Conflict Dynamics presents case studies of six nation-states: Sierra Leone, the Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Indonesia, and Peru. In the book, Alethia H. Cook and Marie Olson Lounsbery examine the evolving nature of violence in intrastate conflicts, as well as the governments and groups involved, by focusing on the context of the relationships involved, the capacities of the conflict s participants, and the actors goals. The authors first present a theoretical framework through which the changeable mix of relative group capacities and the resulting tactical decisions can be examined systematically and as conflicts evolve over time. They then apply that framework to the six case studies to show its usefulness in better understanding conflicts individually and in comparison. While previous research on civil wars has tended to focus on causes and outcomes, Conflict Dynamics takes a more comprehensive approach to understanding conflict behavior. The shifting nature of relative group capacity (measured in many different ways), coupled with dynamic group goals, determines the tactical decisions of civil war actors and the paths a rebellion will take. The case studies illustrate the relevance of third parties to this process and how their interventions can influence tactics. The progression of violence in conflicts is inextricably linked to the decisions made in their midst. These influence future iterations of the conflictual relationship. Complex groups on both sides both drive and are driven by the decisions made. Understanding conflicts requires that these reciprocal impacts be considered. The comparative framework demonstrated in this book allows one to flesh out this complexity.

The process of food production and distribution has grown into a global corporate system in recent years. This has caused significant impacts on sustainability on an international scale, particularly for developing nations. Establishing Food Security and Alternatives to International Trade in Emerging Economies is a pivotal reference source for the latest scholarly research on agricultural trade relations and trade liberalization in the context of developing countries. Highlighting a range of pertinent topics such as crop productivity, rural development, and value-added agriculture, this book is ideally designed for academics, researchers, graduate students, and practitioners interested in the current state of global food markets. Topics Covered: The many academic areas covered in this publication include, but are not limited to: Climate Change Crop Productivity Food Safety Maritime Piracy Rural Development Trade Policies Value-Added Agriculture

What happened then to the intellectuals who spent their life working and writing about the Cold War when the conflict ended in 1991? Looking at one of the most emblematic American think tanks in recent history, the RAND Corporation, Samaan provides key insights on the evolution of strategic studies in the US in the last two decades. Based on numerous interviews and exclusive archives, this is a detailed analysis of RAND's intellectual and corporate development. But beyond this specific case study, the book is more than a historical portray of a American research center. Through RAND and its relationship with the American military, the author seeks to understand the rules of the 'field' of strategic studies in the United States. Moreover this work allows the readers to better comprehend the way the elements driving the US defense policies since 1989 - the political uncertainty and its doctrinal consequences - shaped major international events in the last two decades.

Allies Apart tells the story of Anglo-American relations at a pivotal time, with Britain joining Europe and the US pursing detente with the communist superpowers. To date, the period has been widely portrayed as a low-point for the Anglo-American alliance -- even the end of the so-called 'special relationship'. Using newly-released material from both sides of the Atlantic, Andrew Scott examines if and why this has been the case. Whereas commentators and historians have previously blamed Edward Heath for deliberately downgrading relations with Washington in order to open the door to Europe, Scott reveals a very different perspective, demonstrating the extent to which policy-making under Richard Nixon -- assisted by his chief adviser, Henry Kissinger -- affected transatlantic relations. As the White House set out to transform international relations, overhaul the global economic order and impose its Cold War rivalry on regional crises, London was left feeling impotent, marginalized and even double-crossed -- all of which fuelled the case for Europe.

Britain and the Last Tsar is a fundamental re-interpretation of British foreign and defence policy before the First World War. The current orthodoxy asserts that the rise of an aggressive and powerful Germany forced Britain - a declining power - to abandon her traditional policy of avoiding alliances and to enter into alliance with Japan (1902), France (1904), and Russia (1907) in order to contain the German menace. In a controversial rejection of this theory, Keith Neilson argues that Britain was the pre-eminent world power in 1914 and that Russia, not Germany, was the principal long-term threat to Britain's global position. This original and important study shows that only by examining Anglo-Russian relations and eliminating an undue emphasis on Anglo-German affairs can an accurate picture of Britain's foreign and defence policy before 1914 be gained.

