The fiftieth anniversary of the foundation of the United Nations was commemorated in 1995 with a number of conferences and publications which assessed the history and contemporary role of this paramount international organisation. This book is the result of a meeting of scholars and specialists who wished to further understanding of the challenges faced by the United Nations in its efforts to intervene in post-cold war conflict. In particular the experiences in Bosnia, Somalia and in Rwanda, where UN peacekeepers seemed powerless to act in the face of acts of genocide, gross violations of human rights and the widespread suffering caused by war, makes such an analysis timely and important.

This textbook offers an accessible introduction to the historical, technical, and strategic context of global cyber conflict. The second edition has been revised and updated throughout, with three new chapters. Cyber warfare involves issues of doctrine, strategy, policy, international relations (IR) and operational practice associated with computer network attack, computer network exploitation and computer network defense. However, it is conducted within complex sociopolitical settings alongside related forms of digital contestation. This book provides students with a comprehensive perspective on the technical, strategic and policy issues associated with cyber conflict, as well as an introduction to key state and non-state actors. Specifically, the book provides a comprehensive overview of several key issue areas: The historical context of the emergence and evolution of cyber warfare, including the basic characteristics and methods of computer network attack, exploitation and defense An interdisciplinary set of theoretical perspectives on conflict in the digital age from the point of view of the fields of IR, security studies, psychology and science, technology and society (STS) studies Current national perspectives, policies, doctrines and strategies relevant to cyber warfare An examination of key challenges in international law, norm development and deterrence; and The role of emerging information technologies like artificial intelligence and quantum computing in shaping the dynamics of global cyber conflict This textbook will be essential reading for students of cybersecurity/cyber conflict and information warfare, and highly recommended for students of intelligence studies, security and strategic studies, defense policy, and IR in general.

As peace operations become the primary mechanism of conflict management used by the UN and regional organizations, understanding their problems and potential is essential for a more secure world. In this revised and updated second edition, Paul Diehl and Alexandru Balas provide a cutting-edge analysis of the central issues surrounding the development, operation, and effectiveness of peace operations. Among many features, the book: * Traces the historical development of peace operations from their origins in the early 20th century through the development of modern peacebuilding missions and multiple simultaneous peace operations. * Tracks changes over time in the size, mission and organization of peace operations. * Analyses different organizational, financial, and troop provisions for peace operations, as well as assessing alternatives. * Lays out criteria for evaluating peace operations and details the conditions under which such operations are successful. Drawing on a wide range of examples from those between Israel and her neighbours to more recent operations in Bosnia, Somalia, Darfur, East Timor, and the Congo, this new edition brings together the body of scholarly research on peace operations to address those concerns. It will be an indispensable guide for students, practitioners and general readers wanting to broaden their knowledge of the possibilities and limits of peace operations today.

When we take a look back at the way Western states have fought terrorist organizations in the last 20 years, it is difficult not to think that these alternatives to war might have been more ethical than the decisions to invade Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and in 2003. These cases speak for themselves as they have both led to the death of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians, which is highly paradoxical in light of the logic that supported these interventions. There is a need to think of alternatives to war that will imply the legitimization of proactive sets of measures that would allow states to effectively prevent terrorist attacks through the use of kinetic force in a limited extent as a way to avoid the terrible and unpredictable effects of wars. Violent Alternatives to War: Justifying Actions Against Contemporary Terrorism engages in a moral discussion of the challenges associated with violent alternatives to war when confronting terrorism and suggests a comprehensive approach to how this form of violence can be legitimized and how it ought to be used against this contemporary threat.

This book analyses the evolving geopolitics in the Indo-Pacific region and explains how Djibouti fits in the global strategies of four major powers-the US, China, Japan, and France. It shows how Djibouti is emerging as a key nation in the geopolitics of the Indo-Pacific, explores the interconnections between Djibouti and the Indian as well as Pacific Oceans, and through Djibouti examines broader trends in contemporary great power politics in the Indo-Pacific region, including the Belt and Road Initiative of China. Moving beyond contemporary works on the region, the author integrates Africa and the Middle East with discussions on the Indo-Pacific to illustrate the coalescing of strategic geography from Eastern Africa to the Western coast of the Americas. A major intervention, the volume will be essential reading for scholars, practitioners, and researchers of politics and international relations, security studies, African studies, peace and conflict studies, and maritime studies.

