This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on bloomsburycollections.com. This book studies the processes which lead to explosion of civil strife and tries to spell out the policy options available to address the challenges faced by post-conflict economies. It calls for a more integrated policy approach which can gradually repair trust in public institutions as it addresses the vulnerabilities and grievances that helped start the process. Usually, such societies do not have the luxury of meeting the goals of security, reconciliation and development in a measured or sequenced manner: to avoid an immediate return to violence they must begin the recovery process on all fronts simultaneously.

The Changing Politics of European Security explores the key security challenges confronting Europe, from relations with the US and Russia to the use of military force and the struggle against terrorism. In the future, the authors conclude, European states will act alone, independent of America, on security matters.

Nagorno-Karabakh is the most perilous of the so-called frozen conflicts in Eastern Europe. Whilst the war in Georgia in 2008 shocked the world, there are striking similarities between the pre-war situation there and the recently aggravated situation concerning Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenia and Azerbaijan. In an area almost free of observers, the implications of a new war in Nagorno-Karabakh are largely underestimated. This book sheds light on the current situation in Nagorno-Karabakh, how it evolved, and likely scenarios, taking into account the changed landscape including the EU's new foreign policy instruments. Kambeck and Ghazaryan suggest concrete policy proposals in order to make war a less likely outcome.

Mythologies and narratives of victimization pervade contemporary Croatia, set against the backdrop of militarized notions of masculinity and the political mobilization of religion and nationhood. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in rural Dalmatia in the Croatian-Bosnian border region, this book provides a unique account of the politics of ambiguous Europeanness from the perspective of those living at Europe's margins. Examining phenomena such as Marian apparitions, a historic knights tournament, the symbolic re-signification of a massacre site, and the desolate social situation of Croatian war veterans, Narrating Victimhood traces the complex mechanisms of political radicalization in a post-war scenario. This book provides a new perspective for understanding the ongoing processes of transformation in Southeastern Europe and the Balkans.

Roudometof provides an in-depth analysis of inter-ethnic relations in the southern Balkans. He examines the evolution of the Macedonian Question and the production of rival national narratives by Greeks, Bulgarians, and Macedonians. He introduces the concept of a national narrative in order to account for the production and proliferation of different forms of collective memory among the rival nation-states. Roudometof deconstructs the national narratives of the competing sides and shows the limits of these narratives and their biases. He also develops an alternative interpretation of Macedonian national formation.

The contentious issue of Macedonian national minorities in the southern Balkans is examined as well as the issue of the Albanian movements toward self-determination and succession in Kosovo and western Macedonia. Roudometof argues that the Macedonian minority groups are not as numerous in the neighboring states as it is conventionally assumed. With regard to the Albanian national question, he provides a review of the post-1945 relations between Albania and Greece, the Albanians of Kosovo and the Serbs, and the Albanians and Macedonians. He argues that the Albanian nationalist movements have grown out of the interaction between Albanians and their neighboring nations and ethnic groups. An important resource for scholars, students, and other researchers involved with the Balkans and ethnic conflict resolution in general.

Torn by ongoing civil and military violence, Africa presents a challenge to scholars interested in the root causes of conflict. Each conflict is unique, but overall they exhibit common patterns. The contributors of this book employ an eclectic array of current explanations of civil strife and how to resolve it. The first half of the book provides the relevant theoretical background. Theories of conflict and conflict resolution, the larger context of African strife in Africa, and patterns and trends of conflict are discussed. Shifting from the general to the particular, the remaining chapters of this volume gauge the accuracy and usefulness of the current thinking on conflicts by grounding it in case studies drawn from the Great Lakes Region, Liberia, Nigeria, and Zambia.

From New York Times bestselling author Jeff Abbott... An undercover agent must capture America's greatest traitor.Sam Capra and his thirteen-year-old son, Daniel, are living a quiet life in Austin, Texas, from where Sam runs a collection of bars and nightclubs around the world for America's most secret espionage agency, known as Section K. But a shocking revelation will uproot everything that Sam has been trying to build: Markus Bolt is missing. Having turned over allied agent names and military secrets to the Russians, Bolt fled to Moscow when he was discovered. But now a trusted source inside the Kremlin tells Section K that he has vanished, without a trace. Sam is charged with watching Bolt's abandoned American daughter, Amanda, and determining if she's had any contact with her father. But as the search for Bolt grows ever more dangerous, Sam faces a rising threat born of long-ago secrets - one that could change his and his son's lives forever. An utterly enthralling espionage thriller from the international, multi-million copy bestselling author, full of suspense, action and a twist that will leave you reeling.

