Defense Committee Research Articles

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Ordinary Stalinism: The Council of Ministers and the Soviet Neopatrimonial State, 1946–1953

Next article No AccessOrdinary Stalinism: The Council of Ministers and the Soviet Neopatrimonial State, 1946–1953*Yoram Gorlizki Yoram GorlizkiUniversity of Manchester Search for more articles by this author University of ManchesterPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Journal of Modern History Volume 74, Number 4December 2002 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/376210 Views: 114Total views on this site Citations: 18Citations are reported from Crossref ©2002 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Fabian Burkhardt Institutionalising Authoritarian Presidencies: Polymorphous Power and Russia’s Presidential Administration, Europe-Asia Studies 73, no.33 (May 2020): 472–504.https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2020.1749566Graeme Gill Stalinism and Executive Power: Formal and Informal Contours of Stalinism, Europe-Asia Studies 71, no.66 (Jul 2019): 994–1012.https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2019.1628180Roger D. Markwick War, Violence and the Making of the Stalinist State: A Tillyian Analysis, Europe-Asia Studies 71, no.66 (Jul 2019): 907–931.https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2019.1637400Graeme Gill From the Predominant to the Dominant Leader, 1930–53, (Mar 2018): 101–166.https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76962-2_4Roland Boer After October: Towards a Theory of the Socialist State, International Critical Thought 7, no.33 (Oct 2017): 309–326.https://doi.org/10.1080/21598282.2017.1355742Claus Bech Hansen Power and purification: late-Stalinist repression in the Uzbek SSR, Central Asian Survey 36, no.11 (Sep 2016): 148–169.https://doi.org/10.1080/02634937.2016.1213702Mark Harrison Secrecy, Fear and Transaction Costs: The Business of Soviet Forced Labour in the Early Cold War, Europe-Asia Studies 65, no.66 (Aug 2013): 1112–1135.https://doi.org/10.1080/09668136.2013.815417Marlène Laruelle Informalité de l'État et appropriation prédatrice des ressources : le présidentialisme clientélaire en Asie centrale, Revue internationale de politique comparée 20, no.33 (Jan 2013): 65.https://doi.org/10.3917/ripc.203.0065 Yoram Gorlizki Structures of Trust after Stalin, The Slavonic and East European Review 91, no.11 (Jan 2013): 119.https://doi.org/10.5699/slaveasteurorev2.91.1.0119Neil Robinson Economic and Political Hybridity: Patrimonial Capitalism in the Post-Soviet Sphere, Journal of Eurasian Studies 4, no.22 (Jan 2019): 136–145.https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euras.2013.03.003Daniel C. Bach Patrimonialism and neopatrimonialism: comparative trajectories and readings, Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 49, no.33 (Jul 2011): 275–294.https://doi.org/10.1080/14662043.2011.582731Mark Harrison Secrecy, Fear, and Transaction Costs: The Business of Soviet Forced Labour in the Early Cold War, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2011).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1992434Yoram Gorlizki, Hans Mommsen The Political (Dis)Orders of Stalinism and National Socialism, (Dec 2008): 41–86.https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511802652.003Ronald Grigor Suny The Cambridge History of Russia, (Mar 2008).https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521811446Yoram Gorlizki, Oleg Khlevniuk Stalin and his circle, (Nov 2006): 243–267.https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521811446.011Elizabeth S. Kelley, Albert J. Mills, Bill Cooke Management as a Cold War phenomenon?, Human Relations 59, no.55 (May 2006): 603–610.https://doi.org/10.1177/0018726706066437E. A. Rees Introduction, (Jan 2004): 1–18.https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230524286_1E. A. Rees Stalin as Leader, 1937–1953: From Dictator to Despot, (Jan 2004): 200–239.https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230524286_8

Security, nationalism and the pursuit of nuclear weapons and missiles: The South Korean case, 1970–82

South Korea decided to develop nuclear weapons and surface‐to‐surface missiles in the early 1970s. The Park Chung‐hee administration made the decision because of its concern about a complete withdrawal of US forces from Korea following the Nixon Doctrine. Simultaneously, increasing nationalism within the administration, caused by its tumultuous relations with the United States, further strengthened such pursuits. Later, when faced with the US threat to withdraw security and economic assistance, the administration slowed down active development of nuclear weapons in 1976, but it continued missile development. However, the Chun Doo‐hwan administration, inaugurated in 1980 after military coup and massacre, froze all weapons‐related nuclear research and the missile programme. The Chun regime made such a change because it needed the support of the US to make up for its weakness in legitimacy and because the Reagan administration provided a solid defence commitment to South Korea.

