Suchergebnisse

The key to understanding the construction of deviance in international relations is to understand the interplay between international norms, international law, and the systemic hegemon. This paper argues that the hegemonic power of the international system is central in the creation of the international normative order. Pointing out that deviance is thus an exercise in the maintenance of stability within the normative order, in which the hegemon seeks to maintain both legitimacy and compliance. Anchoring the norms which are supposedly violated by the 'rogue' in international law gives hegemon's actions legitimacy and universality, supporting the hegemon's position, but also restraining it simultaneously. This paper demonstrates this model using the probability probe of Iran's nuclear program, where Iran's image as a 'rogue' arose not because of the country's human rights record, but as a result of Iran's behavior within the non-proliferation regime.

The controversy of the Iranian nuclear programme divided the European Union (EU) member states. Whereas some states preferred confrontation, others were in favour of the accommodation. Policy commentators frequently ascribed this difference to diverging economic interests of Europeans, but this link remained underexplored. In this article, the empirical link between the economic interests and positions towards Iran is explored. The analysis rests on the evaluation of both overall and strategic trade flows. The results suggest that while trade played a certain role in the shaping of the policies, the effect of the strength of the alliance with the USA explains a large part of the puzzle. The article thus casts shadow on the established policy narrative of economic interests being the driver of the EU members' Iran policy. In addition, the theoretical implications cast shadow over the applicability of commercial liberalism on instances of confrontation short of war. Adapted from the source document.

This article sets out to study the voting pattern of the Visegrad countries in the United Nations General Assembly, since the beginning of their respective memberships, analyzing their voting affinity with the Soviet Union (Russia) and the United States. Somewhat predictably, Visegrad countries tended to be closer to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Surprisingly though, the pattern does not change drastically after the end of the Cold War, and Visegrad countries still tend to vote more closely with Russia than with the United States. Equally striking is the fact that Visegrad countries tend to vote almost identically, without any changes given domestic political changes. Pattern of higher agreement with Russia than with the United States can be seen also when inspecting the voting of all EU members. Such finding is relevant for the study of the geopolitical transformation of the Central European region, but also wider geopolitical dynamics in the UN General Assembly. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Inc., copyright the American Council of Learned Societies.]

This article sets out to study the voting pattern of the Visegrád countries in the United Nations General Assembly, since the beginning of their respective memberships, analyzing their voting affinity with the Soviet Union (Russia) and the United States. Somewhat predictably, Visegrád countries tended to be closer to the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Surprisingly though, the pattern does not change drastically after the end of the Cold War, and Visegrád countries still tend to vote more closely with Russia than with the United States. Equally striking is the fact that Visegrád countries tend to vote almost identically, without any changes given domestic political changes. Pattern of higher agreement with Russia than with the United States can be seen also when inspecting the voting of all EU members. Such finding is relevant for the study of the geopolitical transformation of the Central European region, but also wider geopolitical dynamics in the UN General Assembly.

States have recently started using sanctions to enforce actions not only against other states but also against individuals. In 1999 and 2001, the UN Security Council applied sanctions against individuals and terrorist groups for the first time. This paper analyses the terrorist-group blacklisting in the European Union as a risk management measure. Analysing the two regimes of the terrorist group blacklisting in the European Union, the article explains that the emerging human rights issues associated with blacklisting are a result of the different natures of the creation of the lists, which is essentially a management task, and their effect, which is essentially judicial. The risk society theory helps us to understand that the black-listing of terrorist groups and individuals was done because the politicians desperately at-tempted to prevent possible future scenarios which were given high preference among their publics. The blacklisting provides a very useful shortcut from a policy puzzle to its solution, bypassing the standard means of combating terrorism. Adapted from source document.