The current swine flu outbreak takes place amidst ongoing international efforts to establish a system of global health security. While considerable progress towards this goal has been made, serious unresolved problems mean that the concept and practice of global health security is likely to face severe challenges.
In mid 2008, the Sri Lankan government began a military offensive against LTTE rebels. Civilians trapped by the fighting face a double peril: if they flee, they risk being killed by the LTTE; if they stay, they must face the government’s bombardment. All this has prompted some humanitarian advocates to invoke the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ (RtoP) principle. Are they right to do so?
What do the Miss Universe competition, Sesame Street’s Elmo, and Fox’s television show 24 have in common? Aside from being phenomenally successful American cultural products, they can also offer us insight into the workings of world politics, in this case through their connections to the US military detention facilities at Joint Task Force Guantánamo.
One year ago Cyclone Nargis struck southern Burma. This ‘natural’ disaster brought about the death of at least 140,000 people, made homeless 800,000 more, and caused severe hardship for the inhabitants of much of the Irrawaddy Delta. The land of the Delta is Burma’s (and once the world’s) ‘rice bowl’, and so the destruction wrought here a year ago has been greatly damaging to food security amongst the poor throughout the country.
The story of how Yushchenko came to power with high domestic and international expectations that he largely failed to fulfill will be a fascinating area for future research.
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.
A relationship between international actors based on sponsorship differs from classical notions of clientelism and soft power, and is critical of exclusively statist conceptions of international politics. Sponsorship, I argue, becomes a mutual determinant and accelerator of globalisation.
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.
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.
Cultural dynamics reside at the heart of global environmental governance. The politics of the environment is – alongside questions of distribution/justice and physical sustainability – always a matter of meaning and purpose. And this should not come as a surprise.
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