Recreating the diplomatic career of Jack Garnett, from 1902-1919, John Fisher reveals a fascinating individual as well as contextualizing his story with regard to British policy in the countries to which he was posted in Europe, Asia, Africa and South America, during a period of rapid change in international politics and in Britain's world role.

This edited collection interprets and assesses the transformation of Brazil under the Workers' Party. It addresses the extent of the changes the Workers' Party has brought about and examines how successful these have been, as well as how continuity and social change in Brazil have affected key domains of economy, society, and politics.

This book is about China's ambitions in its most complex and internationally visible space endeavor, namely its human space exploration programme. It provides a comprehensive reflection on Chinas strategic direction and objectives in space, including in particular those set forth in its human spaceflight programme and analyses the key domestic and external factors affecting the country's presumed manned lunar ambitions. The objective of the book is to disentangle the opportunities and challenges Chinas space ambitions are creating for other spacefaring nations and for Europe in particular. It therefore includes an in-depth analysis of possible European postures towards China in space exploration and seeks to stimulate a debate on future space strategies in the broader context of world politics.

This work relates the policy of appeasement to the personal beliefs and decisions of those responsible for foreign policy. Using Robert Hadow, First Secretary in the Foreign Office, as an example of an appeaser, this approach aims to demonstrate how intelligent and capable men in Britain fell victim to a policy which, to many still, in retrospect, appears blind and irrational. An examination of Hadow's fear of war, his reaction to communism, his sympathy for the German minority in Czechoslovakia, and his actions inside and outside the Foreign Office in pursuit of appeasement is made in this book through detailed research of Hadow's public and private papers. By following the course of Hadow's career and the working of his mind in the 1930s, this study explains the thinking behind a policy associated with Britain on the eve of World War II.

This volume takes a comparative approach to understand general tendencies in post-Communist transition in Russia and China. Bringing together perspectives from Political Science, Sociology and IR, it analyses three arenas of social change: socio-economic systems, political systems, and foreign policies.

Mediation, the facilitated discussion of disputes and conflicts, is a flexible approach that can be used at all levels of intervention to move us toward a global peace that is both inclusive and fair. Moving Toward a Just Peace: The Mediation Continuum, edited by Jan Marie Fritz," " brings together mediators, scholar-practitioners, and a veteran diplomat to discuss the life and times of mediation in very different settings.

The 13 chapters include three essays about culture, creativity, and models/theories/approaches. And there are ten chapters about practice: community mediation, mediation by police, special education mediation; interventions on behalf of widows in Nigeria; capacity-building work in Burundi; mediation in Israel; the creative facilitation of meetings; community conferencing; UN Security Council Resolution 1325 (Women and Peace and Security) and the role of civil society organizations in peacebuilding.

This volume discusses the expanding roles (from prevention through societal transformation) assumed by mediators and the urgent need for mediators working at different intervention levels to learn from each other. This volume is a must read for the scholars, researchers, policymakers, civil society representatives and practitioners with interests in effective dispute and conflict intervention. It particularly is recommended for those managing dispute and conflict intervention processes."

With the concept of 'Atomic Anxiety', this book offers a novel perspective on one of the most important and longstanding puzzles of international politics: the non-use of U.S. nuclear weapons. By focusing on the fear surrounding nuclear weapons, it explains why nuclear deterrence and the nuclear taboo are working at cross purposes in practice.

Violent behavior has become deeply integrated into modern society and it is an unavoidable aspect of human nature. Examining peacemaking strategies through a critical and academic perspective can assist in resolving violence in societies around the world. The Handbook of Research on Examining Global Peacemaking in the Digital Age is a pivotal reference source for the latest research findings on the utilization of peacemaking in media, leadership, and religion. Featuring extensive coverage on relevant areas such as human rights, spirituality, and the Summer of Peace, this publication is an ideal resource for policymakers, universities and colleges, graduate-level students, and organizations seeking current research on the application of conflict resolution and international negotiation.

In the first book to explore the cultural politics of Cuba's epic military engagement in the Angolan civil war, Christabelle Peters shows how the internationalist mission profoundly influenced Cuban thinking on the African cultural element in national identity. Drawing from multiple sources, including films, political speeches, literature, and autoethnography, Cuban Identity and the Angolan Experience reveals the underlying mythological context for Operation Carlota. By tracing the evolution of slave iconology during the first five--most ideological--years of the intervention, Peters reveals a parallel shift in Cuba's regional identification from Latin American to Caribbean.