This book examines the shape, sources and dangers of information warfare (IW) as it pertains to military, diplomatic and civilian stakeholders. Cyber warfare and information warfare are different beasts. Both concern information, but where the former does so exclusively in its digitized and operationalized form, the latter does so in a much broader sense: with IW, information itself is the weapon. The present work aims to help scholars, analysts and policymakers understand IW within the context of cyber conflict. Specifically, the chapters in the volume address the shape of influence campaigns waged across digital infrastructure and in the psychology of democratic populations in recent years by belligerent state actors, from the Russian Federation to the Islamic Republic of Iran. In marshalling evidence on the shape and evolution of IW as a broad-scoped phenomenon aimed at societies writ large, the authors in this book present timely empirical investigations into the global landscape of influence operations, legal and strategic analyses of their role in international politics, and insightful examinations of the potential for democratic process to overcome pervasive foreign manipulation. This book will be of much interest to students of cybersecurity, national security, strategic studies, defence studies and International Relations in general.

Can war be justified? Pacifists answer that it cannot; they oppose war and advocate for nonviolent alternatives to war. But defenders of just war theory argue that in some circumstances, when the effectiveness of nonviolence is limited, wars can be justified. In this book, two philosophers debate this question, drawing on contemporary scholarship and new developments in thinking about pacifism and just war theory. Andrew Fiala defends the pacifist position, while Jennifer Kling defends just war traditions. Fiala argues that pacifism follows from the awful reality of war and the nonviolent goal of building a more just and peaceful world. Kling argues that war is sometimes justified when it is a last-ditch, necessary effort to defend people and their communities from utter destruction and death. Pulling from global traditions and histories, their debate will captivate anyone who has wondered or worried about the morality of political violence and military force. Topics discussed include ethical questions of self-defense and other-defense, the great analogy between individuals and states, evolving technologies and methods of warfighting, moral injury and post-traumatic stress disorder, broader political and communal issues, and the problem of regional security in a globalizing world. The authors consider cultural and religious issues as well as the fundamental question of moral obligation in a world saturated in military conflict. The book was written in the aftermath of the war on terrorism and includes reflection on lessons learned from the past decades of war, as well as hopes for the future in light of emerging threats in Europe and elsewhere. The book is organized in a user-friendly fashion. Each author presents a self-contained argument, which is followed by a series of responses, replies, and counter-arguments. Throughout, the authors model civil discourse by emphasizing points of agreement and remaining areas of disagreement. The book includes reader-friendly summaries, a glossary of key concepts, and suggestions for further study. All of this will help students and scholars follow the authors' dialogue so they may develop their own answer to the question of whether war can be justified. Key Features Summarizes the debate between pacifism and just war theory Considers historical and traditional sources as well as contemporary scholarship and applications Models philosophical dialogue and civil discourse, while seeking common ground Discusses issues of concern in contemporary warfighting and peacemaking, while offering an analysis of the war on terrorism

This book examines the implications of counterinsurgency warfare for U.S. defense policy and makes the compelling argument that the United States' default position on counterinsurgency wars should be to avoid them. Given the unsatisfactory outcomes of the counterinsurgency (COIN) wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the U.S. military is now in a heated debate over whether wars involving COIN operations are worth fighting. This book provides a comprehensive analysis of the effectiveness of COIN through key historic episodes and concludes that the answer is an emphatic "no," based on a dominant record of U.S. military or political failure, and inconsistency in the reasons for the rare cases of success. The author also examines the implications of his findings for U.S. foreign policy, defense policy, and future weapons procurement. Examines a wider breadth of historical cases than other books on counterinsurgency, allowing for more accurate assessments and conclusions about the efficacy of COIN based on the lessons learned across history Presents research-based evidence that the Unites States should get involved in counterinsurgency warfare only in the rare cases in which U.S. vital interests are at stake Provides thought-provoking discussion of the domestic negative effects resulting from overseas counterinsurgency operations Questions the effectiveness of COIN strategy by utilizing numerous historical examples covered throughout the book Covers major instances of COIN warfare in history, including the French in Algeria and Indochina, the British in Malaysia and Afghanistan, the United States in Vietnam and the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and numerous others Appeals to readers and students of military history, strategy, and defense

