An ‘Aladdin's lamp’ for free enterprise: Eisenhower,fiscal conservatism,and Latin American nationalism, 1953–61

This study explores the Eisenhower administration's efforts to promote free trade and investment policies in Latin America. US officials believed that private capital investment, rather than US foreign aid, would best promote Latin American economic development and improve its abiliry to purchase American products. By eliminating the need for foreign aid, Latin American economic autarky complemented Eisenhower's zeal for fiscal conservatism. Although most scholars have focused on the primacy of anti-communism in Eisenhower's inter-American policies, this study contends that economic nationalism posed the greatest threat to Eisenhower's policies. US officials eventually responded by expanding aid to Latin America, but the additional economic aid was always intended to complement private capital, rather than replace it. This article, based upon the papers of influential administration officials and State Department records, sheds considerable light as to why the United States promoted free trade and investment policies in the developing world, as it still does today.     

Send Good Vibes,Guns, and Money: The Institutionalisation of United States Drug Diplomacy toward Mexico, 1969–1989

ABSTRACT

The State Department played a leading role in the struggle within the United States government to define and implement America’s foreign drug policy throughout the late twentieth century. After their participation in 1969’s Operation Intercept illustrated the central importance of Mexican national sovereignty in bilateral relations, United States diplomats worked to institutionalise an aversion to unilateral American action on drug issues south of the Rio Grande. Over time, both the co-operative framework cultivated between American and Mexican officials throughout 1970s and an especially turbulent chapter in bilateral relations during the 1980s helped to establish further the State Department’s highly conciliatory approach to drug diplomacy that today remains a defining characteristic of joint Mexican–American efforts to combat the production and traffic of illicit drugs.     

Pre-war Post-war Planning: The Phoney War,the Roosevelt Administration,and the Case of the Advisory Committee on Problems of Foreign Relations

The Advisory Committee on Problems of Foreign Relations (ACPFR) of Franklin D. Roosevelt's State Department first met in late December 1939 and operated until early Summer 1940. Its previously overlooked deliberations, chaired by the dynamic Under-Secretary of State Sumner Welles, are important in three related areas. First, the ACPFR was an early marker of the Administration's later post-war planning, notably the Advisory Committee on Postwar Foreign Policy. Second, a remarkable swath of issues were discussed surrounding the ongoing conflict, prospects for its end, and the shape of the post-war world, particularly regarding Europe and the consequences of a German victory. The third area of ACPFR importance is in illuminating our understanding of the Roosevelt Administration's thinking on the conflict during the complex atmosphere of the Phoney War. The analysis concludes that although the fruits of Committee's effort would be indirect, they were nonetheless important in later post-war planning efforts that contemplated a breadth of options for the post-war world before American lives were put in harm's way.     

Russia-North Korea Economic Ties: Is There More Than Meets the Eye?

Russia's relations with North Korea are often ignored in the West. The conventional view is that Russia's role with respect to the North is purely political and diplomatic, predicated on Russia's permanent membership in the UN Security Council. Often overlooked is the fact that Russia maintains a range of economic links with the DPRK. Taken together, they constitute quite a substantial leverage that Russia can exercise over North Korea, when and if it chooses to do so. The paper aims to investigate the economic dimension of the Russia-North Korea relationship. The article also examines North Korea's domestic economic situation, mostly drawing upon Russian expert assessments.     

End Matter

One of the most intriguing, yet forgotten, terrorist groups in history is the Galleanists, an innovative group of militant Italian anarchists active in the United States during the early part of the twentieth century. They introduced tactics and strategies that are widely used today in the world of terrorism. This article examines the rise and fall of the group, and discusses how America's experience with it holds many lessons for understanding today's global terrorist threat.     

