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| 1 |
ID:
136876
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| Summary/Abstract |
Almost across the board, recent studies of small arms proliferation and policy in Africa seem to have disengaged from historical data and analysis. This article contextualizes current debates on small arms and how they relate to the African continent, by revisiting historical data and analysis. The article draws on the relatively large literature on firearms in African history from the slave trade to early independence to offer new ways of thinking about small arms imports, the impact and prospects for control. Despite the richness of historical studies, they tend to be treated as historical conditions, not assessed for their implications for the current small arms regime. Reflecting on the historical sequence, it appears as if the situation today resembles that of the beginning of the 20th century. Enforcement of local leadership is often weak and the arms trade is relatively large and liberalized. This review finds that historical conditions and structures are built into Africa's current arms control architecture, posing significant challenges for effectiveness and legitimacy. The large scale of old and obsolete small arms frequent in sub-Saharan Africa suggests that weapon destruction programmes, rather than marking, recordkeeping and safe stockpiling of old stocks or recovered weapons, would often be more manageable and offer greater improvements in local security. The positive aspects of external influences on African sub-regional arms control regimes in terms of financial and technical support should be carefully weighed against the risk of reinforcing old patterns.
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| 2 |
ID:
136874
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India sat on the Security Council in 2011 when Resolution 1973 passed. This authorized NATO's intervention in the humanitarian crisis in Libya, which ultimately precipitated regime change. India's engagement with the crisis is analysed here with reference to various ‘identity-discourses’, treated as ‘shapers’ of India's specific policy-responses to the Libya crisis. This study finds that India flirted with the responsibility to protect (R2P) norm by abstaining when the Council voted on Resolution 1973; New Delhi effectively declined to oppose measures to resolve the crisis which were broadly consistent with Pillar III of R2P (that is, the responsibility of the international community to protect threatened persons). But after reflecting on NATO's intervention, Indian leaders largely retreated to their traditional preference for relatively strong interpretations of the sovereignty norm, suggesting India's flirtation with R2P – or at least with Pillar III – was brief and unhappy. While this paper finds that ‘soft’ liberal-democratic logic is very firmly established – Indian elites are committed to liberal-democratic principles, at least at home – it seems likely to take some time before the ‘hard’ liberal-democratic logic which shapes Pillar III-consistent responses to humanitarian crises becomes influential in Indian policy-making circles. In other words, New Delhi is unlikely to become a wholehearted supporter of the R2P norm without profound changes to India's international identity, which in turn has negative implications for the wider effort to further entrench R2P, especially its controversial Pillar III.
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| 3 |
ID:
136877
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Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) is internationally recognized to categorize nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons. Despite their joint categorization, each weapon is distinct from the other and use and possession are treated differently. Previous studies have focused on technological aspects of these weapons, failing to examine and explain the distinct nature and underlying significance of this term. Adopting a constructivist approach, and utilizing sociological research, this work addresses this gap by restoring the underlying strategic and ethical significance of the concept of WMD. The article stresses stigmatization of WMD by the international community. The evolving condemnation of chemical and biological weapons forged the stigma and led to the condemnation of nuclear weapons. WMD have been framed as a threat to humanity due to their ability to create widespread, long-term, irreversible destruction. WMD have also been associated with elevated status and power. These two aspects cannot be separated from each other. The article shows that the actors involved in stigmatization have varied. Initially, the stigma emerged top-down, via government officials. In time, grass roots movements and the general public have also condemned these weapons. Secondly, stigmatizing was driven by perceptions of social, economic, and political power, which elevated the status of these weapons. Stigmatization then developed as a reaction to the threatened possession and use of WMD by antagonistic actors. The ethical and political processes cannot be distinguished from each other; each has formed to frame the image of the long-term danger of WMD. Understanding this process of stigmatization is of particular importance at a time in which the threat from these weapons has increased. This work therefore provides greater insight and understanding into ways to address this challenging subject.
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| 4 |
ID:
136875
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What is left of the ‘empire by invitation’? Coined by Geir Lundestad in 1986, the seemingly contradictory phrase has been used to explain the nature of American power in Western Europe and beyond. This article revisits the concept to shed light on Norway's 2008 decision to recapitalize its fighter jet fleet with the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter – an event of considerable political significance in the ongoing history of this complex, controversial, and geopolitically consequential weapons programme. Using multiple sources, including diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks, the article traces how Americans and their local brokers intervened in the Norwegian policy process to ensure that the F-35s would go to the Royal Norwegian Air Force. In addition to suggesting that ‘empire by invitation’ remains a fact of international political life, the analysis also shows the importance of legitimation strategies in security policy. This especially applies to the study of international arms deals because interactions between and among politicians, diplomats, bureaucrats, and lobbyists always involve claims and counterclaims about legitimate national interest.
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| 5 |
ID:
136873
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Contrary to the expectations of liberal theories, interdependence between Europe and Russia in the energy sphere has exacerbated security tensions between the two sides, leading to the competitive foreign policies that now see them at loggerheads in Ukraine. Interdependence has not worked because both sides have been worried that in the future interdependence will become asymmetrical (that is, that they will become more dependent than the other side and that the other side will take advantage of this weakness) and they have adopted policies to reduce their exposure, but they cannot reduce their own dependence without also threatening to increase the dependence of the other side. As a result, the relationship looks like a classic security dilemma – where neither side can improve its own security without threatening the security of the other side. These findings dispel commonly held notions about the pacific effects of interdependence and show that interdependence can exacerbate security tensions, particularly when it is focused on one area and falls short of complex interdependence.
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| 6 |
ID:
136878
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| Summary/Abstract |
A new line of nuclear winter research shows that even small, regional nuclear wars could have catastrophic global consequences. However, major disarmament to avoid nuclear winter goes against the reasons nuclear weapon states have for keeping their weapons in the first place, in particular deterrence. To reconcile these conflicting aims, this paper develops the concept of winter-safe deterrence, defined as military force capable of meeting the deterrence goals of today's nuclear weapon states without risking catastrophic nuclear winter. This paper analyses nuclear winter risk, finding a winter-safe limit of about 50 nuclear weapons total worldwide. This paper then evaluates a variety of candidate weapons for winter-safe deterrence. Non-contagious biological weapons (such as anthrax or ricin), neutron bombs detonated at altitude, and nuclear electromagnetic weapons show the most promise. Each weapon has downsides, and the paper's analysis is only tentative, but winter-safe deterrence does appear both feasible and desirable given the urgency of nuclear winter risk.
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