GEOPOLITICS (incl. Countries, Regions)
Open Access* e-Books
(See also: Africa; Political Science; Forecasting..)
*NOTE: Some titles in these lists are not necessarily Open Access, but all are free (no fee for e-access)
Embedded Files
The Asian 21st Century
(Author: Kishore Mahbubani)
Publisher: Springer Singapore
Year of publication: 2022
This open access book consists of essays written by Kishore Mahbubani to explore the challenges and dilemmas faced by the West and Asia in an increasingly interdependent world village and intensifying geopolitical competition.
The contents cover four parts:
Part One - The End of the Era of Western Domination: The major strategic error that the West is now making is to refuse to accept this reality. The West needs to learn how to act strategically in a world where they are no longer the number 1.
Part Two - The Return of Asia: From the years 1 to 1820, the largest economies in the world were Asian. After 1820 and the rise of the West, however, great Asian civilizations like China and India were dominated and humiliated. The twenty-first century will see the return of Asia to the center of the world stage.
Part Three - The Peaceful Rise of China: The shift in the balance of power to the East has been most pronounced in the rise of China. While this rise has been peaceful, many in the West have responded with considerable concern over the influence China will have on the world order.
Part Four - Globalization, Multilateralism and Cooperation: Many of the world’s pressing issues, such as COVID-19 and climate change, are global issues and will require global cooperation to deal with. In short, human beings now live in a global village. States must work with each other, and we need a world order that enables and facilitates cooperation in our global village.
Table of contents:
Part 1: The End of the Era of Western Domination
The Hypocrisy of the West
Trump, Macron and the Poverty of Liberalism
Democracy or Plutocracy? America’s Existential Question
Can America Escape Plutocracy?
What Do US Capitol Attack and the West’s Covid-19 Death Rates Have in Common?
Was Trump Right or Wrong on China? Biden’s Answer Will Shape the Future
Why the Trump Administration Has Helped China
Why American Presidents Matter
What Biden Will Mean for the Rest of the World
East and West: Trust or Distrust?
Great Battles Require Strategic Discipline—And Washington Needs It in This Crisis
Part 2: The Asian Renaissance
On the Dawn of the Asian Century
ASEAN’s Quiet Resilience
Asia, Say No to NATO
East Asia’s New Edge
Why the ‘India Way’ May Be the World’s Best Bet for Moral Leadership
India’s Tryst with the Asian Century
India: A Brave and Imaginative Superpower?
Can India Become Stronger Than China? Yes, It Can
The West Needs to Rethink Its Strategic Goals for Asia
Myanmar Coup Could Jump-Start US-China Cooperation, Through Quiet Diplomacy
Can Asia Help Biden?
Part 3: The Peaceful Rise of China
China: Threat or Opportunity?
A ‘Yellow Peril’ Revival Fueling Western Fears of China’s Rise
Is China Expansionist?
How Dangerous Is China?
What China Threat? How the United States and China Can Avoid War
The Great Paradox of Donald Trump’s Plan to Combat China
HK People Must Understand They’ve Become a Pawn
Covid-19 ‘Enhanced China’s Position in the World Order’
How China Could Win Over the Post-coronavirus World and Leave the US Behind
Why Attempts to Build a New Anti-China Alliance Will Fail
Biden Should Appear ‘Tough & Fierce’ on China, but Cooperate ‘Below the Radar’
Biden Should Summon the Courage to Reverse Course on China
The West Should Heed Napoleon’s Advice and Let China Sleep
Asian Inheritors of a Western Legacy?
Part 4: Globalization, Multilateralism and Cooperation
Globalization Is Dead! Long Live Globalization!
Can the World Order Catch Up with the World?
Diplomacy: Power or Persuasion
UN: A Sunrise Organization?
Can the World Health Organization Be Rejuvenated?
Multilateral Diplomacy
Can Humanity Make U-turns?
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Back to the Future
: ISPI Report 2023
Publisher: Zenodo
Year of publication: 2023
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has upset the geopolitical balance in Europe, with shockwaves hitting the entire world. As a result, today’s world seems to be heading back to a future that looks all too like countless “pasts”. The mindset of “opposing blocs” is returning to Europe, or so it seems. NATO is rediscovering its identity after 30 years of drift. There is a resurgence of “non-aligned” countries, from Turkey to India, to many Latin American governments, as they seek a tricky balance between the major players. The mix of high inflation and energy crisis has taken to the stage again, dragging us back to the 1970s, when rationing and double-digit price rises were commonplace. And the nuclear threat, poverty and perhaps the risk of a less globalised world are rising too. All these returns and revivals are crucial changes that are taking their toll on Europe. The ISPI Report 2023 provides a compass to navigate this changing world.
