Search results

Disinformation and propaganda are key aspects of Russia's war strategy as it uses the information environment to justify its actions in international politics, both domestically and abroad, and to coerce audiences into unwittingly supporting its actions. Russia, leading up to and throughout the conflict with Ukraine, brought the full scope of its propaganda apparatus to bear, leveraging overt and covert capabilities on both media and disinformation tools to justify the invasion and [attempt to] destroy international support for Ukraine. What kind of instruments, methods, and narratives has Russia used before and after its invasion of Ukraine? The spread of disinformation by the Russian Federation prior to and after the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 as well as the actions taken in response by Ukraine, allied governments, and civil and international organizations provide an important perspective as well as lessons on how to counteract disinformation and propagandistic narratives.

Nuclear weaponry is a factor of military deterrence, hence is also a key means of shaping security and maintaining strategic balance. Therefore, despite implementation of the policy of a nuclear non-proliferation, there is no political will towards eliminating it completely and ultimately. The aim of the article is to analyze and assess the impact of nuclear weapons on shaping the international security policy. In the paper, the author assumed that nuclear weapons, in both political and military categories, are an important factor in shaping international relations. Therefore the importance of nuclear weapons in international relations, despite the passage of time, does not change much. Most countries that possess nuclear weapons, modernize and expand their arsenals, seeing in that not only an expression of power but also guarantee to its security. Studying the article should at least bring some reflection on the evolution of nuclear weapons as a mean of shaping contemporary security relationships.

The subject of the article is the assessment of the impact of international
corporations' activities on the development of Polish commodity
exports against the background of Central European countries in 2004–2018. The detailed analysis covers changes in the value, dynamics, product and geographical structure of exports, the importance of foreign subsidiaries of international corporations in creating export potential and the share of foreign value added in gross exports. The conducted analysis showed a high degree of dependence of Polish exports, as well as those of the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia on the operations of foreign subsidiaries of international corporations. Their share in
the total exports exceeded 50% during the analyzed period, and 85% in the exports of cars and trucks, pharmaceuticals, tobacco products, computers, electronic and optical devices. An important factor in the development of exports is the phenomenon of international fragmentation of production processes. It causes an increase in
trade turnover in subassemblies and intermediate goods. We can estimate the scale of production fragmentation by measuring the share of foreign value added in gross exports. The highest share of foreign value added occurred in the exports of Hungary and Slovakia and exceeded 40%. In Poland, foreign value added accounted for around 27% of gross exports. In all analyzed countries, foreign value added came mainly from the European Union countries, especially from Germany. In recent years, the share of intermediate goods imported from China has also been growing.

The contemporary economic security of states depends more and more heavily on technological factors. The paper provides a comparative study covering the trade of the Visegrád Group with a primary purpose to explore directions of technological change, revealed in the structure of their exports, their likely causes, and consequences. The research problem was positioned in an interdisciplinary methodological perspective, merging critical security studies, international political economy, international economics, and new public governance. The obtained results prove characteristics of V4 economies typical of dependent capitalism and confirm the structural challenge of foreign technological guidance.

The following publication elaborates on the notion of international tax competition and international tax avoidance in the light of cross-border public policy. In terms of intercommunity relations, tax competition may be defined as a phenomenon consisting in application of various tax instruments for the purpose of developing a state's economy and prosperity by means of increasing competitiveness of the domestic business activity or attracting foreign investments. Tax competition is a natural consequence of the processes of globalization since in the reality of growing business interrelations, tax considerations exert more and more influence over investment decisions of holding companies. It reveals the dissonance between the interests of the particular member states in the EU and the interest of the European Union as a whole. Usually it is difficult to mark the border between a harmful and an advantageous tax competition.

The conflict in Syria that started in 2011 has quickly evolved from a local uprising inspired by the events of the so-called "Arab Spring" into a multidimensional and complicated conflict of a civil war character, with many diverse participants and a very significant religious factor apart from political and socioeconomic reasons. Furthermore, the conflict has become internationalized: more and more external parties have gotten involved in it with a view to furthering or safeguarding their own interests. A vast majority of these actors were states (as far as legal entities are concerned). In the context of their activity, operations of non-state entities, such as international organizations, were rather limited and focused on social and humanitarian issues. This also pertains to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Evolving from a typical defensive alliance towards a security organization and, since the end of the Cold War, consistently operating outside the area covered by the Treaty (understood as the territories of member states), NATO as an autonomous entity has not taken any consistent, coordinated, or decisive actions during the first years of the Syrian conflict. This is due to both the specific features of this international organization and the determinants of the international environment with their dynamics.

This book explores the impact of climate change on the legal situation of small island states such as Marshall Islands. Climate change-related problems of these nations touching their legal situation in a very different way than in the case of large countries threatened by economic and social consequences of sea level rise (such as Bangladesh, Vietnam, Nigeria and Egypt). Presentation of scientific forecasts is an introduction to the in-depth deliberations from the point of view of international law. According to many researchers, global sea level rise of 0,5-1 m. is highly possible in the next hundred years. Sea level rise is not the only climate-related threat experienced by small island states. Among other significant problems associated with climate change we can list tropical cyclones, floods, and droughts. Island nations must prepare for such problems on the basis of public international law. The authors draw attention to the most crucial legal challenges associated with sea level rise, such as the deterritorialization of the state, continuity of statehood, the issue of citizenship or the legal status of forced environmental migrants. The authors draw attention to the significant legal challenges (e.g. the legal status of migrants forced to leave their country of origin/residence as a result of irreversible climate change). This issue has still not been regulated by international law documents. Much attention is also being paid to the analysis of the consequences of climate change on the basis of international law of the sea. The core elements of the analysis presented in this book are, inter alia, the impact of sea level rise on Exclusive Economic Zones and fishing rights. The book is focused on the social and legal challenges facing microstates. Presented considerations may become a useful point of reference in the analysis of the problems facing larger countries affected by climate change and sea level rise.

