中东石油的新时代与新石油时代的中东

中东再次出现新的"石油繁荣",被称为"新石油时代"。中东油气业已形成较完整的产业链,改变了昔日单一出口原油的局面。20世纪70年代油价高涨是对在这之前国际石油垄断资本长期强加的超低油价的补偿,存在与外国资本之间的对抗;而这一次"新石油时代"则主要靠石油经济实力的支撑,随着经济的全球化,与外国资本之间的关系也已有所改变。评价高油价需扣除美元贬值的因素。20世纪"高油价—经济滞涨—石油供过于求—油价回跌"局面不会简单重复。政治仍然是影响中东油气业发展的重要因素。     

时代的变迁和新中国外交

进入21世纪后,国际形势与格局发生了深刻的变化,中国外交也面临着新的机遇与挑战。本文以时间为线索,回顾了20世纪出现的国际社会主旋律与现象。同时,本文深入洞析了冷战后国际社会依旧不稳定的原因。结合时代的变迁,中国外交在坚持既往政策的同时,也须审时度势,认清形势,调动积极因素,为世界的持久繁荣与和平作出贡献。     

The Effect of Age Structure on the Abrogation of Military Alliances

Scholars of alliance politics have ignored a potentially important factor that shapes foreign policy: the age structure of a state. In this article, we argue that an alliance member is more likely to terminate the alliance in violation of the terms when the state’s youth ratio is high. The demographic pressure of a high youth ratio raises potential for political instability domestically, which in turn increases the risk of radical foreign policy changes. We demonstrate the effects of a state’s age structure on its alliance policy by examining alliance termination by violation from 1950 to 2000. Through quantitative analysis, we find that youth ratio is a strong and significant predictor of alliance abrogation. A brief examination of several examples illustrates two paths by which the pressure created by a high youth ratio contributes to political instability and results in alliance abrogation—leadership change that brings about a new foreign policy and appeasement of the population through abrogation of an unpopular alliance.     

The Sovereignty of Nature? Environmental Protection in a Postmodern Age

Recent postmodern international relations (IR) scholarship threatens to undermine global environmental protection efforts. Global environmental protection is fundamentally about conserving and preserving nature. It involves safeguarding the quality of the earth's air, water, soil, and other species. Postmodern critics have shown, however, that "nature" is not simply a given, physical object but a social construction—an entity that assumes meaning within various cultural contexts and is fundamentally unknowable outside of human categories of understanding. This criticism raises significant challenges for global environmental politics. How can societies protect the nonhuman world if the very identity of that enterprise is cast into doubt? How can states cooperate to protect nature if the meaning of the term is socially and historically contingent? This article argues that postmodern criticisms of "nature" do not undermine global environmental protection efforts—as many IR scholars suggest—but rather provide their own guidelines for practice. Postmodernists value the so-called "other"; they aim to give voice to the poor, oppressed, and otherwise disadvantaged in an attempt to limit hegemonic tendencies of the powerful. The article calls on postmodernist IR scholars to take their own concerns seriously and stand up for the paradigmatic "other," the nonhuman world in all its abundance and diversity. It calls on postmodern IR scholars to extend their concern for the "other" to the realm of plants, animals, landscapes, and so forth, and work to protect the radical "otherness" of the so-called natural world. The article, in other words, uses postmodern criticism against itself to ground commitment to global environmental protection.     

The Lonely Citizen: Indirect Representation in an Age of Networks

This article explores what it means to be represented and how the nature of representation might change in an age of networks. Citizens' perceptions of political connection and disconnection are examined on the basis of quantitative and qualitative surveys. A typology of political connection is presented and then expanded on the basis of the discussion of four potentially democratizing characteristics of digital information and communication technologies.     

The Age of Anxiety: The Crisis of Liberal Democracy in a Post-Hegemonic Global Order

The crisis of liberal democracy is closely associated with major global shifts, which have been accelerated by the global financial crisis of 2008, with its dislocating effects in the established democracies of the global centre. Relative stagnation and rising problems of inequality and unemployment, coupled with additional shocks in the form of mass migration and terrorist attacks have generated fertile grounds for the rise of right-wing radical populist sentiments, which have been turned into electoral advantage by charismatic leaders. The crisis of liberal democracy is also a global phenomenon in the sense that liberal democracy has been severely challenged by the rise of strategic models of capitalism, notably its authoritarian version represented by the growing power and influence of the China-Russia coalition. Indeed, the success of the latter has served as a kind of reference for many authoritarian or hybrid regimes in a changing global context, at a time when the key Western powers appear to be losing their previous economic and moral appeal.     