This title offers a novel cross-disciplinary theoretical perspective on conflict and conflict transformation in world society. The Middle East will continue to be a focus for theories of Conflict Studies and IR for some time to come. This book offers a new perspective (modern systems theory) on the study of conflicts. It covers conflict in Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, Jordan plus Egypt as well as Israel - the types of domestic, inter-state and global conflict dimensions which emanate from this region are at the heart of any analysis of conflict (and cooperation) dynamics in the entire Arab-Israeli region. It integrates the study of conflicts in the Middle East region into a modern systems theoretical framework.

Drawing upon Robbie Sabel's first-hand involvement with many legal negotiations in the Arab-Israeli conflict, International Law and the Arab-Israeli Conflict examines international law in relation to the conflict by analysing its major events and agreements, both historical and contemporary. Outlining the role of international law from the collapse of the Ottoman Empire until the present day, it considers the legal elements of the various peace treaties that Israel has signed with its neighbouring Arab States. Using his expertise as a professor, practitioner and ambassador, Sabel endeavours to represent both sides of the conflict, offering a wealth of counter-arguments and adding his own legal interpretations. With this valuable resource, students and researchers working within a range of disciplines can fully appreciate the role of international law in the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Ten years after the end of the war, Bosnian ethnicity continues to matter and the country remains dependent on international intervention. The Dayton Peace Accord signed in 1995 successfully ended the war, but froze the ethnic conflict in one of the most complex systems of government in the world. The book provides an in-depth analysis of governance in this divided post-war country, providing important lessons for international intervention elsewhere around the world, from Afghanistan to Iraq.

This book looks at major contemporary conflicts -intra and interstate- in Southeast Asia from a conflict management perspective. Starting with the view that the conventional ASEAN conflict-management methods have ceased to be effective, it looks for new conflict-management patterns and trends by investigating seven contemporary cases of conflict in the region. Focusing on the incompatibilities involved in each case and examining how they have been managed-whether by integration, co-existence, elimination or maneuvering around the conflict-the book sheds new light on the significance of managing conflict in achieving and maintaining the stability of the Southeast Asian region. It makes a significant theoretical contribution to the field of peace and conflict studies by proposing the concept of "mediation regime" as the key to understanding current conflict management within ASEAN.

Dealing with Conflict in Africa analyzes the roles of the various organizations involved in conflict resolution in Africa. The first section of the book deals with the overall issues associated with cooperation between regional organizations and the United Nations, as well as how the United Nations has approached this issue in Africa. In the second section, six case studies examine the major conflicts in Africa, such as the Congo War. For each case study, the author looks at what responsibilities and tasks were taken on by different organizations, the relationship between the organizations, and which ones are most effective in working towards successful conflict resolution. The contributors also examine the effectiveness of coalitions or leaders in comparison to the UN and regional organizations. The contributors are an international group of scholars and consultants, all of whom are well positioned to analyze these issues.

The problems of peacekeeping in Somalia, Rwanda and former Yugoslavia marked a turning point for major powers in international military peacekeeping. Major support for a more pro-active UN role in peacekeeping has not been forthcoming and where major power involvement is deemed vital, non-UN peace operations have increasingly become the norm. This valuable volume explores the continuing significance of peacekeeping in international affairs, particularly in terms of its military dimensions, and examines the priorities and perspectives of the major powers in relation to their military participation in international peacekeeping and wider peace operations in the twenty-first century. It is ideal for scholars and students interested in contemporary international politics, international relations, international organizations, security and strategic studies, conflict resolution and foreign policy analysis.

Britain's Long War assesses the process of strategic change within the British Government's position on Northern Ireland, starting with Westminster's first intervention in 1969 and ending with the Belfast Agreement in 1998. Drawing on a vast range of primary sources including recently released cabinet papers, Peter Neumann analyzes the aims, strategy and restraints of British policy in Northern Ireland. MARKET 1: Undergraduates and Postgraduates studying British Politics; Northern Ireland; Modern British History; International Conflict; Ethnic Conflict; International Relations

This study contributes to the debate on whether defense spending encourages or hinders economic growth. The effect of politics on economic growth in developing societies is assessed, with a focus on the Middle East. The study is the first to add conflict variables to the production function defense-growth model and test them empirically across countries and regions, and provide robust empirical evidence on the differential effects of interstate and intrastate conflicts on economic growth. The study provides compelling empirical evidence and guidelines to policy decision makers on how to allocate the resources of their states and adopt policies that promote political economic development. The study urges Third World leaders to improve levels of freedom, democracy, and openness of their political systems because the results confirm that political factors are at least as important as economic factors in promoting economic growth. Furthermore, the results attest that the reallocation of resources from military to the civilian sector is the sine qua non to improve the performance of developing countries' economies.