This volume provides materials for active learning about peacebuilding and conflict management in the context of complex stability operations. Today, America faces security challenges unlike any it has faced before, many of which requiring lengthy U.S. involvement in stability operations. These challenges are exceedingly dynamic and complex because of the ever changing mix and number of actors involved, the pace with which the strategic and operational environments change, and the constraints placed on response options. This volume presents a series of case studies to inspire active learning about peacebuilding and conflict management in the context of complex stability operations. The case studies highlight dilemmas pertaining to the story of the case (case dilemma) and to its larger policy implications (policy dilemma). The cases stimulate readers to "get inside the heads" of case protagonists with widely differing cultural backgrounds, professional experiences, and individual and organisational interests. Overall, Understanding Complex Military Operations challenges the reader to recognize the importance of specific national security related issues and their inherent dilemmas, deduce policy implications, and discern lessons that might apply to other - perhaps even non-security related - areas of public policy, administration, and management. This volume will be of much interest to students of conflict prevention, transitional justice, peacebuilding, security studies and professionals conducting field-based operations in potentially hazardous environments.

This book uses machine-learning to identify the causes of conflict from among the top predictors of conflict. This methodology elevates some complex causal pathways that cause civil conflict over others, thus teasing out the complex interrelationships between the most important variables that cause civil conflict. Success in this realm will lead to scientific theories of conflict that will be useful in preventing and ending civil conflict. After setting out a current review of the literature and a case for using machine learning to analyze and predict civil conflict, the authors lay out the data set, important variables, and investigative strategy of their methodology. The authors then investigate institutional causes, economic causes, and sociological causes for civil conflict, and how that feeds into their model. The methodology provides an identifiable pathway for specifying causal models. This book will be of interest to scholars in the areas of economics, political science, sociology, and artificial intelligence who want to learn more about leveraging machine learning technologies to solve problems and who are invested in preventing civil conflict.

This unique text challenges the notion that absence of conflict is the foundation and norm of a stable political environment. Combining complexity theory and the notion of signature with case studies, it argues that political processes need to be understood within their social and cultural contexts. It thus develops the idea of enduring conflict, referring to both the enduring nature of political conflict and the endurance of people in conflict-ridden societies, looking at countries involved in conflict transformation, such as Northern Ireland, Cambodia, Indonesia, and South Africa. Examining debates around trauma, memory, and reconciliation, the work shows how conflicts are so socially and culturally ingrained and protracted that political agreements alone cannot bring substantive change. In addition, key texts, such as peace agreements, along with interviews of politicians, participants, and NGOs help identify the conditions under which notions like peace, democracy, and conflict resolution can even be conceived - let alone implemented. This innovative text is a significant contribution to the literature as it highlights the limitations of conflict resolution strategies and identifies the issues that pertain to conflicts throughout global politics. Written in an accessible manner, it will be highly attractive to students in conflict processes, peace studies, and international relations theory.

* The book is a unique contribution to an emerging interdisciplinary and international field, with no English-language competitors in its focus and genre. * The interdisciplinary nature of the topic will provide insight for a variety of fields and courses, such as linguistics, translation studies, intercultural communication, psychology, and business communication, with potential appeal for research groups, NGOs, and working professionals beyond student readerships. * Intercultural communication is a growing field for which this handbook offers a definitive theoretical grounding point in an important sub-field.

The need for constructive solutions to worldwide conflict and violence has stimulated some extremely productive research leading both to a clearer understanding of conflict and to the development of new modes of intervention. This Unesco Yearbook, which is drawn from an international symposium organized by the International Peace Research Institute, Oslo (PRIO) in collaboration with Unesco, distills current knowledge of the subject in twelve original studies of subnational and regional conflicts in societies ranging from nineteenth-century Europe to present-day South Africa. The introduction provides an overview of the different theoretical perspectives and empirical frameworks that have contributed to the work. Five essays focus on historical conflicts linked to political, social, cultural, or economic domination. The specific topics covered are landlord domination in nineteenth-century Ireland, peasant conflicts in pre-revolutionary Russia and China, European anti-semitism, and labor revolts in the Caribbean in the 1930s. The remaining chapters examine current conflicts related to ethnic and racial violence, human rights, genocide, the emergence of nations, and social pluralism, and explore international and regional responses to conflict. Several approaches to conflict resolution are described, and the goals and policy implications of each are discussed in detail. The authors make it clear that the importance of conflict resolution lies less in avoiding or suppressing conflict than in offering the means of using it creatively as an instrument of needed social change. Integrating historical and sociological modes of analysis with a thorough grasp of empirical detail, this work represents a landmark effort to come to grips with one of the most serious problems facing the world today. It will be ofinterest to academics, professionals, and policy-makers working in the areas of conflic resolution, international political economy, human rights, social change, ethnographic studies, and related fields.