The mix that makes unipolarity: hegemonic purpose and international constraints

The nature of a global arena dominated by one great power remains a critical subject for understanding international relations. Brooks and Wohlforth's recent book makes an important contribution by arguing that unipolarity poses few constraints to the hegemon and that the United States today should pursue a policy of primacy. The puzzle is that the United States has mostly resisted a primacy policy since becoming the sole superpower, and when it has done so, has often been less successful than the promise of its power advantage. Explaining this puzzle requires building on ‘the no constraint’ approach to develop a positive theory based on hegemonic purpose, a reformulated notion of constraints, and how purpose and constraints interact to shape outcomes. This reformulation suggests that any American strategy that looks like ‘primacy’ is unlikely to succeed.     

The Struggle for Sea Power: Lessons from the Great War

The history of the contest for naval mastery during the Great War has particular resonance for today because the United States now faces a serious threat from China's increasing capabilities to wage war at sea. China's naval challenge calls into question America's continued command of the maritime commons. The stakes at risk for the United States in today's contest are just as high as they were a hundred years ago for Britain. Defeat at sea would wreck American global leadership in the twenty-first century just as surely as it would have meant the collapse of British power in the twentieth. What, then, can we learn from past struggles for sea power and America's entry into the First World War that offers guidance for understanding our current strategic predicament?     

Exploring FDR'S relationship with the press: A historical agenda‐setting study

This historical agenda‐setting study examined the extent to which Franklin Roosevelt's issue agenda, as expressed in his first seven State of the Union speeches, correlated with subsequent coverage in seven major newspapers and the degree to which newspaper coverage correlated with FDR's issue agenda. While past works have emphasized Roosevelt's ability to influence media coverage, this study suggests that Roosevelt reacted to previous coverage more than he influenced subsequent coverage. Past researchers contend that Roosevelt's strong support early in his first term deteriorated subsequently. By contrast, our study found stronger correlations between FDR's issue agenda and subsequent coverage later in his presidency. FDR reacted to, rather than influenced, coverage in newspapers he read and influenced coverage in newspapers he did not read. Roosevelt's issue agenda posted stronger correlations for the papers that supported him than those that opposed him. This study suggests, then, that historical conditions, amount of exposure to the newspaper, and political leanings of the newspaper are contingent conditions influencing the agenda‐setting process and should be considered in future agenda‐setting studies.     

The Place of Sociology in the Study of Political Communication

Robert K. Merton's Mass Persuasion (1946) and related 1940s communications research represent a body of work that repays those who read it carefully today. Merton charted a world that became our own, one marked by the interplay of mass media, celebrity, and “public images” that traversed cultures of entertainment, moral life, and politics. In this essay, I read Mass Persuasion through a later Merton article discussing the role of reading and rereading classic texts in the human sciences. After extending Merton's arguments about the functions of predecessor texts, I amplify aspects of Mass Persuasion that remain instructive within political communication and related fields today.     

The Meitei upsurge in Manipur

This article traces the rise of militancy in Manipur including the Armed Forces Special Powers Act 1958 (AFSPA) and analyses the reasons and its impact on the people. Manipur is one of the Indian states plagued by self-determination movement, inter-ethnic strife, and the militarization of ethnic groups for the last few decades. The Indian Armed Forces, who are specially trained to protect the country against a foreign invasion, are being engaged to combat internal strife with extraordinary powers. This has further worsened the conditions in the state. In the period of 1980 to May 30, 2007, 2,675 civilians and 1,314 militants were killed; while 2,061 civilians were injured and only 865 militants surrendered to the authorities. It can be said that five decades of conflict have greatly undermined the people of Manipur, both physically and spiritually and have threatened the very survival of entire communities.

