Archive for 2009

Weep for OPEC?

Rodger A Payne • Sep 10 2009 • Articles

Representatives from the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) are meeting in Vienna this week and the looming threat of Copenhagen is clearly on their agenda. I wrote “threat of Copenhagen” because OPEC states are primarily devoted to selling a commodity that is a significant source of climate change.

International Law and the Bush Doctrine

Stephen McGlinchey • Sep 9 2009 • Articles

The Bush doctrine took shape throughout the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, developing in various speeches by the President and high ranking staff. This essay considers how the doctrine complimented, or challenged international law.

The Politics of Power and the Power of Faith: Retracing Martin Wight’s Legacy

Aura Sabadus • Sep 8 2009 • Essays

Whilst disciples and collaborators such as Hedley Bull, Robert Jackson and Brian Porter speak of Marin Wight as a seminal thinker and erudite scholar, others such as Alan James claim that his influence on the discipline is limited. This paper proposes to assess Wight’s impact on the study of International Relations.

AMERICA’S COMMAND STRUCTURE

Harvey M. Sapolsky • Sep 7 2009 • Articles

I think the geographically based commands should be eliminated with one exception, replaced in part by additional functional commands. As some may know, I stand against our willingness to manage global security as well as our own, a willingness allowed by our great military power relative to others and the encouraged free riding of nearly all our “allies”.

Pursuing Peace with the Weapons of War: Ballistic Missile Defence and International Security

Andrew Blencowe • Sep 5 2009 • Essays

This paper will show that the implementation of ballistic missile defence systems is a threat to international peace and security. It will examine of the concept of ballistic missile defence, the cases for and against its implementation and the current realities that are of consideration and its role in international peace and security.

What’s the baseline?

Rodger A Payne • Sep 4 2009 • Articles

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change dates to the June 1992 Earth Summit. The overwhelming majority of nations are parties to this agreement — even the United States, which did not ratify the followup Kyoto Protocol. Essentially, for 20 years the world has been negotiating reductions in greenhouse gas emissions based on reductions from a 1990 baseline.

Kant’s Writings on the State of Nature and Coercion: The Domestic Analogy and the Level of Analysis

Arash Heydarian Pashakhanlou • Sep 4 2009 • Essays

This essay argues that the early Kant largely followed the domestic analogy when describing the state of nature between individuals and states – directly affecting his views on coercion. The mature Kant however incorporated all the level of analysis into his writings and transcended but did not entirely abandon the domestic analogy.

Liberal Peace Transitions: Towards a Post-Liberal Peace in IR?

Oliver Richmond • Sep 3 2009 • Articles

It has become generally assumed that ‘Liberal Peace Transitions’ offer a way out of local, civil, regional and international conflict, as well as complex emergences and development problems. All military, humanitarian, diplomatic, political, economic, and social, interventions since the end of the Cold War have been geared to this programme – with limited success.

Critically Evaluate at Least Two Positions that can be Found in Contemporary Debates about Just War Theory

David Anderson • Sep 2 2009 • Essays

The following essay will present an evaluation of the just war theory using the 1st Gulf war as a case study. The intervention reveals a number of issues regarding applying just war theory to contemporary conflict.

Ballistic Missile Defence and 21st Century Stability in International Relations

Bleddyn E. Bowen • Sep 1 2009 • Essays

This essay determines the effect of National Missile Defence (NMD) is primarily destabilising. However this has to be put in the wider context of relations between the US, China and Russia – for the destabilising effect of NMD is very much characterised by how it is used and what kind of policy it is a part of.

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