The lawless presidency: Economic crisis and democratic accountability in Mexico, 1970–94

The Mexican government has adopted policies of market‐oriented reform since 1982 which have for the most part been praised by professional economists. Mexico even joined the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 1994. However the performance of the economy has been disappointing. Yet a failure to achieve any real per capita economic growth over an extended period is unusual among Latin American countries which have consistently pursued policies of market‐oriented economic reform. A large part of the explanation has to do with the character of Mexico's political institutions, most notably a lack of democratic accountability. The unmistakable trend toward greater democracy since 1982 has so far been expressed principally in terms of greater honesty and competitiveness in the electoral arena. But there has been no significant reform of the executive branch of government, which has for many years been run on authoritarian principles. This makes it difficult for the Mexican government to control corruption, limit the economic consequences of political shocks and prevent the shifts in political power which occur at the end of each sexenio from destabilising the economy.     

Ferocious Times: The IRA,the RIC,and Britain's Failure in 1919–1921

The 1916 Rising was, in military terms, a shambolic failure. Despite the fact that Britain was locked in a gruelling struggle with Germany, the Rising was still utterly crushed within a week. How then, in the aftermath of victory against Germany, did Britain fail to win the subsequent struggle with the Irish Republican Army (IRA) between 1919 and 1921? This article assesses some of the key factors that played out in the conflict, drawing particular attention to the IRA's focus on the Royal Irish Constabulary and the consequences of this, and then later, how distorted perceptions of the proximity of success ultimately undermined British commitment. One of the most remarkable features of the conflict was the widespread belief among many on the British side (and more than a few in the Republican camp) that the IRA was on the verge of total defeat when the truce was declared in 1921. The IRA had suffered heavy casualties and were running low on weapons and ammunition. Yet, somehow the movement prevailed. This article aims to shed light on how and why that happened.     

Guiding Public Opinion on the Far Eastern Crisis, 1931–1941: The American State Department and Propaganda on the Sino–Japanese Conflict

From 1931 to 1941, when China and Japan were at undeclared war, China's propaganda was fairly well-circulated in America through her American friends who played a leading role in shaping American opinions on the Far Eastern crisis. But the United States State Department maintained a neutral stance toward the Sino–Japanese conflict until after 1939 and considered the pro-Chinese opinion not so much a national consensus for policy consideration as a partisan view propped up by propaganda groups. Thus, the State Department guarded its Asian policy from the pressure of propaganda activities and partisan opinions on the Asian conflict, whilst utilising them occasionally as tools of diplomacy toward China and Japan. This article examines the State Department's attitude toward public opinion and propaganda on the Far Eastern conflict from 1931 to 1941 to illustrate how American officials handled partisan opinions on a foreign crisis when most of the information on foreign policy was privately initiated and circulated.     

Different forces in one: the origin and development of organizational cultures in the Japanese Ground and Maritime Self-Defense Forces, 1950–present

This article explains the processes in which the two SDFs’ organizational cultures were formed by examining the ways in which the two Self Defense Forces (SDFs) were established in the early 1950s and have interacted with their US counterparts since that time. The article argues that the reason that the Ground Self Defense Force (GSDF) has been so cautious about sending troops to overseas operations, whereas the Maritime Self Defense Force (MSDF) has been willing to provide any possible support for the US Navy (USN), is that they have developed different organizational cultures – different collective beliefs and understandings about how to contribute to the national interest that they defined – through their decades-long relations with their US counterparts since the early 1950s. It is especially important to consider what type of Japanese actors were in charge of establishing each of the two SDFs in the early 1950s, what intentions they had when they established the two SDFs, and what kind of relations they had with their US counterparts. It is also important to consider how the USAR and USN responded to the requests from their Japanese counterparts in the 1950s and 1960s.     

