Covert or Overt Intervention? The Reagan Administration in Latin America

In my thesis I looked at Cold War interventionism by America. In the Post WWII period, many countries were searching for freedom from colonial rule, and many were attracted to the idea of communism or socialism. In this context of a destabilized world and power struggle between the U.S.A and the U.S.S.R., revolutions often became points of interests and parts of this larger power play. Any type of revolution was a destabilization, in a system that was unstable at best, and peace between the powers rested precariously on the idea of “Mutually Assured Destruction.” I would like to look more specifically, at the Latin American Region, which seemed full of upheaval, and was an area of much intervention, especially during the Reagan Administration. This administration had varying goals and conflicts about the region. The large amount of interventionism in the 1980s was in part a response to the Vietnam War, which was seen as an American failure, since prevention of communism did not occur. Following this, American strength needed to be shown again in the international stage, especially in Latin America, due to its close proximity to America. I would like to explore the intervention in Grenada and see if it followed a pattern of intervention in the region. This will be contrasted with the case of Nicaragua, which seemed more typical of interventions in the region. The causes of intervention in the region as well as the reasons these interventions took such different courses will be explored and investigated.

La política exterior argentina durante la guerra fría : Interpretaciones y debates

El artículo se propone ver cuáles han sido los usos del pasado en los trabajos de política exterior desde las distintas perspectivas teóricas. Para hacerlo, presentaremos un brevísimo racconto del desarrollo disciplinar y señalaremos cuales son sus principales enfoques sobre el periodo, tanto en términos generales, como específicos, cuando terminó esta fase, para finalmente realizar una conclusión sobre la misma.

La política exterior argentina durante la guerra fría : Interpretaciones y debates

El artículo se propone ver cuáles han sido los usos del pasado en los trabajos de política exterior desde las distintas perspectivas teóricas. Para hacerlo, presentaremos un brevísimo racconto del desarrollo disciplinar y señalaremos cuales son sus principales enfoques sobre el periodo, tanto en términos generales, como específicos, cuando terminó esta fase, para finalmente realizar una conclusión sobre la misma.

La política exterior argentina durante la guerra fría : Interpretaciones y debates

El artículo se propone ver cuáles han sido los usos del pasado en los trabajos de política exterior desde las distintas perspectivas teóricas. Para hacerlo, presentaremos un brevísimo racconto del desarrollo disciplinar y señalaremos cuales son sus principales enfoques sobre el periodo, tanto en términos generales, como específicos, cuando terminó esta fase, para finalmente realizar una conclusión sobre la misma.

The Nature of the State in Afghanistan and Its Relations with Neighboring Countries

Since the formation of Afghanistan, its nature as a Pashtun state has affected all its international relations. On the other hand, the fact that it was originally established as a buffer state between Britain and Russia still governs its national integration. In this article I examine Afghanistan's relations with its neighbors through an investigation of its history and the present conditions of its borders with its southern, western and northern neighbors. My aim is to obtain an overall perspective of Afghanistan's relations with its neighbors, historically decisive elements, and the aftermath of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

「紛争ダイヤモンド」問題の力学－グローバル・イシュー化と議論の欠落－

ダイヤモンド原石の取引とアフリカの紛争をめぐる「紛争ダイヤモンド」問題は、近年国際社会が熱心に討議するグローバル・イシューとなった。この問題は2000年になって急速に顕在化し、年末には国連総会において全会一致で加盟国に取り組みを求める決議が採択された。国連の報告書やNGOの運動によって国際世論が盛り上がり、シエラレオネ問題の解決を進めたいイギリス政府、あるいは消費者運動を恐れる業界や生産国が取り組みに加わったことなどがその理由である。しかし、現在の「紛争ダイヤモンド」をめぐる議論では、ダイヤモンドとアフリカの紛争をめぐる問題が部分的にしか扱われていない。そこではアンゴラとシエラレオネにおける反政府勢力の活動を抑えることに主眼が置かれているが、コンゴのように状況が複雑な地域に対する取り組みは遅れている。さらに、ダイヤモンドを武器購入や民間軍事会社への支払いに充当するアフリカ各国政府の行動については、深刻な問題を内包するにもかかわらず、ほとんど議論されていない。「紛争ダイヤモンド」問題が、脆弱な国家における公的な資源の管理・開発という論点と繋がっていることを忘れるべきではない。

The Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1954-55 and U.S.-R.O.C Relations

On September 3, 1954, Chinese artillery began shelling Quemoy (Jinmen), one of the Kuomintang-held offshore islands, setting off the first Taiwan Strait Crisis. This paper focuses on the crisis and analyzes the following three questions: (1) What was the policy the U.S. took towards the Republic of China (R.O.C), especially towards the offshore islands, to try to end the Taiwan Strait Crisis? (2) What were the intentions of the U.S. government in trying to end the Taiwan Strait Crisis? And (3) how should U.S. policy towards the R.O.C. which led to solving the Taiwan Strait Crisis be positioned in the history of Sino-American relations? Through analysis of these questions, this study concludes that the position the U.S. took to bring an end to crisis, one which prevented China from “liberating Taiwan” and the Kuomintang from “attacking the mainland,” brought about the existence of a de facto “two-China” situation.

The effects of international politics on oil-exporting developing countries

International politics affects oil trade. But does it affect the oil-exporting developing countries more? We construct a firm-level dataset for all U.S. oil-importing companies over 1986-2008 to examine how these firms respond to changes in "political distance" between the U.S. and her trading partners, measured by divergence in their UN General Assembly voting patterns. Consistent with previous macro evidence, we first show that individual firms diversify their oil imports politically, even after controlling for unobserved firm heterogeneity. We conjecture that the political pattern of oil imports from these individual firms is driven by hold-up risks, because oil trade is often associated with backward vertical FDI. To the extent that developing countries have higher hold-up risks because of their weaker institutions, the political effect on oil trade should be more significant in the developing world. We find that oil import decisions are indeed more elastic when firms import from developing countries, although the reverse is true in the short run. Our results suggest that international politics can affect oil revenue and hence long-term development in the developing world.

Japan and the Middle East after the Arab Spring

本稿は、中東における問題や紛争に対する日本の政策を考察し、中長期的な視野に立った日本の国益追求のためにはどのような選択肢が考えられるかを論じる。そのために、イランの核開発問題とシリアの市民戦争をケースとしてとりあげる。戦後の日本は中東での問題や紛争に対して、地域内諸国およびアメリカとの関係を同時に維持するために、双方の均衡を図る政策を打ち出してきたが、冷戦後には米国寄りの傾向が多く見られた。現在中東では、アラブの春の展望は不透明な部分が多い。日本は中東との関係において、問題や紛争の性質によっては負の遺産を抱える欧米とは一線を画した独自の政策とアプローチを打ち出すことが、中東資源国との関係の強化と拡大や中東市場の発展と安定には望ましいと考える。また同時に、今後の米国の中東における国益の変化が考えられることも要因ととらえ、本稿は冷戦期にみられたような、より均衡のとれた立場を打ち出し、より広い概念をもとに基づいた効果的なソフトパワーの行使を提唱する。

Chairship system and decision making by consensus in international agreements : the case of ASEAN

How are different positions reconciled under decision making by consensus in international agreements? This article aims to answer this question. Consensus rule provides each participant a veto, which risks resulting in non-agreement. Taking ASEAN as a case study of international organizations that have adopted consensus rule as the main decision-making procedure, this article presents the chairship system as an analytical scheme to examine how different positions are or are not reconciled under consensus rule. The system is based on conventional knowledge regarding the chair in international conference, which can be defined as an institution where the role of the chair is taken by one member state in an international organization and plays a role in agenda-setting. The agenda-setting power given to the chair varies across organizations. This article assumes that the chair in ASEAN is given a relatively strong agenda-setting power to enable the chair to reach agreements and bias such agreements in its own favor.

