A threat to Europe? Middle east ties with the Balkans and their impact upon terrorist activity throughout the region

The internecine warfare in the former Yugoslavia has radicalised many Islamic movements in the region and facilitated close links between local Balkan groups and Middle East states as well as terrorist organisations. This article examines the spread of militant Islamic fundamentalism in the Balkans as well as in Kosovo, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Albania. The scope of linkages between Balkan Islamic movements and Iran pose serious concern for Western governments as a long‐term threat to any stability and democratisation in the Balkan region as it has intensified illegal activity throughout the area and heightened irredentist claims.     

Hizbollah's command leadership: Its structure,decision‐making and relationship with Iranian clergy and institution

Any analysis of the behaviour of the pro‐Iranian Hizbollah organisation in Lebanon requires both an understanding of the movement itself, in terms of its decision‐making apparatus and internal clerical factionalism, and the mechanisms of its institutionalised relationship with Iran and, to a lesser extent, Syria through military and civilian channels at work within Lebanon. This article argues that Hizbollah's behaviour is principally governed by the depth and allegiance of closely forged relationships between individual Hizbollah leaders and Iranian clergy as well as the adaptability of a particular Hizbollah leader to suit the movement's activity to specific requirements within Lebanon and in the region. As such, clerical factionalism within Hizbollah can be monitored by the ascendancy or demotion of clergymen over the leadership and is also a guide to the direction of the movement in Lebanon as well as to the affiliation and loyalty of Hizbollah's leadership with clerical factions and institutions in Iran.     

Varieties of capitalism and the Estonian economy: Institutions,growth and crisis in a liberal market economy

This article examines Estonia's economic institutions, performance and vulnerability to the global economic crisis in the context of the varieties of capitalism framework. It shows that Estonia shares many characteristics of a liberal market economy, but that there are also some features which do not fit the classical model, notably its corporate governance institutions. It also suggests that the varieties of capitalism framework can account for key features of Estonia's economic performance, including its growth trajectory and adjustment to the global financial crisis. The article also reflects on the broader significance of these findings for understanding post-communist capitalism.     

Demobilization of Paramilitaries in Colombia: Transformation or Transition?

Historically, Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reinsertion (DDR) has provided a useful means to terminate conflicts. Since being catapulted to office in August 2002 with 53 percent of the vote of 46.45 percent of the voters, ¹ 1. IFES Election Guide, available at (http://www.electionguide.org/results.php?ID=1011). Colombian President Álvaro Uribe has vigorously pursued a demobilization program, both individual and collective. However, despite the fact that over 40,000 combatants have demobilized under these programs, evidence is growing that this latest round of Colombian DDR is merely transitioning, rather than terminating, violence in that Andean country.     

Beyond formal university technology transfer: innovative pathways for knowledge exchange

The Journal of Technology Transfer - University technology transfer is often associated with formal transmission of science-based inventions, for instance through the licensing of patented...     

Heterosexuality and Race in the Australian Same-Sex Marriage Postal Survey

ABSTRACT

This article argues that race and class are central aspects of sexual citizenship in a Australia. It does so by investigating representations of heterosexuality that were produced and circulated during the 2017 same-sex marriage postal survey. Engaging with feminist and critical race theorists, we position same-sex marriage as not exceptional but part of a wider distribution of sexual citizenship within Australia's ongoing settler colonial history. We do so by introducing a number of illustrative examples of representations of heterosexuality produced during the survey. These representations reveal how same-sex marriage perpetuated heterosexual authority by asserting claims to authenticity and the occupation of space. We observe how heterosexuality in the survey material reproduced fantasies linking these three themes, for example, in an authentic white heterosexual family who speaks from their suburban backyard. It reveals that ceding to a bifurcated view of either progressive or conservative voices forestalls rather than advances other visions which may exceed the limited imaginings of sexual citizenship offered by the white liberal settler colonial state.     

