Responding to radical populism: Chavismo in Venezuela

What are the effective ways of responding to populists, especially radical populists in government? The pessimistic answer provided by Chavismo is that little can be done; most of the negative impact of highly populist movements cannot be avoided in the short to medium term. The reasons lie not only in Venezuela's unique oil-based economy, but in the country's previous failures of democratic governance, a condition shared by many developing countries. Such failures make it likely that radical populists will receive broad popular support. This does not suggest that international actors cannot play a useful role in responding to populism. But the most viable democratic strategy is a long-term one emphasizing patient efforts by domestic opponents to reorganize themselves into programmatic, pluralist options for the future.     

Building civil society in Lao PDR: the Decree on Associations

Since 2006, international organisations in Lao PDR have worked closely with local actors in order to foster the creation of an enabling environment for civil society. By conceiving of civil society development as a system involving a number of closely-connected actors and levels, international actors have been able to contribute to both the adoption of a Decree on Associations, which for the first time in Lao history regulates the civil society sector, and to the organisational strengthening of the few existing domestic organisations. This paper evaluates the impact of international actors' initiatives and assesses civil society's prospects for engaging in human rights work.     

Revisiting DDR in Liberia: exploring the power,agency and interests of local and international actors in the ‘making’ and ‘unmaking’ of combatants

The understanding that disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) programmes are essential in helping to prevent war recurrence in post-conflict situations is at the heart of current international aid practice and the academic literature on peacekeeping and stabilisation. However DDR programmes are often launched on the basis of untested assumptions. This article considers the DDR programme in Liberia and analyses the complex relationship between the programmatic efforts to disarm and reintegrate combatants and the programme's actual effects. If we are to understand how DDR works as a tool of post-conflict governance, it is essential to explore the mechanisms of authority and power at stake. The focus is therefore not on whether combatants were successfully disarmed and reintegrated, but rather on exploring unfolding processes and the field of forces within which DDR programmes are implemented. It critically assesses the ideas of disarmament and reintegration and the basic assumptions behind current DDR policy through an analysis of the Liberian case, emphasising the agency and interests of local and international actors in the ‘making’ and ‘unmaking’ of combatants.     

Changing the Rules of the Game: Comparing FIFA/UEFA and EU Attempts to Promote Reform of Power-Sharing Institutions in Bosnia-Herzegovina

This article compares two international attempts to promote reform of power-sharing institutions in Bosnia-Herzegovina: failed European Union-led efforts to promote reform of the country's constitution, which was established by the 1995 Dayton Agreement; and the recent successful reform of Bosnia-Herzegovina's institutions of football governance, promoted by the game's international and European governing bodies, FIFA and UEFA. The article outlines the history of these two reform processes and seeks to explain why FIFA and UEFA have been more successful in promoting reform in this post-conflict setting than the EU. It argues that, in contrast to the EU, which has been vague about the precise reforms expected of Bosnia-Herzegovina's politicians, leaving the details to be negotiated by domestic political elites, FIFA and UEFA were more precise in their demands and were also willing to capitalise on popular frustration with the governance of the sport and to bypass nationalist elites who stood in the way of reform.     

al Qaeda and Global Governance: When Ideology Clashes With Political Expediency

In recent years, statements by al Qaeda leaders have included references to topics often associated with global-governance proponents’ critique of the state. This article examines the organization's attitude toward symbols of global governance, giving particular attention to its view of the United Nations as the foundation for global governance, and to the manner in which al Qaeda approaches the central questions of environmental threats and human rights. The organization is seeking to insert itself into the discourse of global governance and use it in an instrumental manner; it focuses on anti-Western narrative and seeks to expose the existing order as designed by Western powers, particularly the United States, for self-serving reasons. However, the article argues, notwithstanding al Qaeda's reputation for sophistication in manipulating public opinion, the organization's references to global governance underscore the limitations its rigid ideology imposes on its messaging efforts. Even though adopting the global governance discourse is in line with the group's effort to improve its image, al Qaeda's extremist ideology limits its ability to take full advantage of the benefits this discourse offers.     

