Security Regime Research Articles

High Security and Special Regime in the Albanian Penitentiary System

The Albanian penitentiary system underwent significant transformation in 2020, increasingly reflecting the implementation of a progressive treatment approach aligned with the social risk posed by the convicted individual and aimed at their re-education for the purpose of rehabilitation and reintegration into society. Through this paper, we aim to present an overview of the Albanian penitentiary system according to the provisions of Law No. 81/2020 "On the Rights and Treatment of Convicted Prisoners and Detainees," with a broad focus on the analysis of legal provisions regulating high-security penitentiary institutions and the implementation of the special regime in high-security institutions. This regime, similar to the 41 bis regime provided by Italian legislation, is closely linked to the penal policy pursued by the Albanian state in the context of combating and preventing organized crime. The adoption of this regime aims to maintain order and security by fundamentally preventing leaders and members of organized crime from having contact with their organization and other criminal organizations operating in Albanian territory, thereby inhibiting them from issuing orders from the penitentiary institution where they are held. Received: 21 July 2024 / Accepted: 24 October 2024 / Published: 05 November 2024

Welfare regimes and socioeconomic inequalities in edentulism: A multilevel analysis of 40 countries

Abstract Aim To evaluate the association between welfare regimes with edentulism and to investigate if it modifies the magnitude of socioeconomic inequalities in edentulism. Methods We analysed data from 40 high-, middle- and low-income countries collected between 2007 and 2018, encompassing 117397 individuals 20 years or older. The main outcome was edentulism and welfare regimes were the main exposure and effect modifier. Individual level variables were sex, age and quintiles of the wealth score. Multilevel logistic regression was used to estimate the odds of being edentulous and cross-level interaction terms between individual wealth and country factors were tested. Findings Individuals at the lowest wealth quintile had a consistently higher prevalence of edentulism. The highest age-sex standardised prevalence of edentulism was found in Eastern European countries (9.9%) followed by Informal Security (9.4%), while the lowest was among the Insecurity regime (1.4%) followed by the Social Democratic regime (4.7%). Liberal countries presented the highest magnitude of absolute and relative inequalities, where the lowest quintile had OR = 16.7 (95%CI: 10.5-26.5) times more chances of being edentulous and 14.4 percentage points higher prevalence. Low-income countries in the Insecurity Regime in social and labour market presented the lowest level of inequalities. Among HIC and upper-middle income countries, Social Democratic regime had the lowest absolute inequalities (4.0 percentage points difference between highest and lowest quintiles) and the Informal Security regime had the lowest relative differences between the highest and lowest quintiles (OR = 3.21, 95%CI: 2.83-3.63). Interpretation Our findings suggest that policies in some welfare regimes might improve oral health while reducing inequalities. High and upper-middle-income countries presented a high level of edentulism and inequalities. Key messages • Larger socioeconomic inequalities in edentulism were found in high-income countries with liberal policies. • A possible benefit of welfare policies on prevalence and inequalities in edentulism may be only evident among industrialised countries.

Jordan’s Regime Security Under the COVID-19 Pandemic: Securitisation Against Visible and Invisible Threats

The Jordanian authoritarian regime, headed by the Hashemite royal family, has developed a robust regime security system. Having defeated the Arab Nationalists and Palestinian militias, the most significant threats in the Kingdom’s history, and achieved peace with Israel, the monarchy appears to have legitimised its sovereignty and domestic rule. Meanwhile, nonterritorial threats represented by jihadists have continued intermittently despite a surveillance network and continuous securitisation by authorities. Worryingly, decades-long employment problems and inflationary risks are chronic security risks in Jordan in the 21st century. This study examines how Jordan’s regime is functioning against new and old internal security risks during an unprecedented emergency, the COVID-19 pandemic. Under several lockdowns, the government could securitise prominent social forces including Islamists and professional associations for regulation violations. However, it needed to be more effective against the grassroots movement that continued to criticise the government while using cyberspace as its main battleground. Most critical cases, such as the 2021 uproar over former Crown Prince Hamza, primarily became virtual movements. The battle without winners and losers, fought using information and communication technologies from the perspective of digital authoritarianism by the government and liberation technology by resistance forces, posed a new challenge for Jordan’s regime security.