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A ‘Week that Changed the World’: Britain and Nixon's China Visit of 21–28 February 1972

British diplomats considered President Nixon's China visit of February 1972 a major political success. But while they admired the Realpolitik of Henry Kissinger, the President's National Security Adviser, they were irritated by his reticence regarding the initiative, and by the way in which this impeded their own efforts to raise the status of Britain's diplomatic mission in Peking. Initial American objections to any change in Britain's stance on the admission of the People's Republic to the UN weakened their negotiating position, and led to a protracted tussle with Peking over the status of Taiwan. Marginalized by Kissinger's conduct, the British drew some satisfaction from the fact that the State Department seemed equally by-passed     

The securitisation of civil society: a case study of NGOs–State Security Investigations (SSI) relations in Egypt

This paper explores the changing role of the State Security Investigations apparatus in the context of an authoritarian regime faced with external pressures to democratise. It argues that in Egypt the State Security Investigations (SSI) has played a dual role of repressing opponents while creating and mediating political space for citizen voice and participation, eliciting a positive external image without representing a genuine threat to the regime. The SSI's role in civil society has expanded significantly, in particular since the mid-2000s, and its power is now exercised not only in a hidden form but also in a very visible manner. An increase in the SSI's visibility has increased its exercise of a more pervasive form of invisible power, as is evident from the examination of current SSI–NGO relations.     

Kennedy and Touré: A Success in Personal Diplomacy

Entering the White House at the crest of the African independence movement, John F. Kennedy and many of his advisors believed that Africa had surpassed Asia as the most permeable battlefield in the East–West Cold War struggle. While the battle lines of the Cold War had already been clearly drawn in Europe and in much of Asia, newly independent Africa was wide open for superpower competition. The central component of Kennedy's approach to dealing with Africa was his use of personal diplomacy with the leaders of that continent. This article is a case study of Kennedy's first successful use of personal diplomacy with an African head of State—Guinea's Sékou Touré.     

The Capability–Capacity Crunch: NATO's New Capacities for Intervention

Abstract

In September 2006 NATO's role in Afghanistan expanded to cover the whole of the country. With 32,000 troops under NATO command Stage 4 of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) represents an open-ended commitment to rebuilding a country long torn by war and instability. The Alliance's showpiece for advanced military transformation, the the NATO Response Force (NRF) represents a down payment on the future of transatlantic military co-operation. Taken together these two developments reflect the reality of NATO's new interventionism of an Alliance that bears little or no resemblance to that which won the Cold War. NATO today is an organisation designed for global reach and global effect, undertaking operations at their most robust. Unfortunately, the re-design of NATO's architecture has not been matched by a parallel development in Alliance military capabilities. NATO's big three, the US, Britain and France, have taken steps to improve their military capabilities. However, the transformation of NATO's other militaries has proved slow and uneven, leaving many members unable to fulfil any meaningful role. Thus, as NATO today plans for both robust advanced expeditionary warfare and stabilisation and reconstruction vital to mission success in complex crisis management environments a gap is emerging. Indeed, in an Alliance in which only the Americans can afford both military capability and capacity most NATO Europeans face a capability–capacity crunch, forced to make a choice between small, lethal and expensive professional military forces or larger, cheaper more ponderous stabilisation and reconstruction forces. This article explores the consequences of the crunch and the implications for NATO's current and future role as the Alliance struggles to find a balance between fighting power and staying power.     

Immunizing Iraq Against al-Qaeda 3.0

Iraq still faces the same economic challenges that contributed to the rise of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. And unless these challenges are resolved, the likelihood of future political stability is low. The extremely high level of unemployment and underemployment among Iraq's youth, combined with massive corruption, is contributing to widespread poverty and radicalization. The Iraqi government's efforts to deal with these challenges are hamstrung by the expectation that current low oil prices will continue for a decade or more. These obstacles will constrain state-led development efforts severely. Iraq needs to execute successfully anti-corruption and pro-youth employment strategies that draw on the experience of other states, but are crafted to meet Iraq's unique conditions.This article is part of a special project conducted by the Foreign Policy Research Institute, titled: “After the Caliphate: Reassessing the Jihadi Threat and Stabilizing the Fertile Crescent,” which includes a book, a thematic issue of Orbis: FPRI's Journal of World Affairs (Summer 2018), and a series of podcasts. Each element of the project can be found here: https://www.fpri.org/research/after-the-caliphate-project/.     

