: Two optics 7. The Concept of Legalization 8. Legalized Dispute Resolution: Interstate and transnational Part 3: Globalism, Liberalism and Governance 9. Governance in a Globalizing World 10. The Club Model of Multilateral Cooperation and Problems of Democratic Legitimacy 11. Governance in a Partially Globalized World 12. Afterword: The globalization of informal violence, theories of world politics and the 'liberalism of fear'

Beyond the Anarchical Society: Grotius, Colonialism and Order in World Politics

Abstract: Introduction 1. The orthodox theory of order in world politics 2. The Grotian theory of the law of nations 3. Colonialism, imperialism and extra-European international politics 4. Two patterns of modern international order: toleration and civilisation 5. Order in contemporary world politics, global but divided Conclusion.

Norm Entrepreneurs Scandinavia's Role in World Politics

Abstract: Promising scholarship in international relations is challenging existing approaches by positing the independent effect of `norms' in world politics. This article identifies `Scandinavia' (in its br...

Constructivism in International Relations: The Politics of Reality

Abstract: Acknowledgements List of abbreviations 1. Introduction 2. Identity change? Wendt's constructivism and German military involvement abroad 3. Intersubjectivity and the normative: Kratochwil's constructivism and German military involvement abroad 4. Words and world: Onuf's constructivism and German military involvement abroad 5. The politics of 'reality': Derrida's subversions, constructivism and German military involvement abroad 6. The politics of constructivism Bibliography Index.

The Liberal Illusion: Does Trade Promote Peace?

Abstract: "A very important and long-awaited major contribution to the debate . . . Her work cannot be ignored."--Nils Petter Gleditsch, "Journal of Peace Research" "Barbieri builds on a solid foundation of work on trade and conflict and specifies the conditions under which trade reduces and increases conflict. . . . The bottom line is that this is an important book in the study of trade and conflict because of its comprehensive approach."--Kathy L. Powers, "Perspectives on Politics" "Barbieri's analysis reveals the fundamental and intellectual weaknesses of the various arguments on this topic. [A] solid and timely contribution to the literature"--"Choice" "The Liberal Illusion" sheds light on an increasingly important question in international relations scholarship and the domain of policy making-whether international trade promotes peace. By examining a broad range of theories about trade's impact on interstate relations and undertaking a set of empirical analyses of the trade-conflict puzzle, Katherine Barbieri provides a comprehensive assessment of the liberal view that trade promotes peace. Barbieri's stunning conclusions depart from conventional wisdom in international relations. Consequently, "The Liberal Illusion" serves as an important counterargument and a warning call to policymakers who rely upon trade-based strategies to promote peace, strategies that appear to offer little hope of achieving their goals.

Rational Extremism: Understanding Terrorism in the Twenty-first Century

Abstract: In the last decade, the field of international relations has undergone a revolution in conflict studies. Where earlier approaches attempted to identify the attributes of individuals, states, and systems that produced conflict, the “rationalist approach to war” now explains violence as the product of private information with incentives to misrepresent, problems of credible commitment, and issue indivisibilities. 1 In this new approach, war is understood as a bargaining failure that leaves both sides worse off than had they been able to negotiate an efficient solution. This rationalist framework has proven remarkably general—being applied to civil wars, ethnic conflicts, and interstate wars—and fruitful in understanding not only the causes of war but also war termination and conflict management. 2 Interstate war is no longer seen as sui generis, but as a particular form within a single, integrated theory of conflict. This rationalist approach to war may at first appear to be mute in the face of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Civilian targets were attacked “out of the blue.” The terrorists did not issue prior demands. A theory premised on bargaining, therefore, would seem ill-suited to explaining such violence. Yet, as I hope to show, extremist terrorism can be rational and strategic. 3 A rationalist approach also yields insights into the nature and strategy of terrorism and offers some general guidelines that targets should consider in response, including the importance of a multilateral coalition as a means of committing the target to a moderate military strategy. Analytically, and more centrally for this essay, extremist terrorism reveals a silence at the heart of the current rationalist approach to war even as it suggests a potentially fruitful way of extending the basic model. In extant models, the distribution of capabilities and, thus, the range of acceptable bargains are exogenous,

A Diplomatic Revolution: Algeria's Fight for Independence and the Origins of the Post-Cold War Era