Out on a limb, or a new branch of signalling theory?

Could it be that one of nature's most dazzling displays is just a ‘keep out’ sign to insects? According to Hamilton and Brown's recent analysis 1xAutumn tree colours as a handicap signal. Hamilton, W.D. and Brown, S.P. Proc. R. Soc. London B Biol. Sci. 2001; 268: 1489–1493Crossref | Scopus (120)See all References1 of published data, the autumnal change in leaf colour of temperate deciduous trees is a handicap signal to their insect pests, revealing the commitment of the trees to defence. This is the first costly handicap signal to be proposed in plants 2xThe origin of autumn colours by coevolution. Archetti, M. J. Theor. Biol. 2000; 205: 625–630Crossref | PubMed | Scopus (90)See all References2. In animals, handicap signals are often behavioural: stotting in Thompson's gazelles being the most commonly cited example. The scope for handicap signals in plants is perhaps more limited, at least to our current view, but the area of plant–herbivore interactions is one in which they could evolve.Several conditions for a handicap signalling system between deciduous trees and their insect pests appear to be met. First, leaf colour change is costly. Greater percentages of chlorophylls than of carotenoids are resorbed before abscission, and, combined with the early cessation of photosynthesis and the production of other pigments in autumn leaves, it is difficult to view this process as a mere side effect of senescence. Second, the signal must be received. Some aphid species display a sensory bias towards yellow-green light, apparently preferring a dilute hue of the most attractive colour, which might provide a mechanism for host choice based on relative display intensity. Third, the signal should ultimately confer differential reproductive success. Pre-emptive antixenotic signalling, exploiting a pre-existing sensory bias, should protect the tree from both the effects of herbivory and any potentially damaging pathogens that their insect pests might be carrying.For the signal to remain honest, there must be a link between it and the quality (here defensive commitment) being signalled. In this case, there are two ways in which this might be true. Chemical changes in the leaf that result in the autumn colour display could be associated with the production of inhibitors that prevent germination of seedlings through the leaf litter. Aphids could therefore use leaf brightness as a means of assessing the overall energetic investment of the plant in defence. Alternatively, the colour change could be a visual call to arms: systems in which insect-damaged plants produce signals to attract other predatory insects are known 3xExperimental evidence that plants under attack may benefit from parasitoids. Fritzsche-Hoballah, M.E. and Turlings, T.C.J. Evol. Ecol. Res. 2001; 3: 553–565See all References3. Either way, the fact that a tree can produce a vivid display would provide useful information to insects seeking a host.The key, as always, lies in variation. The authors readily point out that only empirical tests will reveal the truth of their hypothesis, and suggest several potential veins of research at both the intra- and interspecific levels. In addition, some of their assumptions must be validated, particularly that specialist pests are more damaging to hosts than are generalist ones, and that the energetically costly autumn display is produced at the expense of some other function. However, this does not detract from a tantalizing idea that will no doubt spark an explosion of new research. Autumn will never be the same again.

Autumn tree colours as a handicap signal.

Many species of deciduous trees display striking colour changes in autumn. Here, we present a functional hypothesis: bright autumn coloration serves as an honest signal of defensive commitment against autumn colonizing insect pests. According to this hypothesis, individuals within a signalling species show variation in the expression of autumn coloration, with defensively committed trees producing a more intense display. Insects are expected to be averse to the brightest tree individuals and, hence, preferentially colonize the least defensive hosts. We predicted that tree species suffering greater insect damage would, on average, invest more in autumn-colour signalling than less troubled species. Here, we show that autumn coloration is stronger in species facing a high diversity of damaging specialist aphids. Aphids are likely to be an important group of signal receivers because they are choosy, damaging and use colour cues in host selection. In the light of further aspects of insect and tree biology, these results support the notion that bright autumn colours are expensive handicap signals revealing the defensive commitment of individual trees to autumn colonizing insect pests.