Due to its intensity and extensive effects both locally and globally, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has drawn the attention of scholars from numerous disciplines, who attempt to explain the causes of the conflict and the reasons for the difficulties in resolving it. Among these one can find historians, geographers, political scientists, sociologists and others. This volume explores the Israeli-Palestinian conflict from a social psychology perspective. At the core of the book is a theory of intractable conflicts, as developed by Daniel Bar-Tal of Tel Aviv University, applied to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Opening with an introduction to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict situation and a few chapters on the theoretical backgrounds of the creation of a societal ethos of conflict, the volume then moves to an analysis of the psycho-social underpinnings of the conflict, while concluding with a discussion of the possibility of long-standing peace in the region. Among the topics included in the coverage are: * Identity formation during conflict * The Israeli and Palestinian ethos of conflict * The important role of Palestinian and Israeli education * An analysis of the leadership in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process * The challenges and potential towards a road to peace in the region All contributors to the volume are pre-eminent scholars of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and many of them have felt the influence of Bar-Tal's formulations in their own work. A rich resource for those who are followers of Dr. Bar-Tal's work, for those who study intractable conflicts in all its forms, and for those who have a particular interest in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, A Social Psychology Perspective of the Israeli-Palestinian Case offers a detailed exploration of the psychological underpinnings of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the barriers to and opportunities of the peace process.

Mythologies and narratives of victimization pervade contemporary Croatia, set against the backdrop of militarized notions of masculinity and the political mobilization of religion and nationhood. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork in rural Dalmatia in the Croatian-Bosnian border region, this book provides a unique account of the politics of ambiguous Europeanness from the perspective of those living at Europe's margins. Examining phenomena such as Marian apparitions, a historic knights tournament, the symbolic re-signification of a massacre site, and the desolate social situation of Croatian war veterans, Narrating Victimhood traces the complex mechanisms of political radicalization in a post-war scenario. This book provides a new perspective for understanding the ongoing processes of transformation in Southeastern Europe and the Balkans.

Beginning in January 2011, the Arab world exploded in a vibrant demand for dignity, liberty, and achievable purpose in life, rising up against an image and tradition of arrogant, corrupt, unresponsive authoritarian rule. These previously unpublished, country specific case studies of the uprisings and their still unfolding political aftermaths identify patterns and courses of negotiation and explain why and how they occur. The contributors argue that in uprisings like the Arab Spring negotiation is "not just a 'nice' practice or a diplomatic exercise." Rather, it is a "dynamically multilevel" process involving individuals, groups, and states with continually shifting priorities-and with the prospect of violence always near. From that perspective, the essay sits analyze a range of issues and events-including civil disobedience and strikes, mass demonstrations and nonviolent protest, and peaceful negotiation and armed rebellion-and contextualize their findings within previous struggles, both within and outside the Middle East. The Arab countries discussed include Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen. The Arab Spring uprisings are discussed in the context of rebellions in countries like South Africa and Serbia, while the Libyan uprising is also viewed in terms of the negotiations it provoked within NATO. Collectively, the essays analyze the challenges of up risers and emerging governments in building a new state on the ruins of a liberated state; the negotiations that lead either to sustainable democracy or sectarian violence; and coalition building between former political and military adversaries.

This book examines and compares the diverging security approaches of the UK, China and India in peacebuilding settings, with a specific focus on the case of Nepal. Rising powers such as China and India dissent from traditional templates of peacebuilding and apply their own methods to respond to security issues. This book fills a gap in the literature by examining how emerging actors (China and India) engage with security and development and how their approaches differ from those of a traditional actor (the UK). In the light of democratic peace and regional security complex theories, the book interprets interview data to compare and contrast the engagement of these three actors with post-war Nepal, and the implications for security sector governance and peacebuilding. It contends that the UK helped to peacefully manage transition but that the institutional changes were merely ceremonial. China and India, by contrast, were more effective in advancing mutual security agendas through elite-level interactions. However, the 'hardware' of security, for example material and infrastructure support, gained more consideration than the 'software' of security, such as meritocratic governance and institution building. This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, development studies, Asian politics, security studies and International Relations in general.

This book offers a theory and model of counterterrorism based on emancipation and non-violence. Critical Terrorism Studies (CTS) scholars have produced wide-ranging and rich critiques of terrorism-related research, as well as state counterterrorism policies and practices. This work aims to fill in a gap in the current literature by constructing an original and specifically CTS model of counterterrorism. The model outlines the basic assumptions, priorities, principles, strategies and tactics, measures and evaluation of counterterrorism. It challenges prevalent models of counterterrorism through a radical rethinking of the ontology, epistemology and the agenda of counterterrorism. The model aims to prevent future acts of terrorism by (1) re-conceptualising how we study and understand terrorism, and; (2) suggesting that our efforts to counter and prevent terrorism must commensurate with the goals we want to achieve. Essentially, this involves a commitment to emancipation, and a rejection of violence as a tool. The second part of the book is a case study of Norwegian counterterrorism which shows how the theory and model developed in the book can be used. This is the first substantial analysis of Norwegian counterterrorism in almost ten years, and produces encouraging findings which support the potential for non-violent solutions to terrorism. This book will be of particular interest to students of terrorism and counterterrorism, critical security studies, and international relations in general.

