Suchergebnisse

This project convened a dialogue between civil societies in the United States and the Republic of South Africa (RSA) to deepen understanding of the ways in which each nation views its most critical strategic security concerns and the domestic debates that shape those views. This project engaged in dialogue through the lens of nuclear disarmament, energy, and proliferation/nonproliferation issues. Despite cooperation on a number of matters in this area, U.S.-South African relations have not always been cordial and the two have come into open disagreements on a number of occasions. South Africa is a key force for regional stability in Africa. It maintains an active and expanding nuclear energy industry, is an influential country within the African Union (AU), has the largest economy on the continent of Africa, and maintains the most well-equipped and trained military in sub-Saharan Africa. In the framework of the narrative "United States-South Africa Relationship: Going Global"1 the question is how the two countries can improve their cooperation and decrease tension in this area for greater global security. ; U.S. Naval Postgraduate School (NPS), Center on Contemporary Conflict (CCC), Project on Advanced Systems and Concepts for Countering WMD (PASCC)

Supporting shady regimes for security reasons can overshadow the actions America takes across the continent to aid democracy, human rights, development, and public health.

This project evaluates a conundrum facing those making and implementing foreign policies in the U.S. government and elsewhere, whether, in devising policies to address complex security crises, to focus on comprehensive programs that influence the fundamental drivers of conflict (root causes) or to pursue a more limited strategy that seeks to respond to the symptoms of violence. It explicitly focuses on the twin issues of when and why the policy community may take one approach over the other, and what tradeoffs the chosen strategy then creates. The project explores these issues by analyzing the dynamics in a particular subset of policies: mediation strategies employed by third party interveners in violent civil conflict. The project assesses the choices and consequences of different strategies for conflict mediation as a microcosm for debates over whether those responding to conflict should focus their efforts on addressing the fundamental drivers of conflict or the symptoms of conflict once it occurs. ; Defense Threat Reduction Agency Advanced Systems and Concepts Office Contract Number MIPR 09-2516M

Case study of a civic assistance team working in the Horn of Africa, and a description of the structure and purpose of humanitarian aid to the area. ; Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.

The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, the Department of Defense, or the United States Government. ; This paper assesses the potential for Africa's ungoverned spaces to facilitate the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) within Africa and beyond the continent. To those based outside Africa, the large areas of the region that lie outside the control of formal state institutions provide opportunities for the production of WMD precursors and the storage and transport of WMD-related materials (from precursors to weapons). To those based on the continent, however, the threat of WMD seems negligible. No countries currently pursue weapons programs of a biological, chemical, nuclear or radiological nature, and those that in the past have had state-sponsored WMD programs, South Africa and Libya, have either dismantled or are in the process of dismantling these programs. No states have indicated interested in pursuing WMD programs; few countries have the industrial bases necessary to produce large quantities of chemical or biological weapons (as opposed to precursors); and only one currently has nuclear capabilities (South Africa).

Before the advent of democratic rule in South Africa, most people had expected the country to experience an explosion of politicized ethnicity when minority rule was replaced. Yet this has not come to pass, and ethnic political parties have declined in number and influence in post-apartheid South Africa. Instead, between 1994 and 1999 partisan politics developed in a multipolar direction, with some parties embracing racial mobilization and others attempting to build multi-ethnic, non-racial entities. This article explains these developments as a product of the ways that political parties have responded to the incentives established by political institutions, on the one hand, and the structure of social divisions, on the other. The analysis holds implications for our understanding of the ways in which social cleavages in ethnically divided societies become politically salient, and for the lessons of institutional and constitutional engineering, particularly with respect to how proportional representation systems interact with other factors to shape politics in ethnically diverse societies.

Before the advent of democratic rule in South Africa, most people had expected the country to experience an explosion of politicized ethnicity when minority rule was replaced. Yet this has not come to pass, and ethnic political parties have declined in number and influence in post-apartheid South Africa. Instead, between 1994 and 1999 partisan politics developed in a multipolar direction, with some parties embracing racial mobilization and others attempting to build multi-ethnic, non-racial entities. This article explains these developments as a product of the ways that political parties have responded to the incentives established by political institutions, on the one hand, and the structure of social divisions, on the other. The analysis holds implications for our understanding of the ways in which social cleavages in ethnically divided societies become politically salient, and for the lessons of institutional and constitutional engineering, particularly with respect to how proportional representation systems interact with other factors to shape politics in ethnically diverse societies.

The article of record as published may be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1354068805053212 ; Before the advent of democratic rule in South Africa, most people had expected the country to experience an explosion of politicized ethnicity when minority rule was replaced. Yet this has not come to pass, and ethnic political parties have declined in number and influence in post-apartheid South Africa. Instead, between 1994 and 1999 partisan politics developed in a multipolar direction, with some parties embracing racial mobilization and others attempting to build multi-ethnic, non-racial entities. This article explains these developments as a product of the ways that political parties have responded to the incentives established by political institutions, on the one hand, and the structure of social divisions, on the other. The analysis holds implications for our understanding of the ways in which social cleavages in ethnically divided societies become politically salient, and for the lessons of institutional and constitutional engineering, particularly with respect to how proportional representation systems interact with other factors to shape politics in ethnically diverse societies.

It is undeniable that the electoral dominance of the ANC has been steadily increasing since 1994 at both national and provincial levels. The 2004 election will probably be remembered particularly for the fact that the ANC secured its Parliament of Hope, winning over two-thirds of the seats in the National Assembly and the power to form the government in all nine provinces. In contrast to the ANC's consolidating hold on the electorate, the opposition's share of the vote has steadily declined and fragmented since 1994. What do the 2004 electoral returns mean in the context of the evolution of politics and partisan competition in South Africa over the past decade? What do trends in voter registration, turnout and electoral violence say about the consolidation of democracy in South Africa? This paper traces trends in South African electoral politics over the past decade, with particular emphasis on the 2004 election results and the increasing normalisation of democracy and what that means for the character of South African party politics. I argue that trends in voter turnout and declining electoral violence could be viewed as a process of democratic maturation, rather than solely a symptom of widespread disengagement from the political system. The paper assesses trends in electoral outcomes at the national and provincial levels and discusses implications for democratic stability. In light of the 2004 elections, the paper also assesses the composition of the national parliament and Cabinet in terms of retention of members with experience in governance and trends from 1994 to 2004. Finally, the paper assesses what implications all these trends have for the consolidation of democracy in South Africa.

Before the advent of democratic rule in South Africa, most had expected the country to experience an explosion of politicised ethnicity when minority rule was replaced. Yet this has not come to pass, and ethnic political parties have declined in number and influence in post-apartheid South Africa. Instead, between 1994 and 1999, partisan politics developed in a multipolar direction, with some parties embracing racial mobilisation and others attempting to build multi-ethnic, non-racial entities. In most instances, parties have explicitly turned away from mobilisation based on purely ethnic criteria, and instead have embraced more diverse strategies. This paper explains these developments as a product of the ways that political parties have responded to the incentives established by political institutions on the one hand, and the structure of social divisions, on the other. The analysis holds implications for our understanding of the ways in which social cleavages in ethnically divided societies become politically salient, and for the lessons of institutional and constitutional engineering, particularly with respect to how proportional representation systems interact with other factors to shape politics in ethnically diverse societies.