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The proliferation of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) has made it increasingly important to determine their effects on trade flows. At the center of the debate over the impact of these agreements are the questions of whether they are trade diverting or trade creating (Rahman et al 2006) and whether they are on balance trade-liberalizing or protectionist (Krueger 1999). Goldstein et al (2007) find the impact of nonreciprocal PTAs to be negative, contradictory to the underlying goals for such agreements. This paper seeks to further test this and other studies that have found a negative relationship between nonreciprocal trade agreements, preferences, and trade using a recently implemented non-reciprocal trade agreement between the U.S. and Sub-Saharan Africa, the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) of 2000. The AGOA seeks to promote trade, investment, and economic cooperation between the U.S. and AGOA countries by offering 36 eligible African countries duty-free access for most goods, providing coverage for additional commodities above and beyond those covered under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP). U.S. non-oil imports under the AGOA have become the largest category of trade for eligible countries. A traditional gravity model is employed to test whether the AGOA is trade creating for eligible countries targeting the U.S. market. The findings of this study suggest that AGOA membership or eligibility for AGOA textile benefits have no significant impact on trade. The uncertainty of the life span of preferences, eroding preferential margins, and the inability for African producers to respond adequately to preferences are theoretical explanations for these results. The importance of this paper is to advance our understanding of the effect of PTAs, specifically those between a major economic power and less developed countries at a time when preferences are eroding yet remain at the center of debate in the current Doha Round. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper will examine the difficulties involved in understendinag the Iraqi regime from American initial ivolvement in 1980 to 2003. The predictive prediment would be analyzed at three levels: the paradigmatic, the policy and intelligence levels. The longitudinal scope of the paper provides a good understanding of how the discourse on Iraq and the applied policies have changed over time in responses to ideological shifts in the United States and the realities in the Middle East. The Kuhnian-like paradigmatic change triggered by 9/11 and its influence on the Bush administration's decision to launch Opertion Iraqi Freedom will be disccues. Of particular importnace here is the understanding of the Bush's preemtive war doctrine in the so-called Second Nuclear Age. The paper will also the degree of pre-war consensus on two of the most controversial issues of the war; Iraq's WMD and its links to al Qaeda. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates the role played by major external actors upon the processes of regional integration in South America. The paper first analyzes how most theoretical approaches from International Relations, Regional Integration and International Political Economy deal with external actors. It applies, then, a theoretical framework based on the work by Walter Mattli in the case of the processes of regional integration in South America, especially Mercosur and the most recent initiatives, such as the South American Community of Nations and the Union of the South. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores the deep structure and long-term developments in the Western community, “the West” in short. What is underneath the recent conflicts between the U.S. and Europeans? Is it all about the Bush Administration, post 9/11 U.S. foreign policy, or the rupture over the Iraq war? Alternatively, are we witnessing the beginning of the end of a happy transatlantic relationship, the gradual withering away of NATO, as some scholars had already predicted after the end of the Cold War? I start with a few remarks on the nature of the Western order. Second, I comment on the degree to which we can see the transatlantic relationship in crisis. The third part of the paper addresses what we can learn about the sources and causes of the current crisis. Fourth, I discuss the various scenarios for the future of the Western order. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper addresses G. John Ikenberry’s model of constitutional order creation after great conflicts and proposes an additional explanation about the characteristics of the institutional arrangements adopted by the US after World War II. Actors use institutional arrangements to sustain a variety of international orders, but the question here regards why US foreign policy opted for specific kinds of institutions with embedded liberal values. To explain these developments, the paper establishes a dialogue with the consensus paradigm within the discipline of American History and its concept of an ‘American liberal tradition’ developed in the 1950s. The concept ‘American liberal tradition’ expresses the inexistence of a conservative tradition in US politics and a widespread belief in a set of shared liberal principles and values, summarized in the concepts of individualism, a free economy, and an open political system. The liberal tradition works as a framework that enables and constrains politics within the US. In this sense, the principles and values of the ‘American liberal tradition’ would play a decisive role in shaping US foreign policy towards international institutions. The analysis rests on US foreign policy towards the creation of the UN, NATO and Bretton Woods institutions. Focusing on the liberal tradition of American politics brings two main additions to this debate: the understanding of domestic and ideational influences on US foreign policy, and the exposure of the liberal character of the institutions of the contemporary international order, the possibilities that exist within them, and their intrinsic limits. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The multilateral trade regime has long been the creature of its two largest markets, the United States and the European Union (EU). Yet these two giants have occasionally made concessions to developing countries in the form of special and differential treatment (S&D), which provides preferences that contravene free trade rules. This is not surprising per se; both the EU and United States recognize the role of trade in helping poor countries achieve development goals. But what is more surprising is the extent of EU-US agreement on this front. We might have expected the end of the Cold War to expose underlying differences between presumed European support for and American skepticism of preferential treatment of developing countries. Not only did this split not occur; the opposite happened. The EU and United States built a solid consensus on reducing and reorienting S&D in the GATT/WTO regimeâ€"a consensus that, though tested, has to date held firm.This paper explores this surprising EU and US policy convergence in two parts. First, it addresses the conceptual and empirical questions of what it means for EU and US S&D policies to be ‘aligned.’ It defines their policy ideal points as a function of three factors: general material interests (national security and prosperity); specific sectoral interests; and causal and/or normative beliefs. Through a content analysis of EU and US published policy agendas vis-à-vis S&D, the paper traces the convergence of their ideal points as a function of the convergence in the relative salience of these different factors for each.Second, the paper identifies the structural and unit-level factors that explain their growing policy alignment from the 1970s to today. It shows that we can understand EU-US convergence to some extent as a function of broad systemic trendsâ€"namely, the growing gap between ‘emerging’ and ‘least-developed’ (i.e., African) countries, and the plummeting strategic importance of the latter after the end of the Cold War. However, perhaps more important were changes within Europeâ€"specifically, the growing strength of the liberal-technocratic Commission and fading memories of colonial ruleâ€"which brought the EU closer to the American position over time.The paper provides insight into the ‘where do we go from here’ question after the collapse of WTO talks in the summer of 2006. The status quo bargain on S&D becomes even more important now that the ‘Doha Development Agenda” has receded, leaving the world’s poorest countries with uncertain multilateral guarantees of access to Western markets and ever-greater competition from more successful developing countries. This paper’s analysis will generate a set of predictions regarding the status of S&D, and EU and US support thereof, in an uncertain future for the WTO. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this paper is to show the importance of power politics in regionalism/regional cooperation with the case of East Asian regionalism. Unlike the expectation of liberal theory, the necessity of regional cooperation is not a sufficient condition for successful regional cooperation. The intention of strong power regardless of its geographical identity has strong impact on the formation of regional institution. The first East Asian Summit held in Malaysia revealed how much the interests of the United States matters in East Asian regionalism. The attempt to create an East Asian regional institution failed due to the objection of some countries(Indonesia and Japan) to Asia-only regional institution. This paper tries to show that East Asian regionalism is not regional matter but the competition of two strong powers, the U.S. and China for sphere of influence. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The future of the dollar as a medium of international exchange is an "issue" primarily because the U.S. trade deficit is huge, growing, and apparently destined to grow forever. This situation, however, is as old as the floating rate regime, which originated as a "solution" to the collapse of Bretton Woods. Debt can present significant sovereignty issues: in particular, foreign holdings of currency are claims on American assets and can, among other things, imply the ability to purchase American assets including whole corporations and/or vast tracts of real-estate. This fact, along with the uneasiness that accompanies ever-increasing debt payments, accounts for the sense of impending doom for the dollar that has been a demonstrably false but nonetheless canonical assumption of political economists for decades. The floating rate regime of burgeoning debt has now lasted longer than the Bretton Woods system. This paper will examine two "power regimes" related to industrial-imperial organization and the dominant currency. The paper reviews the accumulation of a trade surplus and a soundly managed "liberal internationalist (only a little bit imperialist) currency" fetishized by Kindleberger and Keohane. Some structural ties between the "liberal version" of this model and the "imperialist" (Hobson, Hilferding) will be noted. In sum, this model depends on a now defunct industrial system of industrial concentration and finance capital. We will then "construct" the contemporary regime of expanding debt as an antithesis of the older system, based this time on the alliance of the retail sector and finance. No specific predictions about the end of the dollar will be made: while waiting decades for the dollar to collapse, the only real good crisis that we have had in the floating rate regime, in 1998, showed--astonishingly--that perhaps the main problem in the world is not enough dollars, rather than too many. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The focus of this paper is to offer a better understanding of Iran's relations to the West in general and the ‎United States in particular. By examining the social content of values, concepts, and images that have been ‎constructed in Iran's historical discourses and are now a part of the official state discourse, the paper illustrates how ‎both Iran and the United States reproduce each other as the enemy. The paper argues that the basis for the ‎construction of this mutual animosity is in the representational practices of each state rather than some objective, ‎tangible reality.‎ ‎ ‎ ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The digital revolution has created new opportunities for borderless industries such as online gambling. This has created new collective action problems as industry actors initially operate in a market without rules. In the absence of coordinated formal governance structures and institutions, the industry has responded by creating its own comprehensive self-regulatory regime. However, the United States and United Kingdom have had opposing responses: the US has increasingly sought to prohibit online gambling, while the UK has moved to regulate the industry. This paper examines the emergence of self-regulation for online gambling, and how it has been undermined or supported through the opposing legislative and regulatory responses of these two states. Taking an approach that draws on institutional analysis and design, the paper asks: what are the factors that led to the emergence of a comprehensive self-regulatory regime for this borderless industry in the absence of global governance? Why has the legislative response been so different in the US and the UK? Specifically, which interests and information have shaped their respective regulatory responses? How have these different responses affected the development of the online gambling industry and the capacity of the industry to regulate itself globally? The paper finds that the prohibition of online gambling by the US has done little to deter Americans from gambling online, but has led to the offshore expansion of the industry. The result is the rise of online gambling sites that are unregulated by the US, yet still have the potential to harm American consumers, particularly if their operators are not adherents to the industry’s self-regulation regime. On the other hand, the UK has formally adopted many of the same regulatory tools developed by the industry as effective means of regulation. The findings show that the US has created conditions under which defection from the self-regulatory regime is more likely, exposing consumers to higher risk. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development, production and use of biological weapons (BW) is prohibited by international treaties. Details of this prohibition have been codified in the Biological Weapons Convention of 1972, which forms the core of the BW control regime and contains the core norms of the regime. This paper follows a reflexive approach to international norms, in which norms are not immutable, but subject to change over time and in which certain social practices can lead to norm contestation and change. Clearly such a norm contestation is more likely to have an impact on regime evolution if the norms are contested by a great power like the United States of America, rather than a norm contestation by, say Belgium. Applying such a reflexive approach to the norms of the biological weapons (BW) prohibtion regime, the paper will proceed in four steps. It will first provide a brief outline of the conceptual underpinnings of the approach to norms of international regimes and their contestation. Second, it will describe the normative structure of the BW prohibition regime as it presented itself during the 1990s. This will be followed by an analysis of social practices within the USA, as they manifested themselves in discursive interventions by actors in the political system . The fourth step will trace the impact of this norm contestation on the international level, where the social practices to be analysed will focus on the negotiations for a Compliance Protocol to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), their collapse and the setting-up of the so-called "New Process" to strengthen the effectiveness of the BW regime. The paper will conclude with a (preliminary) assessment of the implications of the norm contestation through the US on the international level for the future of the BW prohibition regime and its normative structure. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of ‘Homeland Security’ is becoming increasingly evident in the EU’s Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (AFSJ), which is defined as ‘the protection of a clearly defined territory of a political community from security threats’. However, this political community is still in the making in the European Union. Consequently, this policy-making area in the EU is characterised by the most complex of decision-making procedures. This paper argues that these institutional arrangements are not just an expression of the national sovereignty of member states. They are also an expression of the aforementioned political process attempting to construct a ‘homeland’ for different political communities by ensuring their security from external security threats. Firstly, it will argue that it is vital to analyse actor behaviour in the process of ‘constructing security threats’. Secondly, however, despite the importance of member states in the European Union, institutional actors such as the European Commission or the Council Secretariat are increasingly gaining in importance. This paper argues that institutional actors have been vital in the construction of a ‘European Homeland Security’ area. Since September 11, the first and foremost security threat to enable the construction of a ‘European Homeland’ has been terrorism. It is argued that the construction of this ‘security threat’ has been utilised by EU institutions in order to establish the creation and the securing of a ‘European Homeland’, which ultimately drove forward the process of European integration. This can be observed empirically in counter-terrorism policy within the EU, as well as in transatlantic cooperation with the US on this matter. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The brief tenure of Ambassador John Bolton as the United States’ Ambassador to the United Nations drew significant criticism from a range of lay people, experts, and practitioners. An underlying assumption of this criticism must be that individual diplomats have a significant effect on outcomes at the UN. This paper, part of a larger project examining the impact of individuals on diplomacy at the UN, will be a quantitative analysis of voting records in the UN General Assembly under President's George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George Bush, including an analysis of how each of their ambassadors voted. This paper is part of a larger work looking at how different US presidents and ambassadors have interacted at the United Nations. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United States Navy, the US Coast Guard and the US Marine Corp are currently developing a new Maritime Strategy to be announced in September 2007. Our paper will review and analyze the new Maritime Strategy in the form announced in September 2007. We will focus on those aspects of the strategy that deal with challenges and threats in the Indo-Pacific region. In particular, we will consider the impact of the new strategy on both US allies and potential adversaries in the region. Given the "thousand ship navy" (more recently, global maritime partnerships) construct of Chief of Naval Operation Admiral Mullen and the US government's increasing shift toward a more multilateral approach to national security, the role of local and regional maritime partners is critical. We will explore how American strategists view cooperation in a maritime context, how the new Maritime Strategy proposes to proceed over the next decade, and examine the responses of allies and adversaries. Finally, the paper will examine initial regional reactions to the strategy and the implications of those reactions for the strategy's success and possible future refinement. This paper will surely be one of the first assessments of the strategy and global reactions to it, especially from the perspective of analysts deeply engaged in the strategy development process itself. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.S.-led military coalition that invaded Iraq in March 2003 captured or seized the records of one of the most repressive and closed regimes in history. This captured records collection includes tens of millions of pages of the regime's most sensitive documents and thousands of hours of recorded conversations between Saddam and members of his inner circle. The original paper copies and electronic media remain in the Middle East awaiting final disposition. Electronic copies of this collection are part of a U.S. Government captured records database which, over the next year, will be made available to non-governmental scholars. Recently, controversy surrounding Saddam's documents and what they may or may not contain has been the subject of a sometimes heated public debate. What can the history of exploiting captured records tell us about the documents captured in Iraq? This paper reviews the significant history of exploiting adversary records by the United States from the aftermath of the American Civil War through the post-World War II period to show that the issues surrounding this latest collection are far from unique. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.S. Intelligence Community (IC) has undergone several reforms since its inception in 1947. The IC generally undergoes fundamental change in reaction to perceived intelligence failures. Thus, it is not surprising that there is a large amount of scholarly literature on intelligence failures and reform proposals. This literature focuses mainly on internal organization, cultural, and leadership deficiencies. However, the literature has yet to incorporate insights about the beliefs and reasoning processes of the IC into their arguments. This is problematic given that cognitions, which are beliefs and reasoning processes, underlie all political behavior. The purpose of this paper is to help remedy this by positing and testing a cognitive theory of IC behavior. I argue that by incorporating the worldview of U.S. intelligence into research on intelligence failures and reform proposals, we will better understand the limits of reform in general. This is because the cognitions that the IC holds about world politics are partly responsible for shaping its identity. Moreover, its identity is meant to help satisfy these beliefs. I utilize the operational code construct to measure the IC’s worldview and test several hypotheses using the VICS method of content analysis and an ANOVA test. After data analysis, the paper concludes with a general summary and a discussion on what the findings add to the literature. I also explain how the framework developed in this paper can be applied to the comparative study of intelligence reform and counterintelligence threat analysis. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The People's Republic of China has been the number one target of antidumping actions filed by the U.S. Commerce Department on behalf of various domestic industries. This paper examines U.S. antidumping (AD) actions against China from 1980 to 2004. Specifically, it addresses both the conditions under which U.S. industries apply for protection from regulatory authorities against China and the likelihood of their obtaining an affirmative ruling from the International Trade Commission. While our statistical analysis of U.S. antidumping actions against China affirms the importance of standard political economy explanations of U.S. antidumping decision-making, it also emphasizes how industries characterized by high levels of intra-industry trade has tended to generate more AD actions against China. In addition, the paper assesses the impact of China's membership in the World Trade Organization (WTO) on the pattern of initiation and imposition of AD actions by the United States against that country, postulating that China's WTO membership may not have had the effect of deterring U.S. protectionism via the antidumping instrument as the designation of China as a non-market economy under the WTO has led U.S. AD authorities to apply more stringent criteria in dealing with AD case against that country. This counter-intuitive finding suggests that under certain circumstances, the legal framework of the WTO can facilitate trade protectionism. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The National Security Council is designed to be the central coordinating body of the U.S. government on matters of national security and foreign affairs. That being the case, understanding the conditions under which it performs poorly is a matter of great importance. Several of those who have observed or studied the organization have stated that its lowest points, those periods during which it was most prone to dysfunction and most clearly failed to work as designed, occurred during the first presidential terms of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. This paper probes the causes of those decision-making failures. Drawing upon the concepts associated with the literatures on leadership trait analysis, leadership style, small group processes, and organizational design, this paper systematically examines what led the NSC to perform so poorly in these two eras. By both contrasting the NSC as it existed in these periods to how it performed in other time periods, and by comparing these two periods to each other, this research aims to provide prescriptive recommendations that may point the way to avoiding similar failures in the future. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Jeffersonian tradition in US foreign policy has been associated through the work of Walter Russell Mead with the policy of principled isolationism. Jeffersonians, it is claimed, sought to avoid international involvement because of the threat it posed to the US constitution. This paper challenges that assumption by arguing that Jeffersonian republicanism was in fact expansionist and that its policy toward the European powers was based on a realist calculation of what was possible given US weakness. Following on from this the paper also challenges Mead's assumption that Jeffersonians can be distinguished from Wilsonians, arguing instead that Wilsonians are in fact Jeffersonians with power. Finally, the paper asks if it is worth keeping the distinction between Jeffersonians and Wilsonians in the typology of US foreign policy traditions. Recalling Daniel Deudney's argument that Madisonian republicanism is in fact the forerunner of Wilsonian liberal internationalism, and recalling Jefferson's concern that the Madisonian system of checks and balances would not be a substitute for a constitutional bill of rights, the paper suggests that the real inheritors of a Jeffersonian liberal internationalist tradition are in fact those activists who seek to hold the society of states to account before a non-negotiable international human rights regime. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Union’s effort to stabilize its near abroad cannot meaningfully be detached from the United States’ policy of maintaining a strong presence in post-Cold War Europe. The United States has bolstered EU efforts: with the intervention in Bosnia beginning in 1995; likewise with the intervention in Kosovo in 1999; and the decision to enlarge NATO â€" made by and large by the United States in the face of widespread European scepticism â€" created the security framework for the subsequent enlargements of the EU. Conversely, the United States has frustrated the EU policy process: notably so by insisting on the compatibility of the CFSP and ESDP with NATO and US designs. This paper will assess the ENP in light of American designs for European security. Did the ENP evolve in transatlantic harmony or was it a source of transatlantic tension? What is the current status of the ENP in relation to predominant issues such as energy security and missile defence? And, finally, looking ahead, is the ENP compatible with US long-term planning for Eurasia?The first part of the paper will trace the development of the ENP and investigate the points at which Atlantic policy-makers were in dialogue. How did the ENP anticipate American reactions, and how did American policy-makers receive the policy initiative? To what extent was the ENP perceived as something new (distinct from past neighbourhood policies) and also compatible with NATO partnership programs?The second part of the paper provides a snapshot of current affairs and notably two security issues that are at the forefront of transatlantic relations. One is the question of securing reliable supplies of energy for Europe. This was on the NATO Riga summit agenda and is built into the ENP by virtue of its relationship to transit countries such as the Ukraine and to alternative suppliers in the Caucasus. The second is the question of missile defence where the United States outside of multilateral forums seek to develop an American capability in Central Europe. Amidst Russian protests and European concerns, is the ENP a bridge between Russia and the EU?The third and final part of the paper looks to the future and notably the way in which American security planners foresee the United States’ engagement in Eurasia. The Pentagon recently created a new African Command, complementing the Central Command and the European Command (under which NATO falls). What is the logic of this new arrangement? Can the ENP serve as a kind of mechanism facilitating a transatlantic division of labour along geographical lines? If so, are the European states willing to do so? ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The American invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, the rise in Lebanon of Hezbollah’s influence, and Iran’s growing ambition toward regional supremacy,have culminated in bringing to surfaceâ€"in a manner and intensity perhaps not seen for centuriesâ€"one of the great historical tensions underlying the Muslim world, i.e., the Shia-Sunni divide. The roots of the current antagonism between the two groups are indeed very complex, based on various historical, theological, ideological, socioeconomic, cultural, and political factors created by a 1400 year-old civilizational dynamics. As a result, the Shia-Sunni “battle” is being fought under different guises, inspired by various dynamics, and with unequal intensity across the greater Middle East. However, despite the apparent heterogeneity of causes and factors involved, as this paper will demonstrate, one of the central premises upon which the Shia-Sunni divide was historically based, and which constitutes today one of the great challenges facing the Middle East, is the divergent views that each community holds with respect to the nature and form of government. This paper will argue that in spite of the many differences that exist within the broader Shia and Sunni communities, the overall set of conflicting beliefs with respect to the form of government and state constitutes a transcending factor. Therefore, changes that have been brought about by post-9/11 events, and the ways in which they have offset the balance of power and power relations within the greater Middle East, have once more given rise to a clash of these two distinct visions. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2008 presidential election campaign will be one of the longest and most expensive in American history. For the first time since 1952, neither major candidate will be an incumbent president or vice president. Foreign policy is a major issue as office holders of the two major parties have substantial differences about foreign policy toward areas of importance to the U.S. As in 1952, American patience has been worn thin by a war that has gone on past the time many expected it to end. The authors make use of the primary author’s long-term mood/interest research to suggest elements of choice and elements of necessity facing the American voters in years like 1952 and 2008. For example, the people can choose who best reflects their approach to Asia or the Middle East, but there are limits to American power. It is likely that by the time the paper is presented that the two major party candidates will be known and that there will be seven months remaining prior to the final decision. Thus there will, at least in theory, be time for the debate to be shaped to provide a meaningful choice.The attitudes of the American public are believed to be following long term trends whereby patience is lost when wars become long and indecisive. While this is normal, differences of opinion among American leaders are unusually pronounced as they seek to prevail in the 2008 election. Efforts at compromise have been difficult at best.In terms of American interests, most agree that there are substantial challenges, but the nature of these challenges and the best way to address them are disputed. The paper will look at past questions regarding interests to explore the nature of and questions regarding American interests. This election, more so than prior U.S. presidential elections, is being followed by people in many parts of the world. How much is up to the American people and how much is dictated by the world environment? What does the long-term evidence suggest? Can anything be learned from other democracies which have had a lot of power in the world? The purpose of this paper is not to give the answers regarding these debates and which candidate might be most qualified. Rather, the purpose is to raise issues which will help the reader place the 2008 presidential election in a historical context. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

That states and markets are ‘mutually constituted’ has become a respectable position in both political science and sociology. For all its respectability, however, there are few works that explicitly theorize this mutual constitution. Building on works on state formation in comparative politics and comparative historical sociology this paper proposes a framework for studying this mutual constitution, which is expressed as a function of the power relationship between pre-state governing elites and capital holders in a society. Power is defined as dependence, and as such is not an attribute of an actor or a group of actors, but a property of the social relation under investigation. The paper further uses this framework to illuminate the effects of colonialism on state and market formation by comparing such relationships in the United States to those in India over time. This is done by linking the variation in the relationships between rulers and capital holders to changes in the structure of capital markets across countries and over time within the same country. This problematizes institutions as legacies of past relationships and thus affords us a better understanding of how and why such relationships and their institutional avatars change. Also, by changing contrast spaces from intra developed country comparisons or intra developing country comparisons to historical comparisons between now-developed countries and now-developing or underdeveloped countries that we can throw new light on phenomena or conceptual categories that are often taken for granted in the context of the now- advanced industrial states. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ten years ago, I published a book entitled World Opinion and the Emerging International Order. While this publication was not an auspicious event in and of itself, the ten-year time period since its appearance provides a good opportunity for reflection upon the concept of “world opinion.” Several specific questions arise: is world opinion still a viable and important concept? Can it be a force even against the most powerful nationsâ€"for instance, in the case of condemnation of the United States for the invasion of Iraq? Are we closer to the acceptance of the “imagined international community” described in the book? Finally, can we actually measure patterns in world opinion beyond the traditional content analyses, or combined survey analyses, often used to this end?The paper concludes that world opinion has actually become a more critical force in the past ten years, to the point where it can influence the decisions and image of a superpower like the United States. The paper also discusses Christopher Hill’s question about whether world opinion deals with the opinions of nations (as usually reflected by their leaders or their nation’s “official position” on an issue) or the opinions of individuals (as reflected by international polls in individual countries). It resolves this question methodologically using global polls where the correlations between attitudes in individual nations become variables to be analyzed on the international level. The paper argues that this method allows one to detect global attitudinal patterns, and the beginnings of a potential “global culture.” ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the fall of Baghdad in April 2003, one of the chief sectarian problems facing U.S. and allied forces has tit for tat killings between sectarian communities in Iraq. This violence, however, does not represent merely senseless killing, or even a concerted attempt to raise the costs of occupation and force a withdrawal of Coalition forces. To the contrary, this paper argues that there is a distinct strategic logic for the violence in Iraq, as the armed groups representing sectarian communities conduct both inter-sectarian and intra-sectarian bargaining. Using the data available on sectarian killing, it argues that Sunni insurgent groups are conducting an escalatory strategy designed to start a civil war with Shi’a insurgents, while attempting to counter al-Qaeda’s strategy of mass-scale civilian killings for demonstration effects. This has led to a process of outbidding where Sunni leaders are gradually becoming more radicalized and less inclined to participate in the political process. It further argues that Shi’a violence can be explained as a form of hedging, as Shi’a leaders participate in the political process while turning a blind eye to freelancing Shi’a militias. This allows them to be in a stronger position vis a vis their Shi’a rivals and Sunni factions if the Iraq government collapses. Thus this paper concludes that only by shifting the incentives for Sunnis (to stop the process of sectarian outbidding) and for Shi’as (to reduce the attractiveness of hedging strategies) can sectarian killings in Iraq be brought to an end. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of the Cold War, there has been an increasing number of interstate conflicts and humanitarian disasters directly tied to these conflicts. As the world sole superpower, the United States has intervened in numerous occasions (Somalia and Kosovo to name a few), but has remained silent most of the time. This paper addresses the following question: what motivates and dictates U.S. Foreign Policy towards such conflicts, particularly those where there are massive human rights abuses? For the purpose of this paper, I will study the Rwandan Genocide in 1994 and the crisis in Darfur since 2003 to assess how U.S. foreign policy is formulated in these specific cases.First of all, I will try to understand why the United States did not do much to stop the mass killings in Rwanda and Darfur. On the one hand, key actors like members of Congress, NGOs, public opinion and even the executive promote human rights and hold those rights as the basis for their actions; it is â€" to the least â€" an integral part of their foreign policy rhetoric. On the other hand, the examples of Rwanda and Darfur show that there is a gap between what is said and what is done.Moreover, what was the impact of the Somalian fiasco in 1993 on the actions of the Clinton government towards Rwanda and of the Iraq war on Bush’s policy towards Darfur? It is clear that these events had an impact on both governments but to what extent?Finally, how come the two situations were handled in a similar manner while two very distinctive administrations had to deal with these crises? Indeed, while the Rwanda and Darfur crisis are different, there is a striking similarity in the way the United States government chose to deal with them. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since World War II, the United States government has frequently engaged its military abroad but support from leading transatlantic alliesâ€"Britain, France, and Italyâ€"has varied. In some cases, like Vietnam, allies responded to requests from Washington by refusing to provide troops to aid in the fighting. In other cases, like Kosovo, leading allies put their troops in harm’s way, providing support for the U.S.-led fighting force. The paper posits a neoclassical realist (i.e., based in international power and security but also sensitive to domestic factors) explanation of variance in allied support. First, it argues that an ally will be more likely to support the U.S. if it perceives the target of intervention to be a threat to its own interests. Second, an ally will be more likely to support the U.S. if it highly values its alliance relationship with the U.S. and perceives its support will impact the relationship. Third, the paper argues that an ally will be more likely to support the U.S. if its domestic public opinion favors support or if electoral competition is low (e.g., because of an unpopular opposition party). The paper provides preliminary analysis of seven cases where the United States put its forces in harm’s way and asked its allies for support: Vietnam, Lebanon, the Persian Gulf War, Somalia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, and the 2003 Iraq War. The paper evaluates the neoclassical realist explanation compared to an alternative explanation rooted in constructivist theory. The paper concludes with recommendations for American policymakers. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars of Southeast Asia have paid increasing attention to the role of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in mediating the relations between the US and China. ASEAN has created a strong reputation for itself as a regional organization that embodies norms promoting respect for sovereignty and non-intervention. ASEAN scholars have argued that ASEAN norms have been adopted by China. This development has afforded ASEAN a more meaningful political institutional role in the region than its relative power merits. ASEAN is exercising a form of normative power in the Asia Pacific.This paper examines this argument from a critical constructivist perspective. ASEAN often does not function as a coherent bloc. The individual states of ASEAN have different perceptions of national interest and their behavior is described by a variety of theories. How do these differences affect the ability of ASEAN, the organization, to act in a coherent way? How is this potential incoherence perceived by the larger powers of the region and what are their respective approaches? China has decided to treat ASEAN as a coherent entity; the US has not. What are the long-term political consequences for these great powers of their respective strategies? This paper is based on field research conducted in the Asia Pacific in 2007. It examines the significance of the regional rhetoric around the ideas of shared norms and values. How credible are these claims and what are their strategic implications? ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Responding to the challenge posed by suicide terrorism is one of the most important issues facing the United States. Â Instead of viewing the adoption of suicide terror tactics by terrorist groups as something motivated merely by their particular political struggle, this study redefines the topic in two ways. Â First, the paper looks at the universe of terrorist groups and seeks to explain why some groups adopt while others do not, rather than just looking at adopters like Hamas or Al Qaeda. Â Second, instead of assuming that the decision to adopt suicide terrorism was independent for each group, this paper employs a diffusion approach to show the interconnections between groups and how that influenced their decisions. Â Using statistical methods and case studies, the paper shows that diffusion processes do govern the way suicide terrorism spreads and that organizational constraints help explain why some groups adopted suicide terror tactics while others, like the IRA and ETA, did not. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent books and commentaries on the current Iraq war suggest that Bush's decision making reflects some of the errors found in Janis's (1982) classic groupthink model. In a previous paper, we found much evidence to suggest that Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003 was plagued by many of the antecedents and symptoms of the original groupthink model. We found that concurrence seeking tended to result in such errors as overestimation of the group, closed mindedness, and pressures toward uniformity. This paper evaluates the decision making process and its impact on the outcome of war. We examine what types of errors were made and how such mistakes contributed to U.S. failure to achieve its stated goals in the Iraq war. The paper uses the groupthink model as a starting point but moves beyond groupthink by incorporating some of the ideas found in the suggested revision of the model (‘t Hart 1994; ‘t Hart, Stern, and Sundelius 2004). More specifically, we highlight the impact of presidential leadership style and advisory systems on group interaction patterns (management and processing of information) and outcomes. We test both models using content analysis. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purchasing PowerThe Effectiveness of Economic Statecraft in American Foreign Policy This paper will examine the use of economic influence strategies in United States foreign policy; a practice commonly referred to as economic statecraft. The conventional wisdom on economic statecraft asserts that it is an ineffectual, even futile, foreign policy approach. This paradigmatic view is a product, however, of Cold War-era empirical research. Scant contemporary research has been conducted in the intervening two-decades since the dissolution of the Cold War to determine if the dominant assessment on economic statecraft remains accurate. This paper will attempt to redress this lacuna in the literature. It proposes to update the economic statecraft corpus, by analyzing U.S. economic sanctions and incentive measures in the post-Cold War era. The efficacy of contemporary economic statecraft measures will be compared against those applied by the U.S. in the Cold War to determine if the prevailing negative assessment of economic statecraft remains accurate, or if it is an anachronism. The central hypothesis of my work is that the efficacy of great power economic statecraft is not fixed; it is not an inherently effective or ineffective practice of foreign policy. Rather, fluctuations in the potency of economic instruments of statecraft occur in response to changes in the structural attributes of the international political system. The most significant causal attribute is polarity -- the polar distribution of power in the international system. I posit that economic statecraft is more effective in unipolar systems than other configurations of power, and especially in comparison to bipolar systems. Consequently, it is likely that the effectiveness of U.S. economic statecraft has increased significantly upon the demise of the bipolar era. This study will test whether this hypothesis has empirical support. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Processes of global restructuring have fundamentally transformed the Mexican state and economy. In this context, the increase in rural-urban migration within Mexico and international migration to the US have had far-reaching impacts. This paper explores the links between processes of global restructuring and transformations of social reproduction in rural Mexican communities. Based on ethnographic fieldwork research in rural Mexico the paper analyses the changing forms of social reproduction, focusing on family dynamics and the role of the heteronormative family model, gendered divisions of labour within the family and the community; and changing forms of masculinity. Thus, for example, women face the triple burden of reproductive, productive and community work; children are abandoned by their parents and left in the care of other family or community members; big motor vehicles become a new way for (young) men to assert their masculinity, etc. The aim of the paper is twofold: to illustrate the complexity and multidimensionality of the crisis of social reproduction, and to show how forms of social reproduction in Mexico have been affected by global restructuring, and in return affect these processes in a mutually influencing relationship. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Partnerships between U.S. and former Soviet Union (FSU) states are essential in reducing terrorist access to nuclear and biological weapons, facilities, and expertise. The English Language and Nonproliferation (ELAN) Program at the Center for Nonproliferation Studies provides the language training necessary for the success of cooperative threat reduction programs, collaborative research projects on drugs and vaccines, and reconfiguration of former weapons facilities. This paper describes how the ELAN Program supports the work of U.S. and FSU nuclear and biological scientists, export control and border control officials, and nuclear engineers who participate in U.S. cooperative threat reduction programs. ELAN participants are employed by former weapons institutes and may be involved in conversion of those facilities to civil use, in new public health research projects, in biodefense, or in export controls. Trainees learn about the larger proliferation dynamics beyond their individual institutes and labs and how a culture of safety and security can help to prevent the proliferation of weapons materials, information, and expertise. They exchange ideas and discuss solutions to proliferation problems in class and with CNS nonproliferation experts. By learning the language of nonproliferation in an intensive English-speaking environment, ELAN participants can be better engaged in cooperative research and threat reduction efforts with their U.S. counterparts. The paper also explores opportunities for expanding the program to other countries, for on-site training at labs and institutes, and for developing international communities of practice for safety and security in the nuclear and biological sciences. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On December 7, 1941 Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. The government responded to American advances in the Pacific by selecting policies of war rather than policies of peace. Why did Japanese decision-makers choose the path of military confrontation rather than the path of diplomacy? What prompted them to confront the United States at Pearl Harbor? Was it the configuration of the international system, or the capabilities and resources of nation-states that compelled them all to choose war? Or were structural circumstances fluid enough for people to disagree, and for differences among decision-makers to reflect variations in the cognitive costs of making judgments?This paper will review Japanese decision-making dynamics in 1941, and investigate whether structural conditions or the cognitive calculus theory of decision-making best accounts for the foreign policy preferences of individual actors. It will draw attention to deliberations at several levels of government, including within the military services themselves, and consider whether the transparency of American provocations forced all decision-makers to routinely choose force, or if the ambiguity of American actions prompted some people to prefer diplomatic initiatives while others preferred military solutions. In particular, it will explore the proposition that because all individuals are cognitive misers or cognitive processing cost-minimizers who unconsciously prefer judgments that are mentally cheap to those that are mentally dear, differences between civilian and military actors predictably reflect the influence of three different cognitive cost-cutting cues: decision stage (problem definition or solution definition), decision role assignment (leader or advisor), and a decision-maker’s level of substantive knowledge (novice to expert).By examining the evolution of Japanese foreign policy over the course of several months, this paper will not only assess whether and when the cognitive calculus theory of decision-making can offer a most useful explanation for this case, it will address whether the actions of Japanese officials in 1941, like those of British decision-makers in 1938 and American decision-makers in the Cuban missile crisis, the turn toward peace in Vietnam, and the 9/11 responses of 2001 (four cases already investigated), reinforce and extend the power of the theory. It will consider whether the cognitive calculus explanation can account for the preferences of different individual actors, in different states, facing different national conditions, and different international circumstances. This paper will conclude with a discussion of the implications of this work for future scholarly and policy efforts. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Obviously, this is not the paper that I had intended to deliver on the 1930s panel, "American (Under) Balancing of Power: Neoclassical Realism, the Roosevelt Administration, and the Road to World War II." Both that paper and the present paper will be chapters 1 and 3, respectively, in my current book project, The Primacy of Power: Realism and U.S. Foreign Policy. This book presents a neoclassical realist theory to explain variation in United States grand strategy from the years immediately preceding its entry into World War II until the present. The theory provides an explanatory and descriptive framework for how the top leaders of the United States assess international threats and opportunities; adjusts national security policies in response to those threats and opportunities; and then mobilizes the human and material resources necessary to implement those policies. Contrary to the conventional wisdom, for much of the past six decades the United States has pursued policies broadly consistent with the expectations of neoclassical realism. In other words, the ultimate causes of U.S. grand strategic behavior lay in the international system. The international system, however, can only influence any state's foreign and security policies through the medium of decision makers' calculations and perceptions. This means that threat perception and the preliminary identification of policy options is rarely objectively efficient or predicable based solely on systemic factors, at least in the short-run. Finally, once leaders have identified threats and their preferred strategies for redressing them, they still face the task of mobilizing domestic political support and extracting the necessary resources from civil society. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

My paper will explore the numerous accounts of failure in US decision-making regarding Iraq, before and after the invasion, using cognitive as well as bureaucratic interpretations of foreign policy. It will elucidate and deepen our understanding of factors at work that impeded the US decision to invade and occupy Iraq. The paper will offer a bridge between theory and empirical research. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most research on small state foreign policy stresses the importance of the international system and the disproportionate influence of more powerful states on the decisions made by small states in the international arena. This paper examines why and how some small states have been willing to oppose some of the most powerful international actors. In particular, this paper examines the resistance of some Latin American and Caribbean states to American foreign policy objectives. In many cases, these states have resisted American pressure despite the risk this poses to their immediate security and economic objectives. In doing so, these states are also presenting a challenge to traditional models of International Relations that argue small states will yield to their powerful neighbours and that economic and security needs are paramount in foreign policy decision making. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many explanations have been advanced in the face of the obvious failures of the official British and U.S. explanations to account for the war being waged on Iraq. In the U.K., discussion has tended to focus almost exclusively on the United States, with British involvement treated as tangential or at most supplemental, and explained largely with reference to aspects of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s personality or some broadly conceived U.K. national interest in maintaining close political relations with the United States. Missing from the discussion is recognition of recurrent features of U.K. foreign policy towards the Middle East and their relation to fundamental aspects of British political-economy, the increasing integration of British and U.S. capital, and the largely Anglo-American-led project of global economic re-structuring currently taking place. This paper focuses on British and U.S. interests in Iraq and larger Anglo-American ambitions that divide the U.K. and U.S. from France, Germany, and other EU and non-EU countries. Part I of the paper briefly reviews the history of British and U.S. foreign policies towards Iraq and the culmination of these policies in the invasion and take-over of the country. Part II places these events in the context of the political-economy of U.K.-U.S. relations and an on-going Anglo-American project of global reconstruction. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is often thought that success impedes substantial change in the ideas underpinning and the discourses legitimating foreign policy and that failure is necessary, although not sufficient, for such change. Yet, when viewed through the lens of narrative, this proposition is not borne out by the history of US foreign policy in the latter half of the twentieth century. The Korean War, made possible by the emerging Cold War, was widely seen as a failure, but it led to the consolidation of the so-called Cold War consensus, not its rejection. The debacle of Vietnam led to only the partial unraveling of that consensus, as substantial elements remained intact through the 1970s and facilitated Reagan’s rise. The Iraq fiasco does not appear to have opened up great fissures in the edifice of the War on Terror, to which the administration had bound it so tightly. The greatest changes in America’s foreign-affairs narratives have in fact come in the wake of unalloyed victory, as previous narratives came to seem less illegitimate or wrong than irrelevantâ€"such as after the Second World War and the Cold War. The proposed paper seeks to explain why policy failure has not led to wholesale narrative change, even when it might have been expected. The key lies in the rhetoric of opposition elites, to which mass audiences turn as the policy’s supporters lose credibility. Because policy failures typically reveal themselves as such only in stages, opposition elites early on have incentives to depart only from elements of the existing dominant narrative, and consequently their criticism reproduces much of that narrative. Later, once the fiasco is well established and opposition elites wish to depart from the narrative that had sustained the failure, they find themselves locked into that narrative whose core they had themselves recently reproduced, and they find the path to meaningful narrative change blocked. To substantiate these claims, the paper will explore empirically the dynamics of political opposition during America’s wars in Korea, Vietnam, and, if space permits, Iraq. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the author will explore the place that "personal" diplomacy plays in shaping Russian and US foreign policy. The paper hypothesizes that a foreign policy based on personal diplomacy can often lack the inclusion of fundamental principles and goals that have shaped the foreign policy of a nation. Personal diplomacy can often lead to foreign policy shifts that are hard to remedy in the short run, depending on the degree of turn-over in the top leadership. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I adopt the perspective of a structured and stable public view to analyze the possible linkage between public opinion and U.S. foreign policy, as we move to a post-Bush administration. The analysis proceeds in the following way. First, the paper begins by reviewing these competing theoretical perspectives, based upon recent studies of the public opinion—foreign policy linkage, and assessing their relative utility today. Second, utilizing the second perspective, the research identifies several necessary and sufficient conditions required for the public to have an effect on foreign policy. The necessary conditions are the degree of structure and stability in the public's views, and the sufficient conditions are the leaders' receptivity to the public's views on foreign policy and the degree of public access to the decision-making process. Third, using some recent polling data, I summarize the public's current general orientation to foreign policy and its position on key issues. Fourth, I assess the foreign policy positions of the likely 2008 Democratic and Republican nominees, their receptivity (and compatibility) with the public's view, and the likelihood that their decision styles will facilitate public input. Finally, the analysis concludes by identifying several structural and process factors that will arguably facilitate greater public impact on foreign policy, regardless of the candidate ultimately chosen as the next president. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, the use of covert military special operations has increased significantly. Highly trained professional soldiers have been able to accomplish dicey missions to secure battlefield and security objectives. Because of the secretive nature of military special operations, policymakers and the public at large have typically assessed the “ends” of the mission rather then the “means” by which it was accomplished. While there are various reasons for this, the most unsettling reason to avoid discussion of “means” is the fear that, in closely examining the actions of special operations, they could be found unsavory or morally detestable. This paper examines the ways U.S. special operations engage in battle through the lens of Just War Theory in hopes of bridging two fields that tend to repel each other. Through historical and qualitative analysis, this paper concludes that the actions of U.S. military special operations can be theoretically consistent with the tenets of jus ad bellum, jus in bello and jus post bellum. Conversely, tangible uses of clandestine force during wartime are less likely to be considered “just” as the Just War principles of discrimination, proportionality and minimal force are highly subjective. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years the European Union has not only reiterated its commitment to the United Nations but has also pledged to work toward strengthening this organization. Since the early 1990s, the UN has been increasingly active in the policy area of international human security. The EU, considered by some as a driving force in the UN policy process, has presented itself as a significant actor in the promotion of concrete actions on human security issues. This paper explores the conditions under which the EU is an effective actor at the United Nations in the policy area of international human security. Using a multilevel game approach, this paper analyzes the willingness of EU actors to work collectively at the UN (internal effectiveness) and the achievements of the EU's objectives at the UN in the area of international human security (external effectiveness). Two case studies of human security negotiations are examined: 1) the fight against landmines, and 2) the illicit trade of small arms and light weapons (SALW). The case studies suggest that the position of other key UN actors regarding a potential agreement appears to influence EU Member States in achieving their objectives. In both the landmines and small arms cases, the EU failed to acquire the support of the United States but also key actors in the G-77. The paper also highlights that the use of consensus in negotiations can have an impact on the EU's effectiveness at the UN. The role of the EU presidency in coordinating the position of all EU Member States and the position of France, Germany and the United Kingdom, also appear to affect the EU's effectiveness. The paper also suggests that domestic politics can directly affect the EU's effectiveness at the United Nation. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years microfinance has garnered growing attention in the government, banking, and non-governmental arenas as an alternative to largely unsuccessful state-run and multilateral development and aid programs. Proponents of microfinance suggest the industry is well-equipped to assist many of the world’s over four billion poor. However, there are still many questions about the impact of microfinance on the quality of life for the poor, and much debate about what “solid” evidence there is to support it as a contextually relevant form of economic development. The research presented in this paper focuses on one component of community sustainability and quality of life that is inextricably linked to poverty: the natural environment. Environmental conditions are of paramount importance to many of the world’s poor due to their reliance on natural resources for both subsistence and income, yet they remain absent from microfinance theory and practice which often focuses on broad applicability rather than locally-informed interventions. Logically and intuitively, there is much potential for microfinanced enterprises to incorporate the local natural environment either as a source for inputs or a sink for outputs. This paper explores the relationship between microfinance-led poverty alleviation and environmental sustainability based on field work with microfinance and sustainable development NGOs in the US and Jinga, Uganda. It uses contextual analysis gauge the potential to create an environmentally-informed microfinance intervention to improve quality of life for the poor. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his recent book, Gandhi and Beyond, David Cortright argues that “nonviolence is the exact opposite of and the most effective antidote to terrorism.” More simply, Tom Hastings states that “violence has not worked to eliminate terrorism. It is time to try the nonviolent approach.” Though Cortright’s and Hasting’s books go far to make the case for nonviolence in an “age of terrorism”, this paper goes further by placing nonviolence in the context of what I call the “new global security agenda”. It therefore links nonviolent theory with practice. I take seriously Cortright’s assumption that “terrorism is fundamentally a political phenomenon, and the strategies against it must be political as well.” Thus, strategy and tactics must return to the classic, Cluasewitzian formulation of war as a “true political instrument.” The US lead “war on terror” fundamentally misunderstands the relationship between means and ends (as witnessed by the strategy of preventative war). This paper compares the US strategy employed so far in the war on terrorism with nonviolent means. It concludes that by using nonviolent strategies and tactics the United States and its allies will more realistically achieve its goal of defeating terrorism. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In contrast to the recent upheaval concerning US nuclear primacy, the underlying trend in international politics tends towards an accelerated downgrading of the role of nuclear weapons. While nuclear weapons may (or may not) have made a substantial difference in the past, the Cold War conception of deterrence is of limited value in the post-Cold War period. This paper outlines five variables that undermine the so-called "nuclear revolution". Although most of these variables already existed before, their importance has grown since the mid-1990's, and there is every reason to assume that their role will be strengthened further in the foreseeable future. The aim of this paper is to enrich the understaffed academic debate about post-Cold War deterrence. At the same time, the model that is put forward here may be helpful for guiding political decision-makers in the nuclear weapon states. They are under pressure to adapt their nuclear weapons policies to the changed circumstances, as in, for instance, the request by the American Congress for the next administration to come up with a new nuclear posture before the end of 2009. But to what framework should the political decision-makers themselves turn ? And which options are currently available ?Before describing the causal mechanisms that undermine nuclear deterrence, we will clarify the conceptual confusion about nuclear deterrence policies. More in particular, a distinction will be made between nuclear primacy, maximum deterrence, minimum deterrence, existential deterrence and post-existential deterrence. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In December 2005, NATO assumed the command of all PRTs deployed throughout Afghanistan. Thirteen nationsâ€"US, UK, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Turkey, Lithuania, Hungary, Italy, Spain and New Zealand-- are leading these PRTs, and each lead-nation adopts its own way of doing business in a PRT, depending on the situation on the ground as well as on the domestic circumstances back home. This paper is an attempt to review the characteristics of the thirteen lead-nations’ approaches to their PRT and to categorize such divergent ways to conducting a PRT by focusing on their differences in the leadership structure, military roles, and civil-military relations within a PRT. By so doing, this paper seeks to develop a typology of PRTs, which will enhance our understanding of actual conduct of PRTs and will help us to produce a coherent doctrine for the PRT initiative. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immediately after liberation from Japanese occupation, numerous experts were deployed from the United States to survey the postwar landscape of the Philippines. They were sent to collect images of and collect statistical information on the extent of damages to Philippine agricultural and manufacturing industry, transportation and shipping facilities, urban and village structures, and natural resources. This collection of information urgently framed the Philippine Islands as "utterly devastated." Within the U.S. congress, immediate calls were made not for short term relief, as originally thought, but rather for long term plans of rehabilitation and reconstruction in the Philippines. From 1945 to 1946 discussions of a Rehabilitation Act were steadily pursued. By 1946 the "original Rehabilitation Bill had been expanded, the kinds and amounts of claimants had been extended and definitions broadened, the amounts appropriated had been multiplied over five times." Bundled along with the disappointing Bell-Trade Act of 1946, the Rehabilitation Act still ushered in a sense of optimism in the immediate postwar Philippines. By the sheer amount of money it provided, numerous projects and institutions were planned to aid in gaining the newly independent Republic the international recognition it deserved. Yet at the same time, inhabiting the shadows of optimism was the anxiety of mismanagement of money. In 1947, one particular group, the Joint Philippine American Finance Commission made up of both Philippine and American members reported their findings and recommendations. Their findings conclude that the initial years of Philippine independence was of critical importance in the "economic development" and stable future of the nation. Chief in their concerns was the potential mishandling of rehabilitation loan money entering the young nation. In response the joint commission makes several recommendations. Of utmost importance is the principle proposal of a Central Bank. The establishment of the Central Bank of the Philippines, as the chief authority on national currency, can ensure that all of their other recommendations are followed. This paper thus proposes to look at the emergence of the Central Bank as an object produced out of the uncanny postwar discourses of economists. These postwar discourses center on the anxiety over the twofold possibilities of misrecognition of money as well as a collapse into a non-modern economy. In the imaginary of economists, the existence of a Central Bank guided by techno-knowledge and sound management, acts as the bulwark against such devastating possibilities. Furthermore, the potential success of the Central Bank is demonstrative of the potential success of a sovereign Philippine political economy. Yet in order to legitimate the existence of a Central Bank, this paper asserts that through disciplined economic research, a recurring non-modern economic world is created by economists. This non-modern economic world is then historically presented as inhabiting the present postwar space of the Philippines. Furthermore, it also threatens to subsume it. It does so in two interrelated ways. The first is the potential misrecognition of money as speaking a language other than the value of capital. The second is the discourse created by economists in order to produce uncanny effects through the economy. These two methods intertwine in order to combine, what they imagine as a chaotic and fragmented space of islands: peasants, rebellions, decrepit banks, atrophied agricultural industries, and other non-modern elements, into a unitary and coherent whole. The name of this object is the Philippine national economy. And like any object, once solid and tangible, it can be continuously manipulated, managed, and exploited by both state and international banking institutions... ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How will the US pursue the “war or terror” after the Bush administration? While changing the name of the American strategy will almost certainly be part of the new approach what will also be required is a disentangling of the various conceptions of the “war on terror” which emerged during the Bush Administration. This paper will demonstrate how the Bush Administration’ approach inflated and conflated the threats which America faced and developed competing strategies to deal with these threats.The “Counter Terrorism” strategy focused on the terrorists themselves, involved traditional counter-terrorism techniques and lead logically to war in Afghanistan. The second strategy, ‘Pre-emption and Pre-eminence’, represented a step change in Washington’s conceptualisation of the terrorist threat and how to deal with it. The third approach, the ‘Forward Strategy for the Democratisation of the Middle East’, sought to identify both the root causes of and the long term solutions to the War on Terrorism. This paper shows how and why American thinking evolved in this way and how the tensions between these different strategies have complicated America’s task of dealing with the terrorist threat. It argues that only by disaggregating these different threats and responses will it be possible to develop a coherent and workable strategy. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historically, race has played a prominent role in framing US’ attitudes and actions in regards to Latin America. From independence onward, the Latin republics were greeted with doubt and derision as American policymakers argued that they lacked the racial pedigree to sustain legitimate democratic governance. Racial constructions of Latinos (as inferior, unstable, treacherous, weak, etc) figured heavily in the US interventions in Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America that took place throughout the 19th and into the 20th century. In that era of popularly perceived white superiority, the influence of racialized thinking on American policies is not surprising. With the end of legalized discrimination and the dramatic shift in public beliefs starting in the 1960s, we would expect modern American policies to be color-blind. However, this is not the case. Most notably in the arena of drug policy, Latin American states continue to receive much different political, military, and economic treatment from the US compared to countries whose citizens are white. This discrepancy is strikingly illustrated in US â€" Colombia relations. Drawing on elements of history, sociology, and post-structuralist thought, the paper scrutinizes this paradox by analyzing a major component of American drug policy â€" Plan Colombia (2000). By employing a critical discourse analysis to examine the language surrounding this legislation, the paper seeks to draw out the impact of racialized thinking upon contemporary US policies towards Colombia and to generate insights into how race may continue to affect United States attitudes and actions towards the region as a whole ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]