Abstract: Algeria sits at the crossroads of the Atlantic, European, Arab and African worlds. Yet, unlike the colonial wars in Korea and Vietnam, the Algerian war for independence has rarely been viewed as a primarily international conflict. Rather, prevailing accounts of the war interpret it as a domestic French crisis that was resolved when Charles de Gaulle granted Algeria independence. Yet, as Matthew Connelly here demonstrates, from the very start of the bloody eight year struggle, the Front de Liberation Nationale pursued self-rule on the world stage. Exploiting Cold War competition and regional rivalries, the spread of mass communications, and international and non-governmental organisations, such as human rights groups, foreign press conferences, and the United Nations, the rebels harnessed international forces to bring pressure to bear on the French government, which became obsessed with the conflict's impact on its reputation. By winning rights and recognition from the global community, the rebels helped break up the French colonial empire and rewrite the rules of international relations. In narrating the Algerian war for independence, Connelly analyses how the United States and other states influenced the war and were, in turn, influenced by it. He interprets it in a global and comparative context, arguing for a reconceptualisation of diplomatic history as international history. Based on research on three continents and, for the first time, the rebels' own archives, this study of the Algerian war for independence offers a landmark reevaluation of the conflict forty years after its conclusion and a model for the writing of international history.

Law of states, law of peoples:

Abstract: There are those who believe that the rules governing the international political system are changing fundamentally; a new universal constitutional order is in the making, with profound implications for the constituent units, competencies, structure, and standing of the international legal order (cf. Cassese 1986, 1991; Weller 1997). On the other side, there are those who are profoundly skeptical of any such transformation; they hold that states remain the leading source of all international rules—the limiting factor that ensures that international relations are shaped, and remain anchored to, the politics of the sovereign state (cf. Smith 1987; Holsti 1988; Buzan, Little, and Jones 1993). “In all times,” as Hobbes put it, political powers are “in continual jealousies, and in the state and postures of Gladiators” (1968, 187–8). Despite new legal initiatives, such as the human rights regime, “power politics” remain the bedrock of international relations; plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose.

Social reconstruction and the radicalization of development : aid as a relation of global liberal governance.

Abstract: That democratic societies do not fall into conflict has become an axiom of contemporary international relations. Liberal societies, however, do not properly exist along the troubled margins of the global order. This absence has lent urgency to present efforts at social reconstruction. Whereas a couple of decades ago the principle of non–interference prevailed, this unfinished business has shaped a new will to intervene and transform societies as a whole. This article critically analyses the international will to govern through three interconnected themes. First, it examines accepted views on the nature of the new wars. These representations usually portray conflict as a form of social regression stemming from the failure of modernity. As such, they provide a moral justification for intervention. Second, an alternative view of the new wars — as a form of resistant and reflexive modernity — is developed. Made possible by the opportunities created by globalization, this resistance assumes the organizational form of network war. The essay concludes with an examination of the encounter between the international will to govern and the resistance of reflexive modernity. This encounter is the site of the post–Cold War reuniting of aid and politics. One important consequence has been the radicalization of development and its reinvention as a strategic tool of conflict resolution and social reconstruction. The use of aid as a tool of global liberal governance is fraught with difficulty; not least, the equivocal and contested nature of its influence. Rather than reconsideration, however, policy failure tends to result in a fresh round of reinvention and reform. The increasing normalization of violence is but one effect.

Mainstreaming Gender in Global Governance

Abstract: In this article, we seek to explain both the origins of gender mainstreaming as a `policy frame' in International Relations, as well as the variable implementation of mainstreaming over time and across various international organizations. We emphasize that in the years since the UN Fourth World Women's Conference in Beijing (1995), mainstreaming has been endorsed and adopted not only by European organizations and governments, but also by nearly every important international organization, and we compare the adoption and implementation of mainstreaming in two international organizations, the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme. We suggest, however, that the rhetorical acceptance of mainstreaming by various international organizations obscures considerable diversity in both the timing and the nature of mainstreaming processes within and among organizations. This variation, we argue, can be explained in terms of the categories of political opportunity, mobilizing structures and strategic f...

