Conspiracy and statecraft in postcolonial states: theories and realities of the hidden hand in Pakistan’s war on terror

This paper is a cautiously sympathetic treatment of conspiracy theory in Pakistan, relating it to Marxist theories of the state, structural functionalism and Machiavellian realism in international relations. Unlike moralising mainstream news reports describing terrorism in terms of horrific events and academic research endlessly lamenting the ‘failure’, ‘weakness’ and mendacity of the Pakistani state, conspiracy theory has much in common with realism in its cynical disregard for stated intentions and insistence on the primacy of inter-state rivalry. It contains a theory of the postcolonial state as part of a wider international system based on class-conspiracy, wedding imperial interests to those of an indigenous elite, with little concern for preserving liberal norms of statehood. Hence we consider some forms of conspiracy theory a layperson’s theory of the capitalist state, which seeks to explain history with reference to global and domestic material forces, interests and structures shaping outcomes, irrespective of political actors’ stated intentions. While this approach may be problematic in its disregard for intentionality and ideology, its suspicion of the notion that the ‘War on Terror’ should be read morally as a battle between states and ‘non-state actors’ is understandable – especially when technological and political-economic changes have made the importance of impersonal economic forces driving towards permanent war more relevant than ever.     

Playing in the sandbox: state building in the space of non-recognition

For unrecognised states in the international system recognition of sovereign statehood is the ultimate goal. Not being ‘a state’ means being excluded from global networks. However, even in the most basic definitions and criteria for unrecognised states there is a period of relative autonomy accorded due to non-recognition. This is a period when political actors can use isolation to establish the state’s narrative, identity and structure. It is this period that provides the foundations for external interaction. It is in this period that the state is born. This article examines another side to the politics of recognition: the politics of non-recognition. Drawing on the contemporary examples of Somaliland and Kurdistan, the article assesses the benefits as well as the costs of non-recognition.     

Taiwan's Quest for Independence: Progress on the Margins for Recognition of Statehood

This article describes many substantive transformations in politics, national self-identification, and economy Taiwan has undergone over the last decade and offers an alternative approach to expediting de jure state status. The transformations speak to significant progress ‘on the margins’ for attaining international recognition. The disjuncture between liberal democracies clinging to an antiquated ‘One-China’ foreign policy approach and the realties of the situation is widening. An alternative avenue to state recognition acknowledges advancements on the margins that justify Taiwan's recognition by others. At the same time, however, Taiwan must hold self-proclamation in abeyance until the breadth of recognition it receives becomes an irresistible force with which the PRC must reckon. The recent transformations coupled with mainland China's growing force projection capability indicate the time is ripe and appropriate to recognize Taiwan's statehood. The United States would be remiss in its avowed commitment and leadership responsibilities for democratic enlargement by not recognizing Taiwan.     

The resilient state: new regulatory modes in international approaches to state building?

‘Resilience’ has quickly risen to prominence in international security and development circles. In recent years it has found its way into political discourse on state building and state fragility, triggering a vast but often conceptually indistinct examination of the subject. Given its meaning in policy publications and guidelines, ‘resilience’ tends to eschew a static conceptualisation of statehood, turning instead to a more dynamic, complex and process-oriented rendering of state–society relations. This illustrates a conceptual shift from ‘failed states’ to ‘fragile states and situations’. It also transforms the concept of ‘failed state’ as a mere threat perception – with ‘stability’ as its logical other – into ‘fragility’ as a particular form of social and political risk. This paper analyses the concepts in 43 policy papers, focusing on the nexus of ‘resilience’ and ‘fragility’ in international state building, and assesses potential consequences. What does ‘resilience’ – as the opposite vision to ‘fragility’ – in fact mean? What is the practice derived from this chimerical state of states?     