A History of International Oil Politics is both an argument for multi-theoretical pluralism and a proposal for a theory-synergetic approach in international relations. Murad Gassanly, a distinguished international relations scholar and rising British politician, explores how international relations paradigms could be utilized in approaching the vital field of international oil politics, specifically historical issues of international energy politics and comparative case studies of energy transmission networks - the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline and the Southern Gas Corridor. This highly original study explores the historical timeline of global energy to demonstrate how a theory-synergetic analysis might offer a deeper and more holistic understanding. As an academic discipline, international relations now offers a maelstrom of competing epistemological, ontological, and normative contestations. Gassanly, however, argues that theoretical diversity has knowledge-producing and maximizing potential and that pluralism does not impede academic progress. Applying different theoretical models to oil politics reveals different realities, but the synergetic whole is greater than the sum of its constituent paradigmatic parts. Empirical convergences between theoretical accounts provides a broad analytical framework for active theoretical synergy.

From the Cold War to the Persian Gulf War, the high drama of America's contemporary foreign policy crises comes to life in this collection of primary documents designed for use by high school and college students. The comprehensive work dramatizes, through memoirs and diaries of the major players as well as key public documents, eight major crises: The Origins of the Cold War, the Berlin Blockade of 1948-49, the Korean War, the Berlin Crises of 1958 and 1961, the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Vietnam War, the Iranian Hostage Crisis of 1979-80, and the 1991 Persian Gulf War with Iraq. The selection of documents for each crisis dramatizes the tension between the opposing nations and illuminates the process of decision-making by U.S. policymakers. Meticulously culled from a wide variety of sources and voices, many of the 382 documents are available in no other resource. Following a general introduction on contemporary American foreign relations, each crisis begins with a narrative introduction and chronology of events. The story of each crisis unfolds through chronologically organized documents, each of which is preceded by an explanatory headnote. The section on each crisis concludes with a suggested reading list. Among the variety of voices heard are memoirs and official statements of every president from Truman to Bush, and memoirs, diaries, and reminiscences of key players including General Douglas MacArthur, Dean Acheson, Robert Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, Nikita Krushchev, Andrei Gromyko, the Shah of Iran, and Generals Norman Schwarzkopf and Colin Powell. The variety of documents includes government reports and policy statements, private correspondence and memos, laws, speeches, positionstatements of interest groups, treaties and agreements, CIA directives, and interviews with key players. This basic research tool provides students with a rich panoply of voices, viewpoints, and key public documents that illuminate a crucial period in American and world history.

Presenting the reader with provocative articles that critically examine the morality of the war on terrorism as it has evolved over the past eight years, this book consists of articles that effectively address specific aspects of the war on terrorism that are missing or underrepresented in ethical discourse since 9/11. The book includes a mix of article types: theory, lecture, research, battlefield journalism, investigative reporting, as well as excerpts from international law and a military leadership manual.

With theoretically-rich contributions from an international group of political scientists, historians, and economists, this volume addresses the puzzle of why the Middle East has produced no single dominant and acknowledged regional power, despite contenders such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Israel, and Turkey. Rich, theoretically-engaged case study chapters address a gap in the vibrant international academic discussion on the role of (new) regional powers in global politics. Furtig offers powerful insights into both the unique nature of the Middle East region, with its dispersed power structures and competing centers, and probable new power constellations.