International Disorder and China's Strategic Thoughts

Since the 2008 international financial crisis,international political and economic disorder has become obvious.Major reasons are the decline of US-led Western developed economies' global influence;US and other Western countries inaction or ineffective actions;power diffusion allowing non-state actors to intervene;a global governance short of needed rules;and mainstream economic theory's overemphasis on market roles.International disorder is a long-term process posing a potential threat to China' s national interests.The situation challenges China to create an international economic and trade order,thereby shaping itself as prophet of global free trade,shaper of international economic and trade rules,and trendsetter for globalization.     

The internal–external security nexus and EU police/rule of law missions in the Western Balkans

Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) police/rule of law missions in the Western Balkans are increasingly guided by externally imposed normative agendas that respond primarily to EU internal security needs rather than functional imperatives or local realities. In line with these needs, EU police reform efforts tend to prioritise effectiveness and crime fighting over longer- term democratic policing and good governance reforms. In practice this means that police reform initiatives are technocratically oriented, yet value ridden fitting EU security concerns and needs. As a result, the police reform process can be—and often is—disconnected from the political and socio-economic reforms necessary for long-term stability and sustainable peace. Police assistance in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been shaped by a determined albeit questionable focus on organised crime and corruption. The focus of EU police reform in Macedonia on primarily crime-fighting aspects of policing has compromised thefunctioning of the Macedonian police. Similarly, the politics of (non-)recognition of Kosovo's self-proclaimed independence and the intrusiveness of EULEX Kosovo's executive mandate contravene meeting local challenges.     

Delegating Terror: Principal–Agent Based Decision Making in State Sponsorship of Terrorism

State sponsorship of terrorism, where a government deliberately provides resources and material support to a terrorist organization, is common in the international system. Sponsorship can provide significant strategic and political benefits for a state, but there are inherent international and domestic risks associated with delegating foreign policy to these actors. Using principal–agent analysis, I develop a model that evaluates the impact of potential costs and benefits on a state’s decision to sponsor terrorism. I test my model by using a novel dataset on sponsorship behaviors that ranges from 1970 to 2008. The results of my analysis support the validity of the principal–agent model in explaining sponsorship, as states will be more likely to engage in sponsorship when the strategic benefits of weakening the targeted state are high and the risks of international reputation loss and domestic dissatisfaction are low.     

Is Democracy Promotion Effective? Comparing Conditionality and Incentives

Many studies suggest that conditionality is a more effective democracy promotion strategy (DPS) than incentives. This paper confirms the validity of this hypothesis by demonstrating that conditional pre-accession political reforms, required from the eastern and central European applicants by the European Union, have substantially progressed from 1998, while the impact of incentives democratic aid programmes carried out by donors since l994 has proved to be either very modest or non-existent. Then it explains these unequal performances by synthesizing insights provided by the analysis of both DPS processes of implementation, interviews conducted with the European Union Eastern Enlargement negotiators and literature devoted to democratic aid programmes, international co-operation and compliance of states with international institutions norms and rules. On the whole, the study challenges the endogeneous theory of comparative politics according to which 'democracy is a domestic affair par excellence'.     

The domestication of governance assessments: evidence from the Rwandan Joint Governance Assessment

In this paper, I consider the strengths and weaknesses of including local actors in governance assessments through an analysis of the Rwandan Joint Governance Assessment (JGA) and its supporting institutions. The JGA is the first and only governance assessment produced and approved by donors and a recipient country. The approach is seen by many as a model to replicate elsewhere, because it combines donors' need to assess governance in the countries in which they work with a desire for context sensitivity and local ownership. However, local and/or joint approaches may also face a variety of problems ranging from implementation difficulties to the risk of political co-optation. The case study presented in this paper highlights the practical and political challenges faced during the implementation of the JGA and analyses to what extent these have the potential to compromise the approach. For both the donors and the recipient government, the process represents unknown terrain in which they continually struggle to position themselves. The findings also point to more general problems that can arise when international frameworks are embedded in local contexts.     