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Dictators and Autocrats
: Securing Power across Global Politics
Publisher: Routledge
Year of publication: 2021
In order to truly understand the emergence, endurance, and legacy of autocracy, this volume of engaging essays explores how autocratic power is acquired, exercised, and transferred or abruptly ended through the careers and politics of influential figures in more than 20 countries and six regions.
The book looks at both traditional "hard" dictators, such as Hitler, Stalin, and Mao, and more modern "soft" or populist autocrats, who are in the process of transforming once fully democratic countries into autocratic states, including Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Turkey, Brazilian leader Jair Bolsonaro, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, Narendra Modi in India, and Viktor Orbán in Hungary. The authors touch on a wide range of autocratic and dictatorial figures in the past and present, including present-day autocrats, such as Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping, military leaders, and democratic leaders with authoritarian aspirations. They analyze the transition of selected autocrats from democratic or benign semi-democratic systems to harsher forms of autocracy, with either quite disastrous or more successful outcomes.
An ideal reader for students and scholars, as well as the general public, interested in international affairs, leadership studies, contemporary history and politics, global studies, security studies, economics, psychology, and behavioral studies.
Contents:
List of contributors
Introduction: dictators and autocrats: a global phenomenon
PART I The notorious three
1 - Joseph Stalin: autocrat par excellence (1878–1953)
2 - Adolf Hitler: from democracy to dictatorship (1889–1945)
3 - Mao Zedong: communist Party dictatorship (1893–1976)
PART II Pathbreaking autocrats of the twentieth century
4 - Fidel Castro: from grassroots dictatorship to Communist autocracy (1926–2016)
5 - Augusto Pinochet: the emergence of one-man rule in Chile (1915–2006)
6 - Robert Mugabe: ruthless authoritarian who preferred democratic clothing (1924–2019)
7 - Joseph Kabila: the “Raïs” of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (born 1971)
8 - Hugo Chavez: was he an autocrat? (1954–2013)
9 - Lee Kuan Yew: autocracy, elections, and capitalism (1923–2015)
PART III Twenty-first-century autocrats: the major powers
10 - Vladimir Putin: Russia’s neo-patrimonial façade democracy (born 1952)
11 - Xi Jinping: the rise of an authoritarian leader (born 1953)
12 - Narendra Modi: elected authoritarian (born 1950)
13 - Donald J. Trump: the authoritarian style in American politics (born 1946)
PART IV Twenty-first-century autocrats: other influential autocrats
14 - Ali Hosseini Khamenei: routinizing revolution in Iran (born 1939)
15 - The Assad Dynasty: quo vadis Damascus? (Hafiz: 1930–2000; Bashar: born 1965)
16 - Kim Jong Un: rise to power and leadership style (born 1984)
17 - Abdel Fattah el-Sisi: the one and only Egyptian dictator (born 1954)
18 - Prayuth Chan-o-Cha: from the barracks to the ballot box (born 1954)
19 - Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud (a.k.a. “MBS”): king in all but name (born 1985)
20 - Viktor Orbán and János Kádár: a post-Communist and a Communist autocrat in Hungary.
A comparative analysis (Kádár: 1912–1989; Orbán: born 1963)
21 - Recep Tayyip Erdoğan: from “illiberal democracy” to electoral authoritarianism (born 1953)
22 - Rodrigo Duterte: macho populism and authoritarian practice (born 1945)
23 - Jair Bolsonaro: beyond the pale, above the fray (born 1955)
Index
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Global Political Leadership
: In Search of Synergy
Publisher: Routledge
Year of publication: 2022
Global Political Leadership explores contemporary shifts in leadership, and the related leadership crisis, in the global world.
Globalization is now perceived as a threatening and hostile force, with many of its advocates and political supporters turning away from it, but its processes cannot be reversed. New powers emerge, old ones re-emerge, and uncertainty about the future global order is increasing. This book tells the inside stories of global power games and asks important questions about the leadership crisis in the western world. The author provides an interpretative framework for contemporary shifts within the western political sphere based on the concept of global leadership. This framework presents the nature of the transformation caused by global processes, as part of which force and coercion have ceased to be the main modus operandi of the international realm. The issue of global political leadership has often been neglected in international relations literature, while being widely exploited by managerial and organizational studies. However, all social organizations have ‘gone global’ within the last several decades; they are more interconnected and more dependent on global processes, so the question of effective leadership strategies matching these new realities is highly necessary, even – or especially – at a time when globalization is no longer seen as a leading political programme.
This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of global affairs, politics and international relations, leadership and development, and diplomatic studies.
