Political Alliances Research Articles

“On the Side of the Good”: Political Alliances of Religious Zionists and Israeli Conservatism in the Quest to Hegemony

This article discusses the recent political alliance between IC and the “Hardal” (acronym for Haredi-Dati-Leumi, meaning Ultra-Orthodox-Religious-Zionists) followers of Rabbi Zvi Thau. This new cooperation is surprising, due to Thau’s tendency to criticize groups that do not adhere to his strict interpretation of Judaism. In this article we analyze the recent developments within Thau’s circle, and determine that this cooperation is a consequence of a unique interpretation of a spiritual state of emergency. We conclude by analyzing the circumstances in which IC was formed, as a lesson religious Zionists took from the 2005 disengagement from Gaza plan. The article demonstrates that IC intentionally intended to enable the creation of this sort of political alliance.

Evolution of the policy of the Republic of Finland regarding NATO membership (1994–2023)

ABSTRACT This article explores the evolution of Finland's policy regarding NATO membership from 1994 to 2023, delving into the strategic shifts and adaptations in response to changing regional and global security dynamics. The primary aim is to elucidate how Finland's unique strategic position, domestic considerations, and pre-existing security relationships influenced its pathway to NATO membership. Utilizing a methodological approach grounded in document analysis, the study scrutinizes official government reports, and treaties to trace Finland's journey toward NATO. The findings reveal a multi-phased approach in Finland's policy evolution. Conclusively, the study underscores Finland's strategic agility in adapting its foreign policy amidst changing security environments. This policy evolution, culminating in NATO membership, reflects Finland's response to regional geopolitical shifts and emerging security threats, highlighting the importance of strategic flexibility and alignment in national security policy. The article contributes to a broader understanding of small states' security strategies and alliance politics, offering valuable insights into Finland's unique experience and the dynamics of NATO expansion in the 21st century.

‘BrOthers in Arms’: France, the Anglosphere and AUKUS

Abstract Important French foreign policy dyads, such as relations between France and the United Kingdom and France and the United States, have consistently been subject to empirical, historical and policy analysis. However, France's relationship with the broader Anglosphere is rarely considered or conceptualized. This article theorizes France's relationship with the Anglosphere at a pivotal historical juncture. The 2021 announcement of AUKUS, a security partnership between Australia, the UK and the US, spectacularly excluded France despite a shared proclivity to use military force in defence of liberal international order. To analyse this vital contemporary case, we undertake a comparative, computer-aided discourse analysis of 540 political and media texts, triangulated with thematic analysis of 37 elite interviews. First, contributing to constructivist and ontological security theory, we develop a novel theorization of alliance politics, generally, through the concept of ‘brOthers in arms’, whereby a double identity inscription binds allies antagonistically together. Second, contributing to critical studies of foreign policy and research on national identity, we locate France–Anglosphere relations, specifically, towards the thick end of an alliance identity spectrum, held together in mutual alterity by complementary, competing and co-constitutive exceptionalisms. Third, contributing to studies of foreign policy and alliance politics, our analysis situates AUKUS within the fractious longue durée of France–Anglosphere relations.

An unfinished suffrage reform. Voting rights in Sweden after the ‘democratic breakthrough’

ABSTRACT This article examines the complex and non-linear process of democratization in Sweden after the introduction of so-called universal suffrage in 1921. The research questions address the excluded groups post-1921, the reasons for their exclusion, and the historical processes that led to further expansions of suffrage rights. The study shows that the expansion of suffrage rights in Sweden after 1921 was not guided primarily by a desire to broaden voter inclusion and/or rectify the limitations of the 1921 legislation. Instead, the motivations were embedded in a more intricate and multifaceted tapestry of political aims and alliances as well as situational factors that included various social, economic, and cultural shifts. The article concludes that the history of suffrage in Sweden after 1921 has been one of continuous negotiations, transformations, and adaptations, and that this provides valuable insights for addressing challenges of political inclusion and representation in the present and future.