Applying the security-development nexus on the ground: land restitution in Colombia

The general consensus on the security-development nexus is that both are key to achieving sustainable peace in war-torn societies. However, this debate has largely taken place among international actors, with little empirical evidence about how security and development relate to each other or are even considered by local actors. The current paper applies the security-development nexus to the case of land restitution in Colombia. Following decades of internal armed conflict, in 2012 the national government passed sweeping land restitution legislation amid ongoing violence. Through in-depth interviews and focus groups with multiple actors involved in this process, ranging from international organisations to national government units, from regional institutions to local communities, the paper analyses the objectives, impact, challenges and opportunities for land restitution related to security and development. Undermining peace-building, a lack of coherence in the integration of security and development priorities limits the extent to which either supports, or is promoted by, land restitution efforts in Colombia. The paper concludes with reflections on how the security-development nexus may promote peace-building amid ongoing conflict.     

From self-reliant churches to self-governing communities: comparing the indigenization of Christianity and democracy in sub-Saharan Africa

Christian missionaries, especially from Anglo-American Protestant denominations, have been remarkably successful in their effort to plant ‘self-propagating, self-supporting, self-governing’ churches throughout the world and especially in sub-Saharan Africa. Today's international non-governmental organizations and inter-governmental organizations engaged in development, humanitarian assistance, peace-building and human rights resemble ‘secular missionaries’ spreading their gospel of democracy, good governance, peace, justice and sustainable development. This article investigates the extent to which today's secular missionaries might learn from the indigenization of Christianity in sub-Saharan Africa. I conclude that an essential ingredient in the missionary strategy of evangelization is conspicuously absent in contemporary programmes of development, democratization, or peace-building. In particular, the extensive efforts devoted by Protestant missionaries to the translation of their Biblical message into local languages and symbolic repertoires bear little resemblance to efforts to transplant Western ideals of universal human rights or the institutional templates of democratic governance first developed in the United States and Western Europe.     

Foreign policy begins at home: the local origin of support for US democracy promotion

ABSTRACT

Citizens hold opinions about what kinds of foreign policy their government should pursue. Because foreign policy often has geographically specific domestic consequences, we expect opinions to vary with the locality of its impact. In this article, we examine whether individual support for US foreign policy to promote democracy abroad depends on exactly where the policy’s domestic impact will occur. We expect individuals to favor policies that bestow local benefits while opposing those that impose local costs. Accordingly, we argue that support for proposed democracy aid grants will be higher when such aid benefits local firms and organizations. Conversely, we expect that opposition to proposed economic sanctions in the form of development aid cuts will be higher when the associated domestic costs stemming from lost jobs fall locally. Using the results from an original survey experiment, we find evidence that a positive local impact of aid increases support for and reduces opposition to democracy promotion, while a negative local impact of sanctions reduces indifference and increases opposition to punitive policy in the case of democratic backsliding.     

Economic Sanctions,Poverty, and International Terrorism: An Empirical Analysis

This study examines the impact of economic sanctions on international terrorism. It is argued that sanctions intensify economic hardships on the poor within countries and this increases their level of grievance and makes them more likely to support or engage in international terrorism. Further, economic sanctions are conceptualized as creating an opportunity for rogue leaders to manipulate aggrieved poor people to terrorize foreign entities who are demonized as engaging in a foreign encroachment on the sanctioned nation's sovereignty. A cross-sectional, time-series data analysis of 152 countries for the past three decades provides evidence that ceteris paribus, economic sanctions are positively associated with international terrorism. This finding suggests that, although the main purpose of economic sanctions is to coerce rogue countries to conform to international norms and laws, they can unintentionally produce a negative ramification and become a cause of international terrorism.     

Human Security and Constructivism

This article explores the concept of "human security" as an academic and fledgling policy movement that seeks to place the individual—or people collectively—as the referent of security. It does this against a background of evolving transnational norms relating to security and governance, and the development of scientific understanding that challenges orthodox conceptions of security. It suggests that human security is not a coherent or objective school of thought. Rather, there are different, and sometimes competing, conceptions of human security that may reflect different sociological/cultural and geostrategic orientations. The article argues that the emergence of the concept of human security—as a broad, multifaceted, and evolving conception of security—rreflects the impact of values and norms on international relations. It also embraces a range of alliances, actors, and agendas that have taken us beyond the traditional scope of international politics and diplomacy. As a demonstration of change in international relations, of evolving identities and interests, this is best explained with reference to "social constructivist" thought, in contradistinction with the structural realist mainstream of international relations. In a constructivist vein, the article suggests that empirical research is already building a case in support of human security thinking that is, slowly, being acknowledged by decision-makers, against the logic of realist determinism.     