Mass Violence and the Recognition of Kosovo: Suffering and Recognition

In instances of international negotiations over state recognition, the way the violence sustained by a given group is categorised becomes a critical factor in the international community's decision to support independence or not. This essay argues that the recognition of Kosovo in February 2008 was made possible by the use of justifications based on Kosovo Albanians' collective status as victims of ethnic cleansing. The essay bridges the gap between two bodies of literature that have not been used in conjunction up to now, namely normative theories of ‘remedial’ secession and works on the logic of mass violence against ethnically defined groups. It finds that the international community has used the ‘remedial argument’ for Kosovo's recognition because it allowed it to minimise the risk of further unilateral declarations of independence in a volatile region.     

Indonesia’s maritime connectivity development: domestic and international challenges

This study considers the political aspects of the Joko Widodo government’s megaproject to build an integrated marine logistic system known as the tol laut. Expanding the existing literature which gives details about the contextual obstacles faced by and the prospects for the Indonesian government to pursue its infrastructure ambitions, the study argues that notwithstanding the relevance of the tol laut for advancing the Indonesian economy, it is inevitably entangled with dynamic internal and external environments which can unfavourably distort the construction processes. This is the way of understanding the political economy of Indonesia’s development issues which allows for the juxtaposition of domestic political and international relations factors as its framework of analysis. The discussion is divided into four sections. Section one explains the conceptual and methodological foundation of the study. Section two outlines the importance of the tol laut to Indonesian national economic development. Section three looks at how the current domestic political settings pose structural hurdles to Widodo’s tol laut, and section four observes the effect of international relations of powerful regional actors and Jakarta’s diplomatic capacity to the on-going tol laut. The concluding section summarizes the findings of the study.     

世界国家的出现是否必然?——承认理论视角下的一种考察

冷战结束以后,西方学术界重新出现了一股研究世界政府或世界国家的热潮。其中,建构主义者亚历山大.温特开创性地将亚里士多德的"四因说"引入到世界国家的研究中。鉴于德国哲学家阿克塞尔.霍纳特的承认理论构成温特世界国家观的重要理论资源,可以从承认理论的框架下考察世界国家的出现是否如温特所说那样不可避免。通过比较温特世界国家观与霍纳特承认理论间的异同后,可以发现两者虽然在"四因说"几乎同构,但前者对后者做了重要的修正。然而,不论是两者之间的同构还是温特对承认理论的修正,都导致他有关"世界国家观的出现是必然的"这一结论无法成立。     

From state socialism to capitalism: The role of class and the world system

While theories of global capitalism have added a new dimension to our understanding of the dynamics of the modern world, a ‘globalisation’ approach to the transformation of the state socialist societies is relatively underdeveloped. This paper studies the role of international and global factors under state socialism and the world system in the pre-1989 period. The paper considers traditional Marxist approaches to the transition to capitalism and criticises the model of state capitalism as well as the world system approach. In contrast, social actors (the ‘acquisition’ and ‘administrative’ social strata and the global political elite)are identified as playing a major role in the fall of state socialism, and were a nascent capitalist class. The transformation of state socialism, it is contended, had the character of a revolution rather than a shift between different types of capitalism.     

The Concepts of State and Society in Defining Russia’s Domestic Political Unity: A Research Note

Abstract

Vladimir Putin’s long period in power has so far raised scant discussion about the political concepts that underpin real state and societal unity, and especially about the domestic political implications of these concepts. Despite this, key concepts of his political regime, such as ‘sovereignty’ and ‘sovereign democracy’, have frequently been used in Russian political discourse. This essay examines the way the current Russian administration has used concepts that stress strong societal unity, and the creation of a stable state and societal unity to support the development of real functioning dynamics in the society. It charts the shift from ‘sovereign democracy’ to ‘sovereignty’ around 2011–2012 as a key discursive concept in moving towards a more isolationist international stand and consolidating Putin’s power by emphasising Russia’s unique political tradition, which requires a strong leader as the basis of national unity and to ensure Russian sovereignty.     