RUSSIAN STRATEGIC CULTURE: INSIGHTS FROM THE FULL-SCALE WAR AGAINST UKRAINE

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24th February 2022 marks a security policy paradigm shift akin to ‘9/11’ for Europe. For the international community of security experts, the invasion represents an anomaly for their rational choice analysis. Their ‘logic of consequence’ must be replaced by the alternative ‘logic of appropriateness’. Hence, the author of this paper employs a broad approach to strategic culture stressing Kremlin regime security as Putin’s operational code. Under this approach, interventionism characterizes the Russian ‘way of war’ as does sheer brutality. The decision to invade Ukraine resulted from Putin’s personal hubris and idiosyncrasies as much as groupthink within the Russian security elite. Putin’s calculus behind invading Ukraine is reconstructed as geopolitical and geo-economic imperialism, along with domestic concerns for pacifying Russia. The first year of war exposed a dysfunctional Russian strategic culture - a collapsing Blitzkrieg effort and a failure to prevail in the subsequent battle for Donbas. The Russian conduct of war reiterated the signature Russian strategic culture of massive destruction and unpunished war crimes. Putin often doubles down and escalates, as seen in the partial mobilization on 21st September 2022. The winter of 2022–2023 brought both systematic Russian attacks on critical Ukrainian energy infrastructure and fierce battles in Vuhledar, Soledar and Bakhmut in which Russia used meatgrinder tactics. The Russian military performance improved during the second year of the war due to the construction of massive fortifications along the frontline. Putin’s strategy has thus turned in favour of a long war of attrition seeking to outlast the combined effect of successive Western upgrading of the weapons supplied to Ukraine and the stamina of the Ukrainians themselves. The Ukrainian counteroffensive shows Ukraine to have the initiative, but progress is painfully slow. This reflects the fact that the war is a war of attrition between two different militaries supported by two dissimilar coalitions of productive power and high-tech innovative capacity.

Food security and the ma(s)king of indigenous peoples’ dispossession: the example of Inuit in Canada

ABSTRACT Focusing on constructions of food security in settler colonial contexts, this article demonstrates how its contemporary conceptualization is heir to long-standing schemes to reform Indigenous peoples and validate state projects. It highlights how discursive regimes of food security in the areas of health, conservation, and economics were conceived within frameworks that instruct Indigenous peoples as to correct behaviour, blame them for their misconduct, and ignore the role of settler states and populations in defining notions of right and wrong and in creating the conditions that promote and sustain those definitions. Ignorance, blame, and indoctrination are thus constitutive features of state interventions aimed at promoting Indigenous peoples’ food security. Using instructional publications directed at Inuit, the article demonstrates how, through the provision of services, and in the exercise of settler nation-building, Indigenous peoples have been subjected to programmes of indoctrination and ideological pacification whilst larger contexts of dispossession are bracketed out.

Challenges to the Capacity-Building of Maritime Domain Awareness (MDA) in East Asia: What Is at Stake?

East Asian countries, including Northeast Asian countries such as China, Japan and Korea, and Southeast Asian countries such as the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore, have endeavored to enhance their maritime domain awareness (MDA) capabilities at either the state or regional level to mitigate, prevent or respond to maritime threats. Vibrant, dynamic East Asia comprises a huge diversity of cultures, religions, political systems, and security regimes, and their perceptions of and approaches to MDA are significantly varied. The regional states need to recognize the importance and value of MDA in ensuring maritime safety and security and to allocate more resources to build up their MDA capacities accordingly. In addition, closer collaboration between Northeast and Southeast Asian countries is required.

Iran’s axis of resistance through the lens of ontological security

Unlike traditional approaches that analyse an actor’s foreign policy by focusing on the search for physical security and material interests, ontological security advocates a more nuanced approach that considers identity politics, regime security, issues of legitimacy, and emotional motives. This article aims to examine Iran’s Axis of Resistance from the perspective of ontological security, without rescinding the possibility of power struggles or ideological motivations in influencing Iran’s foreign policymaking process. This study posits that the Axis of Resistance embodies a profound meaning and overarching significance for Iran that transcends mere considerations of physical security or sectarian-­ideological inclinations. The pursuit of the Axis of Resistance by Iran serves to provide the regime with ontological security, achieved through the utilisation of national narratives, the establishment of routines, concerns pertaining to domestic order, and the incorporation of emotional underpinnings of the Islamic regime. The existential significance that Iran ascribes to the Axis of Resistance is of crucial importance in maintaining this paradigm, despite all its costs.