American elites' strategic thinking towards Korea: From Kennan to Brzezinski

America's foreign policy elites have made different assessments of South Korea's value as an alliance partner, largely depending on their strategic beliefs and visions. Balance‐of‐power realists like George Kennan have tended to let the regional problems be taken care of by the regional major powers, thus attaching less strategic value to such peripheral states as Korea. On the other hand, globalists like Paul Nitze have emphasized America's preponderant role in maintaining global stability, attaching greater importance to the US‐Korean alliance. This article investigates the American foreign policy elites’ strategic thinking toward Korea by reviewing the thoughts of Kennan, Nitze, Kissinger and Brzezinski. It then draws out implications for the future US defence commitment to Korea.

The National Association of Manufacturers and the Militarization of American Conservatism

The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) played an important role in the emerging conservative movement in the United States, both before and after World War II, but its contribution to the increasing militarism of that movement has received little scrutiny. Between 1958 and 1975, a combination of organizational changes peculiar to NAM and political pressures from both the right and the left led NAM to adopt and maintain a militaristic posture. In the late 1950s, a decline in the organization's membership resulted in a take over by larger corporations, which purged the board of its ultraconservative leadership. The reorganized board established a National Defense Committee (NDC) in order to promote defense industry membership and, by 1962, had selected a new permanent president, Werner Gullander. Under Gullander, the NDC moved NAM in the direction of support for defense expansion during the early 1960s.

PAC Contributions and Defense Contracting

This paper examines the political activity of US defense contractors over the years 1980–1994. Using econometric techniques to account for both fixed-effects and selection, I examine the industry determinants and distribution patterns of political action committee (PAC) contributions to the US House of Representatives. The analysis finds that the size of the defense budget is a primary factor explaining political activity across the industry as well as within individual firms; firm size, dependency on defense, and defense contract awards explain much less. I also find that firms appeared to change their political strategies in the face of large exogenous shifts in the US defense budget. While defense expenditures were on the rise, defense firms spread their contributions relatively broadly over the defense committee system; when the budget fell, however, the firms switched strategies and targeted committee leaders. An incidental contribution of the paper is an empirical application of the trimmed least absolute deviations estimator for fixed-effects models with selection.

Reinventing What for Whom? President and Congress in the Making of Foreign Policy

Strengthening the presidency in foreign policy usually means weakening others who may be a president's competitors. Before pursuing such a path it is important to know what problems are present and whether we wish to invest more power in the president to deal with them. An inventory of these problems suggests the following: (1) Congress traditionally has had and continues to exercise influence over the financing of international commitments, (2) the Senate recently has been more actively resisting presidential nominees for extraneous reasons and typically doing so through dilatory and minority obstructing tactics rather than through floor votes, yet (3) presidential willingness to embark unilaterally on foreign policy and defense commitments is rarely successfully resisted. It is dubious that structural reinvention will resolve matters that arise from strong political difference, nor is it the case that presidents, under the present system, find themselves paralyzed from acting.

Evropská obranná a bezpečnostní identita – pohled na Západoevropskou unii

In his essay, the author attempts to find an answer to the question: Where did we get to in Europe in the field of security? That is why he opens his account by recalling historical events which were decisive in the light of European defence and security identity. This applies in concrete terms to the Brussels treaty of 1948, amended in 1954, the Hague platform of the West European Union of 1987, the Maastricht treaty of 1991, the Petersberg declaration of 1992, and the Amsterdam treaty of 1997. The signing of the Franco-British declaration of St. Malo in December 1998 also brought fundamental changes in the approach to European defence; it contained the following crucial points: 1) capacity of autonomous action for Europe, 2) European military methods in the frame of NATO and outside NATO, 3) respect of collective defence commitments. The mentioned measures were subsequently confirmed at the NATO summit in Washington in April 1999 and in the declaration of the fifteen at a session of the European Council in Cologne in June 1999. Today emphasis is placed on cooperation and the transparency of the West European Union with the North Atlantic Alliance which remains for the moment the foundation of collective defence. But this creates a number of problems, for example, the incorporation of a small compact military nucleus in the giant structure of the European Union, the advancement of credible European military forces or the solution of participation by allied non-members of the European Union.In his essay the author arrives at the conclusion that from the point of view of its defence and security identity, Europe is on the right path and that the principles and objectives outlined are correct. The fact is that the West European Union is the guardian of most complex and valuable “acquis”, but shifting this to the European Union could be hard to accomplish without risking a certain paralysis. Yet there is no other option than building a stronger Europe, especially in the area of defence. The fact is that a hegemonist America, “surrounded” by, so speak, vassals must, and will manage to pave the road in the near future to two almost equal partners which will make both sides stronger and capable of facing up jointly to equal future threats.