Post-hegemony and Gramsci: a bridge too far?

This article expands upon the theory of post-hegemony so as to maintain the multitude as an operative political category alongside the State. Ironically, it does so by returning to Antonio Gramsci. It argues that the multitude – or, for Gramsci ‘civil society’ – is constitutive of statal politics in two specific ways: (1) the multitude as a constitutive outside or alterity that the State carries; and (2) constitutive in its positivity, as a productive immanence that affects the social field from which the State is drawn. This relationship of constituent participation – not representation – is demonstrated by investigating changes in politics-as-usual in Venezuela.     

Introduction

Central Eastern Europe (further CEE) has been thoroughly reconstructed during nearly a quarter of century since the fall of the Berlin wall and the end of the cold war. The CEE countries turned to the West for economic and technological advancement, for political and administrative models as well as for protection. The authors coming from eight different countries look at the place and role of the former member states of the Warsaw Pact in the new European and international constellation. This concept of CEE includes most pro-western states of the former ‘Eastern block’: the four countries of Central Europe (Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary) and the Baltic states (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia). There were many tumultuous political developments in and around the region within the last decade, and especially during the last five years when the financial crisis started to take its toll. While the Atlantic link of Central and Eastern Europe is still strong, many commentators have pointed out its wearing strategic meaning. The balance between the focus on the USA and the EU has shifted in favour of Europe. However, this shift has rather been an incomplete one due to the region's own political and economic problems. The aim of this special issue is to analyse the new constellation by looking at the CEE countries themselves, at their ability to react and adapt, produce sound political strategies and act on as national actors: through bilateral ties, regional co-operation, NATO and the EU. Also, the main external actors - the USA, Russia and Germany - are looked at as they directly influence the way how the CEE countries shape their policies.     

Governance and disorder: neoliberalism and violent change in Jamaica

Structural adjustment policies (SAPs) facilitate the hollowing out of the traditional roles performed by states. As a consequence, private entities (some perverse) offer services the state is incapable of or unwilling to provide. Beginning in the 1980s, SAPs plunged neighbourhoods in Latin America and the Caribbean into socioeconomic, and political disorder. This paper assesses the relationship between neoliberal reforms to the Jamaican state and the metamorphosis of violence since the mid-1980s. Neoliberalism transformed violence in Jamaica by increasing inter-gang conflicts, shootings and gang-related murders in Kingston’s garrisons. It also transformed political enforcers into community dons who use violence as a tool for business transactions in the international drug trade, and as a method of gaining local respect and authority.     

Dynamics of democratization and nationalization: the significance of women’s suffrage and women’s political participation in parliament in the Second Polish Republic

This paper will examine processes of democratization and “nationalization” with specific reference to the Second Polish Republic (II Rzeczpospolita) and the interwar period. Starting from a consideration of broader theoretical concepts concerning transformation processes and their relation to the analytical categories of gender and ethnicity, it will discuss the introduction of political rights for women in 1918 as a case study for the role women’s suffrage played in the process of democratization. A closer examination of the activity of three selected female members of parliament – a Polish, Jewish, and Ukrainian MP – in the Polish parliament will help to clarify if and how gender and ethnicity mattered in political institutions. It is argued that especially their speeches, by addressing specifically political demands in a certain way, that is, how they spoke in the name of their sex, nation, and ethnicity, show a close interlinkage between democratization and nationalization during the Second Polish Republic. From this will emerge a more general outlook on the extent to which the recognition of women’s suffrage molded the basis for equality between women and men, and if the legally guaranteed equality really included all citizens of the Polish state.     