Contents page:
Introduction
Chapter 1: Landscape of Political Leadership in the 21st Century
Chapter 2: Changing the Centre of Gravity: Global Leadership Strategies in the Post-American World
Chapter 3: Focus on Followers: Individual Empowerment and Public Affairs on a Global Scale
Chapter 4: Global Leadership as Sense Making
Conclusion
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Human Security in World Affairs
: Problems and Opportunities
Publisher: BCcampus & University of Northern British Columbia
Year of publication: 2020 (2nd edition)
This first university textbook of human security, intended as an introductory text from senior undergraduate level up, and includes chapters by 24 authors that encompass the full spectrum of disciplines contributing to the human security field. It is based on the four-pillar model of socio-political security, economic security, environmental security and health security. The chapters include learning outcomes, extension activities, and suggested readings; a comprehensive glossary lists key terms used throughout the book. This textbook can be used in courses on international studies and relations, political studies, history, human geography, anthropology and human ecology, futures studies, applied social studies, public health, and more.
Contents:
[...]
Preface
Acknowledgements
I. Main Body
1. Introduction
2. Human Security Foundation Documents and Related Resources
3. Why Human Security Needs Our Attention
4. Conflicting Perspectives
Summary
4.1 Introduction
4.2 On Globalisation
4.3 Human Rights and Human Security
4.4 Notes from an Ethnography
4.5 A Hierarchy of Needs?
4.6 The West and the Rest?
4.7 Freedom of Religion, Freedom from Religion
4.8 Conclusion – Paradoxes of Universality
Resources and References
5. Threats to Human Security
Summary
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Assessing Human Security
5.3 Violent Conflict as a Threat to Human Security
5.4 Other Threats to Human Security
5.5 Conclusions
Resources and References
6. Human Security in the Context of International Humanitarian Law and International Criminal Law
Summary
6.1 Introduction
6.2 Situations in Which the Protective Measures Will Apply
6.3 Who and What Are Protected?
6.4 Means and Methods of Warfare
6.5 Different Responsibility Regimes, Core International Crimes and Enforcement Options
6.6 Conclusion: The Future of the Responsibility Regimes
Resources and References
7. Individuals and Groups Outside of the State System
Summary
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Individuals and Groups Outside of the State
7.3 Alienated Citizenship and Sub-state Terrorism
7.4 Counter Terrorism, Human Rights and Human Security
7.5 Conclusion
Resources and References
8. Political Hybridity and Human Security in Post-colonial and Post-conflict State Building / Rebuilding
Summary
8.1 Introduction
8.2 Enhancing State Resilience and Promoting Human Security
8.3 The Quest for Human Security in Insecure and Fragile States
8.4 Diagnosing Vulnerability and Preventing State Failure
8.5 Promoting Human Security in Weak States
8.6 Hybrid Political Orders
8.7 Community Sources of Legitimacy
8.8 Centrality of Context
8.9 Conclusions
Resources and References
Long Descriptions
9. Climate Change and Human Security
Summary
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Current and Future Risks to Human Security