FBI and Asian political organizations in the ending of 1960s – beginning of the 1970s (using the example of Asian-American Political Alliance)

The article examines the FBI's way of working with radical and civil opposition among Asian political organizations in the context of the Vietnam War and the political situation in general during the end of the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s. Using the Bureau's archives of the Asian-American Political Alliance, work's methods of the intelligence agency related to non-radical and obeying the law groups are made. The main threat that such groups considered was the influence of communists' parties and the Black Panther Party, which was far more radical and against them. As a result, the FBI applied anti-constitutional methods of actions. The non-uniformity of the COINTELPRO program, within which the FBI investigations took place, is traced by the conducted research. At this period, most of the Asian political organizations were non-violent and legal in nature. Also, many delegates were professors in universities and its students. Hence, the Bureau acted carefully while working with that kind of organizations because they didn't want to get in an «awkward position». Based on made analyses, the conclusion can be made that the FBI's activity in relation to Asian political organizations was considerably different from their methods for other political organizations of the same kind in a considerable period of history.

Justice, inclusion, and incentives

How does justice affect individual incentives and efficiency in a political economy? We show that elementary principles of distributive justice guarantee the existence of a self-enforcing contract whereby agents non-cooperatively choose their inputs and derive utility from their pay. Chief among these principles is that your pay should not depend on your name, and a more productive individual should not earn less. We generalize our analysis to incorporate inclusivity, ensuring basic pay to unproductive agents, implemented through progressive taxation and redistribution. Our findings show that without redistribution, any self-enforcing agreement may be inefficient, but a minimal level of redistribution guarantees the existence of an efficient agreement. Our model has several applications and interpretations. In addition to highlighting the structure of economies and organizations in which fairness and efficiency are compatible, we develop an application to the formation of rent-seeking political alliances under the threat of fake news.

Nurturing Faith and Enlightening Minds: Assumptionist Education in the Ottoman Empire

The text explores the educational activities of French Roman Catholic missions in the nineteenth century, as they evolved from serving local Catholic needs to becoming crucial assets in advancing France’s religious–cultural influences and the Holy See’s efforts to unify Eastern Christian Churches under Rome. Focused on the Mission d’Orient, initiated during Pius IX’s papacy, this study delves into the Assumptionists’ educational activities in the Ottoman Empire (1863–1914), which aimed to inculturate the Christian communities of the Ottoman Empire, achieve union with Rome, and build a bridge of knowledge between the Ottoman Orient and Europe. Employing a transnational historical approach, this research utilizes primary sources from the Holy See and the Assumptionist Order, examining religious and educational interactions with Ottoman millets. This article argues that Assumptionist institutions succeeded in inculturation and acted as bridges for cultural exchange. The context includes the French protectorate of the Ottoman Empire, the protégé system, and the Capitulations of 1740, demonstrating the Holy See’s use of political and religious alliances. The Assumptionists, influential in advancing the Holy See’s interests, are studied regarding their engagement in France and the Orient. Despite valuable insights from existing research, this article seeks to fill gaps by using Assumptionists as a case study, exploring the specific impacts of their education on various religious groups within the context of France’s religious–cultural imperialism.

Alcohol Diplomacy, Gender and Power in the Late Seventeenth-Century Gold Coast Slaving Complex

Abstract Across the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Atlantic African leaders confronted new challenges as the European demand for captive African labour transformed the political economy of the region and the experience of living within it. Among a range of new and remodelled strategies designed to protect their polities, West African leaders used alcohol diplomacy to facilitate political alliance, cross-cultural communication and economic exchange. This article draws on warehouse registers, European travelogues and joint-stock company correspondence to uncover Queen Tituba of Agona (c.1638–1707) in her efforts to manage the English Royal African Company. By tracing her adroit use of alcohol, it reveals how West Africans repurposed English commodities to fit their own patterns of consumption and exchange. From funnelling diplomatic gifts of brandy into Akan-speaking political hierarchies to resolving disputes over rum, the queen drew on alcohol to fortify her rule against other coastal powers and navigate the demands of her own officials, subjects and enslaved labourers. She deployed alcohol in these ways despite, and because of, the pressures placed on her as a woman political leader. Essential to trade and ritual, yet morally fraught, Queen Tituba’s use of alcohol upended the European hierarchies of race and gender that consigned West African women to the status of commodity rather than recognized them as strategic consumers. Following alcohol offers a way of unravelling the intersection between gender, consumption and authority in a period when the trafficking of enslaved African peoples fundamentally transformed Atlantic political economy.