Letter to Leonard Peltier

In 1975, Leonard Peltier was convicted of the murder of two government agents after a violent confrontation on the Oglala reservation that pitted the American Indian Movement (AIM) and local Sioux against law enforcement officers. Two other AIM members were acquitted in a separate trial, but Peltier received two consecutive life sentences. The trial is the subject of the documentary film Incident at Oglala (1975). February 6, 2000, marks Peltier's twenty-fourth year in prison. Information about his case can be found at www.lpsg-co.org, or by contacting the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, PO Box 583, Lawrence, KS 66044, USA. The following letter was first published on the Internet by the National Commission for Democracy in Mexico (NCDM), based in Austin, TX. This article can also be found at the Monthly Review website , where most recent articles are published in full. Click here to purchase a PDF version of this article at the Monthly Review website.

Party and Committee in Distributive Politics: Evidence from Defense Spending

Recent studies of the domestic distribution of military procurement expenditures and representation on congressional defense committees support the traditional committee-centered distributive theory of congressional policymaking in a manner consistent with the assumption that Congress is organized to produce gains from exchange among legislators with diverse interests via intercommittee logrolling. This paper compares the committee-centered distributive theory to a party-centered distributive theory. Analysis of a multiequation model using pooled time-series data on the distribution of military procurement expenditures and defense committee representation among states from 1963 to 1989 supports a party-centered version of the distributive theory.

Parliamentary scrutiny of defence

Departmental select committees in the House of Commons have a great potential to enhance scrutiny within the British political system. This article, by the Chair of the House of Commons Defence Committee and his Research Associate considers recent developments in the House of Commons Defence Committee and outlines some proposals for further reform.

The Reciprocal Relationship Between State Defense Interest and Committee Representation in Congress

Does prior representation of a state on a Congressional defense committee lead to higher levels of per capita defense contracts, or do higher levels of prior per capita contract awards to a state increase its probability of being represented on a defense committee? To solve this puzzle, we estimate a cross-lagged three-equation model on data from all 50 states from 1963 to 1989 using maximum likelihood within LISREL. We find a substantial reciprocal but non-confounding relationship between representation and the allocation of benefits for the House, but not for the Senate. Thus, for the House, this more appropriate model of distributive politics in Congress supports both the committee-induced benefits hypothesis and the recruitment hypothesis. Further, the paper elaborates on how this reciprocal relationship plays out over time.

Freedom of Expression and Access to Information in the Conflict Situation in Algeria

Ahmed Ancer was born in Jijel, Algeria and started his career as a journalist with the Algerian governmental newspaper, El Moudjahid in 1981 after he studied political science at the University of Algiers. During his career at El Moudjahid, Mr Ancer was prohibited from writing, more than once, by the Algerian government. In 1988, together with other Algerian journalists, he started the MJA (Mouvement des Journalistes Algérien, later changed into AJA, Association des Journalistes Algériens). This Movement originated continuous protests for more than two years against the government. In a political climate where there was no room for democracy, the MJA was the cause of much turmoil by publishing critical articles about issues as Freedom of Expression and Freedom of the Press. In 1990, together with other journalists, he founded the first independent and privately funded newspaper in Algeria, El Watan. Ancer is still working for El Watan as a political commentator and as head of the editorial staff for Algerian national news. Over the past few years almost 60 Algerian journalists have been killed. Having been the target of many attacks by Islamist fundamentalists himself, he has been forced to move his family to a safe zone for journalists, 25 kilometres outside of Algiers. Amsterdam is Mr Ancer's temporary residence. His presence in the Netherlands is a result of an initiative by the International Parliament of Writers (Salmon Rushdie, Chair) to establish "cities of refuge". These cities would provide a temporary home for writers, journalists and others who would live or work under pressure in their countries of origin. Amsterdam decided to announce itself as one of those "safe cities" and hence Mr Ancer was invited in September 1997 to come to live one year in Amsterdam by the Dutch Rushdie Defense Committee, with the support of the City of Amsterdam.

