Missing the Point on Hard and Soft Power?

This article is a critique of two reports of parliamentary inquiries, into intervention and soft power, respectively. Neither report includes any discussion of Britain's involvement in and culpability for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Despite a more radical approach taken by the report on soft power, the article argues that the failure to address recent wars is symptomatic of a deeper and more dangerous inability to face up to profound and dangerous changes taking place in the world.     

Marching to the Left? Programmatic Competition and the 2017 Party Manifestos

This article analyses the content of the 2017 general election manifestos, and introduces the latest estimates from the Manifesto Project to explore recent ideological movements in the British party system. It reports the changing policy emphases in Conservative and Labour manifestos and the ideological positions of the major political parties in 2017. It finds that Theresa May's party produced its most left‐wing manifesto since 1964, and that Jeremy Corbyn's party produced its most left‐wing manifesto since 1992 and the election before the advent of New Labour. The article also finds that the ideological space between the Conservatives and Labour opened up in 2017, and that Northern Ireland's Democratic Unionists published the most right‐wing manifesto.     

International Soft Law, Human Rights and Non-state Actors: Towards the Accountability of Transnational Corporations?

During this age of globalisation, the law is characterised by an ever diminishing hierarchical framework, with an increasing role played by non-state actors. Such features are also pertinent for the international enforceability of human rights. With respect to human rights, TNCs seem to be given broadening obligations, which approach the borderline between ethics and law. The impact of soft law in this context is also relevant. This paper aims to assess whether, and to what extent, this trend could be a proper path to enforce the legal accountability of transnational corporations for human rights. It will be argued that the interplay between law and ethics should be assessed differently depending on which kind of correlative duty is at stake. With regard to negative duties, soft law tools concerning TNCs’ conduct may weaken the impact of hard law. By contrast, when positive duties are concerned, insofar as the horizontal effect of rights cannot be assumed, soft law turns out to be much more useful.

A Nationless State? Malta,National Identity and the EU

This article discusses the relationship of Malta with the European Union in the light of Malta's status as an example of a 'nationless state'. The article first develops the relevance of this under-researched concept by locating it within the discussion of post-colonial, small island nationalism. It then provides a historical critique of the emergence of the Maltese nationless state and of its various integrationist attempts with France, Italy, Britain and, most recently, the EU. Finally, the article explores the possible dialectics of an emerging nationalism with an entrenched two-party political system and its totalising discourse.     

Left High and Dry? Climate Change,Common‐Pool Resource Theory,and the Adaptability of Western Water Compacts

Efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are falling far short of what a consensus of scientists argues is necessary to avoid potentially catastrophic increases in the mean global temperature. Increasingly, attention is devoted to understanding the vulnerability and adaptability of social and ecological systems to climate change in particular areas of the world. In the Western United States and other semi‐arid regions of the world, possibly the most immediate, direct impacts of climate change involve the availability of water resources. Scientific evidence suggests that the West is likely to become hotter and drier and will experience greater variability in precipitation. These changes will affect tens of millions of residents in Western states, and nearly every sector of the economy, especially agriculture. The logic of common‐pool resource theory is applied in this Theory to Practice essay to assess the vulnerability and adaptability to climate change of interstate river compacts and to offer recommendations for coping with climate change. Future areas of research on this critical topic are also outlined. Expert e‐commentaries by Richard Kashmanian and Roger Gorke of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and by Elisabeth Graffy of the U.S. Geological Survey, can be found on the PAR website (go to aspanet.org , click on the link to PAR, and then on the Theory to Practice link).     

Ganging up on Trump? Sino-German Relations and the Problem with Soft Balancing against the USA

Journal of Chinese Political Science - Soft balancing has recently been framed as a general foreign policy strategy that is basically open to any state. However, what coalitions can actually engage...     

Strategic Positioning and the Financing of Nonprofit Organizations: Is Efficiency Rewarded in the Contributions Marketplace?

This article addresses the question of whether operational efficiency is recognized and rewarded by the private funders that support nonprofit organizations in fields ranging from education to social service to arts and beyond. Looking at the administrative efficiency and fundraising results of a large sample of nonprofit organizations over an 11-year period, we find that nonprofits that position themselves as cost efficient—reporting low administrative to total expense ratios—fared no better over time than less efficient appearing organizations in the market for individual, foundation, and corporate contributions. From this analysis, we suggest that economizing may not always be the best strategy in the nonprofit sector.     

Strategic Disorder,the Office of Policy Coordination and the Inauguration of US Political Warfare against the Soviet Bloc, 1948–50

This article examines the inauguration of US political warfare operations against the Soviet bloc, 1948–50. It builds on diplomatic and military historiography of US Cold War foreign policy, and engages with more recent scholarship of the ‘covert’ and unconventional confrontation between east and west. Two key interrelated themes are explored. The failure of Truman's policymakers, particularly the State Department's Policy Planning Staff, to devise a coherent strategy to wage political warfare against communist regimes was fundamental to its ultimate failure. Also, the disordered US government bureaucracy further impaired and strategically dislocated the application and overall success of political warfare operations by the Office of Policy Coordination.     

