Suchergebnisse

Artiklen giver først en kort oversigt over covid-19-håndteringens forløb fra krisens udbrud i 2020 til 2022, hvor der er en forventning om covid-19's forvandling fra en alvorlig og svært kontrollabel sygdom til en endemisk viruslidelse. Næste afsnit gennemgår krisens politiske og administrative beslutningsprocesser, dels under selve krisen i strikt forstand, dels i den lange fase hvor det har handlet om administrativt og politisk at håndtere et samfundsproblem, som ikke ville gå væk. Det sidste afsnit tager krisehåndteringens ret alvorlige kvalitative aspekter op. Det drejer sig om de demokratiske problemer, som krisehåndteringen snarere end krisen aktualiserede, det faglige beslutningsgrundlag (sundhedsfagligt, juridisk, økonomisk og adfærdsvidenskabeligt) og endelig spørgsmålet om, hvordan man kvalitetssikrer krisehåndteringen. ; The paper presents an overview of Danish Covid-19-crisis management as it developed from its outbreak to its status as an endemic virus. This is followed by an analysis of political and administrative decision making during the crisis and during the protracted series of events where the handling of problems that would not go away attracted all political attention. Finally, the paper discusses the important qualitative issues that were raised both by the crisis and by its political handling. These issues were democratic, legal, and professional (health professional, economic, and behavioral).

This brief synthesises the IECEU project's most essential findings on the effectiveness of European Union (EU) missions in four Africa countries: Libya, South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the Central African Republic (CAR). It describes the main elements and impact of the EU missions in these countries, identifies key strategic and operational shortfalls and offers recommendations on how the EU can improve its effectiveness in future conflict prevention and crisis management missions. The EU missions investigated differ in scale, length, objective, budget, priority and context. However, the EU missions presented in this brief share the main characteristic that they have all been deployed under the union's Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP)2 with the explicit intent of improving the overall security situation and addressing conflicts in Africa. This brief will start by providing a short overview of each case, describing the conflict(s), security situation, mission objectives and obstacles. In this way, it compares the overall effectiveness of EU operational conflict prevention across the four African countries and discusses what lessons can be learned from them. The brief does not include all factors needed to answer thisquestion, but highlights the IECEU project's most significant findings in these cases.

In recent years, the Swedish Armed Forces have produced and distributed highly edited video clips on YouTube that show moving images of military activity. Along- side this development, mobile phone apps have emerged as an important channel through which the user can experience and take an interactive part in the staging of contemporary armed conflict. This article examines the way in which the aes- thetic and affective experience of Swedish defence and security policy is socially and (media-)culturally (co-)constructed and how the official representation of Swedish military intervention (re)produces political and economic effects when these activi- ties are distributed through traditional and social media such as YouTube and digital apps. Based on Isabela and Norman Fairclough's thoughts on political discourse, Michel Foucault's dialectic idea of power/knowledge, and Sara Ahmed's concept of the affective, I discuss how the Swedish digital military aesthetic is part of a broader political and economic practice that has consequences beyond the digital, the semi- otic, and what might at first glance appear to be pure entertainment. ; In recent years, the Swedish Armed Forces have produced and distributed highly edited video clips on YouTube that show moving images of military activity. Alongside this development, mobile phone apps have emerged as an important channel through which the user can experience and take an interactive part in the staging of contemporary armed conflict. This article examines the way in which the aesthetic and affective experience of Swedish defence and security policy is socially and (media-)culturally (co-)constructed and how the official representation of Swedish military intervention (re)produces political and economic effects when these activities are distributed through traditional and social media such as YouTube and digital apps. Based on Isabela and Norman Fairclough's thoughts on political discourse, Michel Foucault's dialectic idea of power/knowledge, and Sara Ahmed's concept of the affective, I discuss how the Swedish digital military aesthetic is part of a broader political and economic practice which has consequences beyond the digital, the semiotic and what might at first glance appear to be pure entertainment.

