Cross-border Support Research Articles

Interdependencies in Visiting Relatives Travel: Uncovering the Nature, Meanings, and Dynamics of Host–Guest Interactions

This study examines the role of visiting relatives (VRs) travel in enabling the interdependencies between transnational sojourners and their stay-behind family members. VRs travel is found to facilitate cross-border support exchange while preserving geographically stretched family ties. This study contributes to the theory by demonstrating that the current understanding of social exchange theory does not adequately explain the dynamics of VRs host-guest interactions, because some previously unidentified factors (e.g., felt obligation and family life cycle) also shape visiting and hosting behaviors. At a practical level, the findings help both sides better understand each other’s needs and respective roles in VRs travel. This study contributes new knowledge to the field of tourism planning and management, by revealing motives and patterns that lie behind VRs travel, while suggesting that the VRs travel market is more diverse than it seems to be, as parent and non-parent visitors tend to have different expectations of hosting.

Cross-Border Support: A Solution to Poverty and Inequity in Pakistan

This study aims to examine the impact of foreign resources on alleviating poverty and inequality within the context of Pakistan. Utilizing secondary data spanning from 1980 to 2022, the study employs the Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) to derive its findings. Two distinct models are employed to assess poverty and inequality. In the initial model, the headcount ratio serves as the dependent variable, with foreign direct investment, foreign remittances, foreign aid, external aid, gross fixed capital formation, and labor force participation rate acting as independent variables. Meanwhile, the second model employs the GINI coefficient as the dependent variable, while maintaining the same set of independent variables as the poverty model. The long-term findings of the first model reveal a negative and statistically significant relationship between remittances, foreign aid, gross fixed capital formation, labor force participation rate, and poverty. Although GDP displays a negative relationship with poverty, it lacks statistical significance, while foreign direct investment shows a positive relationship with poverty. Turning to the results of the second model, Foreign Direct Investment, remittances, foreign aid, GDP, gross fixed capital formation, and labor force participation rate are found to be significant and negatively associated with inequality. Conversely, external debt demonstrates a positive and significant relationship with poverty.

Which Energy Security Union? An experiment on public preferences for energy union alternatives in 5 western European countries

The Russian invasion of Ukraine caught the European Union (EU) off-balance, leading some to propose a relaunch of the EU's Energy Union. However, the political feasibility of such programmes remains disputed, and any such policy design is inherently multidimensional with respect to scope, governance, source of financing and other dimensions. To determine public support for energy security cooperation, we conduct a (first ever) conjoint experiment on public support for alternative energy union designs, fielded among a highly representative sample of the French, German, Italian, Dutch and Spanish populations in November 2022. This multidimensional conjoint experiment allows us to determine the causal link between (hypothetical) policy features of potential energy solidarity pacts, and public support or opposition to such policy. Our results show that policy packages receiving the most support have higher levels of ambition, joint EU-level governance, joint purchases and procurement. All-in-all our results reveal considerable cross-border support for energy solidarity, indicating that a compromise policy is feasible and publicly supported. Furthermore, our results suggest that European citizens are willing to support the creation of joint institutions to face issues of common concern, suggesting that major crises open windows of opportunity to re-shape European integration.

Intra-ethnic interaction across a militarised international border: evidence from the Eritrean-Ethiopian border zone

ABSTRACT This paper examines enforcement practices and intra-ethnic interactions and encounters across the international border between Eritrea and Ethiopia from 2000 to 2018, with a particular focus on the Central Sector. The specific objective is to investigate how the Tigrinya ethnic group, who were arbitrarily separated by the colonial border between Eritrea and Ethiopia, make use of intra-ethnic relationships to combat the new border enforcement practices imposed by Eritrea and Ethiopia to advance their everyday reciprocal interests. This micro perspective is applied to two border towns, Serha and Tserona, which are located at Eritrea’s border with Ethiopia. By analysing the everyday lived experiences of the people who live along the border, this article argues that the underground cross-border support and interactions among kin groups play a significant role in their everyday lives as they combat the States’ everyday border enforcement practices.

Turkey-Syria Earthquake: The Importance of Providing a Direct Cross-border Support.