Electoral Rules,Labor Market Coordination and Macroeconomic Performance

Two distinct literatures have studied the macroeconomic effects of electoral systems and of labor market structures, respectively. Results include a positive association between proportional representation (PR) electoral systems and growth, but also between PR and inflation, as well as negative or hump‐shaped relationships between labor market coordination and the ‘misery variables’, unemployment and inflation. However, these results could be biased; particular electoral system and labor market features co‐vary systematically, and extant studies have typically not taken this into account. Effects attributed to PR systems could really stem from labor market coordination, and vice versa. In this article the relationships with macroeconomic outcomes for both electoral systems and labor market structures are re‐evaluated by modelling them jointly. Employing data from more than 30 democracies, with time‐series from the period 1960–2010, some robust and some non‐robust associations are identified. First, PR systems are, indeed, associated with higher growth rates, but not with higher inflation. Regarding labor market coordination, robust curvilinear relationships with unemployment and inflation are identified; intermediate levels of coordination correspond with worse macroeconomic performance – albeit not lower growth – even when accounting for electoral system features.     

Citizens in the Making: The Inclusion of Racialized Subjects in Labour Market Projects in Sweden

This article analyzes the formation of citizenship in today's multi‐ethnic Sweden in light of the inclusion of ‘people with foreign background’. Particular focus is put on how ethnicity and migration renders visible existing citizenship ideals, defined in terms of similarity and difference on the basis of ethno‐cultural background. The formation of citizenship is analyzed in the case of labour market projects targeting racialized migrants. The point of departure is an understanding of citizenship as an ongoing process of citizen formation, highlighting the formation of citizens as rights‐bearing subjects, belonging to the societal community – in contrast to those not bearing these rights and not belonging to the societal community. The analysis illustrates how norms of Swedish‐ness condition the membership in the Swedish societal community, forming a particular kind of racialized citizenship, including certain subjects, under certain conditions, while excluding others. One conclusion is that in addition to the formal dimensions of citizenship, the ability and willingness to adapt to norms of Swedish‐ness is essential for accessing and using social rights – that is, for becoming employable and included on the labour market. In the projects analyzed, racialized migrants have the duty of becoming employable by embracing certain values – the good, working citizen, the free, independent individual, able to make choices – all constituted as being part of an ideal Swedish citizenship.     

Explaining Informal Policy-Making Patterns in the Eurozone Crisis: Decentralized Bargaining and the Theory of EU Institutions

ABSTRACT

During the Eurozone crisis, the so-called ‘Merkozy duumvirate’ emerged as an informal, but highly visible EU policy-making pattern. This article asks why such forms of decentralized bargaining emerge and what this implies for the theory of EU institutions. According to an approach based on negotiation theory, the article argues that Merkozy is a strategic tool used by Germany to realize its preferences on EU crisis management. Based on an incomplete contracts theory of EU institutions, instead, the article analyses Merkozy as an informal institution created by France and Germany to avoid being discriminated by supranational institutions. Both approaches are employed to assess Merkozy’s role in the decision-making process leading to the adoption of the Fiscal Compact.     

Everything will be in order

The late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries represented a period of new conceptual theorizations of “woman” both in the sphere of biological discourse and in literature and philosophy. My focus in this article is on how G.W.F. Hegel constructs gender identity and gender difference philosophically and conceptually. I argue that although the concept “gender identity” was not part of nineteenth‐century vocabulary, Hegel does in fact construct gender difference through a conceptual differentiation between reflexive self‐differentiation and undifferentiated identity constructed as a “difference from difference”. This fundamental logic of gender difference is apparent both in the sphere of Hegel's natural philosophy, in bodily differences between male and female bodies, and in the sphere of social life, in the differentiated spheres of action Hegel prescribes for men and women. Behind both the female body and the position of women as belonging to only one domestic sphere of action lies for Hegel the undifferentiation of spirit, the incapacity to active self‐differentiation and divided or “torn” self‐consciousness. The male body and the position of man as citizen, in contrast, are described by Hegel to be determined by their inner and outer negativity, struggle, and differentiation.