European security, NATO and the transatlantic link: Crisis management

The dramatic events of 1989/90 have transformed the political landscape globally, especially in Europe. Security institutions have to adapt. There is a strong tendency towards inertia, however. NATO wants to keep its collective defence commitments which have their roots in the Cold War; so does the Western European Union (WEU). But both NATO and WEU have created instruments for crisis management and peacekeeping. I propose that future crisis management missions of NATO and EU (WEU) should be merged and carried out by a new Euro‐Atlantic crisis management organization. This also would create a new transatlantic link in the field of security. The Europeans and Americans would have to share burdens, risks and responsibilities in non‐Article V areas. This new organization would be non‐threatening to Russia. It would also facilitate EU enlargement in the field of security to include non‐members of the EU that are participants in PfP or will become NATO‐members.

Parliament and national security

In the UK the role of parliamentary committees might seem of little value compared to those of other, legislatures. The defence committees of most EU countries, for instance, are involved in the budgetary process, while the UK defence committee does not have such powers. In this, article Bruce George, compares the role of the House of Commons Defence Committee (HCDC) to those of other nations. He assesses its role in relation to the Ministry of Defence and explains the HCDC's working methods and activities. Defence, of the Realm is traditionally a Crown prerogative, the responsibility for which has been transferred to the executive. In this situation the legislature, Parliament, generally has a subordinate status in defence issues. However, George argues, Parliament has been able to have significant impact on national security issues and the HCDC has been successful in creating transparency and facilitating greater flow of information from the Executive to the public domain.

La Révolte Enfantine: On Georges Bataille's “La Morale de Miller” and Jean-Paul Sartre's “Un Nouveau Mystique”

In 1946, Daniel Parker—the self-proclaimed “Président du Cartel d'Actions Sociales et Morales”—threatened to take legal action on the grounds of obscenity against the publication in French of Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn, and Black Spring.1 The subsequent “Affaire Miller” brought Henry Miller's authorship to the forefront of a literary debate on obscenity and censorship and resulted in the formation of a “Defense Committee for Miller and Free Expression.” Among its members were such literary figures as André Gide, Jean-Paul Sartre, André Breton, Paul Eluard, Robert Queaneau, and a number of other well-known writers.

Modeling State Representation On Defense Committees in Congress, 1959-1989

Since World War II, why have defense committees in Congress tended to represent some states rather than others? To address this question we use a variation of two-stage least squares (2SLS) to analyze the effects of each state's share of prime military contracts, military payrolls, delegation size, and legislator ideology on representation on the House and Senate Armed Services Committees and the Appropriations Subcommittees of the Department of Defense. We find that during the period 1959-1989 defense committees have been dominated by large ideologically conservative states that received the largest shares of defense contracts and payrolls. The only exception is Democrats on these committees, who did not tend to overrepre sent states with above average levels of defense contracts. These findings correct earlier studies that have stressed the influence of only some of these factors (ideology or payrolls) in models of defense committee membership.

The evolving security architecture in (Southern) Africa

This study deals first with recent developments at the Organization of African Unity (OAU), in particular discussing developments regarding preventive diplomacy, the greater use of observer missions and general attempts to build capacity towards conflict avoidance and mediation within that organization. This section is followed by an analysis of the Southern African Development Community (SADC), in particular the recently‐established Organ on Politics, Security and Stability and the Inter State Defence and Security Committee. The aims, functions and purpose of each organizations are presented together with some comments on the potential contribution that these organizations can make to peace and security in the sub‐region. The final section deals with the potential involvement of South Africa in peacekeeping operations.