Foreign Policy Problems Research Articles

Испания в полосе турбулентности

The global financial and economic crisis abruptly changed the socio-economic and political situation in Spain. While having successfully developed in the decade before the crisis, the country became one of the most unfortunate countries in the EU (the so-called PIIGS group, which also includes Greece, Italy, Portugal and Iceland). After centuries of isolation of Spain integrated into European institutions and started to play a prominent role at the international arena. In the proposed article, the author explores the problems of internal and foreign policy, facing the modern Spain.

Ukraine’s Credibility Gap as a Perennial Foreign Policy Problem

Ukraine’s Credibility Gap as a Perennial Foreign Policy Problem

Thinking Alike? Salience and Metaphor Analysis as Cognitive Approaches to Foreign Policy Analysis

The article brings together two cognitive approaches to the analysis of foreign policy: salience and metaphor analysis. Issue salience and metaphors relate to cognitive heuristics that speak to different aspects of the cognitive representation of foreign policy problems which complement each other: the concept of salience looks at the priming of issues in the foreign policymaking environment; metaphors relate to the framing of these issues. The article shows how both cognitive concepts can help the other address individual blind spots. While analyzing the salience of foreign policy issues tells us what issues actors attend to, metaphor analysis can shed light on how they frame these issues and indicate what policy options are made possible. At the same time, salience can help metaphor analysis identify why certain metaphors resonate better in public discourse than others. To briefly illustrate the potential of thinking salience and metaphor analysis together, the article looks into the British public debate about international terrorism and the “war on terror”.

Charles Townes—Nobel Laureate for Maser-Laser Work

The American physicist Charles Hard Townes shared the 1964 Nobel Prize in Physics with 2 Soviet physicists, Aleksandr M. Prokhorov (1916-2002) and his student Nikolay G. Basov (1922-2001), for fundamental work in the field of quantum electronics, which led to the construction of oscillators and amplifiers on the maserlaser principle. Townes conceived the idea of the maser in 1951 and built the first device in 1953. The Soviet scientists, working independently of Townes, provided much of the theoretical work for lasers and masers. These devices have applications as widely varied as high-resolution spectroscopy, length standards, surgery, welding, radar, and communications. Townes, the fourth of 6 children of an attorney, was born on July 28, 1915, on a farm outside Greenville, SC. He attended Furman University in his hometown, receiving both the BS degree in physics and the BA degree in modern languages in 1935, graduating summa cum laude. He then enrolled in Duke University in Durham, NC, and received the MSc degree in physics in 1937. Next, he spent 2 years at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, where he was awarded the PhD degree in physics, in 1939, for his thesis on “The Separation of Isotopes and the Determination of the Spin of the Nucleus of Carbon 13.” After receiving his doctoral degree, Townes joined the technical staff of the Bell Telephone Company in New Jersey and worked with that group from 1939 to 1947. During World War II (1939-1945), while with Bell Laboratories, Townes worked on radar bombing systems and microwave spectroscopy and did some early work on radio astronomy. In 1948, Townes joined the faculty of Columbia University in New York City as a teacher of physics. By 1950, he was director of the Columbia Radiation Laboratory, and in 1952, he became chair of the physics department of Columbia University. In 1951, he first had the idea of what would culminate in the construction of a maser ( icrowave amplification by timulated mission of radiation). The first maser device, which used ammonia gas, was built in December 1953. In 1958, Townes and a colleague outlined the principle of the optical maser, or laser. They speculated that a maser could deliver infrared or even visible light instead of microwaves. In 1960, such a device was constructed by the American physicist Theodore H. Maiman (1927-2007), who used a pink ruby rod that emitted intermittent bursts of red light. The device was called “laser” for light amplified by timulated mission of radiation. Lasers were soon used in medicine (certain eye operations), chemical analysis (vaporized small bits of substances for spectroscopic analysis), communications, metal working, instrumentation and measurement, and art and by the military. From 1959 to 1961, while on a leave of absence from Columbia University, Townes served as vice president and director of research at the Institute for Defense Analyses in Washington, DC, where he was concerned with problems of national defense and foreign policy. In 1961, Townes officially left Columbia University and joined the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, where he was appointed provost and professor of physics. He directed research in nonlinear optics until 1967. In 1967, Townes was appointed professor at the University of California at Berkeley. He initiated a program in radio and infrared astronomy, which led to the discovery of complex molecules (ammonia and water) in the interstellar medium. In 1986, Townes was made professor emeritus. Townes was honored on stamps issued by St Vincent in 1991 (Scott No. 1563d) and by Madagascar in 1993.