Prisoners of Impunity: What the Global Community Should Know about and Learn from the Russo-Ukrainian War

While the world awoke to the horrors of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Russia’s military intervention into Ukraine’s internal affairs had its roots in 2014 with the annexation of Crimea and the war in Donbas. Long before 2014, Russia had sought to influence Ukraine’s electoral outcomes, foreign policy and political alliances, as well as exert economic coercion through trade wars. The overarching imperialist vision of Ukraine has long been evident in political addresses delivered by Russia’s leadership and the narratives projected by state-controlled media. Much of the world community, however, perceived these actions through the lens of Ukraine as a post-Soviet country presumed to belong to the so-called Russian sphere of influence. Despite numerous historic and modern-day atrocities against those perceived to be part of its geopolitical periphery, Russia enjoyed political, economic and moral impunity. Too often, Western powers prioritized regional stability and trade with Russia over upholding the rule of law and respect for Ukraine’s sovereignty. This was evident in the tepid reaction to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and the instigation of war in Donbas. Settling for a state of ‘negative peace’ in the case of Minsk accords (2014, 2015) – rather than holding Russia accountable for its actions, revealed a lack of holistic understanding of Russia, Ukraine, and what it truly takes to achieve “positive peace”. This essay offers a broader historical context for Ukraine’s nation building and Russia’s enduring and centuries-long colonial drives toward Ukraine. It argues that the Russo-Ukrainian war, beginning with the annexation of Crimea, marks a unique moment in the post – World War II international world order. This event poses a challenge to the current international legal framework while also presenting an opportunity to draw lessons for preserving the liberal world order.

ІСТОРИЧНЕ ПІДҐРУНТЯ ТА СУСПІЛЬНО-ПОЛІТИЧНІ ПЕРЕДУМОВИ СТВОРЕННЯ ПАРТІЇ АЛЬТЕРНАТИВА ДЛЯ НІМЕЧЧИНИ

Based on the analysis of sources, such as programmatic and pre-election documents of the Alternative for Germany (Alternative für Deutschland –AfD) party, materials of civic-political initiatives and formations that preceded its establishment, processing a range of informational, feature and statistical materials, taking into account the works of German, British, Swiss, and American researchers, authors aim to illuminate the historical preconditions and direct socio-political and socio-economic reasons of the emergence, stages of formation, and achievements of the AfD’s first electoral successes on the German political arena. It is established that in Germany, after the Second World War, alongside liberal-conservative and social-reformist parties, several right-wing populist or right-radical parties emerged. Their development occurred in three waves and was marked by legislative restrictions from the state, stigmatization from society, weakness of internal organizational structure, and competition from ruling parties, leading only to temporary electoral successes at the local level. The formation of the new right-wing populist party AfD was primarily influenced by the European debt crisis of 2010 and the Eurozone rescue policy of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government. The article extensively examines the main stages of the party’s genesis and development: the formation of the “Plenum der Ökonomen” in 2010, the “Bündnis Bürgerwille” in 2012, the political alliance “Wahlalternative 2013” and the actual establishment of the party in 2013. The main foundational and programmatic documents are analyzed, highlighting the idea of Germany’s exit from the Eurozone and return to a national currency as a recurring theme. Another important factor in the success of AfD in the early stages of its history was the party’s ability to unite those segments of German society that were skeptical of the integrationist European policies of the ruling parties. Undoubtedly, the refugee crisis that engulfed EU countries and Germany in particular in mid-2015 provided a powerful impetus for the party’s further development. By radicalizing its programmatic demands, AfD achieved sustained electoral success not only at the regional but also at the federal levels over several years.

Political alliance and electoral pacts: a normative understanding of the BJP-Shiv Sena dynamics in Maharashtra

Political alliance and electoral pacts: a normative understanding of the BJP-Shiv Sena dynamics in Maharashtra

Plaidoyer pour la colère antinucléaire : le droit à l’émotion dans l’écriture de l’histoire du Centre d’Expérimentation du Pacifique

This article argues that Tahiti’s nuclear history cannot be written without foregrounding the emotions, past and present, roused by half a century of environmental racism and official lies. Offering a feminist analysis of the sociology of knowledge production, this study questions the objectivity of the discourse favored by France and its political allies in Mā'ohi Nui and explores the limits of its alleged scientific neutrality. Contrasting this official history with Mā'ohi creative discourse, be it written, digital, or embodied, this article suggests that literature constitutes an optimal medium to foreground and process the sadness, guilt and anger associated with nuclear imperialism. Analyzing works conceived in the past five years by emerging artists such as Tevahitua Bordes, Taimana Ellacott, Karine Taea and Rehia Tepa, it asks how contemporary Mā'ohi writers and orators mobilize their creativity to explore the contrasting emotions brought by the Centre d’Expérimentation du Pacifique, ensuring that this ongoing chapter of the country’s history is not written by others in a sanitized and dedramatized fashion.