The article analyses the current, post-crisis case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in cases concerning the so-called Dublin Regulation, i.e. Regulation 604/2013, which establishes the criteria and mechanisms for determining the Member State responsible for examining an application for international protection lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national. The aim of the article is to analyze the standard of migration security in the area of Dublin cases. The key problem for the discussed issue was the judgment in the Jawo case, in which the Court of Justice examined the admissibility of Dublin transfers to the Italian Republic on the grounds that there was a risk of extreme material deprivation of the migrant. The Jawo case is a continuation of high-profile international court rulings in cases such as M.S.S., Tarakhel (ECtHR) and N.S. (CJEU), which decided to suspend transfers to Italy and Greece. Apart from the issues of protection against inhuman treatment, the jurisprudence of the CJEU also draws attention to the issues of legal security, effectiveness and accessibility of administrative procedures for third-country nationals seeking international protection in the EU. Finally, the standard of migration security in the Dublin area also includes the obligation to act in solidarity and mutual trust between the Member States, as set out in the judgments of the CJEU.

The article describes the international cooperation of local governments, which are a form of decentralization of democratic states. This cooperation developed massively after the Second World War. Today more than 200,000 local and regional communities participate in it, cooperating not only by direct contacts, but also through various types of organizations and networks. This is a new and growing phenomenon in the international environment. On selected examples of Polish local governments, it is shown how strong are the positive ties between members of territorial communities from different countries, built by this cooperation. Their strength and nature are shown by presenting the activities of selected Polish local governments during the extreme crisis, i.e. the war in Ukraine. Thus, it was presented how Polish local governments help the attacked Ukrainians and Ukraine.

The change in the nature and ways of using military force in international politics at the end of the 20th century led to the development of new methods of cooperation between states. The circle of entities influencing diplomatic activities, apart from political and military institutions, expanded to include also civil and non-governmental centers. This raised questions about the scale of their actual impact on shaping international security and about the areas in which they were most active. This article aims to present the activities of Polish think tanks for defense diplomacy. Assuming that they showed commitment in this respect, the areas of activities they undertook were identified and the recipients to which they were addressed were pointed out. The analysis was based on data obtained as a result of a survey conducted at the turn of 2019-2020 on a group of fifteen Polish expert think tanks2 operating in the field of international relations, political science, and security and defense. The research used a comparative method (comparative studies), content analysis and a survey method. The tool with which the study was conducted was an electronic questionnaire developed in the Survio program. For the purposes of these analyzes, a hypothesis was adopted that non-political entities in the form of think tanks play an important role in activities for security. They address their activities to political, military and social circles, but the public and scientific circles benefit to the greatest extent from their expert potential.

The article explains the mechanisms leading to achieving the Russian Federation's dominance in the regional and global security environment. To solve the research problems, a systemic approach was applied and methods of literary analysis and critique, non-participant observation, and uncategorized interviews were used. In the research process, it was established that the dominance of the Russian Federation in the international arena is based on force. The key factors enabling its achievement are displayed by the quantitative and qualitative superiority of the armed forces, expressed by force correlation coefficients, strategic forecasting, and operational prediction as well as the modern forms and methods of using armed forces. The Russian Federation balances the existing international disparities with the use of adaptive strategy, blackmail of conflict escalation with the use of nuclear weapons, modern and technologically advanced operational capabilities, and offensive asymmetric activities.

The aim of this article is to present the most important assumptions and goals of three international regional initiatives important from the point of view of Central, Central and Eastern Europe and Central and South Europe: the Visegrad Group, the Three Seas Initiative and the Central European Initiative, as well as institutional and legal solutions of selected countries associated with them in the field of terrorist prevention. For the analysis of the materials found, including studies and documents, the content analysis, the method of information synthesis and critical analysis were used. In addition, a case study, conceptual analysis and synthesis used in the description of key conclusions drawn after the literature review on various solutions, concepts and methods related to the presented issues (international regional initiatives, prevention and combating terrorism in exemplary countries) were used.

This article identifies the political challenges for Central Europe resulting from the Russian Federation conducting competition below the threshold of war. The main research methods, both inductive and deductive, were analysis and a survey of the existing literature. There is still aggression in international rivalry, and its level is deliberately regulated so as not to cross the threshold of open armed conflict as defined by international law. The contemporary rivalry of the Russian Federation takes on an unlimited scope and goes beyond the physical sphere: the main emphasis in its application is on non-military and non-lethal forms of influence that can be easily combined with kinetic ones. The exploitation of the space between the binary borders of war and peace was practically verified both under the Tsarist Russia and the Soviet Union. It has been confirmed that a great deal of importance in Russia is now attached to unconventional activities and that their application offers great opportunities to achieve strategic objectives without the need to resort to direct military confrontation.

The Eastern Partnership (EaP) is undoubtedly a key project of the
European Union's eastern policy. It is being implemented by the EU in cooperation with six partner countries, three of which (Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova) are more committed to establishing integration ties with the EU, while others are more restrained. The article tries to show that the functioning of EaP is influenced not only by its direct implementers, but also by various external actors. The most important of these are global and regional powers such as Russia, the United States, Turkey and China, as well as international financial institutions (including in particular the International Monetary Fund) and, to some extent, the North Atlantic Alliance. Their positions towards the Eastern Partnership may take the form of opposition, support or ambivalence. The analysis carried out allows us to conclude that while the impact of these actors on the functioning of the Eastern Partnership should not be overestimated,
it should not be underestimated, especially in the light of possible
scenarios for the future.