Suchergebnisse

Trends on all major indicators have since the late 1970s pointed towards an increasingly serious world refugee situation. To promote the understanding of this problem, an analytical model is presented and applied. The problem is seen as composed of seven major clusters of factors and the network of relationships between them. The basic compo nents are refugee situations, the conflicts from which they mainly arise, and the efforts to manage and resolve these situations. For understanding the dynamics of the problem, the political and military activities of the refugees and the processes through which refugee situations are interna tionalized are also singled out for particular consideration. In addition, the approach proposed seeks to integrate developmental and environmental factors into the total picture of the refugee problem.

The integration problem of European neutral states is in the first instance composed of the economic pressures that pull or push them into Western European integration, and the restraints of participation arising from foreign policy considerations. The present pressures mainly arise from the EC's progress towards the completion of its internal market, the joint EFTA-EC plan for a Western European home market for industrial goods, and the advance of Western European R&D projects. The pressures are amplified by the growing speculation that some EFTA countries are preparing themselves for bilateral talks with the EC. From the point of view of foreign policy, the neturals' main problem may no longer arise from the EC's role in the East- West conflict but from the EC's own integrative and bloc-like character. The R&D integration is unlikely to raise immediate foreign policy problems for the neutral participants, though their capacity for independent action may weaken in the long term. The comprehensive Western European home market is, as such, unlikely to compromise the EFTA neutrals' foreign policies. Due to her more open policy vis-à- vis the EC, Sweden's situation at the present time is more complex than that of Finland. Finland's problems would become more difficult, however, in the event that some EFTA states approach the EC for new basic treaty negotiations.

Soviet policies with regard to neutrality in postwar Western Europe have developed from largely unsuccessful influence attempts into more realistic and acquiescent lines seeking to find a balance between operative aims and actual leverage. There has been a change from ideologically motivated opposition toward conditional support and flexible search for areas of common interests, and from basically unrealistic grand designs to recognition of the status quo. The Soviet posture toward potentially neutral blocs and disparate neutralist trends in Western Europe has primarily been characterized by a wait-and-see attitude. In order to make Soviet policies and postures understandable, it is necessary to combine the concept of the U.S.S.R. as a rational bloc leader interested above all in weakening the opposite bloc with that of a world power interested mainly in international stability and prevention of war. The popular Western hypothesis that the Soviet union is acting on a design that would incrementally neutralize the whole of Western Europe is difficult to test; even if there were such a design in reserve or in the experimental stage, its degree of crystallization and internal integration would have to be low.

Hakovirta, Harto. Effects of Non-Alignment on Neutrality in Europe: An Analysis and Appraisal. Cooperation and Conflict, XVIII, 1983, 57-75. The effects of non-alignment on European neutrality are analyzed and appraised. Six dimensions of neutrality are discussed: stability, scope, crystallization, credibility, acceptability, and international utility. Some of the basic similarities between the non-aligned and the neutral countries, the development of contacts between them, and Yugoslavian linkage activities are identified as the major preconditions of the effects. Non-alignment tends to destabilize and decrystallize the traditions of European neutrality. The development of a closer relationship between the European neutral states and the non-aligned movement would very likely decrease the credibility and the acceptability of their policies in Western eyes, whereas its repercussions in the East would be more uncertain. The capacities of European neutral states to play traditional third-party roles might be reduced, but closer cooperation with the non aligned might simultaneously provide possibilities for international influence on issues of global importance. Development of the non-aligned movement since the early 1970's has tended to make it politically less attractive to the European neutral states. A return to the earlier lines, dominated more strongly by countries like Yugoslavia and India, would increase the attraction.