The Regime security and Alliance politics in the Middle East

The Regime security and Alliance politics in the Middle East

A Tangled Web

Few debates in modern academia are as heated as the one among scholars who consider the arrival of bubonic plague in Constantinople in the spring of 542 as a demographic and social disaster and those who argue for less tumultuous outcomes. Whatever side one stands on in the current discussion, the pandemic’s immediate impact on the administration, economy, politics, society and religious culture within Constantinople and the wider empire seems clear. In this article I will suggest that increased competition amongst Constantinople’s elites for a shrunken pool of suitable brides and grooms for their sons and daughters was one hitherto underappreciated result of the pandemic. The sixth-century eastern Roman historian, Procopius of Caesarea, offers ample evidence not only about the devastation wrought by the bubonic plague but also its impact on the political alliances in Constantinople. His digressions in Secret History concerning marital politicking amongst Constantinople’s elites provide evidence of this impact. Capitalizing on advances in our knowledge about Procopius both as an author and historical figure, I will analyze his writings on three levels: as history, literature and propaganda. By pondering what motivated Procopius to focus on these marital alliances and, moreover, pondering links between them, the paper offers some revisionist takes on these digressions, both as literary devices and as actual events.

Franklin Roosevelt, the “Third New Deal,” and the transformation of partisanship

AbstractThis article focuses on Franklin Roosevelt's influence on the Democratic Party. It brings to light the significant, but underexamined “Third New Deal,” the controversial program Roosevelt pursued during his second and third terms. Shortly after his landslide 1936 re‐election, Roosevelt pursued three polarizing initiatives: the Court‐Packing Plan, the 1937 executive reorganization bill, and the 1938 “purge” campaign. These measures, while far from completely successful, began an important transformation that replaced the decentralized, patronage‐based party system, which had dominated the 19th century and remained regnant through the first three decades of the 20th century, with an executive‐centered partisanship, which subordinated parties to the ambitions of the White House. Roosevelt's assault on existing partisan practices—most notably, the unprecedented “purge” campaign—imposed his personal brand on the Democratic Party. More broadly, his profound influence on the Democratic Party led to what Max Weber called the “routinization of charisma,” whereby the disruptive leadership of a charismatic leader is displaced by a “mechanism of rules” that transcend “personal authority.” The deinstitutionalization of the Democratic Party was part of a broader objective to build an executive‐centered administrative state that Roosevelt and his political allies considered a more effective means to pursue their partisan objectives. Ronald Reagan's presidency signaled that Republicans, no less than Democrats, embraced executive‐centered partisanship. Eventually, as became all too clear during the presidency of Donald Trump, the fusion of executive prerogative and partisanship resulted in a “personal president,” as Theodore Lowi termed it, and a plebiscitary politics that denigrated political parties as collective organizations and threatened to turn political parties into cults of personality.

Drawing a “Geopolitics” of Medieval Middle East: Political Alliance and Rivalry among Islamic Caliphates, the Mongols, and the European Kingdoms

This article aims to sketch the “geopolitics” of the past by investigating the context of the medieval Islamic world. Not only in today’s world, international political and economic relations have also had their precedents in the past. Given its strategic position in this issue, the Middle East is one of the regions that are interesting to study in the context of geopolitical narratives from the past to the present. This article tries to unravel the geopolitical situation of the Medieval Middle East by tracing historical records related to the economic-political relations of Islamic dynasties through a broader picture by looking at their relationship with other political powers that existed at that time, especially the Mongols and European-Christian kingdoms in general. This exploration shows how the issues of political pragmatism filled with negotiations and the necessity of religious issues have been deeply intertwined with each other and became a major feature of geopolitical relations in the medieval Middle East.[Artikel ini menggambarkan sebuah sketsa tentang “geo-politik” di masa lalu dengan menginvestigasi konteks dunia Islam pada abad pertengahan. Tidak hanya terjadi di dunia saat ini, relasi internasional dalam bidang politik dan ekonomi juga telah memiliki presedennya di masa lalu. Timur tengah adalah salah satu ranah yang layak untuk dikaji dalam konteks narasi geopolitik sejak masa lalu hingga saat ini, mengingat posisinya yang strategis dalam isu ini. Artikel ini mencoba mengurai situasi geopolitik Timur Tengah pada abad pertengahan dengan menelusuri catatan sejarah terkait relasi ekonomi-politik dinasti-dinasti Islam ditinjau dari konteks yang lebih luas dengan melihat kaitannya dengan kekuaan politik lain yang ada ketika itu, termasuk Mongol dan kerajaan-kerajaan Kristen Eropa secara umum. Penelusuran ini menunjukkan bagaimana isu pragmatisme politik yang dipenuhi dengan negosiasi dan isu keagamaan telah sangat terkait satu sama lain dan menjadi fitur utama dalam relasi geopolitis di Timur Tengah pada abad pertengahan].