Demonstrating that none of the various perspectives under review has emerged as the clear winner in the struggle for theoretical hegemony in security studies, this book shows that eclectic perspectives, like democratic realist institutionalism, can better explain peace and security in the Asian Pacific. The Asian Pacific has emerged as one of the most important regions in the world, causing scholars to pay increased attention to the various challenges, old and new, to peace and security there. Peace and Security in the Asia-Pacific: Theory and Practice is a comprehensive, critical review of the established theoretical perspectives relevant to contemporary peace and security studies in the light of recent experiences. Illuminating ongoing debates in the field, the book covers some 20 theoretical perspectives on peace and security in the Asian Pacific, including realist, liberal, socialist, peace and human security, constructivist, feminist, and nontraditional security studies. The first section of the book discusses perspectives in realist security studies, the second part covers perspectives critical of realism. The author's goal is to assess whether any of the perspectives found in nonrealist security studies are capable of undermining realism. His conclusion is that each theoretical perspective has its strengths and weaknesses, leaving eclecticism as the best way to understand the region's dynamics. An extensive bibliography covers various theoretical perspectives in the field of international relations/security studies and materials on the Asian Pacific Helpful indexes include specific countries, security issues, and theoretical perspectives

Constructive Conflicts explains how large-scale conflicts-such as clashes between different ideological, religious, ethnic, and racial groups; civil wars; labor-management struggles; and public policy disputes-can be waged more constructively, with more positive consequences and fewer destructive consequences for those involved. Drawing on research from political science, sociology, social-psychology, neuroscience, cultural studies, and other disciplines, Dayton and Kriesberg follow the lifecycle of social and political conflicts as they emerge, escalate, de-escalate, become settled, and often emerge again in new forms. Throughout the book the authors present examples of conflict episodes that have avoided extreme coercion or violence and which have resulted in the advancement of the interests of most parties involved. The book gives policymakers, concerned citizens, and students a powerful analytical framework, supported by data, for understanding and constructively intervening in conflicts of different type and scale, offering a way out of the destructive cycles of conflict management which have come to characterize contemporary social and political relations. The sixth edition pays increased attention to changes in the social and political landscape including the rise of nationalism, the erosion of liberal internationalism, conflicts related to COVID response, political polarization, and the Black Lives Matter movement. Additionally, the growth of 'bottom-up' strategies for peace and conflict management, the rise of misinformation in a 'post-truth' era, and insights from neuroscience all inform this major revision. This edition is also supplemented with end-of-chapter critical reflections, updated cases and tools for conflict analysis, and ancillary teaching materials, including experiential exercises, simulations, and PowerPoints.

South Africa has succeeded in establishing a democracy, but has yet to eliminate public violence from society. This book takes up the issue of post-settlement violence and ways of consolidating the newly-found democratic peace. The role of negotiated institutions such as the new police force, economic factors relevant to the anticipated "peace dividend," external factors such as arms smuggling networks, popular responses to rising threats to physical safety, and symbolic factors in enhancing the capacity of the state to deal with this issue are examined.

United Nations peacekeeping has undergone radical transformation in the new millennium. Where it once was limited in scope and based firmly on consent of all parties, contemporary operations are now charged with penalizing spoilers of peace and protecting civilians from peril. Despite its more aggressive posture, practitioners and academics continue to affirm the vital importance of impartiality whilst stating that it no longer means what it once did. Taking Sides in Peacekeeping explores this transformation and its implications, in what is the first conceptual and empirical study of impartiality in UN peacekeeping. The book challenges dominant scholarly approaches that conceive of norms as linear and static, conceptualizing impartiality as a 'composite' norm, one that is not free-standing but an aggregate of other principles-each of which can change and is open to contestation. Drawing on a large body of primary evidence, it uses the composite norm to trace the evolution of impartiality, and to illuminate the macro-level politics surrounding its institutionalization at the UN, as well as the micro-level politics surrounding its implementation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, site of the largest and costliest peacekeeping mission in UN history. Taking Sides in Peacekeeping reveals that, despite a veneer of consensus, impartiality is in fact highly contested. As the collection of principles it refers to has expanded to include human rights and civilian protection, deep disagreements have arisen over what keeping peace impartially actually means. Beyond the semantics, the book shows how this contestation, together with the varying expectations and incentives created by the norm, has resulted in perverse and unintended consequences that have politicized peacekeeping and, in some cases, effectively converted UN forces into one warring party among many. Taking Sides in Peacekeeping assesses the implications of this radical transformation for the future of peacekeeping and for the UN's role as guarantor of international peace and security.