A Kantian System? Democracy and Third-Party Conflict Resolution

Abstract: While constructivist scholars have recognized an important role for norms in international relations, they have not considered the changing proportion of democratic states in the international system as a potential source of norm formation I argue that democratic norms become international norms as the proportion of democratic states in the international system increases, focusing on the democratic norm of third party dispute resolution I reach the novel conclusion that non-democratic states are more likely to behave like democratic states, adopting democratic norms, as the proportion of democracies increases Empirical analysis of peaceful settlement attempts of territorial claims in the Americas supports this hypothesis Third party settlement is sixteen times more likely for non-democratic dyads when the proportion of democracies in the system is 50% than when the proportion is zero My theory and empirical results offer new insight into the democratic peace literature and the constructivist literature on international norms

Inequality and Theorizing in International Relations: The Case for Subaltern Realism

Abstract: I argue that the dominant paradigms in IR fail to explain adequately two of the central issues in the international system: the origins of the majority of conflicts and the behavior of the majority of states. These paradigms fail because they formulate generalizations from data drawn from a restricted universe and because they lack historical depth. Both these flaws are related to inequality in the arena of the production of knowledge in IR, which in turn is a function of the inequality in material capabilities in the international system. A supplementary, if not alternative, perspective is needed to correct this situation and fill this gap. We can fashion such a perspective by drawing upon classical realist thought, the historical sociology of state formation, and the normative perspicacity of the English School. Combining their insights and applying them to the analysis of Third World conflict patterns and the external and domestic behavior of Third World states is likely to provide more satisfactory explanations for the origins of the majority of contemporary conflicts. Such an exercise will also shed light on the crucial variables that determine the behavior of the majority of states in the Third World. Moving postcolonial states into the mainstream of theorizing in IR will also help reduce the impact of inequality on the field and open new vistas for theoretically informed scholarly research. I also call for pluralism in international relations theorizing rather than a search for universally applicable law–like generalizations divorced from historical and social contexts.

Theories of War in an Era of Leading-Power Peace Presidential Address, American Political Science Association, 2001

Abstract: The motor of international politics has been war among the leading states. The most developed states in the international system—the United States, Western Europe, and Japan—form what Karl Deutsch called a security community, which is a group of countries among which war is unthinkable. These states are the most powerful ones in the world and, so, are traditional rivals. Thus the change is striking and consequential. Constructivists explain this in terms of changed ideas and identities; liberals point to democracy and economic interest; realists stress the role of nuclear weapons and American hegemony. My own explanation combines the high cost of war, the gains from peace, and the values that are prevalent within the security community. Whatever the cause, the existence of the community will bring with it major changes in international politics and calls into question many traditional theories of war.

The End of Empire in French West Africa: France's Successful Decolonization

Abstract: In an effort to restore its world-power status after the humiliation of defeat and occupation, France was eager to maintain its overseas empire at the end of the Second World War. Yet just fifteen years later France had decolonized, and by 1960 only a few small island territories remained under French control. The process of decolonization in Indochina and Algeria has been widely studied, but much less has been written about decolonization in France's largest colony, French West Africa. Here, the French approach was regarded as exemplary -- that is, a smooth transition successfully managed by well intentioned French politicians and enlightened African leaders. Overturning this received wisdom, Chafer argues that the rapid unfurling of events after the Second World War was a complex , piecemeal and unpredictable process, resulting in a 'successful decolonization' that was achieved largely by accident. At independence, the winners assumed the reins of political power, while the losers were often repressed, imprisoned or silenced. This important book challenges the traditional dichotomy between 'imperial' and 'colonial' history and will be of interest to students of imperial and French history, politics and international relations, development and post-colonial studies.

