Search

Building on the original corpus of OSCE monitoring reports, the article analyses quarter of century of election monitoring in Europe and assesses the congruence of OSCE written assessments with expert views. We show that, overall, the OSCE monitoring reports are highly correlated and congruent with expert assessments. More importantly, the level of congruence between the two increases with time. However, we also identify various forms of biases rooted in strategic interests and institutional preconditions. Mainly, we show that OSCE has a strong and positive bias towards Russia and its allies when it comes to election assessments indicating defensive and lenient stances. We theorize this mechanism as a pushback effect and show that although Russia's effort to cripple the activities of OSCE in the past two decades was not successful, OSCE was effectively forced into a defensive position producing less critical assessments than reality warrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author explores the deterioration and (forthcoming) collapse of the global arms control system, with special consideration given to potential consequences this event would have for the European continent. In this context, and in assessing the significance of the remaining mechanisms for preventing a potential arms race and deepening of conflict in Europe, he draws attention to the OSCE Vienna Document as a tool that could enable the revival of stability through confidence-building in Europe, especially given its capacity for adaptation and modernization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is perhaps the world's least-known major security organization. However, the same characteristic which puts the OSCE seemingly continually on the verge of irrelevance with respect to the other actors in European and global security is in fact what has allowed it to endure and is in fact its greatest asset. That is, the OSCE's distinct combination of modern and postmodern characteristics in both its composition and its activities allows it to create what can be called “embedded security”. Tracing the evolution of one particular set of decision-making rules embedded within a normative framework which questioned the fundamental meanings of “security”, and exploring present-day activities, this article reinterprets the OSCE in the light of this new model. In so doing, it re-contextualizes both the OSCE's origins and its contemporary relevance. Instead of a modernist, functional, rule-driven interpretation which situates the OSCE on the periphery in a crowded field, this explanation puts the OSCE at the centre of the postmodern and normative European security architecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the security situation in Europe as of November 2015. Topics cited include the importance of a rapprochement between Russia and the European Union (EU) according to the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement signed in 1994, the use of the block-to-block approach to establish effective European platforms for resolving conflicts and the Russia-Ukraine conflict. It discusses the reported energy cooperation between Russia and EU countries.

How can we improve security in the immense area of the fifty-seven participating states of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (osce)? The author addresses this question by appealing to the Final Report and Recommendations of the Panel of Eminent Persons on European Security as a Common Project. This Report is full of insights, and much of it is seen by the author as an honest account of the events and policies that divide osce countries. On the basis of the final report, the author offers twelve concrete recommendations that may promote trust in the osce area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The forty-year anniversary of the Helsinki Agreements on which the existing formal security arrangements of Europe are based, could have led to a convivial party. In reality the opposite is actually the case. The European safety relations in 2015 look now on course for another long-lasting conflict between East and West. There is little time to celebrate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2001, the increasing tension led to a threat to Macedonian sovereignty and territorial integrity due to the events that took place in the north -western regions of the country bordering Albania and Kosovo. The actions of Albanian separatists associated with National Liberation Army that aimed at making Albanian and Macedonian nationalities equal within the Republic resulted in an increase of anti -Albanian attitudes that contributed to the Macedonian -Albanian conflict. The six -month fight was ended on 13 August 2001 when the peace agreement was signed in Ohrid. The agreement, which was accepted by both sides of the conflict, was more favourable for the Albanians since it made their status as citizens almost equal to that of Macedonians. A growing tension among the Albanian minority forced immediate implementation of the decisions included in the Ohrid Agreement. The European Union in cooperation with the OSCE and NATO played a key role in the process of stabilising the socio -political situation. The police reform in the Republic of Macedonia was a crucial element of the Ohrid Agreement. The changes were to ensure proportional representation of all nationalities comprising the Macedonian society in law enforcement services. The European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe conducted three stabilisation missions: one was a military mission -- CONCORDIA, and two were police missions: PROXIMA and EUPAT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An interview with Russian Federation Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Alexey Meshkov is presented. He addresses perceptions of anti-Russian sentiment in the European media, how the European Union (EU) might have avoided the economic hardships experienced during the early 21st century, and the possibility of an EU collapse. He also discusses the growth of the EU, the political systems of the EU, and Russian participation in organizations such as the Council of Europe.