China’s Promoting of Authoritarian–Westphalian Democracy and Its Implications for the Liberal International Order

China is seen as undemocratic, illiberal, and autocratic by many who live outside it, and the terms “democracy” and “China” are often difficult to reconcile. Nonetheless, Beijing has been actively employing the concept of democracy both domestically and on the international stage in recent years. This paper aims to critically examine how Beijing conceptualizes and advocates for democracy at home and abroad. It also endeavors to explore the implications for the country’s domestic and global governance, particularly in relation to the US-centered liberal international order in the context of critical international relations studies. In so doing, this paper will focus methodologically on Beijing’s official documents and state media outlets, presenting an argument that is twofold. First, by promoting its unique form of democracy known as “whole-process people’s democracy,” Beijing domestically intertwines democracy with authoritarianism, hierarchy, and dictatorship. This whole-process people’s democracy appears to function at home as a tool of regime security that is characterized by a rule that is of and for the people but not by the people. Second, China on the international stage has adopted Western-style liberal values to advocate for enhanced democracy in international relations. Through its strategic adoption of these liberal values, Beijing accuses the United States of a hegemonic liberal hypocrisy in international relations while appearing to aspire to a world that is fragmented into essentially different entities.

千定煥 명예교수의 교정간호 개혁론: 채용측면

Correctional nursing is nursing that which is related medical practices for inmate and it comes from the educational ideology. The ideology of correctional nursing should be transferred to correctional nursing welfare that contributes to resocialization as it is transferred to the correctional welfare ideology and It is my correctional nursing welfare theory that the recruitment of correctional nurses should be a friendly recruitment of correctional nursing welfare. In the reality, correctional nurses and security officers may have business conflicts due to different values and behaviors pursued. A new nurse will have an ethical dilemma if he / she is employed without knowing the characteristics of the correction environment in which the security symbol acts strongly as a substructure. This reduces the productivity and resocialization of correctional care. Therefore, it is important to recruit a nurse with corrective motivation, propensity and qualities. In order to do this, it is necessary to approach from the perspective of correctional environment and personnel administration. At present, in terms of personnel, there is a recruitment method of a dualized correctional nurse consisting of a plain clothes nurse and a uniform nurse. But, the dual recruitment method hinders the unity of personnel administration and the uniform nurse system has many problems in terms of social psychology. Therefore, as a reform plan, fundamentally, it is necessary to reform the general correctional officer recruitment system. Thorough correction reforms such as abolishing the memorization-oriented recruitment system that hinders the validity of the test and hiring through the establishment of a correctional welfare university are necessary, but it is difficult to expect a thorough security regime in Korea. Therefore, it should be precisely employed to enhance the validity of the correctional nurse recruitment test. In this logic, we need to unify the recruitment method of the currently dualized nurses or testing methods should be revamped to ensure that correctional-friendly nurses are employed. However, if the current system is maintained, the recruitment system such as the written test should be reformed to make the test valid, the correction-friendly recruitment ideology and the human rights ideology. In terms of personnel environment, institutional measures should be sought to include correctional facilities in clinical practice institutions such as nursing departments. Until the first half of 2023, there were no papers suggesting the problems of recruitment of orthodontic nurses. Therefore, this paper describes the problems and development plans in a multidisciplinary approach from a unique point of view.

North Korea's Nuclear Risk Management and Transformation of the ‘International Security Regime’ : Focusing on Korea-U.S.-Japan ‘Linked Politics’ and Policy Coordination Mechanisms

North Korea's Nuclear Risk Management and Transformation of the ‘International Security Regime’ : Focusing on Korea-U.S.-Japan ‘Linked Politics’ and Policy Coordination Mechanisms

Comrades in arms, or comrades in angst? Interest convergence, regime security, and the Vietnam factor in Cambodia’s and Laos’ relations with China

Abstract Cambodia and Laos are often perceived as the states most geo-politically aligned with China in Southeast Asia. By engaging indigenous sources, we dive deeper into this claim through a comparative approach in this article. Parsing two primary parameters for comparisons—the degree of interest convergence and sources of regime security in Cambodia and Laos—it is argued that even as Phnom Penh and Vientiane both maintain largely China-friendly policies and positions, they also differ in their degree of tilt toward Beijing, with Laos pursuing a relatively more careful and calibrated approach toward its neighboring giant. This distinction can be explained by the relative difference in both countries’ calculations on Vietnam, an intervening factor that affects their management of asymmetry with China.

Factors influencing IMF assistance in the Sub-Saharan African region.