The 7.8 magnitude earthquake that occurred in southern Turkey on February 6, 2023, has resulted in over 40,000 and 5,000 confirmed deaths in Turkey and Syria, respectively, including substantial infrastructure damage. While Turkey has received assistance from various countries and international organizations, the level of support Syria has received remains unclear. The Assad regime has demanded that aid be sent to the capital Damascus, but this may hinder the delivery of assistance to the areas most severely affected by the earthquake because the affected regions were mainly controlled by rebel forces. One of the biggest challenges in providing aid is accessing the affected region, as the earthquake occurred close to the border between Syria and Turkey, where roads and other infrastructure are poorly constructed. Furthermore, the northwest area of Syria shelters many internally displaced people, and more than 50% of medical facilities are not functioning due to the ongoing conflict, making the situation more hazardous. In light of the experience of the Great East Japan Earthquake, securing direct support routes and dispatching medical personnel to the affected areas is crucial for a gradual recovery from the disaster. Therefore, it is essential for the international community, including Japan, to negotiate with the Assad regime to expand direct support routes and provide support for the dispatch of medical personnel who will remain and work in the affected areas. Humanitarian assistance and political issues should be kept separate to avoid further hindrances to aid delivery.

Distortions of National Policies to Renewable Energy Cooperation Mechanisms

The EU endeavors to stimulate the use of renewable energy cooperation mechanisms. These cooperation mechanisms can significantly reduce the policy cost for meeting renewable targets. Several authors, however, have raised concerns that such cooperation mechanisms can be subject to efficiency losses due to different national regulatory conditions, and due to an ill-advised selection of cross-border support instruments. A quantitative evaluation of these effects remains missing. To address this gap, we first introduce a unifying analytical framework to show how optimal cross-border renewable energy trade should be organized and how these mechanisms could be distorted. We then develop a partial equilibrium model, formulated as a large-scale mathematical program with equilibrium constraints, to assess the impact of (i) different national grid cost allocation regimes and (ii) different cross-border feed-in premium implementations. Our results indicate that EU-wide auctions for renewable electricity should (i) not be based on sliding feed-in premiums and should (ii) ideally be discriminatory if national regulatory conditions differ across Member States. We also consider country-level distributional effects and confirm that Member States can lose when engaging in renewable cooperation.

Research on Low-Density Cross-Border Support Technology for Large-Section Coal Roadway in Shallow-Buried Thick Coal Seam

The slow excavation speed of coal roadways has always been a key factor restricting the safe and efficient production of large-scale coal mines in China, and the problem of unbalanced mining replacement caused by this is widespread. This paper takes the S1231 heading face of the Ningtiaota coal mine of Shaanxi Coal and Chemical Industry Group as the research object, analyzes the characteristics of the stress evolution of coal roadway driving, reveals the principle of low-density cross-border support, and proposes a low-density cross-border support plan. Using FLAC3D to study the roadway stress-displacement evolution law of the new support scheme during the driving and mining phases, the results show that the peak stress during the driving is 5.3 MPa, and the coal pillar side stress concentration is the most obvious during the mining period, with the peak value being 7.9 MPa. The moving distances of the two banks are both 10 mm, which verifies the feasibility of low-density cross-border support. Field application shows that during roadway excavation, the amount of roof subsidence and the displacement of the two sides are 9 mm and 11 mm, respectively, and the development depth of roof cracks is controlled within 0.5 m. The overall control effect is good, and the speed of coal roadway driving is increased by 77.19% compared with the original. The new support builds a thick roof anchor structure to ensure the safety and stability of the roadway. At the same time, by reducing the number of bolts, the bolt support time has been greatly reduced, effectively alleviating the tight situation of mining replacement, and providing solutions for mines under the same conditions.

To instill fear or love: Terrorist groups and the strategy of building reputation

Why does one terrorist group employ actions that win the hearts and minds of its constituency while another resorts to tactics that alienate their support? The paper investigates terrorist groups’ strategy of building reputation in their constituency/in-group population and non-constituency/out-group population. Studying all domestic terrorist groups between 1980 and 2011 with original data, we find that ethnic/religious groups and those with territorial control invest in positive reputation in their constituency as they can minimize the risks of returns. Radical groups and those with cross-border support, however, tend to build negative constituency reputation. While the former type of group has a small constituency, the latter ones can find resources across borders, which reduces their dependency on the constituency. Lastly, we find that terror groups seeking policy concessions avoid building a negative reputation in their non-constituency as this strategy enhances their chances of negotiating with the government.