9.3 Major Culprits and Victims of Climate Change
9.4 Barriers to Counteracting Climate Change
9.5 Achieving Climate Justice as the Way Forward
Resources and References
Long Descriptions
10. Human Security and Resource Scarcity
Summary
10.1 Introduction
10.2 Resource Scarcity Through the Ages
10.3 Understanding Resource Scarcity
10.4 Tragedy of the Commons
10.5 Social Traps
10.6 Understanding Complex Systems
10.7 Resource Scarcity and Conflict
10.8 Human Security in the Face of Resource Scarcity
10.9 Case Studies in Water Scarcity
Resources and References
11. Our War Against Nature: Ontology, Cognition and a Constricting Paradigm
Summary
11.1 Introduction: Defining Terms, Posing Questions
11.2 Reality, Science and Revolutions in Our Thinking
11.3 Seeing the Complexity of Nature
11.4. Seeing Ourselves in Life’s Larger Context
11.5 The ‘War Against Nature’
11.6 Understanding How and Why We Continue to Wage ‘Our War Against Nature’ and Reversing Course
11.7 Becoming Reflexive: Rethinking ‘Who’ We Are, Breaking Free of a Constricting Paradigm, Ending the ‘War’
Resources and References
12. Our War Against Nature: Letters from the Front
Summary
PART I: The Assault on Organisms and Ecosystems
12.1 Introduction: Welcome to the Anthropocene!
12.2 Animal Armageddon
12.3 The Fraying of Food Webs
12.4 Assault on the Oceans: Chemical and Physical Changes
PART II: The Human Footprint
12.5 The Human Footprint: Population
12.6 The Human Footprint: Consumption
12.7 Money Games: Chasing the Symbol
12.8 Who Are We?
Resources and References
13. Transnational Crime
Summary
13.1 International Crime or Transnational Crime? Some Definitions
13.2 Globalization and Transnational Crime
13.3 The Economic Scale of Transnational Crime
13.4 The Threat of Transnational Crime
13.5 Transnational Crime as a Human Security Threat
13.6 Trafficking in Persons
13.7 International Efforts to Address Transnational Crime
13.8 Regional Efforts to Address Transnational Crime
13.9 Sovereignty, Security or Sentiment? Solving Transnational Crime
Resources and References
14. Recalling the Significance of Local Governance to Human Security in Illiberal Sub-Saharan African Contexts
Summary
14.1 Introduction
14.2 Post-Cold War Realities in Sub-Saharan Africa Versus Africanist Scholarship
14.3 Assessing Value
14.4 Making Historical Comparisons
14.5 Conclusion: Recalling the Significance of Local Government Institutions
Resources and References
15. Issues with Human Rights Violations
16. Developing Good Governance
Summary
16.1 Introduction
16.2 Sustainable Development and Human Security
16.3 The Principle of Sustainability
16.4 Governance for Sustainability
16.5 The Role of Civil Society
16.6 The Earth Charter: A Framework for Global Governance
16.7 Conclusion
Resources and References
Long Descriptions
17. Health Security in the Context of Social-ecological Change
18. Empowering International Human Security Regimes
19. Conflict Transformation and Peace Processes: Peace Without Justice Is Just a Ceasefire
Summary
19.1 Introduction: What Do We Mean by ‘Transforming’ Conflict?
19.2 From Peace Treaties to Peace Processes: Conflict and Peace in Historical Perspective
19.3 Four Peace Processes
19.4 Post-conflict Conditions Today
19.5 Assessing Conflict Transformation in Four Peace Processes
Resources and References
20. Human Security and Global Environmental Governance
21. Conclusions, Prospects, Futures
Summary
21.1 Human Security in World Affairs: Challenges
21.2 Human Security in World Affairs: Opportunities
21.3 Besides Environmental Sustainability, What Other Aspects of Human Security Need Improvement?
Resources and References
Glossary of Terms and Definitions
Authors’ Biographical Information
Versioning History
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Inventing the Third World
: In Search of Freedom for the Postwar Global South
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Year of publication: 2022
This open access book explores the ways in which the global south reimagined the future world order at the end of the Second World War, and the cultural and intellectual breakthroughs that these new narratives created.
[From the Preface:] The end of the Second World War and the eclipse of empires brought a wave of efforts to reimagine the world in the future tense. Nation-states emerging from the shadows of colonial rule gathered at Bandung to chart alternative destinies and to challenge global inequalities. The result was nothing less than an effort to reimagine the world order in a way that stood in direct contrast to the liberal regime designed in Bretton Woods and in San Francisco as the Second World War drew to a close. Anticolonialism and development dreaming envisioned a less hierarchical, more pluralistic, and more distributive arrangement. As the current world order gets caught ever more tightly into an impasse, this volume looks back at the proliferating alternative visions under the mantle of the Third World. Avoiding the tendency to treat alternatives as doomed, utopian projects, the volume seeks to recover the world-changing aspirations of the Third World project as well as its cultural and intellectual breakthroughs.
By inventing the Third World, writers, artists, musicians, and photographers sought to create new institutions of solidarity, new expressions, and alternative narratives than the liberal and/or imperial ones they had inherited. In so doing, they also created substitute channels, networks, and associations to circulate and exchange their insights, ideas, and cultural production from universities to book prizes, foundations and literary festivals, magazines and movies, many of which moved across borders but outside the dominant circuitry of what we now call the Global North. They built a nonaligned movement to strike a different path from Cold War geopolitics. Equally important, writers, artists, photographers, and musicians experimented with cultures of hope and possibility. Viewed from different points in what we now call the Global South, or what was then called—in a triumphal chorus—the Third World, there was a search for new meanings of freedom, self-determination, and the promise of development.
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The Moral Mappings of South and North
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Year of publication: 2018
What is the 'Global South' and where is it? The term 'Global South' marks a new attempt at providing order and meaning in the current global political constellation, replacing the term 'Third World'. But the term 'Global South' is fraught with many ambiguities.
This book explore the possible meanings of this new distinction and assess the advantages and disadvantages of adopting it. They cast a wide exploratory net, looking beyond the dominant politico-economic meaning to how the way that we interpret the world has changed over time and the wider cultural–intellectual meanings.
Renowned globalization scholar Jan Nederveen Pieterse deftly guides the reader through the development of globalization in the West and the East, explaining key topics such as the 2008 crash, trends in inequality, the changing fortunes of the BRICs, and the role of governance and democracy. Accessible and insightful, this book will be an essential guide for both students in the social sciences and for professionals and scholars seeking a fresh perspective.