This study examines the determinants influencing the likelihood of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries seeking assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The IMF, as a global institution, aims to promote sustainable growth and prosperity among its member countries by supporting economic strategies that foster financial stability and collaboration in monetary affairs. Utilising panel-probit regression, this study analyses data from thirty-nine SSA countries spanning from 2000 to 2022, focusing on twelve factors: Current Account Balance (CAB), inflation, corruption, General Government Net Lending and Borrowing (GGNLB), General Government Gross Debt (GGGD), Gross Domestic Product Growth (GDPG), United Nations Security Council (UNSC) involvement, regime types (Closed Autocracy, Electoral Democracy, Electoral Autocracy, Liberal Democracy) and China Loan. The results indicate that corruption and GDP growth rate have the most significant influence on the likelihood of SSA countries seeking IMF assistance. Conversely, factors such as CAB, UNSC involvement, LD and inflation show inconsequential effects. Notable, countries like Sudan, Burundi, and Guinea consistently rank high in seeking IMF assistance over various time frames within the observed period. Sudan emerges with a probability of more than 44% in seeking IMF assistance, holding the highest ranking. Study emphasises the importance of understanding SSA region rankings and the variability of variables for policymakers, investors, and international organisations to effectively address economic challenges and provide financial assistance.

President Rule Article 356 Federalism and Issue of National Security

Federalism is an organisational structure in which authority is shared or split among all of the subordinate governmental institutions rather than being solely vested in the central government. The relationship between the Union and the States is depictedin the Indian system.Because the constitutional division of powers by levels of government can control the potential hazards that security and intelligence authorities represent for individual and collective freedoms, federalism may be preferable to unitary security regimes. Federalism, however, can also be a security problem since it is believed to obstruct effective decision-making about public safety.The legal-institutional framework and constitution of the federal system in India exhibit a unique trend. Studies on national security legislation typically centre on striking a balance between security and liberty, with the vast majority of these studies\ examining this balance along the horizontal axis between federal branches. The vertical axis and the post-9/11 emergence of state and local government in American national security legislation and policy are two additional features that this article adds to question that traditional focus. It promotes a federalist framework that places a strong emphasis on vertical intergovernmental arrangements for the longterm promotion and mediation of a wide variety of policy values. When it comes to national security intelligence and counterterrorism, the federal and local governments collaborate and sometimes clash. This federalism framework clarifies these dynamics and provides insights that can help shape future reforms.

A Ouvidoria como Manifestação da Transparência Passiva nos Regimes Próprios de Previdência dos Municípios Fluminenses

We identify how the Special Social Security Regime (RPPS) Ombudsman of municipalities of Rio de Janeiro State falls under the level I certification of the RPPS Pro-Management Program, in the indicator related to the Ombudsman; a tool to promote the democratic participation of citizens through passive transparency. The relevance of this study stems from the fact that the RPPS are in charge of managing a substantial number of resources, having managed around 157 billion Reais in investments for their respective insureds in 2020 (SPREV, 2021). Through documental analysis performed on the websites of the Rio de Janeiro RPPS and their respective federative entities, we concluded that among the 92 municipalities in the State, only 79 have RPPS. Furthermore, 54.4% of municipalities have a communication channel in the RPPS, while 43.1% have it available through the Federal Entity to which they are linked, and 2.5% have no such communication channel. Thus, we state that most RPPS has given due importance to the RPPS Pro-Management Manual, specifically regarding the accomplishment of the goal of providing more transparency to the relationship between the insured and society.

Simulation of long-term storage dynamics of headwater reservoirs across the globe using public cloud computing infrastructure

Reservoirs play an important role in relation to water security, flood risk, hydropower and natural flow regime. This study derives a novel dataset with a long-term daily water-balance (reservoir volume, inflow, outflow, evaporation and precipitation) of headwater reservoirs and storage dynamics across the globe. The data is generated using cloud computing infrastructure and a high resolution distributed hydrological model wflow_sbm. Model results are validated against earth observed surface water area and in-situ measured reservoir volume and show an overall good model performance. Simulated headwater reservoir storage indicate that 19.4–24.4 % of the reservoirs had a significant decrease in storage. This change is mainly driven by a decrease in reservoir inflow and increase in evaporation. Deployment on a kubernetes cloud environment and using reproducible workflows shows that these kind of simulations and analyses can be conducted in less than a day.

Applying multi-criteria decision analysis in the bidding process of an own social security regime institute

Public administration is responsible for managing public resources and offering various types of services to the population. Therefore, to ensure that the maintenance of state bodies is carried out in a responsible manner, both for the acquisition of goods and for the contracting of services, it is necessary to carry out bidding processes that follow constitutional principles. In this way, the use of Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) methods can help decision makers to solve selection problems in public institutions. In this context, the objective of this paper is to select, from a pre-defined list of ten alternatives, the three cars considered most suitable to meet the needs of an Own Social Security Regime Institute, allowing the opening of a bidding process more reliable. To carry out this selection, three MCDA methods were used to aid the choice: Analytical Hierarchical Process (AHP), PROMETHEE II and Weighted Sum Method (WSM). The results demonstrated that the three methods applied together managed to select the three best cars for carrying out the bidding process and that the use of these tools has great potential for the area of public management.