The dragon in the room: the China factor in the development of US–India ties in the Cold War

ABSTRACT

In recent years, as China has continued to rise as an economic, political and military power, there has been increasing consideration of its role in shaping US–India relations over the last two decades. However, this article, considering the period 1949–1979, shows that American and Indian perceptions of and policy toward China shaped the US–India relationship even during the Cold War. In doing so, the article seeks not just to bring China back into the story of past US–India relations, but also shed light on the China–India–US triangle of today and of tomorrow.     

A Whiff of Cordite: Theodore Roosevelt and the Transoceanic Naval Arms Race, 1897–1909

Theodore Roosevelt's most enduring contribution to American power and influence in the world was in the promotion and construction of a blue water navy. Although much has been written about Roosevelt's notion of a uniquely American imperial vocation, as well as of his social Darwinist conception of Great Power competition, the priority he awarded to American naval power was based above all on a dispassionate and pessimistic interpretation of the direction of international affairs between 1890 and 1909. Bracketed by the inauguration of German Weltpolitik on the one hand and the Japanese naval triumph at Tsushima on the other, Roosevelt's naval policy was not the product of a romantic imperial imagination but rather of a wholly objective appreciation of the most fundamental imperative of American national security for the near and distant future.     

Russian–Japanese relations after the Russo-Japanese war in the context of world politics

Abstract

The Treaty of Portsmouth could not solve all the diplomatic problems between Russia and Japan, and dissenting voices were heard in both countries. Nevertheless, Russo-Japanese relations went in the direction of not only normalization, but also building an alliance. That radical change from hostility has not often happened in history and needs careful research, in particular the early stages of this process after the conclusion of the Treaty of Portsmouth. The construction of an alliance was not the primary goal at the beginning of Russo-Japanese negotiations after the war between the two nations. This goal appeared during the process of solving different problems, and so the international situation is extremely important to understand changes in Russo-Japanese relations. This process had several facets. First, there was the deterioration in Anglo-German relations with a corresponding realignment of British policy towards Russia. Second was the resolution of problems in Central Asia between Russia and Great Britain. Third, there was the mutual interests Japan and Russia had in China, in particular rail interests, which were related to the organic unity of the northern part of the Russian railroad in China. Finally, Russia had the desire to keep relations with France as a corner-stone of foreign policy.     

The WikiLeaks Cables: How the United States Exploits the World,in Detail,from an Internal Perspective, 2001–2010

The disclosure of more than 250,000 American diplomatic cables by the dissident media organisation WikiLeaks in 2010–2011 gained much attention in the American mass media but generated little interest for diplomatic historians. A small number of scholars explored small parts of the archive, but diplomatic historians and political scientists largely dismissed the cables as insignificant source material. These scholars overlooked important primary sources. The cables provide important revelations about American actions in every region of the world, especially between 2001 and 2010. Although United States officials and their supporters in the American mass media insisted that the cables showed American diplomats performing admirable work, the cables reveal how the United States exploits the world.     

International Migration as Criminal Behaviour: Shifting Responsibility to the Migrant in Mexico–US Border Crossings

* I would like to thank Brent J. Steele for his valuable insight on the theory of governmentality as it pertains to this article. I would also like to thank Rob Topinka and Franziska Jung for their feedback on earlier versions of the article, and participants on the panel “Political Economy of Migration in Latin America” at the International Studies Association Annual Convention 2011 in Montreal for helpful insight on this work as a burgeoning research project. View all notesThe increasing criminalisation of immigration procedures has the effect of shifting responsibility from the state to the individual migrant for alleged “criminal” behaviour. This shift represents a form of disciplinary power as it is enacted over “deviant” populations who are unable to self-govern according to the tenets required in a system of global governmentality. In this article, I use Foucault's governmentality to examine the “responsibilisation” of undocumented migrants who are perceived as making a rational choice to cross the border. I argue that the criminalisation of immigration shifts the emphasis to individuals as rational actors who have rejected paths to legal immigration, choosing “illegal” immigration, which carries the connotation of criminal behaviour. This constructs a population of always already criminal subjects who are understood to disregard the rule of law. In this research I carry out a critical discourse analysis that looks at the performative conceptualisation of “illegal immigrants” and the production and reproduction of the understanding of migrants as criminals. I look at the example of Mexico–US border crossings from the perspective of a system of global governmentality and I posit that international undocumented migration is criminalised and migrants are “responsibilised”, which effectively controls the movement of peoples, contributing to a geopolitical discourse that represents population management at the global level.     

