Any system of government is comprised of several dimensions of functionality, which must all work in congruence. When any part of the system is dysfunctional, the government's stability becomes fractured and societal problems can arise. Political Discourse in Emergent, Fragile, and Failed Democracies examines the effects of unstable democratic systems of government in modern society, providing an imperative analysis on political communications from such nations. Highlighting real-world examples on the constraints seen in malfunctioning or emerging governments, this book is a pivotal reference source for policy makers, researchers, academicians, and upper-level students interested in politics and governance.

With the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, warnings about a 'new Cold War' proliferated. In fact, argues Gilbert Achcar in this timely new study, the Cold War has been ongoing since the turn of the century. Racing to solidify its position in the 1990s as the last remaining superpower, the US alienated Russia and China, pushing them closer and rebooting the 'old' Cold War with disastrous implications. Vladimir Putin's consequent rise and imperialist reinvention, along with Xi Jinping's own ascendancy and increasingly autocratic tendencies, would, respectively, culminate in the murderous invasion of Ukraine and mounting tensions over Taiwan and trade. Was all this inevitable? Will these three world powers' permanent readiness to war write the story of the twenty-first century? What comes after Ukraine? What might the contours of a more peaceful world look like? These questions and many others are addressed in this essential book by one of the most astute and seasoned analysts of international relations.

Geopolitics and climate change now have immediate consequences for national and international security interests across the Arctic and Antarctic. The world's polar regions are contested and strategically central to geopolitical rivalry. At the same time, rapid political, social, and environmental change presents unprecedented challenges for governance, environmental protection, and maritime operations in the regions.With chapters that raise awareness, address challenges, and inform policy options, Polar Cousins reviews the state of strategic thinking and options on Antarctica and the Southern Oceans in light of experience in the circumpolar North. Prioritizing strategic issues, it provides an essential discussion of geostrategic thinking, strategic policy, and strategy development. Featuring contributions from international defence experts, scientists, academics, policymakers, and decisionmakers, Polar Cousins offers key insights into the challenges unique to the polar regions.

The history of oil is a chapter in the story of Europe's geopolitical decline in the twentieth century. During the era of the two world wars, a lack of oil constrained Britain and Germany from exerting their considerable economic and military power independently. Both nations' efforts to restore the independence they had enjoyed during the Age of Coal backfired by inducing strategic over-extension, which served only to hasten their demise as great powers. Having fought World War I with oil imported from the United States, Britain was determined to avoid relying upon another great power for its energy needs ever again. Even before the Great War had ended, Whitehall implemented a strategy of developing alternative sources of oil under British control. Britain's key supplier would be the Middle East - already a region of vital importance to the British Empire - whose oil potential was still unproven. As it turned out, there was plenty of oil in the Middle East, but Italian hostility after 1935 threatened transit through the Mediterranean. A shortage of tankers ruled out re-routing shipments around Africa, forcing Britain to import oil from US-controlled sources in the Western Hemisphere and depleting its foreign exchange reserves. Even as war loomed in 1939, therefore, Britain's quest for independence from the United States had failed. Germany was in an even worse position than Britain. It could not import oil from overseas in wartime due to the threat of blockade, while accumulating large stockpiles was impossible because of the economic and financial costs. The Third Reich went to war dependent on petroleum synthesized from coal, domestic crude oil, and overland imports, primarily from Romania. German leaders were confident, however, that they had enough oil to fight a series of short campaigns that would deliver to them the mastery of Europe. This plan derailed following the victory over France, when Britain continued to fight. This left Germany responsible for Europe's oil requirements while cut off from world markets. A looming energy crisis in Axis Europe, the absence of strategic alternatives, and ideological imperatives all compelled Germany in June 1941 to invade the Soviet Union and fulfill the Third Reich's ultimate ambition of becoming a world power - a decision that ultimately sealed its fate.