Trzydziestolecie stosunków między Rzeczpospolitą Polską a Republiką Armenii

THIRTY YEARS OF RELATIONS BETWEEN THE REPUBLIC OF POLAND AND THE REPUBLIC OF ARMENIA
 The thirty years of diplomatic relations between Poland and Armenia represent a challenging and inspiring history of seeking a collaboration between states belonging to different political and military alliances, geographically and culturally distant, with significantly different potentials.

Democratic Regression in Indonesian Local Elections: Police in Political Positions Prior to The West Java Governor Election 2018

This article examines the democratic regression in Indonesia before the local political competition, particularly the 2018 West Java regional election, by investigating the allocation of police officers to civilian political positions. This study contends that the government plays a role in the development of challenges in police professionalism that become apparent during democratic elections. In this study, the government achieved this by assigning serving police personnel to civilian political positions, particularly as temporary governors. This study employs a qualitative methodology that entails conducting desk research to analyze secondary data from many sources, such as books, journals, articles, reports, and official documents, with a specific focus on government regulations. The research findings validate that the connection between the police and the regime forms a political alliance between the state and the police, resulting in the police's role and engagement in the political sphere, particularly during elections. Local political competitions in Indonesia are currently experiencing degradation in democratic processes, which has become a notable phenomenon of democratic regression.

Evolution of geopolitical expansion of Western powers in the Asia-Pacific region: confrontation between China and the AUKUS bloc countries

The article presents an assessment of the evolution of the institutional environment of multilateral military and political cooperation between Western powers (USA and UK) in the Asia-Pacific region. The basis of the study was determined by military alliances in the Asia-Pacific region from the second half of the twentieth century to the present. The need to assess the evolution of the multilateral alliance of Western powers in the Asia-Pacific region is due to the current dynamics of changes in the approach to the implementation of military cooperation, which determines the need to create a new military alliance of the AUKUS type; as well as an analysis of the influence of the new alliance on the emerging international security system in the context of a stagnating confrontation between the United States and its allies and the People's Republic of China (including the strategic partnership with the Russian Federation). As a result of the study, it was revealed that the emergence of a military and political alliance of the AUKUS type is due to the evolutionary-strategic need for the leader of the alliance (USA) to consolidate its hegemony within the Asia-Pacific region after the loss of influence in the region and the establishment of the dominance of the People's Republic of China in the early twentieth century. The general geopolitical trends in the development of the system of military and political alliance were also identified in the context of a correlating increase in conflict potential in the regional security system of the Asia-Pacific region with the increasing need of China to develop a strategic partnership with Russia against the backdrop of the military and political and economic crisis between the United States (and its allies) and the PRC. The intensifying confrontation between Washington and Beijing motivates the further deepening of Russian-Chinese relations. Both in the field of trade, economic and military cooperation.

Transplantation and adaptation of the Soviet economic model in North Korea, 1945-1960

The North Korean development model holds distinct similarities to the Soviet model. The Soviet Union’s experience and example played a key role in the initial nation-building in North Korea. However, as this study aims to argue, in the certain areas such as the economy, the transfer of the Soviet model to the Korean soil was often done against the direct Soviet advice. This study based on analysis of primary sources including declassified archival materials traces the entrenchment in North Korea in the 1940s-1950s of the key elements of the “classic” Soviet economic model such as directive centralized economic planning, nationalization, industrialization and prioritized heavy industry development and collectivized agriculture. Such research contributes to the better understanding of the economic and political processes in North Korea in the first post-liberation decades, of its economic system and relations with key political and economic allies in the Cold War.