Suchergebnisse

The international intervention after the 2011 Libyan uprising against Muammar Gaddafi was initially considered a remarkable success: the UN Security Council's first application of the 'responsibility to protect' doctrine; an impending civilian massacre prevented; and an opportunity for democratic forces to lead Libya out of a forty-year dictatorship. But such optimism was soon dashed. Successive governments failed to establish authority over the ever-proliferating armed groups; divisions among regions and cities, Islamists and others, split the country into rival administrations and exploded into civil war; external intervention escalated. Ian Martin gives his first-hand view of the questions raised by the international engagement. Was it a justified response to the threat against civilians? What brought about the Security Council resolutions, including authorising military action? How did NATO act upon that authorisation? What role did Special Forces operations play in the rebels' victory? Was a peaceful political settlement ever possible? What post-conflict planning was undertaken, and should or could there have been a major peacekeeping or stabilisation mission during the transition? Was the first election held too soon? As Western interventions are reassessed and Libya continues to struggle for stability, this is a unique account of a critical period, by a senior international official who was close to the events.

"The large asset price jumps that took place during 2008 and 2009 disrupted volatility derivatives markets and caused the single-name variance swap market to dry up completely. This paper defines and analyzes a simple variance swap, a relative of the variance swap that in several respects has more desirable properties. First, simple variance swaps are robust: they can be easily priced and hedged even if prices can jump. Second, simple variance swaps supply a more accurate measure of market-implied variance than do variance swaps or the VIX index. Third, simple variance swaps provide a better way to measure and to trade correlation. The paper also explains how to interpret VIX in the presence of jumps"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site

"The expected time- and risk-adjusted cumulative return on any asset equals one at all horizons. Nonetheless, I show that a typical asset's realized time- and risk-adjusted cumulative return tends to zero almost surely. As a corollary, the value of a typical long-dated asset is driven by extreme events: either by good news at the level of the individual asset or by bad news at the aggregate level. In the case of the aggregate market, the fact that its Sharpe ratio is higher than its volatility suggests that bad news is the relevant consideration in practice"--National Bureau of Economic Research web site

The Scottish Government is currently in the process of making some significant changes to the governance of education in Scotland (see Crowther in this volume). This is likely to have major implications for community education work in Scotland, shifting its focus and purpose. These changes are also creating unease amongst many practitioners. However these changes and what lies behind them – increased managerialism and technical rationality, the narrowing of the scope of the work to emphasise attainment and employability, and more State targeting of who we work with – will have resonance beyond Scotland. Due to this renewed focus on the purpose of community education work, we thought it would be helpful for those trying to make sense of the current context to publish a paper by Ian Martin from 2008. With a focus on adult education, Martin explores some of the key traditions, ideas and challenges, which have helped shape what adult education is today, and reasserts the need for political and social purpose in this work.

Argues that the 1999 international military intervention in East Timor was strikingly different from the international intervention in Kosovo during the same year. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) intervened in Kosovo over the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia's claim to sovereignty that NATO insisted it would continue to recognize. In contrast, although Indonesia's claim to sovereignty over East Timor was not recognized by the UN, the international community claimed Indonesia's consent was necessary for intervention. Attention is called to the extreme suffering of the people of East Timor during the years of non-intervention; Indonesia's resistance to any international security presence in East Timor; & Indonesian President B.J. Habibie's decision to allow the East Timorese to choose between autonomy within Indonesia or independence. The violence that erupted after the ballot prompted criticisms that Australia, the US, & the UN should have exerted more pressure on Indonesia to accept an international force to maintain security in East Timor. Further contrasts between the East Timor & Kosovo interventions are pointed out along with their implications for humanitarian interventions. J. Lindroth