The interest in minority protection emerged during the period of democratic transition, particularly of ethnically segmented postcommunist societies after the end of the Cold War. Minority issues became prominent as postcommunist states lined up as potential candidates for EU membership as respect for and protection of minority rights was an essential part of the criteria these states had to fulfil before EU accession. Minority rights protection has constituted an important 'gatekeeping' criterion for EU membership. Its monitoring remains a powerful instrument to mediate tensions and to adjudicate discriminations in the present-day Europe. In many countries, minority rights standards have been transposed in domestic legislation, but whether these norms constitute a legitimate background which states accept, sustain and promote is the focus of this book. This volume takes on the task of analysing the diffusion of minority rights norms across the European continent. It looks specifically at the oft-neglected process of compliance meaning not only the formal adoption of European laws but also their implementation within the domestic context. The contributions analyse the political rhetoric, legal transposition and behavioural compliance in a range of European states, East and West, to assess compliance to norms of minority protection. This book was published as a special issue of Perspectives on European Politics and Society.

The interest in minority protection emerged during the period of democratic transition, particularly of ethnically segmented postcommunist societies after the end of the Cold War. Minority issues became prominent as postcommunist states lined up as potential candidates for EU membership as respect for and protection of minority rights was an essential part of the criteria these states had to fulfil before EU accession. Minority rights protection has constituted an important gatekeeping criterion for EU membership. Its monitoring remains a powerful instrument to mediate tensions and to adjudicate discriminations in the present-day Europe. In many countries, minority rights standards have been transposed in domestic legislation, but whether these norms constitute a legitimate background which states accept, sustain and promote is the focus of this book.

This volume takes on the task of analysing the diffusion of minority rights norms across the European continent. It looks specifically at the oft-neglected process of compliance meaning not only the formal adoption of European laws but also their implementation within the domestic context. The contributions analyse the political rhetoric, legal transposition and behavioural compliance in a range of European states, East and West, to assess compliance to norms of minority protection.

This book was published as a special issue of "Perspectives on European Politics and Society.""

This book focuses on marginal actors in the global order. Such a perspective is often missing as global order analysis is often biased towards exploring large powerful actors and equating their relations with global order. Such an approach is not only dated but also analytically incomplete. It is because of the increasingly decentred nature of global order, that marginal actors and their relations, tactics, strategies and approaches matter for global order as they matter for these actors. The book starts by providing an analytical framework exploring different policy options for African agency which are located along a nexus of choices ranging from accommodation, engagement to system transformation. The selection of a particular interaction type is argued to be dependent on external opportunity structures in the form of different global orders reaching from competitive polarity to dispersed forms of authority or even non-polarity. In addition to these external conditions, the ability to generate meaningful African agency facilitates a greater role in global order. Empirically, the book covers four policy fields which are peace and security, international criminal justice, economics and trade and COVID-19.

This book focuses on marginal actors in the global order. Such a perspective is often missing as global order analysis is often biased towards exploring large powerful actors and equating their relations with global order. Such an approach is not only dated but also analytically incomplete. It is because of the increasingly decentred nature of global order, that marginal actors and their relations, tactics, strategies and approaches matter for global order as they matter for these actors. The book starts by providing an analytical framework exploring different policy options for African agency which are located along a nexus of choices ranging from accommodation, engagement to system transformation. The selection of a particular interaction type is argued to be dependent on external opportunity structures in the form of different global orders reaching from competitive polarity to dispersed forms of authority or even non-polarity. In addition to these external conditions, the ability to generate meaningful African agency facilitates a greater role in global order. Empirically, the book covers four policy fields which are peace and security, international criminal justice, economics and trade and COVID-19.

This book examines peacekeeping in Africa, exploring how the various actors are forming an African security regime complex.

This book examines peacekeeping in Africa, exploring how the various actors are forming an African security regime complex. The changing dynamics of peacekeeping in today's world have encouraged a more cooperative approach between international and regional actors. At the centre of this book is the analysis of how an African security regime complex could emerge in the area of cooperative peacekeeping. The African regime complex on peacekeeping includes a number of organizations at the regional and sub-regional African level, as well as global institutions such as the UN, interregional partners like the EU and individual lead nations. This book is the first in providing a systematic overview of peacekeeping doctrines, capacities and deployments of these key actors and single lead states. Theoretically, the book links up with regime complexity scholarship but connects it with dependency theory. Here inter-institutional relations are conceptualised as acts of resource exchange. The book explores how primarily international organizations are partnering by exchanging resources. Empirically, the study analyses the phenomenon of regime complexity in three prominent African crises covering Eastern Africa (Somalia), Central African (Central African Republic) and Western Africa (Mali). This book will be of much interest to students of peacekeeping, international organisations, African politics, security studies and IR in general.

This book explores how BRICS countries respond to, and get involved in, large scale armed conflict. It argues that through responding to armed conflict and deviating from the preferred Western foreign policy, BRICS countries are actively involved in building a multi-polar and post-western world order. The author develops a concise typology of response types portraying a nuanced picture of the BRICS grouping. Responses reach from non-coercive and cooperative multi-lateral behaviour reaching to neo-imperial unilateralism and military intervention. The book explains the selection of response types with reference to six variables which refer to the proximity to war, availability of power resources, the type of conflict, economic interests, the BRICS normative agenda and global humanitarian norms. Four armed conflicts in Libya, Syria, South Sudan and the Ukraine are chosen to illustrate the BRICS engagement with large scale armed conflicts.

This book explores how BRICS countries respond to, and get involved in, large scale armed conflict. It argues that through responding to armed conflict and deviating from the preferred Western foreign policy, BRICS countries are actively involved in building a multi-polar and post-western world order. The author develops a concise typology of response types portraying a nuanced picture of the BRICS grouping. Responses reach from non-coercive and cooperative multi-lateral behaviour reaching to neo-imperial unilateralism and military intervention. The book explains the selection of response types with reference to six variables which refer to the proximity to war, availability of power resources, the type of conflict, economic interests, the BRICS normative agenda and global humanitarian norms. Four armed conflicts in Libya, Syria, South Sudan and the Ukraine are chosen to illustrate the BRICS engagement with large scale armed conflicts.

This study examines the question of how European minority rights and non-discrimination standards have diffused from the international arena into Estonia and Slovakia. The main aim is to explore and compare the conditions for formal legal norm adoption with the conditions for norm implementation. This thesis starts with a critical analysis of the spiral and the external incentives models of norm diffusion. Based on the two models this thesis develops three diffusion dimensions - the quality of norms, international organisations, and domestic level agents. Each dimension integrates rationalist and constructivist concepts of norm diffusion. It is argued that a theoretical synthesis of rationalist and constructivist approaches best accounts for the process of norm diffusion. Empirical data suggests that the legal adoption of minority rights norms was crucially influenced by EU conditionality and external incentives in combination with minority political participation, and international socialisation. However, the diffusion process was not completely successful. The empirical analysis reveals significant implementation deficits. Frequent racial discrimination towards Roma in Slovakia a