Suchergebnisse

The article offers a balance of French President Nicholas Sarkozy's foreign policy on the basis of his first year of government and of the presidency of the European Union, to be held by France the forthcoming six months. It deals with change and continuity, in other words, with what is new and what is old in the foreign policy of a nation that, independently of the incumbent government, continues to be strongly conservative and follows premises established by former president Charles De Gaulle during the 60s.The article focuses on Sarkozy's campaign speeches and particularly on his statement to French ambassadors at the Elysée, on 27 August 2007. Finally, it refers to Sarkozy's implementation of foreign policy ; El artículo ofrece un balance de la política exterior del presidente francés Nicolás Sarkozy a partir de su primer año de gobierno y de la presidencia de la Unión Europea que Francia ejercerá el semestre próximo. Trata de cambio y de continuidad, esto es, de lo que hay de antiguo y de nuevo en la política exterior de una nación que, independientemente del gobierno de turno, continúa siendo marcadamente conservadora y basada en las premisas fijadas por el ex presidente Charles De Gaulle en los años sesenta. El artículo centra la atención en los discursos pronunciados por Sarkozy durante la campaña y en especial en la exposición realizada ante los embajadores franceses en el Elíseo el 8 de agosto de 2007. Por último, se refiere a la aplicación de la política exterior por el presidente.

The year 2020 marked a change in Kazakhstan's approach to Kazakh asylum seekers from China. For the first time, ethnic Kazakhs escaping China's security and ethnic policy apparatus in Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR; Xinjiang) were granted a right to a temporary stay in the country. The status was valid for one year only, yet it was a significant improvement as until 2020 similar cases were lost in Kazakh courts. This change was possible due to the international advocacy of local Kazakh human rights activists, the growing international recognition of the Xinjiang issue by the West, and the ambitions of Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who has been developing his own style of the presidency with social issues as its centrepiece. The purpose of this article is to assess Tokayev's approach to Xinjiang as a human rights issue in the context of his domestic and foreign policies. This article argues that despite the initial improvement in how the country dealt with asylum seekers from China, the situation of both human rights activists and refugees has deteriorated, forcing them to seek shelter in a third country. The article also finds that Kazakhstan's foreign policy under Tokayev has been increasingly China-oriented, prioritizing economic and political relations with Beijing over those with the West. This approach immediately affects Tokayev's strategies towards anti-Chinese activists and asylum seekers from China; it also has a long-lasting effect on the country declarative multi-vectoral and Eurasian foreign policy outlook. (Asian Aff/GIGA)

The United States first became involved in humanitarian demining in 1988 when it sent a team to assess the landmine situation in Afghanistan. Five years later, U.S. demining-related programs were underway in Afghanistan and seven other countries. By the end of 2001, we will have provided more than $500 million to 38 countries, as well as the Province of Kosovo and northwest Somalia, for various humanitarian demining efforts such as deminer training, mine awareness and mine clearance, as well as orthopedic assistance to, and socioeconomic reintegration programs for, landmine accident survivors and their families. Almost $100 million of this amount will be spent in Fiscal Year (FY) 01, the largest commitment of any nation involved in financing humanitarian demining activities. The list of recipients of U.S. humanitarian demining assistance is expected to grow in 2002. As a result of our assistance, and that of other donor nations, the world is seeing positive results in many mine-affected countries' reduced casualties, restored agricultural and pastoral land, the return of refugees and internally displaced persons (IDP) to their homes, reopened roads, schools, and markets, and other visible evidence of a return to a productive life. The goals of the U.S. humanitarian demining program are simple and direct: to reduce the loss of life and limb of innocents; to create conditions for the safe return of refugees and IDP; and to afford opportunity for economic and social reconstruction. Our principal means of achieving these objectives is to assist mine-afflicted countries worldwide in establishing a sustainable, indigenous demining capacity with the appropriate resources and skills needed to sustain progress toward a country declaring itself mine-safe. This, the 3rd edition of To Walk the Earth in Safety: The United States Commitment to Humanitarian Demining, tells the U.S. story, but not the whole story. Foreign governments, the United Nations, other international and nongovernmental organizations (NGO), and mine-affected countries also play a critical role in supporting humanitarian demining programs. The impact of these collective contributions is felt in many mine-affected countries. Moldova declared itself mine-safe in March 2001. In the near future, several other countries likely will also declare themselves mine-safe. The success stories in this publication attest to the United States Government's belief that when we assist other countries in meeting needs such as clearing landmines, we are serving America's long-term interest and staying true to America's permanent values. The U.S. Humanitarian Demining Program, like our other assistance efforts, is more than foreign aid; these programs aid America, too. Our assistance helps define America's role in the world, often contributing to the economic well-being of our own citizens and those of other countries, and advances our interest in peace, stability, and freedom abroad.

