African peasants and revolution

The last thirteen years have seen important peasant uprisings in Angola, Guiné and Mozambique, conflicts which must be judged to some extent within the context of traditional colonial wars. Although the influence of events in neighbouring countries and urban notions of freedom and nationalism is undeniable, it is argued that these struggles reveal the rising trend of ‘modern’ resistance and its final dependence on mass participation by local communities conscious of their particular oppressions and fighting together to overcome them. The role of such revolutionary movements as the MPLA has been to organise and guide rebellions which would have occurred spontaneously if less successfully without them.     

Evaluating development assistance: A review of the literature

Three phases of development of the subject of evaluation are identified. Up to 1979 it was still in its infancy, with the main impetus coming from the USA (the World Bank and US AID), and from one or two large UN organizations, although the OECD also did some useful work in bringing evaluators together. The second phase (1979-1984) saw rapid ‘take-off’, with greatly increased resources going into evaluation work, and a veritable ‘explosion’ of interest worldwide. All the main donors had by now set up evaluation units and were amassing enough material to begin to ‘synthesize’ the findings. The OECD provided a focus and a forum through its Expert Group on Aid Evaluation. The third phase, from 1984 onwards, finds the subject having ‘come of age’, its maturity being marked by the publication of major works such as Cassen's Does Aid Work?. The emphasis now is switching from ex-post evaluation towards improving project design through such techniques as the logical framework.     

The decline in sexual assaults in men's prisons in New South Wales: a "systems" approach

Male prison rape and sexual assaults remains a serious and sensitive issue in many countries. Human rights groups claim that sexual assaults among male prisoners have reached pandemic proportions and need to be stopped. Researchers for many years have studied the causes of male sexual assault in prison and offered numerous recommendations on its prevention. Few, however, have presented evidence for a decline in male prisoner sexual assaults and investigated the reasons for the decline. This article provides evidence from population-based surveys of a steady decrease in male prisoner sexual assaults in New South Wales (NSW) between 1996 and 2009. The authors conducted in-depth interviews with former and current inmates, and using a "systems" approach they discuss the complexity of sexual assaults in prison, incorporating a multiplicity of perspectives. In particular, they bring together different sources of data and discuss this in relation to changes in power structures and control in a modern prison, the attitudes of older and younger prisoners, the concept of "duty of care," introduction of prison drug programs, and prisoner attitudes toward gender and sexuality. In anthropology, the term "system" is used widely for describing sociocultural phenomena of a given society in a holistic manner without reducing the complexity of a given community.     

Citizenship education and the challenge of racism,discrimination and disadvantage

The idea behind citizenship education is that it will help both to integrate the demands of justice, equality and community and to prevent the increasing apathy towards politics and government, which may damage the health and stability of a modern liberal democracy. The recent British Report on Education for Citizenship and the Teaching of Democracy in Schools (the Crick Report) can be seen as a response to those concerns. This article discusses these concerns and offers an evaluation of the main recommendations of the Crick Report from the perspective of ethnic minorities and disadvantaged groups. If citizenship education as defined by the Crick Report is intimately linked to ideas of entitlement, justice and tolerance of difference, would such an education help students to acquire the necessary knowledge and understanding, skills and dispositions to tackle racism, discrimination and disadvantage? An incisive education must help to remove social, racial and sex barriers that prevent some citizens from enjoying their full citizenship rights. This article offers some critical general conceptual perspectives that aim to help inform teachers thinking about those issues.     

The EU's security and the sea: defining a maritime security strategy

Abstract

This article comprehensively discusses the maritime dimension of the European Union's (EU's) security, which encompasses military and civilian aspects, intergovernmental and community components as well as institutional and geopolitical elements. First, the article provides a narrative of the development of the maritime element in the EU's security policy since the adoption of the European Security Strategy in 2003. By depicting the interrelations between the sea and the EU's security, the article shows that the maritime dimension of EU security is generally well established, but often obscured by the complicated institutional structure of the Union. Thereafter, the article emphasises the need to define an effective EU Maritime Security Strategy, which would provide a strategic framework for the Union's security-related activities regarding the sea that encompass maritime power projection, as well as maritime security and safety. Accordingly the article provides some recommendations concerning the definition of such a strategy and for appropriate constituting elements: the maritime-related risks and threats, the maritime strategic objectives, the means to implement the strategy, and the theatres of EU maritime operations.