Cuba después de la Guerra Fría : ¿cuál debería ser la política de los Estados Unidos?

Cuba has always been a particularly emotional issue in US foreign policy. However, given the current scenario, What should be the United States policy towards Cuba now that the Island no longer represents a security concern or even a foreign policy problem? This paper analyzes the internal situation of Cuba, the need for reforms, the issue of Human Rights, the position of the Cuban-American community, the interests of the United States and, the Cuban Democracy Act, to finally propose an appropriate approach to the Post-Cold War War period, and conclude that through a process of engagement, the United States can do its utmost to encourage Cuba to carry out transformations.

Between threats and war: U.S. discrete military operations in the post-Cold War world

When confronted with a persistent foreign policy problem that threatens U.S. interests, and that cannot be adequately addressed through economic or political pressure, American policymakers and opinion formers have increasingly resorted to recommending the use of limited military force: that is, enough force to attempt to resolve the problem while minimizing U.S. military deaths, local civilian casualties, and collateral damage.These recommendations have ranged from the bizarre-such as a Predator missile strike to kill Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe, or the assassination of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez-to the unwise-the preemptive bombing of North Korean ballistic missile sites-to the demonstrably practical-air raids into Bosnia and Somalia, and drone strikes in Yemen and Pakistan. However, even though they have been a regular feature of America's uses of military force through four successive administrations, the efficacy of these Discrete Military Operations (DMOs) remains largely unanalyzed, leaving unanswered the important question of whether or not they have succeeded in achieving their intended military and political objectives. In response, Micah Zenko examines the thirty-six DMOs undertaken by the US over the past 20 years, in order to discern why they were used, if they achieved their objectives, and what determined their success or failure. In the process, he both evaluates U.S. policy choices and recommends ways in which limited military force can be better used in the future. The insights and recommendations made by Zenko will be increasingly relevant to making decisions and predictions about the development of American grand strategy and future military policy.

The US and East Asian Regional Security Architecture: Building a Regional Security Nexus on Hub-and-Spoke

Abstract The current East Asian strategic environment and US strategy toward the region reveal that the United States faces foreign policy problems that would diminish US influence in the long term. While establishing an East Asian regional security architecture would curtail such progression, its design needs to be considered due to political and military uncertainty caused by China's rise. In this context, the article compares the validity of five policy alternatives in terms of effectiveness, costs, risk, and uncertainty. The argument is that the United States, as the most pivotal player in East Asian security, needs to reconstruct its security strategy toward East Asia by establishing a “regional security nexus” that allows US allies to have more diplomatic autonomy in nurturing and building an open regional community while strengthening security ties with the United States.

After Hiroshima: the United States, race and nuclear weapons in Asia, 1945-1965

By emphasising the role of nuclear issues, After Hiroshima, published in 2010, provides an original history of American policy in Asia between the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan and the escalation of the Vietnam War. Drawing on a wide range of documentary evidence, Matthew Jones charts the development of American nuclear strategy and the foreign policy problems it raised, as the United States both confronted China and attempted to win the friendship of an Asia emerging from colonial domination. In underlining American perceptions that Asian peoples saw the possible repeat use of nuclear weapons as a manifestation of Western attitudes of 'white superiority', he offers new insights into the links between racial sensitivities and the conduct of US policy, and a fresh interpretation of the transition in American strategy from massive retaliation to flexible response in the era spanned by the Korean and Vietnam Wars.

The European Union's Asia strategies: Problems of foreign policy and international relations

European Union (EU)–Asia relations raise linked problems (on the one hand) of EU collective action and identity and (on the other hand) of cooperation. The relationship is characterized by complexity and variety in three dimensions: first, ‘voices’ and history; second, institutional engagement and structure; and third, issue structure. In order to explore the implications of this complexity and variety, and to generate propositions for further research, we deploy International Relations theories based on material interests, ideas and institutions. These help us to demonstrate not only the application of ‘analytical theory’ but also the role of ‘practitioner theory’ in the evolution of relations between the EU and Asia, and thus to reflect systematically on the problems of collective action and cooperation identified at the beginning of the article.

