新中国70年国家安全观的演变:认知、内涵与应对

新中国成立以来,面对国内外安全环境的变化,中国实现了由传统安全观向总体国家安全观的演变,显著体现在安全环境研判、安全内容认知和安全维护手段三个方面。中共十八大以来,中国在安全方面频繁推出新理念、新方案和新举措,中国的安全能力不断增强,国际安全影响日益增加。在安全观方面,中国先后提出了总体国家安全观、亚洲新安全观、亚太安全观等理念,实现了安全观的变革与创新。安全环境研判方面,对国内安全的认知更加全面系统、对周边安全的认知更加统筹协调、对国际安全认知更加注重“中国作为”;安全内容认知方面,认知内容日益丰富,兼顾传统安全与非传统安全,统筹国家安全与人民安全;安全维护手段方面,不断完善国家安全体系、加强国家安全能力建设和推进国际安全合作。回顾新中国七十年国家安全观的演变,历经安全实践的锤炼,已经形成了一些基本经验,主要体现在安全环境研判需考虑内外因素并注重其联动性、坚持核心安全需求的底线和安全维护手段要以和为贵、文攻武备。展望未来,其重要启示在于中国的国家安全观要注重安全需求与安全能力之间的平衡,将安全能力建设视为至关重要的任务,不断促进安全维护手段的多样性和灵活性。     

Repackaging national identity: Cool Japan and the resilience of Japanese identity narratives

‘Cool Japan’ is an instance of Japanese government's nation branding exercise as part of its soft power projection in which the unique selling point is identified as Japanese national identity. In this paper, I examine the relationship between Cool Japan and Japanese national identity and highlight a tension in the construction. Cool Japan is about emphasizing Japan's attractiveness for public diplomacy, while the top-down nature of the branding undermines the imagery that the branding is designed to convey. I show that policy elites resolve this tension by invoking the traditional Japanese identity narratives that construct Japan into both a non-Western and an un-Asian entity, reproducing the myth of Japanese uniqueness. I argue that the elite narratives surrounding Cool Japan readily replicate the language reminiscent of prewar identity construction. Despite the contemporary popularity of manga and anime, the purported ‘coolness’ of these products are framed within older constructions of Japanese Self that can trace their pedigree back to the nineteenth century. Using the minutes of committee meetings, policy documents, as well as media interviews given by policy- and business elites, I show that Cool Japan is effectively a twenty first century rendition of the familiar Japanese identity construction.     

Defending the Egyptian nation: national unity and Muslim attitudes toward the Coptic minority

This article discusses the Muslim discourse concerning the Coptic Christian minority since the 2000s in Egypt. Emphasizing the effects of the January 2011 uprising, the paper analyzes the role of nationalism and the national unity discourse in suppressing the debate regarding discrimination against the Copts. Despite the fissures that were created in the discourse, which rejects any reference to discrimination against the Copts, the Coptic issue remains trapped among the contested interpretations of national unity. All narratives of national unity and Egyptian essence, whether the official one pursued by the regime or the one promoted by pro-democracy activists, require the Copts to suppress their demand for rights for the sake of national unity. Adherence to the national unity discourse by all forces precludes the possibility of developing a form of nationalism or a national culture which embodies pluralism of identities and cultures and reinforces the role of nationalism as a tool for stifling pluralism and democracy for all Egyptians, whether Muslim majority or minorities.     

“It's Like Fighting for Survival”: How Rejected Black African Asylum Seekers Experience Living Conditions in an Eastern German State

This article explores how Black African asylum seekers in an eastern German state experienced living conditions and the forms of agency they exhibited to redress the stressful circumstances of everyday life. The article draws on 12 in-depth interviews with rejected Black African asylum seekers and ethnographic research. Participants experienced various socio-environmental stressors and the absence of resources that affected their well-being and were injurious to their human rights. Their responses were embedded in different practices tied to the accumulation of capital that buffered stress and contested repressive asylum laws. The implications of the study for policy and advocacy are discussed.     

Raising citizens in ‘mixed’ family setting: mothering techniques of Filipino and Thai migrants in Belgium

As states increasingly regulate ‘mixed’ family formation, self-positioning has become central to the lives of migrant spouses, including women. To understand this process, the present article investigates the mothering techniques of Filipino and Thai migrant women in Belgium, that is, the decisions, actions and ways of being they consciously enact in response to state policies ‘here’ and/or 'there' to secure the mother–child bond in space and time. Interviews and observations reveal these women’s main techniques: obtaining Belgian nationality for themselves, prioritising a single nationality (Belgian) for their children and staying at home (in the case of Filipino migrant women) or working (in the case of Thai women). This self-positioning sets these women’s own path and prepare their children’s route towards full, active membership in the nation. Mothering appears therefore as a fertile site of citizenship, which from afar echoes the public–private divide but in close-up reveals the porosity of such dichotomy.     