Russia's strategy in the Arctic is dominated by two overriding discourses – and foreign policy directions – which at first glance may look like opposites. On the one hand, an IR realism/geopolitical discourse that often has a clear patriotic character, dealing with "capturing", "winning" or "conquering" the Arctic and putting power, including military power, behind the national interests in the area – which is why we, in recent years, have seen an increasing military build-up, also in the Russian Arctic. Opposed to this is an IR liberalism, international law-inspired and modernization-focused discourse, which is characterized by words such as "negotiation", "cooperation" and "joint ventures" and which has as an axiom that the companies and countries operating in the Arctic all benefit the most if they collaborate in peace and friendliness. So far, the IR liberalism discourse has set the trend of the Russian policy carried out in relation to the Arctic. Thus, it has primarily been the Russian Foreign Ministry and, above all, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov that have drawn the overall lines of the Arctic policy, well aided by the Transport Ministry and the Energy Ministry. On the other side are the Russian national Security Council led by Nikolai Patrushev and the Russian Defence Ministry headed by Sergey Shoygu, which both have embedded their visions of Russia and the Arctic in the IR realism/geopolitical discourse. Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, does the same. Nevertheless, he has primarily chosen to let the Foreign Ministry set the line for the Arctic policy carried out, presumably out of a pragmatic acknowledgement of the means that have, so far, served the Russian interests best. Moreover, it is worth noting that both wings, even though they can disagree about the means, in fact are more or less in agreement about the goal of Russia's Arctic policy: namely, to utilize the expected wealth of oil and natural gas resources in the underground to ensure the continuation of the restoration of Russia's position as a Great Power when the capacity of the energy fields in Siberia slowly diminishes – which the Russian Energy Ministry expects to happen sometime between 2015 and 2030. In addition to that, Russia sees – as the polar ice slowly melts – great potential for opening an ice-free northern sea route between Europe and Asia across the Russian Arctic, with the hope that the international shipping industry can see the common sense of saving up to nearly 4,000 nautical miles on a voyage from Ulsan, Korea, to Rotterdam, Holland, so Russia can earn money by servicing the ships and issuing permissions for passage through what Russia regards as Russian territorial water. The question is whether Russia will be able to realize its ambitious goals. First, the Russian state energy companies Gazprom and Rosneft lack the technology, know-how and experience to extract oil and gas under the exceedingly difficult environment in the Arctic, where the most significant deposits are believed to be in very deep water in areas that are very difficult to access due to bad weather conditions. The Western sanctions mean that the Russian energy companies cannot, as planned, obtain this technology and know-how via the already entered-into partnerships with Western energy companies. The sanctions limit loan opportunities in Western banks, which hit the profitability of the most cost-heavy projects in the Arctic. However, what hits hardest are the low oil prices – at present 50 dollars per barrel (Brent). According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the fields in the Arctic are not profitable as long as the oil price is under 120 dollars per barrel. Whether Russia chooses to suspend the projects until the energy prices rise again – and until it has again entered into partnerships that can deliver the desired technology and know-how – or whether the Russian state will continuously pump money into the projects is uncertain. The hard-pressed Russian economy, with the prospects of recession, increasing inflation, increasing flight of capital, rising interest rates and a continuously low oil price, provides a market economic incentive for suspending the projects until further notice. Whether the Kremlin will think in a market economic way or a long-term strategic way is uncertain – but, historically, there has been a penchant for the latter. One of the Kremlin's hopes is that Chinese-Russian cooperation can take over where the Western-Russian cooperation has shut down. Russia has long wanted to diversify its energy markets to reduce its dependence on sales to Europe. At the same time, those in the Kremlin have had a deeply-rooted fear of ending up as a "resource appendix" to the onrushing Chinese economy, which so far has been a strong contributing reason for keeping the Russian-Chinese overtures in check. The question now is whether the Western sanctions can be the catalyst that can make Russia overcome this fear and thus, in the long term, support the efforts to enter into a real, strategic partnership with China. ; Russia's strategy in the Arctic is dominated by two overriding discourses – and foreign policy directions – which at first glance may look like opposites. On the one hand, Russia have an IR realism/geopolitical discourse that often has a clear patriotic character, dealing with "exploring", "winning" or "conquering" the Arctic and putting power, including military power, behind the national interests in the area – which is why we, in recent years, have seen an increasing military build-up, also in the Russian Arctic. Opposed to this is an IR liberalism, international law-inspired and modernization- focused discourse, which is characterized by words such as "negotiation", "cooperation" and "joint ventures" and which has as an axiom that the companies and countries operating in the Arctic all benefit the most if they cooperate peacefully.

