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Israel's efforts to quell violence during the recent conflict with the Palestinians include targeted assassinations of militia leaders. The international community permits the use of lethal force in only two cases, law enforcement and just war, and assassination cannot be justified in either. In the context of law enforcement, assassination remains prohibited as a form of extra-legal execution, regardless of Israel's status as an occupying power. In the context of just war, assassination violates the proscription against perfidious and treacherous means of warfare. In the current conflict, assassination cannot be accomplished without collaborators, a practice that not only is prohibited by convention but seriously undermines Palestinian society. As a result, assassination provokes violent retaliation and corrodes the basis necessary to renew peace negotiations. Nevertheless, assassination may be defensible as a last resort in some cases. These include tyrannicide, killing a murderous and brutal leader to protect innocent civilians, together with instances of 'ticking bombs' – that is, immediate and otherwise unavoidable grievous threats to noncombatants. In each case a modified argument from necessity offers grounds for the defensible, although limited, use of assassination.

Analyzes & compares two constructivist ethnicity paradigms -- the organizational (ethnicities used or discarded based on political need) & the critical (postmodern consequences of ethnic experience) -- & their contributions to the understanding of policy making, communal growth & decline, & inclusion. The underlying ideas & assumptions of each paradigm are described & related to the context of modern politics & societies. Their respective strengths & weaknesses are explained, along with their relevance to the situations of ethnic groups. The influence of postmodernity plays a major role. The opposing primordial or organic paradigms, which see ethnicity as fixed, are still influencing both scholarship & policy decisions. Organic paradigms are criticized as contradictory to modern political realities & experiences; the constructivist view of ethnicity as voluntary is more relevant. The future of ethnic groups is likely to be characterized by increased disaffiliation, segregation, or transformation, depending on the influence of each paradigm. A unified view of ethnicity that includes premodern, modern, & postmodern elements, & sees ethnicity as an evolutionary process, is called for. T. Arnold

Collective moral action is analysed using two models: a deontological, non-strategic model emphasizing right moral judgment and individual action and a rational, strategic model emphasizing the need to overcome free-rider problems. While these models fail to explain satisfactorily collective moral action each provides valuable insights which are used to examine three case studies: successful collective action to rescue Jews in Europe and failed action to confront Japanese-American persecution during World War Two. Several striking conclusions emerge. First, enlightened moral judgment is not a necessary condition for collective moral action. Instead a complex structure of action emerges in which organizational leaders acting within parochial groups manipulate incentives and substitute public goods. Second, enlightened political actors are very often the most politically impotent. This emerging paradox severely attenuates the moral basis of political action which underlies normative theory.