Global Governance and the Evolution of the International Refugee Regime

Abstract: Since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 the refugee regime has evolved with our modern state system, reflecting changes in international law, politics, economics and ideology. Responding to a history of religious and political persecutions, a comprehensive refugee regime finally emerged under the League of Nations after World War I. This regime underwent dramatic change during World War II to create a permanent framework to cope with the refugee problem through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. The Cold War had an overwhelming influence on the norms and rules of this regime, and in the postCold War era the regime has struggled to reflect and adapt to emerging global concerns — from internally displaced persons to gender and race distributional issues. As UNHCR is forced to reconsider its definitions, laws, and policies, the larger evolving regime must give way to a form of global governance in which the international authority of the UN body has more meaningful influence on the implementation of national law and policy. In today’s transnational world where borders are losing their definition and populations mobilize on a global scale, the refugee issue is an increasingly pressing one. Since the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648 the refugee regime has evolved with our modern state system, reflecting changes within the broader scope of international politics, and highlighting ∗ Laura Barnett, JD, MA (International Relations); Student-at-Law, Ontario Superior Court of Justice. I am extremely grateful to Colleen Thouez of the International Migration Policy Programme and Jeff Crisp, Head of the Evaluation and Policy Analysis Unit at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva, for their assistance in arranging interviews for this paper and its subsequent publication in UNHCR’s Working Paper Series on New Issues in Refugee Research (Feb. 2002). The views expressed in this paper are those of the author, and do not reflect those of the Superior Court of Justice or the Ministry of the Attorney General. 1 The term ‘regime’ is subject to varying interpretations, however this paper relies on an understanding found in international relations and political theory. Regimes may be defined as explicit rules or implicit norms guiding the actions of states and individuals, together with institutions and organizations expressing these rules or norms. Friedrich Kratochwil and John Gerard Ruggie (‘International Organization: A State of the Art on an Art of the State’ (1986) 40(4) International Organization 753 at 759) define a regime broadly as ‘governing arrangements constructed by states to coordinate their expectations and organize aspects of international behaviour in various issue areas. They thus comprise a normative element, state practice, and organizational roles.’ International Journal of Refugee Law Vol. 14 No. 2/3  Oxford University Press 2002. All rights reserved Global Governance and the Evolution of the International Refugee Regime 239 notions of ideology, economics, and balance of power. Since the early religious and political persecutions of the Huguenots, then the aristocrats of the French Revolution, a more comprehensive refugee regime finally emerged under the auspices of the League of Nations after World War I. This regime responded to circumstance, undergoing dramatic change during the Second World War to create a permanent framework to cope with the refugee problem through the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Cold War had an overwhelming influence on the norms and policies of this regime, and in the post-Cold War era the regime has had to adapt to reflect global concerns. Today the refugee regime is struggling to respond to gender and race distributional issues. Forced to reconsider its definitions and policies, the emerging regime must create an environment where the collective international authority of the UN body has meaningful influence on the autonomous implementation of individual government policy. In a world where the rigid constructions of the traditional international system are beginning to crumble, established approaches to refugee policy are becoming irrelevant as well. The regime that took root in 1648 no longer dictates, as customary concepts of global governance adapt to an uncertain environment of shifting politics and security. 1. A Historical Perspective Although the phenomenon of people forced to flee their homes has always existed, the first true refugees recognized as such in the modern state system were the Huguenots, French Protestants fleeing France in 1685. King Louis XIV provoked this flight by revoking the Edict of Nantes, a proclamation issued by Henry IV in 1598 tolerating religious minorities under Catholic rule. With the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes came royal decrees against emigration and harsh punishments for those who attempted escape; yet 200,000 Huguenots still managed to flee France to the Netherlands, Switzerland, England, Germany, Denmark, and the United States. This number constituted one fifth of all Huguenots, and 1 per cent of the entire French population. The early modern international system went on to see the flights of many other populations in Europe, most notably during the French Revolution in 1789. The persecution of all those who stood against the egalitarian ideal of the Revolution culminated in the execution of the royal family in 1793. Many of the French aristocracy fled to Austria and Prussia, seeking refuge from certain death at home. 2 Richard M Golden, ‘Introduction’ in Richard M Golden (ed.), The Huguenot Connection: the Edict of Nantes, its Revocation, and Early French Migration to South Carolina (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1988), 1 at 1+23.