Gaining a decisive technological edge is a never-ending pursuit for defense establishments and the countries they protect. Intensifying geo-strategic and geo-economic rivalry among major powers, especially the U.S. and China, and the global technology revolution occurring in the civilian and military domains promise to reshape the nature and distribution of global power. This book examines the state of global defense innovation in a select number of countries chosen because they are representative of the diverse make-up of the global defense innovation community. These include small countries with advanced defense innovation capabilities (Israel and Singapore), closed authoritarian powers (North Korea and Russia), large catch-up states (China and India), and advanced large powers (U.S.). The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Strategic Studies.

This open access book introduces adaptive mediation as an alternative approach that enables mediators to go beyond liberal peace mediation, or other determined-design models of mediation, in the context of contemporary conflict resolution and peace-making initiatives. Adaptive mediation is grounded in complexity theory, and is specifically designed to cope with highly dynamic conflict situations characterized by uncertainty and a lack of predictability. It is also a facilitated mediation process whereby the content of agreements emerges from the parties to the conflict themselves, informed by the context within which the conflict is situated. This book presents the core principles and practices of adaptive mediation in conjunction with empirical evidence from four diverse case studies - Colombia, Mozambique, The Philippines, and Syria - with a view to generate recommendations for how mediators can apply adaptive mediation approaches to resolve and transform contemporary and future armed conflicts.

Policy decisions in education have changed drastically as a result of the recent threats to our international and national security. In this timely and compelling collection, contributors discuss the significance of policy decisions on education systems, and argue that all forms of violence, including terrorism, are often reproduced through education. Contributors incorporate case studies from a broad spectrum of countries to make a case for peace-building alternatives and non-military security cooperation. The collection highlights education systems around the globe that sustain violence, brings together human security and preventive diplomacy research to predict future trends, explores foreign policy implications that could lead to non-violent interventions abroad, and provides teachers and policymakers with relevant reflections on reform. This collection arrives at a time when many of us are wondering what education systems can do to eliminate violence, and is the only one of its kind to address these questions on a global scale.

Countries emerging from civil war or protracted violence often face the daunting challenge of rebuilding their economy while simultaneously creating the political and social conditions for a stable peace. The implicit assumption in the international community that rapid political democratisation along with economic liberalisation holds the key to sustainable peace is belied by the experiences of countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Often, the challenges of post-conflict reconstruction revolve around the timing and sequencing of different reform that may have contradictory implications. Drawing on a range of thematic studies and empirical cases, this book examines how post-conflict reconstruction policies can be better sequenced in order to promote sustainable peace. The book provides evidence that many reforms that are often thought to be imperative in post-conflict societies may be better considered as long-term objectives, and that the immediate imperative for such societies should be 'people-centred' policies.

This edited book offers a collection of highly nuanced accounts of children and childhoods in peace and conflict across political time and space. Organized according to three broad themes (ontologies, pedagogies, and contingencies), each chapter explores the complexities of a particular case study, providing new insights into the ways children's lives figure as terrains of engagement, contestation, ambivalence, resistance, and reproduction of militarisms. The first three chapters challenge dominant ontologies that prefigure childhood in particular ways. These include who counts as a child worthy of protection, questions of voice and participation, and the diminution of agency. The chapters in the second section bring to view everyday pedagogies whereby myriad knowledges, performances, practices, and competencies may function to militarize children's lives, including in but not limited to advanced (post)industrial societies of the global North. The third and final section includes investigations that foreground questions of responsibility to children. Here, contributors assess, among other things, resilience-building, the exigencies of protection, and the ethics of military recruitment practices targeting children.

This handbook provides a comprehensive analysis of the contemporary theory, practice and themes in the study of national security. Part 1: Theories examines how national security has been conceptualised and formulated within the disciplines international relations, security studies and public policy. Part 2: Actors shifts the focus of the volume from these disciplinary concerns to consideration of how core actors in international affairs have conceptualised and practiced national security over time. Part 3: Issues then provides in-depth analysis of how individual security issues have been incorporated into prevailing scholarly and policy paradigms on national security. While security now seems an all-encompassing phenomenon, one general proposition still holds: national interests and the nation-state remain central to unlocking security puzzles. As normative values intersect with raw power; as new threats meet old ones; and as new actors challenge established elites, making sense out of the complex milieu of security theories, actors, and issues is a crucial task - and is the main accomplishment of this book.