Внешнеполитические проблемы в зеркале общественного мнения в России (2000-е годы)

The article aims to outline a concept of public opinion on foreign policy issues, which is forming in contemporary Russia within society as a whole, resting upon the data resulting from the sociological study of 2000s in comparison to 1990s surveys. At the same time, factors which determined and determine the Russians' perceptions of foreign policy problems are analyzed, and an attempt to apprehend the degree of the real public opinion influence on Russia's foreign policy development and implementation process is made.

Unwitting Sanctions: Understanding Anti-Bribery Legislation as Economic Sanctions against Emerging Markets

Although the purpose of international anti-bribery legislation, particularly the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, is to deter bribery, empirical evidence demonstrates a more problematic effect: in countries where bribery is perceived to be relatively common, the present enforcement regime goes beyond deterring bribery and actually deters investment. Drawing on literature from political science and economics, this article argues that anti-bribery legislation, as presently enforced, functions as de facto economic sanctions. A detailed analysis of the history of FCPA enforcement shows that these sanctions have most often occurred in emerging markets, where historic opportunities for economic and social development otherwise exist and where public policy should encourage investment. This effect is contrary to the purpose of the FCPA which, as the legislative history shows, is to build economic and political alliances by promoting ethical overseas investment. These perverse and unanticipated consequences create two policy problems. First, the sanctions literature suggests that the resulting foreign direct investment void may be filled by capital-rich countries that are not committed to effectively enforcing anti-bribery measures. This dynamic can be observed, for example, in China's aggressive investment in Africa, Latin America, and Central Asia, and creates myriad ethical, economic, and foreign policy problems. Second, by enforcing these laws without regard to their sanctioning effects, developed nations are unwittingly sacrificing poverty reduction opportunities to combat bribery. The paper concludes with various proposed reforms to the text and enforcement of international anti-bribery legislation that would further the goal of deterring bribery without deterring investment.

U.S.–UN Relations: Briefing Memorandum to the 44th President of the United States

This analysis is based on the conclusion that the state of U.S.–UN relations is a barometer of U.S. leadership in the world. Because the new president will assume office presiding over a country whose standing in the world has been seriously damaged, he will have to reestablish the credibility of the United States as a world leader. In that effort the UN, with its membership of 192 sovereign states, constitutes an important venue in which the United States is challenged to exercise its leadership role in world affairs. As he faces each foreign policy problem or crisis, the 44th president will be influenced by the decisions of his predecessors. Moreover he, like they, will authorize the practice of synchronized diplomacy—in which bargains are struck, compromises are arranged, and diverse causes are reconciled—after determining whether a problem can be handled unilaterally or multilaterally and if the latter, whether the UN is the most effective diplomatic tool. In the final analysis, this analysis makes cl...

A Military History of Russia, from Ivan the Terrible to the War in Chechnya by David R. Stone (review)

