New Labour in Power: Five Problems of Contemporary History

The history of New Labour is highly politicised, deployed either for its policy lessons (good or bad) or as a weapon in Labour's factional struggles. But, just as historians in the 1990s reassessed the premierships of Harold Wilson and James Callaghan, so the distance of time and the opening of archives offers an opportunity to reappraise New Labour as history. Such work raises five methodological challenges: the lack of sufficient distance from the subject to tell whether policy innovations will remain popular and permanent; the long shadow the Iraq war casts over this whole period; the deluge of data and sources available; the continuing and controversial part that key actors, such as Tony Blair, are still playing; and the lack of expertise any one author will inevitably face in some policy areas. This article addresses each of those difficulties in turn.     

Financing War or Facilitating Peace? The Impact of Rebel Drug Trafficking on Peace Negotiations in Colombia and Myanmar

Rebel involvement in drug trafficking is broadly found to prolong and intensify civil wars. Being an illicit good with strong demand, high profit margins, limited barriers to entry, and few interdiction opportunities, narcotic drugs disproportionately benefit rebel groups as a source of funding in civil wars. Furthermore, drug trafficking is believed to prolong civil wars by creating war economies that benefit rebel groups, making them reluctant to engage in peace negotiations. However, recent peace agreements suggest that drug trafficking can in some cases be used to “buy off” rebel leaders, whereas other insurgents willingly relinquish this source of funding. This article compares attempts at conflict resolution in Colombia and Myanmar, focusing on the impact drug trafficking by Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) and United Wa State Army has on contemporary peace negotiations.     

Aristocratic and Confederate Republicanism in Hamiltonian Thought and Practice

This article identifies and explores the presence of republicanthought in the intellectual and policy writings of AlexanderHamilton, particularly as it applied to his theoretical understandingof the American executive branch. The article moves chronothematically,highlighting, through the Revolutionary, Constitutional, andGovernmental periods of American political development, Hamilton'sunique sense of republicanism with respect to internationaland domestic politics, as well as American political economy.The article not only attempts to demonstrate Hamilton's intellectualadherence to the republican tradition, but also his commitmentto rhetorically applying the ideology to the realization ofpractical executive policy goals.