Since the historic Nuremberg Trial of 1945 an international customary law principle has developed that commission of a core crime under international law - war crimes, genocide, crimes against humanity and aggression - should not go unpunished. History shows, that when in Africa such violations occurred, especially as a result of election disputes, national and regional actors, including the African Union, resorted to political rather than legal responses. However, when crimes against humanity were alleged to have been committed in Kenya during the 2007-2008 post-election violence, a promising road map for criminal accountability was agreed upon alongside a political solution. In the spirit of this road map, the author analyzes the post-election violence in Kenya from a legal point of view. He extensively examines legal options for domestic criminal accountability and discusses both retributive (prosecutions) and restorative justice (mainly truth commission) mechanisms, being the main legal responses to the gross violations of human rights. Furthermore, he thoroughly investigates the Kenya situation before the ICC and the legal-cum-political responses to the ICC intervention in Kenya. Practitioners and academics in the field of international criminal law and related disciplines, as well as political sciences and (legal) history will find in this book highly relevant information about alternative legal approaches of the fight against and punishment of crimes against humanity, as defined under the ICC Statute.

This book takes a novel look at the modern Middle East through the prisms of six cascading negative critical turning points. It identifies the seeds of a potential seventh in the collective dignity deficits generated by poor governance paradigms and exacerbated by geopolitical competition for the region's natural resources.

This book examines the role of collective violence in the achievement of solidarity, shedding light on the difficulty faced by sociology in theorizing violence and warfare as a result of the discipline's tendency to idealize society in an attempt to legitimize the idea of progressive social change. Using the global War on Terror as a focal point, the authors develop this argument through the related issues of power, knowledge, and ethics, explaining the War on Terror in terms of the Anglo-American tradition of imperial power and domination. Exploring the victimage rituals through which society is brought together in the ritual domination and destruction of a constructed "villain," Progressive Violence: Theorizing the War on Terror also considers the price of the liberal moral values in terms of which the global war on terror is frequently justified, and the volume of "progressive violence" involved in advancing the cause of freedom. The authors use this case to theorize the general role of vicarious victimage ritual in the social genesis of political violence and sadism, and its calculated use by politicians to achieve their imperial aims. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology and social theory with interests in terrorism, violence, and geopolitics.

This book explores the last 25 years of international peacebuilding and recasts them as a growing crisis of confidence in universal ideas of peacebuilding and self-government. Since current peacebuilding interventions are abandoning domineering, top-down and linear methodologies, and experimenting with context-sensitive, self-reflexive and locally driven strategies, the book makes two suggestions. The first is that international policymakers are embracing some of the critiques of liberal peace. For more than a decade, scholarly critiques have pointed out the need to focus on everyday dynamics and local initiatives and resistances to liberal peace in order to enable hybrid and long-term practice-based strategies of peacebuilding. Now, the distance between the policy discourse and critical frameworks has narrowed. The second suggestion is that in stepping away from liberal peace, a transvaluation of peacebuilding values is occurring. Critiques are beginning to accept and valorise that international interventions will continuously fail to produce sensitive results. The earlier frustrations with unexpected setbacks, errors or contingencies are ebbing away. Instead, critiques normalise the failure to promote stability and peace. This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, international intervention, conflict resolution, international organisations and security studies in general.

This book sheds new light on the security challenges for failed states posed by violent non-state armed actors (VNSAs). By focusing on the Syrian Civil War, it explores the characteristics, ideologies and strategies of the Islamic State (ISIS) and the People's Protection Units (YPG), as well as the regional and geopolitical impacts of these VNSAs. The contributors also cover topics such as the re-imagination of borders, the YPG's demands for national sovereignty, and the involvement of regional and global powers in the Syrian crisis. "This timely volume by regional scholars and experts examines various aspects of the emergence and expansion of violent non-state actors in the Syrian/Iraqi conflict. The wealth of detail and approaches enhance our understanding of the transformation and dynamics of contemporary conflicts within and beyond the region." Keith Krause, The Graduate Institute, Geneva "This book opens fascinating glimpses into contrasting forms of "state-like" governance established by non-state actors, ISIS and the Kurdish PYD. [...] It is an important source for students of the Syrian conflict, civil wars, failed states and hybrid governance."Raymond Hinnebusch, Director Centre for Syrian Studies, University of St. Andrews "This book is an excellent resource for those looking for an interdisciplinary account of VNSAs during the Syrian civil war. It makes a nice contribution to the study of violent non state actors and poses a set of new and pressing questions." Max Abrahms, Northeastern University.