Various phases of cooperation, their objectives and accomplishments.

The Cuban missile crisis marks its 50th anniversary this year as the most studied event of the nuclear age. Scholars and policymakers alike have been dissecting virtually every aspect of that terrifying nuclear showdown. Digging through documents in Soviet and American archives, and attending conferences from Havana to Harvard, generations of researchers have labored to distill what happened in 1962 -- all with an eye toward improving U.S. foreign policy. Yet after half a century, we have learned the wrong intelligence lessons from the crisis. In some sense, this result should not be surprising. Typically, learning is envisioned as a straight-line trajectory where time only makes things better. But time often makes things worse. Organizations (and individuals) frequently forget what they should remember and remember what they should forget. Adapted from the source document.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) pervades most aspects of life in post-revolutionary Iran. Ostensibly the regime's security organisation, the IRGC's political clout and economic heft enable it to extend its influence beyond security and into foreign policy. This study employs a constructivist perspective, casting light on the key elements of the IRGC's identity, notably its religious discourse. In doing so, it develops our understanding of how the organisation's beliefs and values affect the foreign policy agenda of the Islamic Republic of Iran. This article draws on IRGC press statements, ideological training materials and its constitutive charter in conjunction with an analysis of the organisation's behaviour to delineate an image of an organisation staunchly loyal to the total imperium of the 'House of Leader', and which buttresses the regime with its militant, violent and religiously hardline outlook. Working to promote rather than define Ayatollah Khamenei's system of Islamic governance, the IRGC's role is closer to that of enforcer and implementer than of autonomous agent of foreign policy. This article contributes to the wider literature on constructivist idealism by highlighting the importance of ideas as relational and performative elements of foreign policy. (Asian Aff/GIGA)

I hypothesize that as the domestic political institutions in a state share similar policy preferences or policy goals, disputes become more likely & tend to last longer. I employ event count & continuous-time hazard models to analyze US conflict propensity & conflict duration during the period 1945-1992. Using the Militarized Interstate Dispute data set (version 2.1), I model US militarized dispute behavior as a function of congruence between the policy preferences of the US President & the Congress. The models reveal a strong relationship between preference congruence & both the amount of conflict & the duration of the disputes in which the US engages. The congruence hypotheses are robust across a variety of measures. The results add substantial strength & substance to claims that domestic political characteristics affect international conflict. The theory & empirical analyses also refine the domestic-international linkage by allowing scholars to consider the effect of normal political change in a single state on that state's foreign policy decisions. 4 Tables, 42 References. Adapted from the source document.

Once upon a time, during the early 1960s, all undergraduate International Relations courses in the United Kingdom were deemed incomplete if they did not contain a number of lectures on the question of the relationship between a country's foreign policy and the shape, size and other attributes of its national political community. The lectures often evolved into a discussion of the relative advantages of possessing a large population, and whether or not this was an element in a state's power (as in the case of the Soviet Union) or of a state's weakness, and hence of its inherent inability to attain a wider range of desirable foreign policy goals (as in the case of India). The debate was usually fairly inconclusive.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is considered as an engine of economic growth. Before the Economic reforms the flow of foreign direct investment to India has been comparatively limited because of the type of industrial development strategy and the various foreign investment policy followed by the nation. Government policy towards foreign capital was very selective. Foreign investment was normally permitted only in high technology industries in priority areas and in export oriented areas. So the inflow of FDI before 1990's was very low. To fully utilize the country's immense economic potential, the government launched Economic reforms in 1991. The new government policies are simple, transparent and promote domestic and foreign investment. India's abundant and diversified natural resources, its sound economic policy, good market condition and high skilled human resources make it a proper destination for FDI. After long years of journey FDI was also introduced in various sectors and states in India. The Investment of FDI in various states and sectors leads to rapid growth of Indian economy. On this background, the paper analyses the sector wise and state wise inflows of FDI during the period 2000-2010.