550 seer, 86, 3, july 2008 were found to that end. As Herberstein noticed (orwas told by his Russian minders), the trinityof titlesTsar, Autocrat and Great Sovereign was a terrestrial reflection of the Holy Trinity. The eschatological expectations thereby generated stimulated the lettered class both spiritually and politically. If this was one means of bolstering the legitimacy of Moscow's ruler, ge nealogical inheritance was another. Ivan claimed imperial blood by virtue of his descent from the union ofGrand Prince Vladimir and theByzantine prin cess Anna. However, insurance was subsequently taken out in the form of genealogies tracing his successors' descent from the Emperor Augustus's brother, Prus and, indeed, from themythical Romulus. Ivan IV assumed the tideTsar in 1547, although a conclave ofOrthodox prelates inConstantinople did not endorse the entitlement until 1561 and it stillhad to be legitimized internationally. In 1549 the designation 'orthodox' was added; and then the preface 'By grace of God'. The phrase 'ofAll Russia', originally a term of respect, is a different case because it came to represent a claim to territory,though ithad differentmeanings for different parties. For Orthodox Russians the term came to imply an obligation to incorporate all territories whose populations had once been Orthodox, whereas forCatholic Lithuanians and Poles ithad ethnic rather than religious connotations, an example of difficulties arising from contrasting political cultures. As late as 1500, argues Fliushkin, Muscovy still regarded its territoryas a conflation of hereditary properties, and itwas slow to develop a concept of the state.However, the chief defining point ofMuscovite political culture was a theocratic idea of the ruler. The Muscovite establishment despised elective credentials. When Stephan Batory was elected King of Poland, Ivan com pared him to thebiblical King Saul who had been acclaimed by the Israelites, by contrast to the God-chosen King David. Even though exigencies of the moment compelled the Tsar to sue for peace, he insisted on adopting a posi tion ofmoral superiority,presenting itas an act ofChristian piety. This made obedience to the Tsar's commands a religious as well as a political obligation, and invested Muscovy's policies with a moral dimension. It also proclaimed the state to be an instrument of redemption. Filiushkin's is an extensive, conscientious, and occasionally illuminating account, though it isunlikely to end all arguments in the area. Unfortunately, themaps intended to show the relationship of possessions to territorial titles are very unclear. London Philip Longworth Stone, David R. A Military History ofRussia, from Ivan the Terrible to the War inChechnya.Praeger Security International. Westport, CT and London, 2006. xiv + 259 pp. Maps. Suggested reading. Index. $49.95: ?28.99. David Stone is best known for a highly regarded study of the Soviet military build-up in the early 1930s (HammerandRifle: TheMilitarization of the SovietUnion, ig26-igjj, Lawrence, KS, 2000; reviewed in SEER, 79, 2001, 4, REVIEWS 55I pp. 763-65). This era gets relatively brief attention in his ambitious new volume, which within a small compass offers the layman an accurate and objective survey of the evolution of Russia's armed forces over the last five hundred years, along with competent analyses of theprincipal campaigns they fought. The focus is quite properly on strategy and tactics, equipment, size and structure, and leading commanders' performance ? the stuff of tradi tionalmilitary history.Yet we are also told enough about the domestic scene and foreign-policy problems to understand why Russia so often found herself at war. Whether somuch belligerency was justifiable in terms of the 'national interest', however defined, is a matter of opinion. Stone wastes little time on such speculations, or in assessing the heavy burdens that 'a society organized for war' (p. xii) imposed upon civilians. Nor does he present a currently fash ionable 'view from below' of ordinary soldiers' battlefield experiences. Instead we get pungent evaluations of the quality of Russia's military leaders over the centuries. Top marks go to A. A. Brusilov, who in 1916 performed 'a masterful job' inpreparing his offensive on the South-western front,only tobe letdown by GHQand his counterparts to the north (pp. 168-70). Interestingly,his ex ample inspired the Soviet generals (latermarshals) G. K. Zhukov and A. M. Vasilevskii when they directed...

Reviewing the Literature on Sequential/Dynamic Foreign Policy Decision Making

Most, if not all, foreign policy problems continue over an extended period of time and are revisited numerous times before finally being resolved. In fact, foreign policymakers “often find themselves returning again and again to the task of coping with an issue they have addressed before” (Billings and Hermann 1998:53) because a foreign policy problem of any consequence is likely to be “ill-structured” (Steinbruner 1974) and rarely disappears from the scene easily. Turkey's accession negotiations with the European Union, for example, have taken more than four decades. Since Turkey's first application for full membership to the Union in 1959, both European Union and Turkish foreign policymakers have had to deal with the issue of Turkey's membership on numerous occasions. As this example shows, foreign policy concerns cannot usually be dealt with by a single decision. Rather, policymaking involves a series of decisions that entail differing priorities at different times as well as different decision-making bodies (Hermann 2001). As a result, foreign policy decision making needs to be examined sequentially (Stern 1999), taking into account the past and prior actions as well as the future (Billings and Hermann 1998). This thinking is in line with the major argument Ranan Kuperman has just made in the previous pages. However, even though Kuperman's suggestion that we should be exploring “dynamic foreign policy decision making” is valuable and on target, it is rather misleading to suggest that studies on dynamic foreign policymaking have been absent from the fields of international relations (IR) and foreign policy analysis (FPA). Indeed, very different strands of research have made some important contributions to our understanding of how sequential foreign policymaking takes place, and “thoughtful scholars have long acknowledged that policymaking is itself an ongoing process in which decisions (and nondecisions) generate responses that create new opportunities …

Karel Kramář's speeches in the Czechoslovak National Assembly (1918–1937)

SUMMARY Martina Lustigová examines Karel Kramář's speeches in the Czechoslovak National Assembly. Kramář (1860–1937) was one of the most important personalities of Czechoslovak politics during the period 1918–38. He was elected to Parliament at the age of 30, at the beginning of 1891. He remained a Member of Parliament until his death, with a short interruption during the First World War. He soon became one of the most important Czech politicians. He was also the first Czechoslovak Prime Minister. The speeches of Kramář in the National Assembly during the years 1918–37 are divided into two categories: foreign policy and domestic problems. For almost all of this era, Kramář worked in the Committee for Foreign Affairs because he was interested in international relations. He often spoke about Russia (he loved Russia and hated Bolshevism), about Germany or about Slavic policy. In his speeches he criticized the political system of Czechoslovakia and he often spoke about his nation (and nationalism as well) or about the problem of minorities.