Key features:
Asks whether 'Global South' and 'Global North' are useful for understanding the current global constellation
Analyses the recent global transformation that allegedly made the 'Third World' disappear and the 'Global South' emerge
Explores how space is used for different but overlapping purposes: to build socio-political concepts, to criticise recent trends in global developments and to develop a normative angle for collective political action
Draws on global history, conceptual history, comparative literature, social and political theory, political philosophy and social history to develop a full, interdisciplinary picture of the uses of 'South' and 'North'
Contents page:
Acknowledgements
Illustrations
Contributors
1. Finding one's way in global social space
Peter Wagner
2. Does the world have a spatio-political form? Preliminaries
Gerard Rosich
3. The BRICS countries: time and space in moral narratives of development
Cláudio Costa Pinheiro
4. Russia between East, West and North: Comments on the history of moral mapping
Maxim Khomyakov
5. Digging for class: thoughts on the writing of a global history of social distinction
Jacob Dlamini
6. North–South and the question of recognition: a constellation saturated with tensions
À. Lorena Fuster
7. On spaces and experiences: modern displacements, interpretations and universal claims
Aurea Mota
8. The South as exile
Nathalie Karagiannis
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Multipolar Globalization
: Emerging Economies and Development
Publisher: Routledge; UC Santa Barbara
Year of publication: 2017
Like a giant oil tanker, the world is slowly turning. The rapid growth of economies in Asia and the global South has led to a momentous shift in the world order, leaving much of the traditional literature on globalization behind. Multipolar Globalization: Emerging Economies and Development is the perfect guide to these ongoing 21st-century transformations, combining engaging and wide-ranging coverage with cutting-edge analysis.
The rise of China and other emerging economies has led to the emergence of a new geography of trade, new economic and political combinations, new financial actors, investors and donors, and weaker American hegemony. This interdisciplinary volume combines development studies, global political economy, sociology, and cultural studies to ask what this growth means for domestic and global inequality and examines the role of multipolarity in the reshaping of globalization.
Renowned globalization scholar Jan Nederveen Pieterse deftly guides the reader through the development of globalization in the West and the East, explaining key topics such as the 2008 crash, trends in inequality, the changing fortunes of the BRICs, and the role of governance and democracy. Accessible and insightful, this book will be an essential guide for both students in the social sciences and for professionals and scholars seeking a fresh perspective.
Contents page:
Introduction
1 Into the multipolar world
2 Oriental globalization
3 Asia rising: moving complementarities
4 BRICS are in the eye of the beholder
5 Social inequality: multicentric perspectives
6 Crisis and the East-South turn: dynamic imbalances
7 Media and hegemonic populism: representing the rise of the rest
8 Governance and protest
9 Debugging theory
10 Conclusion: global restructuring?
Glossary
References
Index
Reviews:
"As always, Jan Nederveen Pieterse is in the avant garde, advancing debates and perspectives with a global yet nuanced sweep. He continues to explore an East-South turn as the centerpiece of global restructuring as he anticipates further varieties of development and capitalism: another eagerly-awaited masterpiece." — Timothy Shaw, University of Massachusetts Boston, Global Studies
"This is the book we need to understand the contemporary crisis of globalization. I hope it will be assigned in courses, and read by citizens, all around the world." — Craig Murphy, International Relations, Wellesley College; University Massachusetts Boston
"This is an outstanding book that demonstrates the need to understand globalization with a radically new register, in light of the momentous shifts around the emerging economies in Asia and the global South." — Fazal Rizvi, Professor of Global Studies in Education, The University of Melbourne
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New Authoritarianism
: Challenges to Democracy in the 21st century
Publisher: Verlag Barbara Budrich
Year of publication: 2019
The authors deal with comparative aspects of contemporary authoritarianism. Authoritarian tendencies have appeared in several “old democracies” but their main successes take place in several states which departed from dictatorial regimes recently. The book contains case-studies of contemporary Hungarian, Kenyan, Polish, Russian and Turkish regimes.
[From the introduction by the Editor, Jerzy J. Wiatr:]
"The theme of this volume is “new authoritarianism”. It refers to the emergence of hybrid regimes which combine electorally expressed will of the people with the centralization of state power in the hands of the supreme leader and/or in the hands of the ruling oligarchy and with the destruction of the rule of law, the cornerstone of which are independent courts. Such systems have been called by various names, like “controlled democracy” (Peter Anyang Nyong’o), “delegative democracy” (Guillermo O’Donnell), “electoral authoritarianism” (Ilter Turan), “illiberal democracy” (Fareed Zakaria). In this issue we have opted for the term “new authoritarianism” to underline both the continuity with the older forms of authoritarianism and the novelty of the current phenomenon, which – unlike “old” authoritarianism – is not based on a naked power but successfully seeks public support expressed in contested elections.
In the present century several states have been moving in the direction of new authoritarianism. They belong to the large category of countries which had departed from dictatorial regimes in not too distant past. There are, however, authoritarian tendencies in old democracies, as manifested in several recent elections in Europe and America."