This article is a slightly revised version of an address given at the 25th anniversary of the Netherlands Helsinki Committee in The Hague, Netherlands, 25 January 2013. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is a study about the measures that European organizations take in response to violations of media freedom in Russia. Despite vigorous efforts, the media situation has not improved considerably. What are the reasons for the apparent inefficiency of the European enforcement mechanism? To overcome the tangle of sometimes contradictory historical, sociological, philosophical, and mere pragmatic explanations, one has to distinguish obstacles at the conceptual level from obstacles at the level of implementation. I will argue that insistence on a specific Russian mentality and another idea of freedom of expression in the Russian context is a mere rhetorical trick of the ruling political forces to hide the lack of democratic commitment in Russia and to avoid criticism from the West. Whereas these 'ideological' reasons-or, at least, their historical necessity-can be rejected, 'practical' reasons for the small impact of European measures cannot be denied. When exclusively addressing those responsible in the Russian government, European organizations underestimate not only reluctance by the Russian authorities but also the complexity of the whole situation. Without a change of journalistic behavior and some institutions closely connected with the work of journalists-and, most notably, a comprehensive alteration of public opinion-it is improbable that the situation of the media will change in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the status of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and whether or not changes should be made. The Russian government has been calling for changes in informal security agreements among the members of OSCE such that agreements be put into writing and become legally binding upon the members. Many members of the OSCE are dissatisfied with the low level of security in the Euro-Atlantic region. At a meeting of members in Corfu, Greece in 2009, it was agreed that a security agreement should be made that would prevent future conflicts and break the impasse in arms control.

This review essay questions whether European standards for the protection of minorities are “a major historical achievement”. Two questions are posed. Why has this development taken place in Europe? Why has it taken place since 1990? These questions are answered in the light of the historical and political context. After a brief account of the extraordinary experiment in minority rights protection in the inter-War period, the review turns to the origins of the Council and of the OSCE in the Cold War, and comments on the legitimacy and efficacy of these texts and mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I draw on the later work of Michel Foucault to elaborate a governmentality framework for the study of international governmental organizations (IGOs). The main `value added' of the proposed framework is that it brings into focus the micro-domain of power relations, thereby highlighting what mainline 100 studies fail to thematize. IGOs exercise a molecular form of power that evades and undermines the material, juridical and diplomatic limitations on their influence. They are important sites in the non-sovereign, microphysical workings of power that shape territorialized populations in unspectacular ways. In short, I argue that our understanding of IGOs remains incomplete if we do not pay attention to the effects of domination generated by their everyday governance tasks and good works. I develop this argument through a brief engagement with an innovative strand of 100 studies: research on international socialization, which is empirically illustrated through a brief exploration of the induction by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe of post-socialist countries into its embryonic security community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE is one of the most important. but least well known. of the security institutions in the pan-European region since the end of the Cold War. This essay argues that the OSCE has a vital role to play in providing for European security that is not supplied by any other multilateral institution NATO, the European Union, the Western European Union, the Council of Europe. or the Commonwealth of Independent States. The OSCE is the only organization that bridges the military and the human dimensions of security. It play s an especially important role in conflict prevention and in trying to seek negotiated solutions in regions that have experienced violent conflict since 1989. The OSCE is most effective when it works cooperatively with other multilateral institutions in the region. and it constitutes a necessary part of the network of interlocking institutions that have created a trans-European security regime since the end of the Cold War. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: In 2011 the Consensus Statement on Performance Assessment was published in Medical Teacher. That paper was commissioned by AMEE (Association for Medical Education in Europe) as part of the series of Consensus Statements following the 2010 Ottawa Conference. In 2019, it was recommended that a working group be reconvened to review and consider developments in performance assessment since the 2011 publication., Methods: Following review of the original recommendations in the 2011 paper and shifts in the field across the past 10 years, the group identified areas of consensus and yet to be resolved issues for performance assessment., Results and Discussion: This paper addresses developments in performance assessment since 2011, reiterates relevant aspects of the 2011 paper, and summarises contemporary best practice recommendations for OSCEs and WBAs, fit-for-purpose methods for performance assessment in the health professions.