Co-opting Good Governance Reform: The Rise of a Not-so-Reformist Leader in Kebumen,Central Java

Challenging the existing literature, which tends to downplay the impact of good governance reform in post-Suharto Indonesia, the article suggests that greater intervention by international donors, combined with the process of decentralisation, has influenced the dynamics of political competition at the local level. It suggests that the increasing availability of international aid has provided local elites with an option to engage in a new form of patronage politics that relies less on old instruments, such as money politics and violence. By selectively committing themselves to good governance reform, Indonesian local elites can now seek a new source of power in the form of support from international donors, with which they can raise their profiles as ‘reformists’ and consolidate power, only to engage in familiar, if less blatant, forms of patronage politics. The article highlights such a dimension of local politics with reference to the case of Kebumen's former regent, Rustriningsih.     

Reframing the rising powers debate: state transformation and foreign policy

Abstract

The volume that we introduce breaks with the prevalent tendency in International Relations (IR) scholarship to treat rising powers (such as China, Russia, India and Brazil) as unitary actors in international politics. Although a neat demarcation of the domestic and international domains, on which the notion of unitary agency is premised, has always been a myth, these states’ uneven integration into the global political economy has eroded this perspective’s empirical purchase considerably. Instead, this collection advances the concept of ‘state transformation’ as a useful lens through which to examine rising power states’ foreign policymaking and implementation. State transformation refers to the pluralisation of cross-border state agency via contested and uneven processes of fragmentation, decentralisation and internationalisation of state apparatuses. The volume demonstrates the significance of state transformation processes for explaining some of these states’ most important foreign policy agendas, and outlines the implications for the wider field in IR.     

Oligarchic rule and best practice migration management: the political economy origins of labour migration regime of the Philippines

The Philippine labour migration regime has been praised as one of the best examples of government-led migration management in the developing world, with some of the most extensive policies and bureaucratic organisations to manage and protect its citizens working abroad. However, not much knowledge has been accumulated that explains its origins or why it emerged in the Philippines and not in other large-scale migrant-sending countries. Contrary to current explanations that emphasise the economic benefits of labour migration and civil society mobilisation, this paper highlights the migration regime's compatibility with the political economy interests of the country's ruling elites. Bringing together the country's two important political and economic features, oligarchic rule and labour export, this paper suggests that the unique genesis of the Philippines’ migration regime casts doubts on the replicability of the Philippine model in other labour-sending countries as currently pursued by the international development community.     

The Consociational System of Democracy in Kosovo: Questioning Ethnic Minorities' Special Status in Kosovo's Constitutional Regime

This article examines the constitutional position of ethnic minorities in Kosovo, the individual features, and the key protection mechanisms applied therein. At the outset, the article provides a general introduction to the topic, illustrating the character of Kosovo's state model. Subsequently, it builds upon the view that Kosovo was shaped under an international supervision, which aimed to establish a state freed from mono-ethnicity, which is regarded as both multi-ethnic and a state of citizens. The article proceeds to explain the institutional mechanisms established with the objective to protect and uphold the ethnic minorities’ position at both central and local levels. Furthermore, it discusses the affirmative human rights law standards granted to ethnic minorities—both at personal and collective levels. The article concludes by suggesting that the constitution of Kosovo provides for a broad degree of self-rule to ethnic minorities, which, in turn, provides them with the capacity to enjoy a rather constitutive position as regards the essential components of the polity.     

Corruption in post-conflict Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo: a deal among friends

Since the late 1990s international state builders have paid increasing attention to fighting corruption in both Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo. On the surface this effort has brought significant results, since both countries have adopted legal frameworks modelled on the best practices of Western democracies. In practice, however, corruption remains rampant. This disappointing outcome has several explanations: in reviewing the empirical evidence we consider the two countries as cases involving heavily assisted transition from both socialism and war, highlighting how collusive practices between political and criminal interests have played a role in establishing formally liberal but substantively ‘hybrid’ institutions. We argue that the spread of corruption has been implicitly legitimised by international actors, who have pressured local parties to accept the formal architecture of good governance, including anti-corruption legislation, while turning a blind eye to those extra-legal structures and practices perceived as functional to political stability.