Based on sources still unavailable in the West, this first English language study of Russian-Kazakh relations provides unorthodox interpretations of many events and introduces new concepts in analysis of contemporary relations. Because political thought found itself a little behind the rapid political change that engulfed the former USSR, a process of adjustment of concepts and development of new approaches is now underway. Examining the complex nature of Russian-Kazakh relations immediately prior to and after the collapse of the USSR, the book examines four major groups of issues in Russian-Kazakh relations: status of ethnic Russians in Kazakhstan; Kazakh and Russian attitudes to post-Soviet integration; bilateral military relations; and Russian and international competition for Kazakhstan's energy resources. Beginning with research on Gorbachev's time in office, the book analyzes the effect of Moscow's policies on Kazakhstan and the factors which propelled the republic to independence. Next, one sees how Kazakhstan and Russia tried to establish a new, post-imperial basis for their relations during the first six months after the break-up of the Soviet Union. Subsequent chapters move from historical to structural analysis. With his inside knowledge of the mechanisms of Russian foreign policy formulation, the author pays particular attention to such controversial problems as Kazakh policy in the creation of a nation and its effects on Kazakhstan's Russian population; the concept of Eurasian Union, Custom's Union, and other integration initiatives supported by Kazakhstan; Kazakh nuclear disarmament; the Caspian Pipeline Consortium; and the legal status of the Caspian Sea.

Troy analyses how the understanding of religion in Realism and the English School helps in working towards the greater good in international relations, studying religion within the overall framework of international affairs and the field of peace studies.

This new discipline proposes a systematic understanding of the customs, moral attitudes, and cultures of foreign populations to enhance the efficacy of national security initiatives. The book offers an in-depth analysis and conceptualization of a much needed intelligence discipline, Sociocultural intelligence (SOCINT). SOCINT means observing and analyzing such elements as the land, the people, and their communities. Customs, moral attitudes, and culture of foreign populations are integrated into the analysis of the information gathered to maximize the efficiency of security initiatives. A key tool in intelligence and covert operations, SOCINT can mostly be used for non-lethal operations that require a thorough understanding of networks and systems. Simply, by understanding the behavioral aspects of relationships and systems, we will have a greater opportunity for 'success' by knowing who, what, where, when, why, and how to influence within the systems themselves. Not only a tool for war fighting, SOCINT is needed for multiple uses, such as law enforcement operations and business. Written by an international expert, this unique book combines theoretical analysis with practical application to present and advocate for the systematic use of SOCINT to students and practitioners in intelligence studies, intelligence communities, and national security. "The Continuum Intelligence Studies Series" presents new research to enhance both the study and practice of intelligence. The volumes in CITS will focus on theory, concepts, teaching methods, new research, methodologies, best practices, and more across all fields of intelligence studies. The focus will be on contemporary issues and new research. Composed of coursebooks, monographs, practical guides, and reference works written by scholars and experts, the series is geared toward students in intelligence and security studies, as well as practitioners and policymakers.

"This book is a solid overview that is more concerned with what happened than why it happended, and a work that can be a starting-point for those who want an introduction to US-Central American relations or a dependable reference for the more knowledgeable. Although primarily concerned with getting the most important facts recorded, Findling knows when to stop and present interpretative insights (as in his page on the New Deal, which he handles critically and well). Comets come and go, but this book should have a good life as an analysis that serves as a useful reference to a relationship that remains, unfortunately for Central Americans and US foreign policy, too little understood." The International History Review

French President Charles de Gaulle (1958-1969) has consistently fascinated contemporaries and historians. His vision conceived out of national interest of uniting Europe under French leadership and overcoming the Cold War still remains relevant and appealing. De Gaulle's towering personality and his challenge to US hegemony in the Cold War have inspired a vast number of political biographies and analyses of the foreign policies of the Fifth Republic mostly from French or US angle. In contrast, this book serves to rediscover de Gaulle's global policies how they changed the Cold War. Offering truly global perspectives on France's approach to the world during de Gaulle's presidency, the 13 well-matched essays by leading experts in the field tap into newly available sources drawn from US, European, Asian, African and Latin American archives. Together, the contributions integrate previously neglected regions, actors and topics with more familiar and newly approached phenomena into a global picture of the General's international policy-making. The volume at hand is an example of how cutting-edge research benefits from multipolar and multi-archival approaches and from attention to big, middle and smaller powers as well as institutions.

This book is an introductory study of the complex security relationship that exists between the United States and Taiwan. It explains how U.S. security policy toward Taiwan has been steered primarily by Cold War calculations and how the U.S. has sought to respond creatively to the constraints on military support for Taiwan imposed by the normalization of relations with the People's Republic of China. Hickey suggests that, with the disintegration of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, the time has arrived for adjustments in the U.S.-Taiwan relationship. These modifications should not, however, include a change in American security policy, which should continue to serve U.S. interests in the post-Cold War environment.