The Radical Crescent: The United States,the Palestine Liberation Organisation,and the Lebanese Civil War, 1973–1978

This analysis examines the efforts by the Palestine Liberation Organisation [PLO] to formalise relations with the United States before and after the October 1973 Arab–Israeli War. It details the public and private attempts by PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat to present the organisation as a legitimate partner for negotiations with Israel. However, the American secretary of state and national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, hindered the PLO’s diplomatic initiatives during the Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford administrations. Kissinger viewed the PLO as an impediment to his efforts to resolve the Arab–Israeli conflict through separate peace agreements, rather than a comprehensive solution. Despite Washington’s objections to the PLO, the organisation had regional and international legitimacy, its stature aided by its political and ideological allies. Yet these ties also contributed to the PLO’s involvement in the Lebanese civil war. Kissinger encouraged Syria’s June 1976 invasion of Lebanon to weaken, if not destroy, the PLO as an independent actor. Although the PLO survived Syria’s intervention, Kissinger’s actions and agreements limited the diplomatic initiatives of the Jimmy Carter Administration.     

The role of sectarianism in the Provisional IRA campaign, 1969–1997

This article concerns the nature of political violence in an ethnonationally divided society. The article engages with the debates surrounding the discrimination employed, or not, by the PIRA when selecting their targets and waging their campaign against British rule and partition in Ireland between 1969 and 1997. The piece challenges the assertion that the PIRA discriminated with religious bias, and that they actively targeted Protestant civilians. It does so by drawing upon analysis of original data collected for the piece, corroborated with qualitative primary sources including the memoirs of former PIRA members, and the sentiments of a former PIRA member turned informer, Sean O’Callaghan, who agreed to be interviewed for the piece. It is argued that the PIRA aimed only to kill individuals whom they deemed to be in some measure actively responsible for the persistence of British control in Ireland, and the prevention of a reunion with the Republic; and did so in a fashion that was, for the most part, blind to religious diversity. It is also argued, however, that the PIRA were either unable or unwilling to recognise the gap between the actual impact of their “armed struggle” and the intentions that lay behind it.     

Japanese diplomacy during the Cambodian peace process and Japan's post-Cold War role in Southeast Asia: the legacy of the Fukuda Doctrine, 1989–1993

Japan's role during the Cambodian peace process after 1989 is often considered a successful case of post-Second World War Japanese diplomacy. In contrast to claims in the existing literature that Japan began to consider and initiated its involvement in the settlement only beginning in the late 1980s, this article demonstrates that Tokyo's role built upon a diplomatic platform that the Japanese had constructed through peace efforts since the Cambodian conflict erupted in 1979. The policy framework, objectives and initiatives of Japan's Cambodia diplomacy during the peace process represented the culmination of a ten-year diplomatic endeavour. Ultimately, Japan's involvement in the Cambodian settlement, guided by its Southeast Asia strategy of promoting coexistence and cooperation between ASEAN and Indochina, legitimated and favoured Japan's attempts to expand its post-Cold War role in regional political and security affairs.     

Managing the “Helsinki Spirit” in the Balkans: The Greek Initiative for Balkan Co-operation, 1975–1976

The analysis examines the origins and implementation of the Greek diplomatic initiative for multilateral co-operation amongst the Balkan states in the aftermath of the Helsinki Act of the Conference for Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE). Notwithstanding pressing domestic and security concerns, détente and, in particular, the spirit of the CSCE process significantly influenced Greek Prime Minister Constantinos Karamanlis’ decision to instigate Balkan co-operation on a multilateral and not just on a bilateral level. The “Helsinki spirit” opened a window of opportunity for regional Powers from different blocs to come together. Despite its limited results, the political significance of the Athens Conference lay in the fact that it took place at all in view of Cold War realities and inter-Balkan rivalries.     