‘Growth oriented’ corporate governance reform – can it solve Japan's performance puzzle?

Abstract

Recent governance reforms in Japan aim at promoting ‘the establishment of an environment that supports appropriate risk-taking by the senior management.’ The article evaluates the reforms on the basis of two questions: do the reforms tackle the right issues? And will they be effective? The Japanese economy faces indeed a performance puzzle. Despite Japan's strong efforts in the field of research and development, its excellent work force and abundant financial capital, the economy is performing poorly in terms of productivity. The performance puzzle seems to be closely related to the way large Japanese companies are governed, namely by boards filled with internally promoted lifetime employees. However, the correlation between board composition and performance is spurious. Both are influenced by a third factor, which manifests itself in the predominance of in-house careers. In-house careers determine the composition of boards and have, over the last twenty years, had a negative impact on economic performance. The governance reforms do not address the root of Japan's performance puzzle. They may nevertheless provide an important stimulus for redesigning the way Japanese corporations recruit, train and promote future leaders.     

The structure of the international telecommunications regime in transition: A network analysis of international organizations 1

This paper examines the structure of the international telecommunications regime in terms of networks of social interaction and institutional affiliation among international actors. Social interaction and overlapping membership data of 69 international telecommunications organizations in the Yearbook of International Organizations 1994/1995 are analyzed to describe the social structure of the international telecommunications system through network analysis. The analysis reveals a center‐periphery structure with the Western industrial countries at the center and the less developed countries at the periphery. The international telecommunications system is also regionally structured suggesting influence by geopolitical and cultural proximity. The results indicate that inter‐governmental global organizations such as the ITU and UNESCO play intermediate and coordinating roles at the central linking‐pin positions (or cut‐points) in the international telecommunications regime. In summary, this research shows that transitional trends in international telecommunications have affected the interaction patterns of international actors.     

Ideas and interests in global financial governance: comparing German and US preference formation

Financial crises underline the necessity for more effective global governance. Despite the creation of the Basel II Accord, no agreement has been reached on the reform of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Why do governments only selectively agree to reform global governance? I argue that convergence and divergence of governmental positions cannot be explained solely by the logic of the international system, institutions or globalization. Instead, they strongly reflect domestic ideas and interests. Furthermore, the ability of governments to compromise internationally is influenced by the different impact of domestic ideas and interests. With regard to their prevalence in domestic preference formation, ideas prevail when governance affects lobby groups diffusely and poses fundamental questions on the role of politics in governing the economy. Interests prevail when lobby groups are affected directly and new governance concerns a specific distribution of costs. These arguments are tested on the preference formation of the United States and German governments on the IMF and Basel II.     

Governing failure: development,aid and audit in Haiti

This paper analyses practices for monitoring, tracking and assessing the international aid and reconstruction efforts in Haiti in an attempt to ‘build back better’ from the devastation of the January 2010 earthquake. We suggest that aid and reconstruction efforts filter through an international network of development organisations. This network also acts as a governing auspice, overseeing the transformation of Haiti from a ‘failed state’ to a strong democratic state. The central governing mechanism in this reconstruction effort involves the embedding of the ideas and practices of audit within Haitian political and civic culture. We reveal how, in Haiti, this culture of audit monitors aid and reconstruction through biopolitical technologies such as benchmarks and performance indicators, and through the constitution of calculable and accountable entities. More than a means of implementing disaster recovery, audit culture is a technique of biopolitical governance that aims to transform Haiti's state, civic institutions and citizens into entities accountable to an international development agenda.     

Socio-political tensions in Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) development in low-income Asian cities

International development agencies, with the help of the central government, support building state of art Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) in low-income Asian cities. However, BRT investment over indigenous modes of mobility is creating socio-political tensions at the local level. This article uses multi-level governance as a theoretical lens to examine the relationships among actors in BRT investment decisions in Bandung and Surabaya, Indonesia. The research finds that local stakeholders can distort national and supranational policy initiatives totally or in a way that while projects are delivered, they are of limited use to the local communities they intended to help.