Identifying the Causes of Issue Attention and Policy Change: Evidence from U.S. Offshore Oil and Natural Gas Drilling Policy, 2008

The flow of attention in the policy process is dynamic and disruptive. While we know changes in issue attention often result in policy change, the causal mechanisms underlying the different stages of the attention allocation process remain unclear. This article uses Punctuated Equilibrium Theory to examine an underdeveloped aspect of issue attention within policy‐making institutions: how specific policy indicators influence the entry and exit of issues on policy‐making agendas. Partisan issue attention in the House of Representatives is used to analyze a significant change to U.S. offshore oil and natural gas drilling policy in 2008. The results highlight how historically high gasoline prices precipitated a shift in attention to offshore drilling and subsequent policy change. Moreover, gasoline prices Granger‐cause attention to energy policy in partisan speeches over time. The analysis further reveals how competing policy frames and a salient focusing event shaped congressional and public discourse, leading to subsequent changes in attention. Taken together, the findings broaden our understanding of the policy process by identifying the specific forces behind the entry and exit of issues on the policy‐making agenda.     

A New Progressive Patriotism

The need to hold capital to account and to bend markets to the common good is as powerful as ever, yet it is becoming steadily harder to create an electoral or political majority for such an idea in societies that are fractured and divided. The fundamental bond between voters and parties depends on political identity relationships; old ones are fading, new ones need to be created. The most dynamic politics in advanced capitalist societies are those of nation, people and place. The strategic challenge for the left is to create a new progressive patriotism that can embed radical ideas in a common sense of national purpose.     

The structure of foreign policy attitudes in transatlantic perspective: Comparing the United States,United Kingdom,France and Germany

While public opinion about foreign policy has been studied extensively in the United States, there is less systematic research of foreign policy opinions in other countries. Given that public opinion about international affairs affects who gets elected in democracies and then constrains the foreign policies available to leaders once elected, both comparative politics and international relations scholarship benefit from more systematic investigation of foreign policy attitudes outside the United States. Using new data, this article presents a common set of core constructs structuring both American and European attitudes about foreign policy. Surveys conducted in four countries (the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Germany) provide an expanded set of foreign policy‐related survey items that are analysed using exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM). Measurement equivalence is specifically tested and a common four‐factor structure that fits the data in all four countries is found. Consequently, valid, direct comparisons of the foreign policy preferences of four world powers are made. In the process, the four‐factor model confirms and expands previous work on the structure of foreign policy attitudes. The article also demonstrates the capability of ESEM in testing the dimensionality and cross‐national equivalence of social science concepts.     

“We have to tell our own story”: semiotics of resisting negative stereotypes of Nigeria in the heart of Africa nation branding campaign

This study examines the semiotic resources deployed in resisting negative stereotypes of Nigeria in the international community, particularly representations of the country in the Western media. Data for the study were drawn from Nigeria’s Heart of Africa nation branding campaign. The study applies the discourse-historical approach (DHA) pioneered by Ruth Wodak of the Vienna School of CDA. DHA attempts to integrate much available knowledge about the historical sources and the background of the social and political fields in which discursive events are embedded. Further applying Reisigl and Wodak's presentation of the discursive strategies normally oriented towards understanding texts related to nations and national identities, among others, the study reveals that in appropriating the semiotic resources in the campaign, the discourse producers have predilection for the discursive strategies of mitigating negative attributes which the out-group intensifies, and highlighting positive attributes which the out-group seemingly under-reports in its representations of Nigeria. Notwithstanding the rhetorical dynamics of the semiotic resources, the study concludes that enduring national image management thrives on creating new images and associations lived by a country’s citizens rather than tries to refute old ones.     

Security Providers: Obstacles to Effectiveness in Democracies

To usefully discuss security, one must analyze the security providers states utilize to enhance international and domestic security. These are the armed forces, police, and intelligence agencies. This paper analyzes the implications of democratization on the requirements—posited as strategies, resources, and coordination institutions—these providers require in order to achieve the goals civilian leaders set for them. In analyzing case studies of how nations implement six different tasks, it becomes clear that the absence, or weakness, in any of the requirements leads to serious weakness in implementation. Two findings from the case studies are particularly important for policy. First, presidents, who are elected directly and for fixed terms, may ignore or even abolish institutions, including national security councils, that are created to coordinate policy. Second, as civilians are in control, if they lack clear incentives they are not willing to provide the necessary requirements for the security providers.