After the end of the Cold War, it seemed as if Southeast Asia would remain a geopolitically stable region within the American imperious for the foreseeable future. In the last two decades, however, the re-emergence of China as a major great power has called into question the geopolitical future of the region and raised the specter of renewed of great power competition. As the eminent China scholar David Shambaugh explains in Where Great Powers Meet, the United States and China are engaged in a broad-gauged and global competition for power. While this competition ranges across the entire world, it is centered in Asia, and in this book, Shambaugh focuses the ten countries that comprise Southeast Asia. The United States and China constantly vie for position and influence in this enormously significant region-and the outcome of this contest will do much to determine whether Asia leaves the American orbit after seven decades and falls into a new Chinese sphere of influence. Just as importantly, to the extent that there is a global "power transition" occurring from the US to China, the fate of Southeast Asia will be a good indicator. Presently, both powers bring important assets to bear. The US continues to possess a depth and breadth of security ties, soft power, and direct investment across the region that empirically outweigh China's. For its part, China has more diplomatic influence, much greater trade, and geographic proximity. In assessing the likelihood of a regional power transition, Shambaugh at how ASEAN (the Association of Southeast Asian Nations) and the countries within it maneuver between the United States and China and the degree to which they align with one or the other power. Not simply an analysis of the region's place within an evolving international system, Where Great Powers Meet provides us with a comprehensive strategy that advances the American position while exploiting Chinese weaknesses.

Why our democracies need urgent reform, before it's too late A generation after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the world is once again on the edge of chaos. Demonstrations have broken out from Belgium to Brazil led by angry citizens demanding a greater say in their political and economic future, better education, heathcare and living standards. The bottom line of this outrage is the same; people are demanding their governments do more to improve their lives faster, something which policymakers are unable to deliver under conditions of anaemic growth. Rising income inequality and a stagnant economy are threats to both the developed and the developing world, and leaders can no longer afford to ignore this gathering storm. In Edge of Chaos, Dambisa Moyo sets out the new political and economic challenges facing the world, and the specific, radical solutions needed to resolve these issues and reignite global growth. Dambisa enumerates the four headwinds of demographics, inequality, commodity scarcity and technological innovation that are driving social and economic unrest, and argues for a fundamental retooling of democratic capitalism to address current problems and deliver better outcomes in the future. In the twenty-first century, a crisis in one country can quickly become our own, and fragile economies produce a fragile international community. Edge of Chaos is a warning for advanced and emerging nations alike: we must reverse the dramatic erosion in growth, or face the consequences of a fragmented and unstable global future.

A Companion to Border Studies introduces an exciting and expanding field of interdisciplinary research, through the writing of an international array of scholars, from diverse perspectives that include anthropology, development studies, geography, history, political science and sociology. * Explores how nations and cultural identities are being transformed by their dynamic, shifting borders where mobility is sometimes facilitated, other times impeded or prevented * Offers an array of international views which together form an authoritative guide for students, instructors and researchers * Reflects recent significant growth in the importance of understanding the distinctive characteristics of borders and frontiers, including cross-border cooperation, security and controls, migration and population displacements, hybridity, and transnationalism

An Intelligence Studies Anthology: Foundational Concepts and Case Studies for the 21st Century is designed to provide undergraduate students with an introduction to the U.S. government's collection and use of intelligence. Through a carefully curated selection of readings, students gain an understanding of the history of the intelligence process and the agencies involved in it. They also learn about the intelligence cycle, types of intelligence products, best practices for writing and briefing intelligence, covert operations, counterintelligence, technical tools and legal concepts, and the ways in which law enforcement collects and uses intelligence. The anthology provides students with a novel collection of information discussing the ways the intelligence process can be used to stop health crises, including pandemics, and includes the editor's original article discussing the creation of a new department in the U.S. government devoted to fighting future pandemics. Illuminating and insightful, An Intelligence Studies Anthology is an exemplary resource for introductory courses in intelligence, criminal justice, criminology, government, and health/public health.