“How many miles make an inch?” Center-state relations and the 1967 India-Burma boundary agreement

ABSTRACT

Unabated protests in Manipur against India’s boundary with Myanmar and the lack of demarcation of some boundary pillars, despite the signing of the India-Burma Boundary Agreement in 1967, makes it an important case to study how center-state relations impact India’s foreign policy decision-making and implementation processes. Based on fresh archival material, this article explains why New Delhi refused to consult state governments in Northeast India before signing the boundary agreement, and the limiting consequences of such a top-down decision-making approach during the demarcation phase. A postcolonial entity that struggled to generate legitimacy in and assert sovereign control over the Northeast, India’s approach on this issue offers an opportunity to reflect upon the (limited) conceptualization of, and ongoing debates around, the idea of a ’state’ within foreign policy analysis.     

Russia and the EU Ten Years On: A Relationship in Search of Definition

Russia and the EU have dramatically expanded their relationship over the last ten years ever since the 1997 Partnership Cooperation and Agreement entered into force. The four spaces of cooperation agreed upon in 2003 have provided a myriad of opportunities for dialogue and cooperation. Yet, quantity does not equal quality in a relationship that lacks a clear endgame perspective. Russia's new cockiness and the EU's internal divisions do not help bridge the strategic gap. Energy and the common neighbourhood are today the main spoilers in the relationship. They could however be turned into major opportunities in developing a strategic partnership.     

Health service utilization among widows living with HIV/AIDS: an interview survey in Manipur, India

Widows living with HIV/AIDS (WLHA) are a vulnerable and often overlooked group. The North Eastern Indian state of Manipur, which has one of the highest concentrations of HIV/AIDS cases in India, is not an exception. This paper aims to describe the pattern of and factors contributing to the use of health services by WLHA in Manipur. Structured face-to-face interviews were conducted among 510 respondents. Only 49% of the respondents were aware of available health facilities. The place of residence (67.8%) and appointment at a convenient time (70.8%) were the main factors affecting the use of health services. To improve access to health services, it is imperative that the services of trained health providers are made easily available. Policy makers and organizations working on HIV/AIDs should work together to remove the barriers to the use of health services, making them user friendly for vulnerable groups such as WLHA.     

Japan's security policy in relation to normal statehood

The paper begins by establishing the context in which Japan's normal statehood will be based. The paper shows how difficult it is for Japan to attain the status of a normal state based on the country's political forces and the rising powers in the Asian region. The paper looks at the relationships between Japan and other nations like China and South Korea, which should be considered by Japan in order to attain normal statehood. These are countries that initially were under the control of Japan, especially in business and even militarily, but today they are assuming their own position in the world; an aspect that is considered a threat to Japan's smooth return to normalcy. The paper takes into consideration the models that Japan can adopt or adapt to attain the status of a normal state. The three models discussed are those of Britain, Germany, and France. The main aspect discussed under these models is autonomy; this is based on the fact that Japan can only attain the status of a normal state if it becomes autonomous.     

Confrontational Mutual Perceptions and Images: Orientalism and Occidentalism in Europe and the Islamic World

Europe's reactions to its recently-constituted Muslim communities reflect its implicit self-image of cultural homogeneity, despite a long tradition of cultural adaption. This, in turn, is a facet of the persistance of an Orientalist vision which stimulates its opposed mirror-image, Occidentalism or Orientalism-in-reverse, as those communities react with a sense of profound alienation. The two interact to generate the cultural and political confrontation that typifies inter-communal relations today, constructing a new inter-communal socio-political boundary that could harden into a permanent divide of mutual hostility. It is this, far more than globalised salafi-jihadism, that explains the political extremism confronting European states today.