后冷战时代阿拉伯君主制和王权的走向

中东是当今世界君主制政权最集中的地区,伊斯兰教与部落和家族传统是阿拉伯君主制和王权存续的两大基本元素.后冷战时代,阿拉伯君主国的王位继承和君主制受到内外挑战.各君主国在不变更君主制和王权统治的前提下实施了一系列变革与改良,其主要内容包括:完善王位继承制;强化君主制构架及其治理机制;实施"亲民政策",营造宽松的政治局面等.这些变革和改良在一定程度上顺应了时代潮流,并为君主国的政治发展提供了新动力.但由于诸多局限,阿拉伯君主国向民主化政治的演变将是一个长期、复杂、渐进的过程.     

生物安全时代：新生物科技变革与国家安全治理

科技进步改进了人类对天然生物危害因子的操控能力,在诱发新的生物安全危害形态的同时,也赋予了生物安全客体的源头难以追溯性、生物安全主体的多元性、生物安全危害演变机理的复杂性等特点。生物安全在很大程度上体现了非传统安全的非传统特点。随着生物科技与生物安全在推动人类社会发展进程的作用日益显著,21世纪或将成为生物安全的时代。新一轮生物科技变革及其与人类社会互动衍生的生物安全问题,已经逐渐触及人类安全观念和现代文明的内源性危机或挑战。全面提升国家生物安全能力、优化国家生物安全治理,不仅是世界各国的战略选择,也是对人类科技文明与政治文明的新探索。     

金正日时代经济决策趋向及改革问题

金正日时代的经济政策具有"原则"和"实利"的二元化特征,反映了金正日政权在"安全"和"民生"两难选择中举棋不定的矛盾心理.然而,为追求"实利"而推行的新一轮经济改革,实际上已经超出了传统体制所能容纳的范畴.由此引发的一系列社会变化,为今后改革的深入提供了新的机遇.本文对金正日时代经济决策趋向、朝鲜经济领域发生的变化、存在的问题以及面临的挑战和机遇进行了分析.     

China's Foreign Policy Comes of Age

Although China has acquired new weight in world affairs, its foreign policy is driven primarily by domestic considerations. This is true of China's approach to international norms, where it largely resists the case for humanitarian intervention as accepted by most of the international community. The Chinese government still adheres to the doctrine of non-interference, albeit with some flexibility, when its prestige as a responsible great power may be at stake. Its management of regional security issues is conducted with a wary eye to the intense nationalism evident among the educated young at home. China's deepening economic interdependence with the outside world is raising new problems for China and its main trading partners as their respective societies become more deeply engaged with each other.     

Transnational Dialogue in an Age of Terror

11 September led many people to dismiss the prospects for a meaningful dialogue between Islam and the West. This article argues that the terrorist attacks against the United States also created the potential for a new kind of dialogue by initiating a virtually unprecedented issue-specific global public sphere focused on the question of the relations between Islam and the West. It draws on Habermas to consider the potential for dialogue under contemporary conditions. By examining the constructivist foundations of both Islamist and neoconservative approaches to international politics, this article posits both a demand for and an important potential supply for a meaningful dialogue. In particular, it discusses the intense and important public arguments within the Islamic world about the concept of dialogue and its political possibilities. It focuses upon the internal arguments between moderates and extremists on both sides, and considers how dialogue (or its absence) can change the terms of the interaction by breaking the monopoly over representation claimed by – and too often granted to – radicals.     

Nuclear Turbulence in the Age of Trump

The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons has served as the normative anchor of global nuclear orders since 1968. Remarkably successful with respect to peaceful uses of nuclear energy and non-proliferation, it has failed to achieve nuclear disarmament. In 2017, geopolitical tensions had intensified in several regions across the world; there were no nuclear arms control negotiations between any of the nuclear-armed states and two of the leaders of countries with nuclear weapons appeared volatile and unpredictable. With fewer warheads but spread amongst more countries, some in conflict-prone regions, nuclear risks and threats have grown, as has the realisation that the world lacks the capacity to cope with the humanitarian consequences of nuclear war. Like-minded states and civil society advocates teamed up to heighten the consciousness of nuclear dangers and convened a United Nations-mandated conference to negotiate a prohibition treaty adopted on 7 July. In the ensuing bifurcated global nuclear order, it has become necessary to reconcile latent tensions between the two nuclear regimes, for example with regard to safeguards standards, institutional linkages, and enforcement agencies.     

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.     

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.