Assessing a Mediated Learning Joint Television Course: Foreign Policy Problem Management in the First Bush Administration1

This article reports on a multimedia television course taught jointly at two universities and focusing on foreign policy problem management in the administration of George H. W. Bush. The course centered on appearances by President Bush and his major foreign policy team members, discussing in a case study format, the major foreign policy challenges of the administration. The theoretical framework of the course is outlined, the technological aspects are discussed, some evaluative comments are presented, and some future-oriented ideas are offered for building on this experience.

HELSİNKİ ZİRVESİNDEN GÜNÜMÜZE AB-TÜRKİYE İLİŞKİLERİ ÇERÇEVESİNDE KIBRIS GELİŞMELERİ

In every era of significant transformation in its foreign policy, Turkey pushes forward the Cyprus problem in order to ensure legitimacy for its new policy. Ankara, who could initiate its process of adaptation to the new international system of the postCold War era only in 1999, pursed this transformation through Cyprus problem once again. This article depicts this process of transformation in Turkey, while examining the developments regarding the Cyprus problem within the framework of Turkish-EU relations in the post-Helsinki period. Furthermore, it evaluates the positions of TRNC (Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus) and Greek Cypriot Administration and their approaches towards a solution to the problem. Finally, underlining that the developments in Turkish foreign policy and Cyprus problem have reached a point of no return and the parameters of Cold War have changed, this article argues that Turkish foreign policy and the Cyprus problem have undergone a qualitative transformation and therefore should be analyzed through different lenses.

Slippery Business Why America Attacked Iraq

It is argued that American leaders and their British counterparts responded to the situation in Iraq as a broad foreign policy problem, not as a simple opportunity to seize oilfields. Nevertheless, the future of the global oil supply undoubtedly looms large in their policy considerations. The importance of petroleum to modern society requires little elaboration, and although experts disagree about how much remains available for extraction, the amount is finite. Demand, meanwhile, continues to increase, particularly in countries with emerging industrial economies and growing populations. US planners are undoubtedly susceptible to self-interest, but events challenge the argument that they are committed to a grand scheme to bring Iraq's oil under direct American control.

Foreign Policy Analysis and Globalization: Public Opinion, World Opinion, and the Individual

As commonly defined, international politics as a field examines the sources of conflict and cooperation between and among states and international actors within the international system. As a distinct branch of international politics, foreign policy analysis (FPA) considers a specific aspect of this larger question by focusing on the processes by which specific international actors (primarily state governments and leaders) make choices. Tracing back to the classic work of Richard Snyder and his collaborators (1962), the result has been an enormous literature on “how leaders, groups, and coalitions of actors can affect the way foreign policy problems are framed, the options that are selected, the choices that are made, and what gets implemented” (Hermann 2001b:1). In the coming years, the challenge for FPA will be to integrate ongoing transformations in international political structures and processes into theories regarding government processes and individual behaviors. During this transformative period,...

'High' and 'Low' Geopolitics: Images of Foreign Countries in the Eyes of Russian Citizens

The objective of the article is to reveal the main features of the geographical images of Russian citizens. Some features of the images held by different social strata in Russian society of northern European countries such as the Netherlands and Finland will be introduced in the context of the broader system of Russian geographical images of countries elsewhere in Europe and also other countries in the world at large such as India, China, the USA and Israel. The work is based on an analysis of a series of representative surveys conducted in 2001 and early 2002. The author proposes some classifications of these images and shows their relationships to the changing geopolitical codes of the country and concrete problems of foreign policy and 'high' geopolitics in general. The results draw attention to the ways in which Russian geographical images have adapted to the post-Soviet era, suggesting that Russian public opinion may be more willing to support co-operation with the West than many experts may think.