The Vietnam War is one of the defining conflicts of the twentieth century: not only did it divide American society at every level; the conflict also represented a key shift in Asian anti-colonialism and shaped the course of the Cold War. Despite its political and social importance, popular memory of the war is dominated by myths and stereotypes. In this incisive new text, John Dumbrell debunks popular assumptions about the war and reassesses the key political, military and historical controversies associated with one of the most contentious and divisive wars of recent times. Drawing upon an extensive range of newly accessible sources, Rethinking the Vietnam War assesses all aspects of the conflict - ranging across domestic electoral politics in the USA to the divided communist leadership in Hanoi and grassroots antiwar movements around the world. The book charts the full course of the war - from the origins of American involvement, the growing internationalization of the conflict and the swing year of 1968 to bitter twists in Sino-Soviet rivalry and the eventual withdrawal of American forces. Situating the conflict within an international context, John Dumbrell also considers competing interpretations of the war and points the way to the resolution of debates which have divided international opinion for decades.

This study addresses the many initiatives to decrease industrial pollution emitting from the Pechenganikel plant in the northwestern corner of Russia during the final years of the Soviet Union, and examines the wider implications for the state of pollution control in the Arctic today. By examining the efforts of Soviet industry and government agencies, Finnish and Swedish officials, and Norwegian environmental authorities to curb industrial pollution in the region, this book offers an environmental history of the Arctic as well as a transnational, geopolitical history.

There is widespread agreement that climate change is a serious problem. If we fail to regulate greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming, or use alternative strategies for addressing the problem, the damages could be significant, and perhaps catastrophic. After several international meetings in which nation-states have tried unsuccessfully to address the climate change problem, there is a sense of frustration and urgency: frustration at the slow pace at which countries are moving toward an international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions; urgency because of the growing evidence that climate change is a serious problem that should be addressed globally and quickly. This book takes a close look at the fundamental political and economic processes driving climate change policy. It identifies institutional arrangements and policies that are needed to design more effective climate change policy. It also examines ethical and distributional arguments that are critical in understanding and framing the climate debate. The book is built around a conference honouring Tom Schelling that took place at the Sustainable Consumption Institute at The University of Manchester. Each chapter represents a significant contribution to the literature on the political economy of climate change.

Central Asia has become the battleground for the major struggles of the 21st century: radical Islam versus secularism, authoritarianism versus identity politics, Eastern versus Western control of resources, and the American 'War on Terror'. Nowhere are these conflicts more starkly illustrated than in the case of Tajikistan. Embedded in the oil-rich Central Asian region, and bordering war-torn Afghanistan, Tajikistan occupies a geo-strategically pivotal position. It is also a major transit hub for the smuggling of opium, which eventually ends up in the hands of heroin dealers in Western cities. In this timely book, Lena Jonson examines Tajkistan's search for a foreign policy in the post 9/11 environment. She shows the internal contradictions of a country in every sense at the crossroads, reconciling its bloody past with an uncertain future She assesses the impact of regional developments on the reform movement in Tajikistan, and in turn examines how changes in Tajik society (which is the only Central Asian country to have a legal Islamist party) might affect the region. The destiny of Tajikistan is intimately connected with that of Central Asia, and this thorough and penetrating book is essential reading for anyone seeking to make sense of this strategically vital region at a moment of transition.

As David Vine demonstrates, the overseas bases raise geopolitical tensions and provoke widespread antipathy towards the United States. They also undermine American democratic ideals, pushing the U.S. into partnerships with dictators and perpetuating a system of second-class citizenship in territories like Guam. They breed sexual violence, destroy the environment, and damage local economies. And their financial cost is staggering: though the Pentagon underplays the numbers, Vine's accounting proves that the bill approaches $100 billion per year. For many decades, the need for overseas bases has been a quasi-religious dictum of U.S. foreign policy. But in recent years, a bipartisan coalition has finally started to question this conventional wisdom. With the U.S. withdrawing from Afghanistan and ending thirteen years of war, there is no better time to re-examine the tenets of our military strategy. Base Nation is an essential contribution to that debate.