The Relations of the Central Asian Republics of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan with Israel

Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan became independent upon the breakup of the Soviet Union. Neither of these republics developed strong nationalist identities and it has been the task of their former communist leaders who are still in power to develop such identities while suppressing internal divisions. Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan have had a history of tolerance toward their respective Jewish populations, from which many have immigrated to Israel (and the United States) in recent years to unite with family or for economic reasons. Those republics view Israel Diaspora Jews as a source of investment and technological know-how as well as an avenue for better relations with the United States. Conversely, Israel, while considering Russian sensitivities in its relations with Central Asia, values the region as a market for Israeli products, a source for hydrocarbon resources and a way to counteract Iran as well as to seek a more favourable attitude in disputes with the Arabs.     

Citizenship,migration and loyalty towards the state: a case study of the Kyrgyzstani migrants working in Russia and Kazakhstan

Building upon recent studies in the field of citizenship and transnationalism, this article examines the relations that Kyrgyzstani migrants in Kazakhstan and Russia entertain with their homeland, both in terms of concrete status (rights and responsibilities) and subjective attitudes (feeling of membership and loyalty). The article relies on field research, including semi-structured interviews, conducted in March and April 2007. Findings show that Kyrgyzstani migrants have developed a distinctive and somewhat paradoxical relation to their state of origin, in which pragmatic interest and long-term loyalty are not easily reconciled.     

A Failed Manipulation: The British,the Oudh Bequest and the Sh i Ulama of Najaf and Karbala

Between 1850 and 1903, the Oudh Bequest channelled over six million rupees from India, through British mediation, to the Shi i shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala in Iraq. It has intrigued historians the way that this sophisticated British tool has exercised influence and control over the Shi i Ulama in Iran and Iraq. However, the British became directly involved in the distribution of the Bequest in 1903, on the eve of the Constitutional Revolution. In view of the ulama's growing involvement in Iranian politics, and gross corruption among the distributors, the British saw the Bequest as a means to enhance their influence over the ulama in Iran. The political usage of the Bequest was a subject of a prolonged debate within Bequest bureaucracy. Disagreements often stemmed from different priorities, determined by local considerations, of British authorities in Iraq, Iran and India. In 1912 the British took over the direct distribution of the Bequest, abandoning their expectations to use the Bequest as a ‘powerful lever’ in Iran, and shifting their focus to enhancing their prestige in Iraq itself and acquiring the goodwill of Shi is in India. These policies were renewed with greater vigour after the British occupation of Najaf and Karbala in 1917. Overall, these British attempts ended in dismal failure, showing that charity, however generous, cannot compensate for the need of religious leaders to maintain popular support by distancing themselves from foreign patronage and tutelage. Moreover, manipulation proved less powerful than broader historical processes such as the rising national and religious awakening against foreign powers.     

From non-intervention to non-indifference: the origins and development of the African Union's security culture

This article employs the concepts of security culture and normlocalization to explore some of the cultural dimensions of theAfrican Union's (AU) security policies. After providing an overviewof constructivist accounts of norm socialization in internationalrelations, I use these insights to analyse the origins and developmentof the AU's security culture. The final two sections explorethe ongoing process of norm localization in relation to thetwo most recent tenets of the AU's security culture: intoleranceof unconstitutional changes of government and the responsibilityto protect principle. An awareness of the uneven and contestednature of this process helps account for the fact that althoughthese two transnational norms have been institutionalized inthe AU Charter and endorsed by the United Nations, they havebeen internalized unevenly by the AU's member states. Externaladvocates of these two norms would thus do well to help thecontinent's norm entrepreneurs build congruence between thesenorms and the AU's security culture.     

The security culture of the ECOWAS: origins,development and the challenge of child trafficking

This article explores the relationship between the security culture of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and how it has responded to transnational challenges in West Africa. To do so, it provides an overview of how the ideas, norms and principles that constitute the embryonic security culture of ECOWAS have evolved historically. Against this backdrop the article focuses on how the regional organisation has dealt with a specific contemporary security challenge: child trafficking. The concluding part of the article seeks to explain ECOWAS's collective action on child trafficking with reference to the region's different threat perceptions and security priorities. This article argues that although the decisions and policies of ECOWAS on child trafficking are influenced by certain shared ideas, norms and principles, a breakdown of collective political will and continuing differences on the key security referents and appropriate approaches to the security of individuals have led ECOWAS member states to fail in effectively addressing this particular transnational security challenge.     

Security culture,transnational challenges and the Economic Community of West African States

This special issue explores how one particular regional organisation, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), has defined certain transnational issues as security threats and how it has addressed them. In this introductory article, we begin by providing an overview and analysis of some of the most important transnational security challenges facing West Africa. Specifically, we discuss some of the problems raised by cross-border insurgencies, health challenges, organised criminal activities, terrorism and environmental degradation. We then examine the different levels at which actors have responded to these challenges. The section ‘Security culture: shaping the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) response?’ sets out our approach to thinking about the concept of security culture and asks whether it might be relevant to understanding how and why ECOWAS has focused on responding to certain transnational security challenges and not to others. The final section provides an overview of the other articles in this issue.     

Shaped on the Anvil of Mars: Vance and Nettie Palmer and the Great War

In Australia as elsewhere within the belligerent nations of the Great War, dissenting thinkers were marginalised with the mobilisation of militarism. Vance and Nettie Palmer, Australia's most important literary partnership in the interwar period, were initially critical of the war, their response typical of the English radical intelligentsia among whom they were living at the time of its outbreak. Forced back to Australia in 1915, the Palmers had to re-establish themselves in its increasingly turbulent intellectual battlefields. Nettie's earlier anti-war beliefs and cosmopolitanism were undermined while Vance became ever more deeply enmeshed in a discourse concerning the virtues of the “ordinary people”, which encompassed the men of the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). Nevertheless, in their extensive writings about Australia, neither Palmer ever endorsed the legend of the heroic Anzacs. The Great War, however, profoundly shaped their political consciousness and their choice of genre and writing strategies, as it did others of their literary generation. This article will show that the war was a far more important influence on their work than usually acknowledged in Australian literary scholarship, and thereby reveal some of the cultural patterns that shaped their generation of Australian radical writers and intellectuals — particularly in Melbourne, arguably the heartland for the tradition of democratic literary nationalism which the Palmers have been seen to epitomise.     

对美国政治学的一种"知识考古学"反思——读《美国和美国的敌人》

美国政治学的一些学者往往把政治学与自由民主联系在一起。佛罗里达大学政治学系副教授伊多.奥伦的《美国和美国的敌人:美国的对手与美国政治学的形成》②一书,对长久占据美国政治学界话语霸权地位的这种正统观点进行挑战。乔姆斯基认为,伊多.奥伦这本著作挑战了“美国政治学作