Martin Wight's Thought on Diplomacy

Martin Wight was a founding member and one of the most influential thinkers of the 'English School' of International Relations. His thought on diplomacy is at the heart of his international theory. He portrays diplomacy as a defining activity of international relations; it marks the international sphere. His diplomatic thought is shaped by, more than anything else, a traditional Christian outlook that can be characterized as Augustian. Unless one comprehends that religious disposition of Martin Wight's thought one will not properly understand it.     

From Women of the Year to “Soccer Moms”: The Case of the Incredible Shrinking Women

In the 1992 U.S. election year, mainstream print and television news coverage was replete with hosannas for female politicians, praised as strong and politically powerful figures during this so-called ''Year of the Woman.'' Just 4 years later, 1996 election news reports relied upon a very different image to describe women vis-à-vis electoral politics: soccer moms. Soccer mom was the term used most recurrently in mainstream television and print media to refer to an aggregate of women, vis-à-vis electoral politics, who were described as crucial to the success of either presidential candidate: President Clinton or Robert Dole. This period of time represents a dramatic shift in news discourse: from discussing women as political power wielders (Women of the Year) to discussing women as a group of swing voters defined primarily by their filial obligations. This article considers some possible implications of this shift and argues that it represents a discursive connection between women voters reduced to a demographic category characterized by womens relationships to their children and an ideology of consumerism that reduces electoral politics to personal choices around product consumption and lifestyle.     

Internet Regulation Process Model: The Effect of Societies,Communities, and Governments

The Internet is often seen as borderless and unmanageable and, therefore, not fully understandable. Starting from the assumption that it can be understood, we begin an attempt to organize the Internet by characterizing it as a behavior space in which groups categorized as societies, communities, and governments interact. We emphasize the utility of organizing the Internet and focus specifically on attempts by societies, communities, and governments to regulate the flow of information. We posit an Internet regulation process model that, we believe, explains most of the efforts to regulate the Internet. In addition, we provide some insight into the relationships between and within the various groups involved. Our conclusions center on the observation that political power (especially Western political power) has been a defining factor in the regulation of the Internet as governments have played a prominent role in regulatory action.     

Memory and forgetting: examining the treatment of traumatic historical memory in Grave of the Fireflies and The Wind Rises

Within Japanese popular culture, manga and anime have played a significant role in mediating responses to the outcome of the Pacific War. Miyazaki Hayao's (possibly) final feature-length film, The Wind Rises, has been an important addition to the preceding body of popular media ‘texts’ that raise such themes. This article aims to address the question of how far cinematic animation can reasonably be obliged to follow the kinds of historiographical concerns that inevitably arise when engaging with Japan's militarist past. To answer this question, considerable space is devoted to examining the historical context of what others have done in the post-war period and integrate that commentary into an analysis of how the works of Takahata Isao and Miyazaki Hayao fit amongst a succession of creative works that have been co-opted in the reshaping of historical perceptions of the Japanese at war amongst the Japanese themselves. This will also require some incidental discussion of methodological issues that arise when dealing with such cases as vehicles for understanding transformations in historical consciousness. Ultimately it is argued that Miyazaki does indeed make an important contribution to the commentary on the Japanese war experience, although it must, perhaps unavoidably, be on highly personal terms so far as The Wind Rises is concerned.     

Cautious Surfers: The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Negotiates the Wave of the Information Age

Due to the ongoing information revolution, diplomats find themselves in an increasingly competitive information-intensive environment where they have to prove that they still are relevant and needed. The article explores this general development by detailing how the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has related to the technological challenge. Drawing on personal interviews with MFA staff, study of MFA documents including reports from Norwegian embassies and delegations, as well as participant observation, reasons for the relative tardiness and path-dependence in implementing IT-supported organizational change at the MFA are explored.     