The Nuclear Nonproliferation Regime as a “Failed Promise”: Contestation and Self-Undermining Dynamics in a Liberal Order

Abstract The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) forms the core of the most prominent multilateral security governance regime of the liberal international order (LIO). Despite being a widely supported and remarkably successful security regime to prohibit the spread of nuclear weapons, NPT politics have become increasingly polarized. In this article, I analyze contestation and self-undermining dynamics in the nuclear regime. The NPT is a strongly institutionalized but weakly liberal regime. However, it is unevenly institutionalized. Patterns of contestation in the regime derive from these characteristics. The basic source of contestation is the fundamental inequality between the nuclear “haves” and “have-nots.” Specifically, dissatisfied states seek to strengthen the rules and obligations in the less institutionalized domain. I argue that when efforts at order-consistent reform fail, states shift to a more radical strategy of liberal counter-institutionalization to pursue their goal of equality. Nonnuclear states have long been dissatisfied with the uneven distribution of the burdens and benefits of the regime, and especially the nuclear-armed states’ failure to pursue their obligation of disarmament. Most of the contestation in the NPT over the decades has been order-consistent and pursued “liberal reform.” However, when proponents of nuclear disarmament failed to achieve meaningful progress through the NPT, they shifted to a liberal counter-institutionalization strategy and adopted an entirely new legal instrument, the 2017 Nuclear Prohibition Treaty, to pursue disarmament. This was a direct—but liberal—challenge to the existing suborder. This treaty, which prohibits nuclear weapons for all, legalizes the NPT obligation to pursue disarmament.

Data Flows and Data Protection in the Greater Bay Area: The Need for a Coordinated Legal Framework

Abstract The ambitious Greater Bay Area (GBA) agenda pursues deeper cooperation among Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macau for further regional development. The integration of the digital economies across the GBA cities depends on effective cross-boundary data flows. However, the free flow of data between Mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau is currently hampered by stark differences in data protection and cyber security regimes. While the Mainland restricts data exports outside its jurisdiction, Hong Kong does not specifically regulate cross-border data exchanges. This article explores the potential for greater coordination and harmonization of data privacy laws between Hong Kong, Macau, and Mainland China. It proposes to explore the potential of facilitating inter-regional data transfers through a coordinated data export framework. The article also explains why this is likely a more realistic medium-term objective than a full harmonization of the data protection regimes in the three jurisdictions.

Haikuology, for Kara, after Sonia Sanchez

AbstractBeginning with an autoethnographic reflection on my sister's obsession with writing haiku toward the end of her long struggle with cancer, this essay falls into a wider world of illness and confinement, death and grief, moving from the COVID‐19 pandemic to the haiku practices of two modern innovators of the form, Masaoka Shiki (1867–1902) and Richard Wright (1908–1960). As a mixed genre piece interweaving prose and poetry, it draws upon Renato Rosaldo's examination of culture, emotion, and rituals of bereavement, as well as his development of antropoesía as a form of ethnographic attention to emotional force. Survival, as the organizing principal of campaigns such as the War on Cancer, conditions us to privilege individuated cure and protection, with the body defended by promissory regimes of science and security. How do survivors of those lost to untimely death account for the harm this discourse simultaneously produces? The haiku moment—declarative and fleeting—sketches a map across time and place, of struggle and loss, intimate and global. Dwelling in the details of its reparative terrain provides connection to the joy and pain of yearning to be of the world, in spite of and because of the ways it tears us apart.

No Safe Haven: Operation Condor and Transnational Repression in South America

Abstract Transnational repression, i.e., the deliberate targeting of refugees and dissidents by states across borders, is a relatively understudied subject in international relations. This article analyzes why states act together to persecute political opponents abroad and explains variations in such practices. It proposes a theory of cooperation in transnational repression and uses the case study of Operation Condor in the 1970s to test it. Through Operation Condor, South American authoritarian states willingly forewent key aspects of their sovereignty to establish a sophisticated system of cooperation to target dissidents abroad. This scheme was a critical extension of these countries’ domestic-level policies of repression against political opposition and enabled them to target politically active refugees wherever they were located. Exiles were perceived as constituting an existential threat to these autocracies’ survival, given their ability to potentially undermine both their internal and external regime security, which therefore warranted their elimination. We draw on an interdisciplinary methodology, which combines archival research, interviews, trial observation, and the analysis of legal verdicts, alongside conclusions derived from our novel dataset, the Database on South America's Transnational Human Rights Violations (1969–1981).