Neoconservatism’s approach of democratising the Middle East via military intervention, tempering terrorism in the area, and dealing with Iran decisively has already formed the core of Obama’s policy package, all continuations from the Bush administration.
The 20th Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall offers has understandably generated a number of opportunities to look backwards to what happened, and to ask why it was that IR specialists seemed unable to see what was coming.
Following a provision of the Doha agreement, signed by Lebanese political leaders to put an end to the May 2008 crisis, the Lebanese parliament discussed the country’s Parliamentary Electoral Draft Law and voted for reform on September 29th, 2008. But many of the proposals made by the National Commission were rejected, leading Minister of the Interior Ziyad Baroud to qualify it as “a cup half full”. But is this too optimistic?
In order to guide democracy development efforts in the Middle East, Western policymakers must be guided by a realistic and nuanced view of the region. Militancy and terrorism, especially, have traditionally been viewed in terms of simple dichotomies and broad generalizations. This paper attempts to address this issue by offering a framework for the evaluation of Islamist political parties and their participation in democratic systems.
The 2008 election was not a fluke. The days of Republican advantage on foreign and security affairs are over. The Democrats have learned to talk tougher on defense matters and to appoint Republicans and moderate Democrats to the senior posts. The Democrats now treat military preparedness, including Ronald Reagan’s missile defense, like the Republicans treat Social Security —with the self-preserving respect accorded electrified third rails.
Eyal Weizman’s comprehensive account of the techniques of expansion and oppression deployed by the Israeli forces in the Occupied Territories provides a thorough and graphic exposé of a whole range of colonizing methods. In this essay I attempt to highlight a selection of Weizman’s observations and relate them to the arguments of Yiftachel and an updated understanding of Foucauldian population geography by Legg.
The first part this essay introduces the concept of microfinance and the rationale behind targeting women, which is critically examined. The second part looks at the impact of microfinance initiatives on poverty alleviation. Drawing on examples from some African and Asian countries, the argument is built on the examination of two dimensions of poverty, namely income generation and empowerment.
Transnational Oil Companies struggle to operate in the face of widespread anti-oil protests and civil conflict in the Niger Delta. Shell, in particular, has faced considerable security challenges since the emergence of an active civil society in the early 1990s – most notably manifested by MOSOP. The brutal repression of that group proved ultimately counterproductive and Shell now aims to build a security-development nexus in partnership with local people. However, the policy is based on a paradox.
This essay examines the ways in which the post-9/11 discourse on terrorism has prioritised certain interpretations of terrorism, and argues that these carefully chosen frameworks serve to legitimate certain conceptions of conflict and insecurity, whilst marginalising others.
We know that torture is a constant presence in warfare, most especially in counter-insurgency operations. Terrible things happen in wars. But warfare is also a learning process where participants try to avoid repeating the mistakes of their own experience and that of others.
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