Contents page:
From the Editor
Populism, Right-Wing Extremism and Neo-Nationalism
A Conceptual History of Political Regimes: Democracy, Dictatorship, and Authoritarianism
Some of the Foremost Challenges to the Status Quo
The Massive Exchange of Elites as a Mean of Formation of the Authoritarian Regime
The Rise of Populist Electoral Authoritarian in Turkey: a Case of Culturally Rooted Recidivism
Opposition as a Mirage of Political Field in Russia
From Horthy to Orbán: Neo-Authoritarianism in Hungary
Authoritarianism with the Electoral face in Africa
Authoritarian Tendencies in the Polish Political System
New and Old Authoritarianism in a Comparative Perspective
Index
List of Contributors
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Multipolarity After Ukraine
: Old Wine in New Bottles?
Publisher: Ledizioni
Year of publication: 2023
One year after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the war has exacerbated the rift between Russia and the “collective West”. While Western governments have been steadfast in punishing Russia for the invasion, other countries around the world have been more ambiguous, at times even choosing to side with Moscow politically or economically. These dynamics have revived the idea of a shift towards multipolarity along an anti-Western trajectory. Are we really heading in that direction? Are we facing increasing fragmentation due to the war or a re-consolidation of longstanding alliances? What principles underlie the formation of these blocs? What are the consequences of these dynamics for global security and the global economy? This Report aims to shed light on these questions, while also outlining the war’s possible future implications for the Russian Federation, the “West”, and the international order.
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Revisiting Regionalism and the Contemporary World Order
: Perspectives from the BRICS and beyond
Publisher: Verlag Barbara Budrich
Year of publication: 2019
The book critically analyzes the ongoing changes in the regional, intra-regional, and global dynamics of cooperation, from a multi-disciplinary and pluralist perspective. It is based on the insight that in a post-hegemonic world the formation of regions and the process of globalization can be largely disconnected from the orbit of the US, and that a plurality of power and worldviews has replaced US hegemony. In spite of these changes, most existing analyses of current changes in the world order still rely upon Western-centered approaches, and Westphalian thinking. Against this backdrop, the book proposes to advance a truly global IR understanding of the post-hegemonic world, and weaves together the pluralist and multi-disciplinary perspectives of scholars located all around the world.
The book explores different questions, for example the status and role of BRICS in the changing international order; how countries in the Global South can use regionalism to change the world order; the competing worldviews that manifest themselves in the institutional variety of regionalism; and, most importantly, how all these changes push International Relations as a field to become more global, or at least to go beyond Westphalian thinking – thus bringing the role of multilateralism back to the discussion.
Contents page:
Notes on contributors
List of abbreviations
Acknowledgements
Introduction: An elusive changing international order
PART 1 - Emergence and Challenges of Regionalism
1. Africa and World War II: The emergence of an imposed regionalization
2. The emergence of BRICS: An extension of interregionalism to the Global South
3. BRICS and the emergent countries in the twenty-first century: Discussing contemporary perspectives
4. Regionalism as resistance? South Africa’s utopia of Souths
PART 2 - Contemporary Regionalism in Practice
5. Bilateralism and multilateralism: Obstacles to sub-regionalism in the Maghreb
6. Coping with the changing world order: The case of Russia
7. From competitive to inclusive trade regionalism: How to consolidate economic cooperation through a revival of ‘ambitious RTAs’ between major trading nations
8. Foot in the Door: China’s Investments in the Arctic Region
PART 3 - Theoretical Perspectives on the Changing World Order
9. Beyond Ideology: a reassessment of regionalism and globalism in IR theory, using China as a case study
10. Liberal international order without liberalism: Chinese visions of the world order
11. International Relations in the Finnish national epos, Kalevala: Encounters of historical epochs and civilizations in the changing international order
Index
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Russia’s New Authoritarianism
: Putin and the Politics of Order
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Year of publication: 2021
This book studies the transformation of Russian domestic politics and foreign policy under Vladimir Putin. It asks what kind of political system ‘Putinism’ denotes. Engages with the scholarly and policy debate on the growth of illiberal politics and authoritarianism globally, in the post-Soviet space and in countries as diverse as Hungary, Egypt, Turkey and the Philippines
The book uses contemporary case studies – including Russia’s legal system, the annexation of Crimea and Russian policy in Syria – to critically examine Russia’s political ideology. Why did Russia’s post-Soviet political system developed into a new form of authoritarianism? And how did its foreign policy came to pose such a profound challenge to the West? David G. Lewis goes beyond current polemical debates to address these questions. Lewis investigates the Russian understanding of key concepts such as sovereignty, democracy and political community. He analyses the Russian political system as a novel form of authoritarian political order, unpacking the ideological paradigm that underpins it. He reveals that Russia's new order is characterised by the consolidation of political and economic power around a sovereign leader, together with a willingness to take political decisions outside the law both at home and in international affairs.
