Commentaries on Brunner and Willard’s ‘professional insecurities’

Commentary

Commentaries on Brunner and Willards professional insecurities     

The North Korean abduction issue: emotions,securitisation and the reconstruction of Japanese identity from ‘aggressor’ to ‘victim’ and from ‘pacifist’ to ‘normal’

Abstract

After Kim Jong-il's confession in 2002 that North Korean agents had abducted thirteen Japanese citizens in the 1970s and 1980s, North Korea has become the most detested country in Japan, and the normalisation of bilateral relations has been put on the back burner. The abduction issue has taken precedence in Japan even over North Korea's development of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles. It has also grossly overshadowed the atrocities for which Imperial Japan was responsible in the 20th century. Why has there been such strong emphasis on an issue that could be disregarded as comparatively ‘less important’? This article understands the ascendency of the abduction issue as the epitome of an identity shift under way in Japan – from the identity of a curiously ‘peaceful’ and inherently ‘abnormal’ state, to that of a more ‘normal’ one. The differentiation of North Korea as ‘abnormal’ emphasises Japan's own (claim to) ‘normality’. Indeed, by incarnating the perils of Japan's own ‘pacifist’ ‘abnormality’, which has been so central to the collective sense of Japanese ‘Self’ in the post-war period, the abduction issue has become a very emotional argument for Japan's ‘normalisation’ in security and defence terms. The transformation from ‘abnormal’ to ‘normal’ is further enabled by Japan trading places with North Korea in the discourse, so that Japan is defined as ‘victim’ (rather than former aggressor) and North Korea as ‘aggressor’ (rather than former victim). What is at stake here is the question whether Japan is ‘normalising’ or ‘remilitarising’, and the role of the abduction issue discourse in enabling such foreign and security policy change.     

Editors’ Introduction

Political Behavior -     

Editors’ Introduction

Abstract

The police restructuring efforts in Bosnia and Herzegovina driven by the international community, using in particular the leverage of European integration, attempted to achieve a reform that would transform a very fragmented police system into a de-politicized single structure and ended in the signing of a rather weak political agreement. The main reason why the process proved to be so difficult was that police restructuring touched upon the fundamentals of a delicate ethno-political power-sharing model in a post-conflict situation. But also, the approach chosen by the international community had serious deficiencies as the international community was far from speaking with one voice, thereby limiting its leverage.     

From special operations to special political action: The ‘rump SOE’ and SIS post‐war covert action capability 1945–1977

This article examines the post‐war dismantling of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) and amalgamation with the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS). It is argued that the existing literature has been unclear on this matter, confusing two very different SIS departments, the Special Operations Branch and the Special Political Action Section. The article then examines how the assets and personnel of SOE were dispersed to three different divisions of the SIS; the Directorates of Production, Training and Development and War Planning, and then examines the separate origins and function of the Special Political Action Section.     

The Soviet reaction to ‘Eurocommunism’

Assertion of independence from Moscow by some West European Communist parties, inaccurately known as ‘Eurocommunism’ has caused angry reaction by Soviet Russia, especially when those parties have criticised the internal policies of the Soviet government in the matter of civil rights. The Soviet Union is also apprehensive about the possible effects of ‘Eurocommunism’ on the cohesion of the Communist bloc. But this apprehension should not be exaggerated. The USSR can still rely on the Western Communist parties for support for its foreign policy, and can exercise control over them in various ways. There is no probability of a break between the USSR and any Western Communist party in the foreseeable future.     

Judgment on the ‘Hitler Diaries’

As the full story of the forged ‘Hitler Diaries’ unfolded, the euphoria of the far right soon evaporated.     

Beyond bi-nationalism? The Young Hebrews versus the ‘Palestinian issue’

The bi-national option for the solution of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is as old as Zionism itself. The standard bi-national scenario envisaged an accommodation in a shared polity of separate Jewish and Palestinian identities. The Young Hebrews movement defied this paradigm by arguing that these identities were not national and should be incorporated into the Hebrew nation. This article analyses the Young Hebrews’ solution to the ‘Palestinian issue’ by showing that they used it as a tool to destroy Zionist hegemony in Israel and open the way to a radical geopolitical rearrangement of the entire Middle East.