UN Conferences and Constructivist Governance of the Environment

Abstract: In this article I review the history of global environmental conferences and draw political lessons about their broader role in constructing efforts at global environmental governance. I also examine the future of global conference diplomacy for the environment, in particular Rio+10 in Johannesburg in 2002 and the prospects of reaching the goals for sustainable development set at the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). Global conferences are oft-used policy instruments, thus deserving careful evaluation and assessment. Jacques Fomerand expresses justifiable skepticism that most global conferences are momentary media events that provide sound bite opportunities without lasting effects on policies or the quality of the environment. (1) Guilio Gallarotti, and Michael Barnett and Martha Finnemore, offer similar skeptical judgments about the potential for effective state-based international governance. (2) Yet Fomerand also points out, as do I, that many conferences provide indirect effects that may be beneficial for inducing states to take more progressive steps toward governance and sustainable development. Governance and Constructivism Governance has recently become a popular catchphrase of international relations. Without the prospects of hegemonic leadership, and in light of the substantial growth of influence of international institutions and nonstate actors, international rule making has become the domain of multiple overlapping actors and regimes, rather than the clearcut leadership by one state or multilateral conformity with a small and homogeneous set of shared rules backed by enforcement mechanisms. Anne Marie Slaughter defines it as "the formal and informal bundles of rules, roles and relationships that define and regulate the social practices of states and nonstate actors in international affairs." (3) Sustainable development requires multilateral governance, because without well-defined rules and expectations most countries are incapable of unilaterally protecting themselves from transboundary and global environmental risks Constructivist scholars of international relations (IR) have been focusing on the institutional, discursive, and intersubjective procedures by which international governance develops. John Ruggie writes that social constructivism rests on an irreducibly intersubjective dimension of human action ... constructivism is about human consciousness and its role in international life.... Constructivists hold the view that the building blocks of international reality are ideational as well as material; that ideational factors have normative as well as instrumental dimensions; that they express not only individual but also collective intentionality; and that the meaning and significance of ideational factors are not independent of time and place. (4) Constructivists look at the mechanisms and consequences by which actors, particularly states, derive meaning from a complex world, and how they identify their interests and policies for issues that appear new and uncertain. It is now widely accepted by most IR scholars that governance increasingly occurs in a decentralized manner, through a loosely tied network of multiple actors, states, functional state agencies, and nonstate actors who interact frequently, sometimes at global conferences. (5) Governance of the environment is no different. Constructivists focus on such distinctive processes as socialization, education, persuasion, discourse, and norm inculcation to understand the ways in which international governance develops. Typically these are complex procedures involving multiple interacting actors that accrue over time and contribute to transformational shifts in perceptions of national identity, international agendas, and the presumptive ways by which national interests are to be attained. UN conferences contribute to governance and sustainable development by establishing and reinforcing some of these constructivist themes in international relations. …

Discrimination in International Relations: Analyzing External Support for Ethnic Groups

Abstract: Why do some ethnic groups in conflict (those that are mobilized or face discrimination) receive more external support than others do? This is an important question that has been overlooked despite the crucial role international support has played. Which characteristics of groups and their host states cause them to receive more support? I consider three explanations. First, separatist groups are less likely to receive support owing to their threat to regional stability and international norms. This argument is derived from accounts focusing on the inhibiting impact of vulnerability upon the foreign policies of African states. Second, groups in stronger states are more likely to receive support as states try to weaken their most threatening adversaries - an application of realist logic. Third, groups with ethnic ties to actors in positions of power elsewhere are more likely to receive external assistance. Using Minorities at Risk data, analyses focusing on the number of states supporting particular groups and the intensity of this support suggest that ethnic ties influence the international relations of ethnic conflict more than vulnerability and relative power. Further analyses contrast the international relations of peaceful ethnic disputes and violent ethnic conflicts. These analyses reveal that some factors (such as regime type, nearby separatism) increase breadth and/or intensity of support for groups that are not engaged in violence, while other variables (separatism of the group in question, relative power of host) influence the international relations of violent conflicts. The article concludes with implications for policy and future research.

Support Organizations and the Evolution of the NGO Sector

Abstract: This article focuses on the emergence of support organizations that play strategic roles in the evolution of development nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) as a sector of civil society. We begin with a discussion of sector challenges from outside (such as public legitimacy, relations with governments, relations with businesses, and relations with international actors) and from inside (amateurism, restricted focus, material scarcity, fragmentation, and paternalism). We describe the rise of agencies to serve critical support functions, such as strengthening individual and organizational capacities, mobilizing material resources, providing information and intellectual resources, building alliances for mutual support, and building bridges across sectoral differences. Then, we examine how those organizations have solved critical problems for NGO communities, and we develop some propositions about the creation and establishment of support organizations, their strategic position, the choice to take strategic action, and how external assistance can support their strategic roles.

The Challenge of September 11 to Secularism in International Relations

Abstract: This essay argues that the study of international relations is secularized due to the secularizing character of its founding event, the Peace of Westphalia. But today, religion has entered back into the actual conduct of international relations, thereby calling for an accommodating revision of international relations theory.