Contents page:
Preface
1: Authoritarianism, Ideology and Order
Understanding Russian Authoritarianism
Order, smuta and the Russian State
Russia as Weimar
Carl Schmitt and Authoritarian Order
2: Carl Schmitt and Russian Conservatism
Carl Schmitt in Moscow
Schmitt in the Academy
Dugin, Schmitt, and Neo-Eurasianist thought
Remizov and the New Conservatives
Normalising Schmitt
3. Sovereignty and the Exception
The Centrality of Sovereignty
Sovereignty in International Affairs
Discursive sovereignty
Domestic Sovereignty: Deciding on the Exception
The Sovereign Leader
The Sovereign and the Court
Exception, Norms and ‘Manual Control’
The Dual State
4: Democracy and the People
Putinism and Democracy
The Decline of Parliamentarianism
Constructing a Majority
A majority of values
5: Defining the Enemy
Russia and its enemies
Constructing the Enemy Discourse
The Enemy Within: The fifth column
Civil society and foreign agents
The End of Consensus
6: Dualism, Exceptionality and the Rule of Law
Law in Russia
Conceptualising dualism
Politicized justice
Mechanisms of exception
Prokuratura
Security services
Courts and judges
The exception becomes the norm
7: The Crimean Exception
Crimea: The sovereign decision
Legality as imperialism
Order and orientation
8: Großraum Thinking in Russian Foreign Policy
A World of Great Spaces
Russia’s Spatial Crisis
Russia’s Spatial Projects
Russia as Hegemonic Power
The Political Idea
Exclusion of Foreign Powers
The new Schmittians
9: Apocalypse Delayed: Katechontic Thinking in late Putinist Russia
Russian messianism
Russia as contemporary katechon
Katechontic thinking and the Syrian intervention
Conclusion
Bibliography
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The Self-Deception Trap
: Exploring the Economic Dimensions of Charity Dependency within Africa-Europe Relations
(author: Carlos Lopes)
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year of publication: 2024
Includes policy suggestions to help overcome negative cycles of aid donation
Provides an African perspective on aid and how to overcome its stigma
Discusses the role of migration in the economic relationship between Africa and Europe
This open access book examines the economic relationship between Africa and Europe. It highlights the stigmatized narratives about Africa and analyses how they influence a range of key actors and processes. This is illustrated by the actions of European actors who reinforce negative narratives through replacing real economic transformation and development with charity, while African leaders compete to maximize aid donations and help further these narratives.
This book acknowledges the complex history of the relations between Africa and Europe and details the ways in which Africa has become a peripheral player in the world economy. It will be relevant to researchers and policymakers interested in development and African economics.
Contents page:
Front Matter
Introduction: A Masterclass in Dealing with Passive Aggressive Behaviour
Empires of the Mind
The Disappointing Discussion About Aid Effectiveness
Comparative Advantage Is an Old-Fashioned Trick
Lost Decades or Blessing?
The Good Samaritans Lose Their Way
Migration Takes Centre Stage
The Free Trade Fantasy
Conclusions: A New Era of African Agency
Back Matter
About the Author:
Carlos Lopes is a Professor at the Mandela School of Public Governance, University of Cape Town and Affiliate Professor at Sciences Po, Paris. He has occupied important leadership positions across the United Nations, the African Union, and academic institutions.
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Suppressing Dissent
: Shrinking Civic Space, Transnational Repression and Palestine–Israel
Publisher: Oneworld Academic
Year of publication: 2024
Or https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/148263
Civic space worldwide is shrinking – nowhere is this plainer than in Palestine–Israel.
Suppressing Dissent brings together leading experts of shrinking civic space and transnational repression concerning Palestine–Israel to show how failing to address the phenomenon has impacts in the United States, the Middle East and beyond.