Muslims,South Asians and the British mainstream: A national identity crisis?

Current popular opinion assumes that Muslims and South Asians in Britain develop anti-mainstream identities because they live in impoverished and segregated ghettos, participate in non-mainstream religions, and politically organise via ethnically and religiously motivated networks. This article uses survey data from the 2003 Home Office Citizenship Survey to challenge each of those points. First, it shows that Muslims and South Asians are almost as likely as whites to identify themselves as British. Second, it argues that discrimination is more important than simple socio-economic difficulties for British identification. In addition, it claims that despite living in ethnically segregated neighbourhoods and retaining ethnic and religious social and political networks, Muslims and South Asians have actively built integrated networks, have trust in mainstream political institutions, and are committed to being a part of the larger British community.     

Who Takes the Blame? The Strategic Effects of Collateral Damage

Can civilians caught in civil wars reward and punish armed actors for their behavior? If so, do armed actors reap strategic benefits from treating civilians well and pay for treating them poorly? Using precise geo‐coded data on violence in Iraq from 2004 through 2009, we show that both sides are punished for the collateral damage they inflict. Coalition killings of civilians predict higher levels of insurgent violence and insurgent killings predict less violence in subsequent periods. This symmetric reaction is tempered by preexisting political preferences; the anti‐insurgent reaction is not present in Sunni areas, where the insurgency was most popular, and the anti‐Coalition reaction is not present in mixed areas. Our findings have strong policy implications, provide support for the argument that information civilians share with government forces and their allies is a key constraint on insurgent violence, and suggest theories of intrastate violence must account for civilian agency.     

Crashing the Party? Elites,Outsiders, and Elections

We consider an election between two parties that nominate candidates for office. The parties are polarized along a traditional cleavage, but they are also internally divided along a second issue dimension. We introduce a threat of entry from Outsider candidates, who have the prominence and resources to bypass party elites. We consider when voters will turn to Outsiders, and identify the conditions under which Outsiders will enter the election through an established party's nomination process, as opposed to circumventing established parties via a third-party challenge. We further explore when the elites will fail to respond to the threat of Outsider candidates. Our framework highlights how established parties will be especially vulnerable to Outsider primary entry in periods of intense ideological polarization between the parties, and that this vulnerability is especially heightened for the majority party.     

Do Politicians See Eye to Eye? The Relationship between Political Group Characteristics,Perceived Strategic Plan Quality,and Strategic Consensus in Local Governing Majorities

Although strategic consensus is a core concept in strategic management research, empirical evidence is lacking on (1) the degree of strategic consensus in public organizations, (2) how strategic consensus is impacted by group characteristics specific to public strategic decision‐making groups, and (3) how strategic plans impact these relationships. An analysis of multisource data from 1,075 governing majority members nested in 256 Flemish municipalities (Belgium) indicates that within‐group strategic consensus varies among governing majorities and is negatively impacted by political diversity and political power, but these relationships are mediated by perceived strategic plan quality. The results indicate that the idiosyncrasies of public decision‐making groups can impede high levels of strategic consensus, but strategic plans can attenuate this effect by fulfilling a boundary‐spanning role.     

Left Behind: Boris E. Skvirsky and the Chita Delegation at the Washington Conference, 1921–22

Although the story of the role of the Special Trade Delegation of the Russian short-lived Far Eastern Republic during the Washington Conference on Naval Disarmament of 1921–22, seems to be well-known from its many Western accounts published since 1922, a recent search in the records of the Russian Communist Party has uncovered many hitherto unknown or obscure details that shed the light on the fascinating intelligence origins of the secret documentation, which the delegation made public during the conference. Particularly, the Russian records indicate the central role of one of the delegates, Boris Skvirsky, who would be left behind in the United States to become the Soviet unofficial representative and back channel during the years of non-recognition of the Soviet Union by the United States.     

Adorno and Marcuse at the Barricades?: Critical Theory,Scholar-Activism,and the Neoliberal University

When Marx proclaimed the importance of not just interpreting the world but actually changing it, he initiated an important imperative that has existed within all forms of critical theory up to today. Drawing upon the work of Theodor Adorno and Herbert Marcuse, we use their unique way of looking at the theory/praxis couplet as an avenue to rethink the role of critical theory as a form of “scholar-activism.” Theory, to paraphrase Adorno, lives on because the moment to realize it was missed; and it is because of this lack of immediate utility that theory occupies a space of resistance. Nonetheless, as Marcuse avered, theory itself may retreat into the privileged space of scholastic philosophy if it does not constantly engage activist movements that challenge the historical and social conditions of human oppression. In the first part of the essay, we will look at Adorno and Marcuse’s critical theories as well as their own political engagements to clarify the concept of critical theory as scholar-activism. In the second part of the essay, we will demonstrate the importance of this particular kind of scholar-activism in the context of (and against the logic of) the neoliberal university.