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.     

Powerless and Frustrated: Britain's Relationship With China During the Opening Years of the Second Sino–Japanese War, 1937–1939

Foreign policy is multi-faceted. It was not only diplomatic, political, socio-cultural, economic, Imperial, and strategic factors that structured—and limited—Britain's foreign policy during the interwar period; so, too, did those of other countries. Given the number and variety of Britain's—and the interconnected other Powers'—interests in China, Britain's relationship with China during the opening years of the Second Sino–Japanese War provides a useful insight which has wider implications on Britain's road to war narrative. Given the topic's neglect, one can be forgiven for inferring that events in Europe entirely eclipsed those of East Asia. This article demonstrates the contrary. As awareness of Chinese suffering spread and as Japanese aggrandisement threatened British interests, sinophilism became vogue once again. However, the often insurmountable obstacles that the interwar period presented to Britain and others—particularly the United States—limited Britain's ability to aid China. It was not for want of fortitude.     

The Eurafrique Initiative,Ernest Bevin and Anglo–French Relations in the Foreign Office, 1945–1950

This analysis examines the prevalence of Eurafrican thinking in the British Foreign Office throughout the late 1940s. Drawing on British and French diplomatic archives, it reveals the centricity of the Foreign Office, and British Embassy at Paris to a project largely confined to the mental map of the Foreign Secretary, Ernest Bevin. The financial stains facing Britain, often misinterpreted as “decline”, seemed a temporary phenomenon that “multilateral European cooperation” could rectify. Although shelved in 1949–1950, the Eurafrique initiative has seen few historians analyse its strategies across the corridors of power. This analysis reappraises British desires for Western European “co-operation” and a renewed faith in the Entente Cordiale as a geo-political counterweight to growing East–West bipolarity. Discussions of strategies to pool African possessions to recover the European economy were short-lived. Yet they challenged prospects of long-term economic dependence upon the United States in favour of an Anglo–French led European bloc.     

Lethal Connections: The Determinants of Network Connections in the Provisional Irish Republican Army, 1970–1998

Using stochastic methods we illustrate that the Provisional Irish Republican Army's (PIRA) network is clustered along three primary dimensions: (a) brigade affiliation, (b) whether the member participated in violent activities, and (c) task/role within PIRA. While most brigades tended to foster connections within the brigade (that is, “closure”), the tendency to do so varied across the organization. Members who engaged with violent activities were far more likely to connect with each other; in later periods there is polarization into those who engage in violent activities and those who do not. Across brigades, those who engage in a particular task and role (improvised explosive device [IED] constructor, IED planter, gunman, robber/kidnapper/drug smuggler/hijacker) are more likely to connect with others who do the same task or play the same role than with other members who fulfill other roles. Standard forms of homophily (that is, the tendency to make connections with people who are similar in terms of demography or status) play a very weak role in explaining which members interact with one another. Finally, our analysis illustrates clear patterns of relational change that correspond to changes in the formal structures that PIRA's leadership promoted.     

Uncertainty,risk, and trust: The Swedish—German general staff negotiations of 1910

Despite a protracted and well‐established policy of neutrality, in 1910, Sweden decided to enter into negotiations with Germany concerning military collaboration in case of a Russian attack against Germany and Sweden. This article argues that behind the Swedish decision to enter into the talks was Swedish trust towards Germany to the effect that Germany would not exploit the talks for its own interests. The article discusses the phenomenon of inter‐state trust in terms of risk and uncertainty, and analyzes the Swedish decision process leading to the general staff negotiations.