Contents page:
Introduction: Palestine, Israel, and the Battle for Hearts and Minds – and the Levers of Policy by Zaha Hassan
Palestinian Civil Society in the Shadow of a One-State Reality: Managing the Terms of Subjugation After the Oslo Accords … Resentfully and Ineffectively by Nathan J. Brown
The Oslo Framework and Palestinian Authoritarianism by Dana El Kurd
Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Impact of Israel’s Occupation and Palestinian Authoritarianism on Community Organizing and NGOs by Zaha Hassan and Layla Gantus
The Rise, Weakening, and Resurgence of Civil Society in Israel by Dahlia Scheindlin
Neo-Kahanism: The Growing Influence of a Violent, Jewish Supremacist Ideology by Jessica Buxbaum and Katherine Wilkens
US Counterterrorism Law and Policy: Its Role in Shutting Down Palestinian Activism and Agency by Nour Soubani and Diala Shamas
Israeli Mechanisms to Restrict Civic Space: From Surveillance and Repression in the Occupied West Bank to Policing Israelis Writ Large by Yael Berda
Made in Palestine: Repackaging Apartheid as “Smart” Cities by Matt Mahmoudi
Digital Repression: How Palestinian Voices are Censored, Surveilled, and Threatened Online by Marwa Fatafta
The How-to of Shutting Down Pro-Palestinian Speech and Protest in the US by Lara Friedman
Restrictions on Financial Services and Banking and their Impacts on Palestinian NGOs by Ashleigh Subramanian-Montgomery and Paul Carroll
Closing Spaces Beyond Borders: Israel’s Transnational Repression Network by Yousef Munayyer
From Exclusion to Erasure: The Attempt to Silence Arab Americans on Palestine by Maya Berry
Shrinking Civic Space in the Arab World and its Relationship to Palestine/Israel by Marwan Muasher and Rafiah Al Talei
Conclusion: Rules, Dissent, and National Security by H.A. Hellyer
Reviews:
“An urgent and compelling read, this collection of essays dismantles the false promise that repression can ever guarantee safety. A must-read that envisions a future grounded in the self-determination and human rights of both Palestinians and Israelis.” — Tess McEnery, Executive Director, Middle East Democracy Center, former director for Democracy and Human Rights at the White House National Security Council
"Democracy is under threat around the world, as illiberal governments cooperate to develop and refine their tools of repression. This incredibly timely book sounds the alarm about efforts by the Israeli government to export its repression of Palestinian rights to the United States, with implications for political dissent and activism globally. Anyone who cares about the future of democracy should pay attention." — Matt Duss, Executive Vice President, Center for International Policy, former foreign policy advisor to Senator Bernie Sanders
"Repressing speech is never the end of a problem, but rather the beginning of a bigger one. This volume clearly shows that creation of a bigger problem for Israel and Palestine, a region desperately in need of dialogue not imposed silence. Suppressing Dissent fills a gap in the policy community’s understanding of how shutting down discussion only fuels anger, limits cooperation, and undermines possibilities for peace." — Sarah Yager, Washington Director, Human Rights Watch
"This comprehensive collection unpacks how policy on an issue ever more central to US and global security has often been precooked by the delimiting and even criminalization of open discourse and debate. For anyone trying to figure out the appalling policy outcomes and American complicity in war crimes, this collection is a good place to start." — Daniel Levy, President, U.S. / Middle East Project, former Israeli negotiator under prime ministers Yitzhak Rabin and Ehud Barak
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World Politics at the Edge of Chaos
: Reflections on Complexity and Global Life
Publisher: SUNY Press
Year of publication: 2016
Why are policymakers, scholars, and the general public so surprised when the world turns out to be unpredictable? World Politics at the Edge of Chaos suggests that the study of international politics needs new forms of knowledge to respond to emerging challenges such as the interconnectedness between local and transnational realities; between markets, migration, and social movements; and between pandemics, a looming energy crisis, and climate change. Asserting that Complexity Thinking (CT) provides a much-needed lens for interpreting these challenges, the contributors offer a parallel assessment of the impact of CT to anthropocentric and non-anthropocentric (post-human) International Relations. Using this perspective, the result should be less surprise when confronting the dynamism of a fragile and unpredictable global life.
Contents page:
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Inside/Outside and Around: Observing the Complexity of Global Life
Part I. Complexity Thinking and Anthropocentric International Relations
1. The Gardener and the Craftsman: Four Types of Complexity in Global Life
2. Theorizing International Relations: Emergence, Organized Complexity, and Integrative Pluralism
3. Musings on Complexity, Policy, and Ideology
4. Harnessing the Knowledge of the Masses: Citizen Sensor Networks, Violence, and Public Safety in Mugunga
5. Ascertaining the Normative Implications of Complexity Thinking for Politics: Beyond Agent-Based Modeling
Part II. Complexity Thinking and Nonanthropocentric International Relations
6. Complexifying International Relations for a Posthumanist World
7. Prologomena to Postanthropocentric International Relations: Biosphere and Technosphere in the Age of Global Complexity
8. The Good, the Bad, and the Sometimes Ugly: Complexity as Both Threat and Opportunity in National Security
9. Complexity and Stability in Human-Environment Interaction: The Transformation from Climate Risk Cascades to Viable Adaptive Networks
Conclusion: Complexifying IR: Disturbing the “Deep Newtonian Slumber” of the Mainstream
Contributors
Index
Reviews:
". ..provides the scientific community with a compilation of exemplary scholarship which addresses the responsibility institutions face in terms of managing complexity. " — International Journal on World Peace
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