Sovereignty and Intervention in the Middle East: From the Fall of the Ottoman Empire to the Arab Spring

This research provides an institutional explanation of the practices of external intervention in the Arab state system from the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1922 to the Arab Spring. My explanation consists of two institutional variables: sovereignty and inter-state borders. I examine the changes in regional and international norms of sovereignty and their impact on the practices of external intervention in the Arab state system. I also examine the impact of the level of institutionalization of inter-state borders in the Arab World on the practices of external intervention. I argue that changes in regional and international norms of sovereignty and changes in the level of institutionalization of inter-state borders have constituted the significant variation over time in both the frequency and type of external intervention in the Arab state system from 1922 to the present. My institutional explanation and findings seriously challenge the traditional accounts of sovereignty and intervention in the Arab World, including the cultural perspectives that emphasize the conflict between sovereignty, Arabism, and Islam, the constructivist accounts that emphasize the regional norm of pan-Arabism, the comparative politics explanations that focus on the domestic material power of the Arab state, the post-colonial perspectives that emphasize the artificiality of the Arab state, and the realist accounts that focus on great powers and the regional distribution of power in the Middle East. This research also contributes to International Relations Theory. I construct a new analytical framework to study the relations between sovereignty, borders, and intervention, combining theoretical elements from the fields of Role Theory, Social Constructivism, and Institutionalization. Methodologically, this research includes both quantitative and qualitative analysis. I conduct content analysis of official documents of Arab states and the Arab League, Arabic press documents, and Arab political thought. I also utilize quantitative data sets on international intervention.

The Arab Spring: A Litmus Test for the EU’s Women’s Rights Policy in the Euro-Mediterranean Area? Bruges Regional Integration & Global Governance Paper 1/2013

The promotion of women’s rights is described as a priority within the external action of the European Union (EU). As a result of the Arab Spring uprisings which have been ongoing since 2011, democracy and human rights have been pushed to the forefront of European policy towards the Euro-Mediterranean region. The EU could capitalise on these transformations to help positively reshape gender relations or it could fail to adapt. Thus, the Arab Spring can be seen to serve as a litmus test for the EU’s women’s rights policy. This paper examines how and to what extent the EU diffuses women’s rights in this region, by using Ian Manners’ ‘Normative Power Europe’ as the conceptual framework. It argues that while the EU tries to behave as a normative force for women’s empowerment by way of ‘informational diffusion’, ‘transference’ ‘procedural diffusion’ and ‘overt diffusion’; its efforts could, and should, be strengthened. There are reservations over the EU’s credibility, choice of engagement and its commitment in the face of security and ideological concerns. Moreover, it seems that the EU focuses more intently on women’s political rights than on their social and economic freedoms.

Road to Proscription: The EU and Hezbollah since the Arab Spring. EU Diplomacy Paper 07/2013

The European Union (EU) has traditionally taken a rather nuanced view of the activities of Hezbollah. Despite historic links to violent activity, Europe always remained reluctant to place the Lebanese militant group on its list of terrorist organisations. Internal divergences among member states, as well as the strategic-realist goals of the EU in both Lebanon and the Middle East more generally meant that such a listing never materialised. This remained the case even in the initial turmoil following the Arab uprisings, when Hezbollah’s relatively moderating objectives were viewed as a force for stability. However, the EU shifted policy in July 2013 by listing the military wing of Hezbollah as a terrorist entity. This paper will investigate the reasons behind this decision, as well as the likely implications and effectiveness of the new policy. Two principal catalysts were behind the decision. The first was a Hezbollah-linked bombing in Bulgaria which provided the focal point around which a consensus of the EU member states could emerge in the Council. Secondly, the escalation both of the Syrian conflict and Hezbollah’s role in it provided a more political and strategic impetus for the decision. This paper maintains that although a change in policy was somewhat necessary, it is questionable whether the artificial separation of Hezbollah’s political and military wings and the symbolic proscription of the latter is the most propitious choice to achieve European objectives.

First Anniversary of the Vilnius Summit: Or, how Tolstoy might have portrayed the legacies of Yanukovich and Putin. CEPS Essay No. 18/25 November 2014

Taking inspiration from both Tolstoy’s epic novel War and Peace and the Bible, Michael Emerson reflects in this CEPS Essay on the tumultuous year that has passed since President Yanukovich reneged on signing Ukraine’s Association Agreement with the EU, and on President Putin’s decision to intervene in Ukraine, tearing up all norms of international relations and public morality and inducing the sanctions that now inflict grave economic damage on Russia itself.