Urban Terrorists in Continental Europe after 1970: Implications for Deterrence and Defeat of Violent Nonstate Actors

This article considers the experience of continental European governments after 1970 in dealing with indigenous groups that sought the violent overthrow of parliamentary democracy and market economics. Drawing on detailed case histories of the so-called “urban terrorists” in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain—along with lessons from Greece and the Netherlands—the article examines efforts to achieve deterrence by denial of nonstate actors. Even under the constraints of law in highly evolved criminal-justice systems, the affected governments often were successful in employing both conciliatory and coercive measures to deny the urban terrorists popular sympathy, ability to remain at large, communications while in custody, financial resources, crossborder support, and recruitment of new members. These measures, along with changes in the political and social environment, combined to neutralize the threat from urban terrorism in most of the countries studied.

Analyzing the Canada–U.S. Environmental Relationship A Multi-Faceted Approach

The topography and hydrology bisected by the political boundary dividing Canada and the United States makes binational environmental policy problems inevitable. Many of these problems are handled without dissention, but some are causes of conflict. From the Lake of the Woods to Puget Sound, and from the Gulf of Alaska to the Beaufort Sea, the international boundary is ruler-straight. Geophysical and bioregional features are bisected politically, with little regard for ecosystemic relationships. (Lynton Caldwell 1992) ********** Canada and the United States share a set of ecosystems that span the North American continent and the transboundary nature of environmental problems creates the need for cooperation between the two countries at multiple levels. Certainly, we have learned much over the past two decades about the binational environmental relationship, where federal officials in both countries seek to exercise influence through diplomatic channels and collaborate via joint mechanisms such as the International Joint Commission. Adding to the state of knowledge on Canada-United States environmental relations are the growing number of studies aimed at unearthing less prominent subnational cross-border linkages. Subnational interactions are more likely to take place within the realm of the workaday, yet are just as important for the state of the overall environmental relationship as national-level diplomatic interactions. Our understanding of the trilateral environmental context is rather more recent, although it is becoming clear that the continental influence tends to operate through collaborative science and shared problem definition. As Alan Schwartz, a long-time observer of Canadian-American environmental relations, explains: there is a complex web of interactions on many levels...which holds most issues at bay as minor, behind-the-scenes irritants rather than allowing them to develop into full-blown crises. (1) To grasp the full complexity of the Canada--U.S. environmental relationship, one must employ a multi-faceted framework for analyzing cross-border interactions. This requires both a multi-level approach that takes into account interactions at the subnational, national, and continental levels and attention to different modes of cross-border interaction. More specifically, it is necessary to combine examinations of, first, formal relations or negotiations generally conducted by senior-level officials and, second, less visible, working relations among mid-level officials, experts and non-governmental organizations, which can lead to the development of likeminded epistemic communities. The recent Canadian-American negotiations on the Ozone Annex to the Canada--United States Air Quality Agreement demonstrate that analyses ought not to focus on national-level interactions at the expense of subnational and supranational relations or, alternatively, concentrate on formal, high-level interactions at the expense of mid-level working relations. Certainly, the manner in which the binational negotiations unfolded over 1999-2000 is an important part of the overall story. However, the development of a transboundary network of officials, experts and nongovernmental actors at multiple levels during the 1990s was critical. Out of this network, a web of cross-border support for addressing ground-level ozone via specific policy instruments gradually evolved. Framing the Analysis: Lessons From a Burgeoning Literature During the 1980s and into the 1990s, many studies of CanadianAmerican environmental relations focused primarily on the efforts of federal officials in the two countries to coordinate domestic and crossborder political dynamics in order to further bilateral aims, much as two-level game theorists would. In Putnam's classic characterization, cross-border negotiations consist of, first, Level I negotiations, or bargaining between negotiators from different countries which leads to tentative agreement, and, second, Level II negotiations, or separate discussions with domestic interests about whether to ratify this tentative agreement. …