The regional powerhouse, South Africa, has since the introduction of the nonracial democratic dispensation in 1994, played a central and important role in the formation of both the regional and continental security architecture. With the establishment of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) in 1992, one of the central areas of collaboration for the community was envisioned to be security, understood within a broadened human security framework. Security was therefore from the outset one of the cornerstones of integration in the SADC. It was believed that the formation of a security community would help dismantle the enmities that had plagued regional relations during the apartheid era. For some parties, institutionalisation of relations pointed to a means of stabilising and disseminating a particular order. Such institutions depict the power relations prevailing at the time of their establishment, which, however, can change over time (Cox 1981:136). The integration ambition surrounding security correlated with the ambitions of South Africa, the new democratic government in the regional powerhouse. South Africa and its overall foreign policy ambitions desired the pursuit of peace, democracy and stability for economic growth and development in the region and within South Africa itself. Since South Africa's acceptance into the SADC in 1994, the organisation has attempted to set up the required institutional framework to enable co-operation on security, both in terms of narrow military co-operation and regarding designated 2 softer security issues, such as migration and cross-border crime. The military cooperation moved forward in the early years after 1994 with the 1996 decision of creating an Organ for Politics, Defence and Security Co-operation (OPDSC)1 and later the signing of the Mutual Defence Pact (MDP) in 2003, and eventually the creation of the Strategic Indicative Plan for the Organ (SIPO) in 2004, which operationalised the OPDSC (SADC 2004). However, the actual military cooperation, e.g. military exercises, came close to a standstill. Several developments obstructed military co-operation of which the evolving crisis in Zimbabwe and the subsequent withdrawal of donor support to, for instance, the Regional Peacekeeping Training Centre (RPTC) in Harare are but two examples. The RPTC constituted the backbone of the co-operation, but political differences between member states illustrated during the Zimbabwean crisis and following the mandate of the interventions in especially the DR Congo and partly Lesotho in 1998 all contributed to regional tensions.2 Despite the crisis, SADC members, and in particular South Africa, declared that the organisation would be able to form a regional stand-by brigade for the use of the African Union (AU) as part of its wider security architecture. On 17 August 2007, the SADC declared its stand-by-force operational at a large parade in Lusaka, Zambia and at the same occasion signed a memorandum of understanding on the SADCBRIG (SADC 2007). According to the timeline provided by the AU, the brigade should be fully operational by June 2010. Former South African deputy foreign minister Aziz Pahad stated after the launch that this was an important step, but that now there was much to be done securing joint levels and types of training, interoperability, etc. (Pahad 2007). The question that continues to linger is to what extent this brigade is operational and for what purpose. Is this new regional military formation in its present form just a paper tiger, or is it "real progress" and an example of "successful" regional cooperation and integration? This article scrutinises the security co-operation and integration in SADC and asks whether an apparent lack of common values between SADC member states are blocking the security integration process, the creation of a security community, and thereby the establishment of an effective stand-by brigade, the so-called SADCBRIG. The article furthermore attempts to scrutinise the role played by South Africa in establishing the SADCBRIG.

The region of Southeast Asia is faced with a complex set of challenges stemming from political, economic and religious developments at the national, regional and global level. This paper sets out to examine trade-, foreign- and security policy implications of the issues confronting the region. In ASEAN, the Southeast Asian countries are continuing their ambitious attempts at further integration. Plans outlining deeper security and economic communities have been adopted. However, huge differences in political systems, economic development and ethnic/religious structures are hampering prospects of closer cooperation. The highly controversial conflict case of Burma/Myanmar is testing the much adhered-to principle of non-interference and at the same time complicating relations with external powers. Among these, the United States and China are dramatically strengthening their interests in the region. American influence is not least manifesting itself in light of the war against terrorism, which the region is adapting to in different ways and at different speeds. By contrast, the European Union does not seem to answer Southeast Asian calls for further engagement. A flurry of bilateral and regional trade agreements is another prominent feature of the economic landscape of the region. This is to a certain degree a reflex ion of impatience with trade liberalization in the WTO and within ASEAN itself. Structures of economic cooperation are under rapid alteration in Southeast Asia. The paper analyses the above-mentioned developments with a view to assessing the prospects of future stability, economic development and integration in and among ASEAN countries. It is concluded that although the scope for increased economic benefit and political harmonization through ASEAN integration alone is limited, the organization could still prove useful as a common regional point of reference in tackling more important policy determinants at national and global level.

I marts 2005 var det 20 år, siden Mikhail Gorbatjov kom til magten i Sovjetunionen som generalsekretær for Sovjetunionens Kommunistiske Parti og fremlagde sit program til reform af det sovjetiske system. Nøgleordene i reformen var perestrojka, glasnost og demokratisering. De fik ikke alene betydning indadtil, men også udadtil i forholdet til omverdenen, der hurtigt fattede lid til Gorbatjov og hans nyskabelser. Dette working paper giver et overblik over Gorbatjovs og hans meningsfællers opfattelse af udviklingen siden da og deres vurdering af reformernes skæbne og skildrer Ruslands stilling på verdensscenen i dag. Dette indebærer også en kritisk vurdering af præsident Vladimir Putins indenrigs- og udenrigspolitik. Der tegnes et billede af et svagt Rusland, der ikke har frigjort sig fra den sovjetiske arvs byrde, men tværtimod på mange måder søger tilbage til den autoritære styreform, et Rusland, der ved inertiens kraft stadig nyder en vis respekt, om end ikke anseelse i det internationale samfund. ; In March 2005 it was 20 years since Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in the Soviet Union as Secretary-General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and presented his programme for reform of the Soviet system. Key words in the reform were perestroika, glasnost and democratization. They became important not only internally but also externally in the relations to the outside world that swiftly put its trust in Gorbachev and his innovations. This working paper gives an overview of the perception that Gorbachev and his like-minded have of the development since then, presents their evaluation of the fate of the reforms and of the position of Russia on the world scene today. This also includes a critical evaluation of the domestic and foreign policies of President Vladimir Putin. The paper outlines a weak Russia that has not released itself from the burden of the Soviet heritage but on the contrary in many ways goes back to the authoritarian form of government, a Russia that by inertia still enjoys a certain respect although not esteem in the international community.