Daring to Be Heard: Advertorials by Organized Interests on the Op-Ed Page of The New York Times , 1985-1998

Advertorials are a form of outside lobbying that organized interests use to influence policymakers and attentive publics. It is apparent from their popularity that organized interests consider them to be an effective form of political communication. This article analyzes 2,805 organized interest advertorials that appeared on the lower right quadrant of The New York Times op-ed page from 1985 to 1998. Advertorials take two broad forms: (a) image advertorials, which are paid messages by organized interests designed to create a favorable climate of opinion, and (b) advocacy advertorials, which are sponsored messages intended to win support for an interest's viewpoints on controversial issues. Typologies of advertorials (11 categories), organized interests (21 categories), corporate and noncorporate economic interests (29 categories), and policy content (28 categories) are used to document annually and over time who is sponsoring advertorials, what types of advertorials are being used, what interests avail themselves of advertorial campaigns, which issue areas are receiving attention, what images and policy messages are being communicated, which organizations sponsor the most advertorials, and the timing of such political advertising campaigns. We find over time an increasing number of advertorials, an increasing number and diversity of sponsoring interest organizations, an increasing trend toward advocacy advertorials, a continuing but declining sponsorship dominance by corporate interests, a shifting policy issue emphasis that corresponds to events in the political environment, and evidence that organized interests employ a variety of sponsorship strategies.     

The Dynamics of Diversion: The Domestic Implications of Presidential Use of Force

Several studies report evidence of diversionary behavior by presidents, while others dispute findings that suggest domestic politics are part of the use of force decision calculus. We argue that previous studies of U.S. force short of war have failed to articulate what diversion actually means. We approach this important debate from a perspective that brings to bear presidential agenda-setting theory. Rather than treating the use of force solely as a dependent variable, we assess whether the use of force diverts attention by modeling the percent of the American public identifying the economy as the nation's most important problem. We also include presidential approval in the model. We treat the public opinion measures as endogenous variables that may or may not affect the decision to use force. We employ Vector Autoregression (VAR) methods to evaluate the causal direction of force and public opinion while controlling for the state of the economy and war. VAR is a multiple-lagged time-series approach that allows us to test a variety of hypotheses derived from diversionary and agenda-setting theory. Our results indicate that uses of force by the president have a notable agenda-setting effect, shifting public attention away from the economy. The shift in attention also causes a long-term effect on the president's public-approval rating.     

中东变局与世界主要大国中东战略的调整——兼论中国的中东外交

中东地区历来是大国战略博弈的重点区域。自阿拉伯国家陷入群体性动荡以来,美国、欧洲、俄罗斯等大国或地区力量围绕中东变局纷纷进行政策与战略调整。美国中东战略调整的根本目标是既要避免类似伊拉克战争的深度卷入,又要保持对中东事务的主导权。欧盟尤其是法、英两国对中东变局的积极干预使欧洲对中东事务的影响明显增强,欧盟正力图确立统一的中东战略,但其内部分歧不容忽视。俄罗斯中东战略的核心特征是原则性与灵活性相结合的实用主义外交,并极力维护其地缘战略利益和能源利益。中国应进一步增强对中东战略地位的认识,冷静客观地认识中东变局对中国国际环境变化的影响,并在坚持原则的同时适度扩大对中东事务的参与。     

试论1954年中印总理、中缅总理的互访

朝鲜战争结束后,美国极力拉拢中国周边的亚洲国家组建针对中国的包围圈,为了应对这一情况,中国提出了建立“国际和平统一战线”的外交战略,1954年中印、中缅两国总理互访就是落实“国际和平统一战线”政策的重大举措。在互访过程中,中印、中缅共同提出了和平共处五项原则,中国领导人着力消除了印度、缅甸在华人华侨、边界问题、亚洲国家共产党以及中美关系等问题上的疑虑和担心,从而促进了中印、中缅两国关系,巩固了亚洲国家的中立倾向,为亚非会议的召开奠定了良好的基础。     

中欧国家媒体的“中国观”:基于媒体报道的分析

本文通过对一段时期内中欧四国(捷克、波兰、匈牙利、斯洛伐克)部分主流媒体涉华报道的主要内容、对华评价、信息来源、议题设置以及对双边关系的态度等进行指标分析发现,当前中欧四国媒体的中国观非常复杂:政治和社会文化议题呈现出明显的负面态度;经济上兼具正负两方面态度;在中美矛盾冲突日益激烈背景下,中欧国家媒体并没有出现“站队美国”的倾向;在科技领域,承认中国在网络技术和数字经济领域的进步和领先地位。中欧国家媒体中国观的一个重要出发点是在发展对华关系中获得实际利益,中国的国际影响力对本国会产生何种作用。中欧国家媒体中国观的形成是其各自国家利益、历史经验、价值观、舆情民意等多种因素互动作用的结果。本文从“议程设置论”角度探讨了中欧媒体中国观的呈现方式以及中欧媒体中国观的代表性问题,即媒体是反映本国精英的中国观还是大众的中国观。