"10 years after NATO Membership. An Anniversary in the Shadow of a Crisis", indeholder artikler fra politiske aktører, diplomater og forskere, der alle bidrog til til konferencen af samme navn, hvor den 10-året for baltisk medlemskab af NATO var omdrejningspunktet. Udover den danske forsvarsminister, er den estiske og litauiske forsvarsminister og NATO's vicegeneralsekretær blandt bidragyderne. Konferencens formål var at fejre, inddrage og diskutere 10 års forsvarspolitisk NATO-samarbejde i Østersøområdet. Den internationale udvikling i Europa betød at konferencens dagsorden i stedet for kom til at stå i skyggen af krisen i Ukraine, og det anspændte europæiske forhold til Rusland. Dette afspejledes ikke kun på selve konferencen, men har også sat et dybt fodaftryk på publikationen, der dels belyser det forsvarspolitiske samarbejde mellem Danmark og de baltiske stater, dels tegner et billede af hvordan den russiske aggression på Krimhalvøen blev italesat af de repræsenterede landes Forsvarsministre samt fra hovedkvarteret i NATO. Konferencen blev afholdt tidligere i år i København, og var et resultat af et tæt samarbejde mellem Forsvarsakademiet, Forsvarsministeriet og ambassadørerne for Estland, Letland og Litauen i Danmark. ; Since the recognition of their independence in 1921, the three Baltic States Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania have enjoyed a special status in Danish foreign policy that has continued into present-day times. Being one of the few countries that never officially recognized the Soviet annexation in 1940, Denmark became an early advocate in relation to Baltic membership of NATO in the wake of the Cold War. Defence cooperation, such as the joint contribution to the missions in the Balkans in the early 1990s, as well as the present air policing mission, first initiated in 2004, has been an important part of the political relationship. A conference celebrating and evaluating the first ten years of NATO membership was quite naturally a high-level event to be placed in Copenhagen. As progress with planning the conference proceeded, the international security community suddenly faced a crisis in Crimea, when separatists, with Russian support, gradually took control of the Crimean Peninsula. In only 24 days, what had initially been demonstrations and protests evolved into a complete Russian annexation, through a very dubious local democratic election, where independence from Ukraine, as well as affi liation to Russia, was declared with 96% of voters in favor of joining Russia. These events naturally had a massive impact on this conference, which resulted in an anniversary in the shadow of a crisis. This turn of events forced a new discussion upon the member states of NATO: What is the main purpose of the Alliance? This question became a focal point for the conference, as well as the articles presented here.

This study takes a novel approach to the study of threatening communications by arguing that they can be characterized as a genre – a genre that generally carries strong connotations of intimidation, fear, aggression, power, and coercion. We combine the theoretical framework of Rhetorical Genre Studies (RGS) with results from theoretical and empirical analyses of threats to arrive at a more comprehensive perspective of threats. Since threats do not form part of any regular curriculum of genres, we designed a survey to test how recognizable they are. While scholars on threats describe threatening communications as remarkably varied in form and contextual features, the majority of our respondents categorized test items as threats without prompts of any kind, indicating that threats are a recognizable genre. We propose that threatening communications belong to a wider category of illicit genres: i.e. genres that generally disrupt and upset society and commonly affect their targets negatively. The uptakes of illicit genres are very different from those of other genres, as the users of the genres often actively avoid naming them, making uptake communities significant shapers of illicit genres. The present study contributes to research on threatening communications, since genre theory sheds light on important situational factors affecting the interpretation of a text as a threat – this is a particularly contentious question when it comes to threats that are indirectly phrased. The study also contributes to genre theory by pointing to new territory for genre scholars to examine, namely illicit genres. Studies of illicit genres also have wider, societal benefits as they shed light on different kinds of problematic rhetorical behavior that are generally considered destructive or even dangerous. ; Denne artikel anlægger et nyt perspektiv på studiet af sproglige trusler ved at argumentere for at de kan karakteriseres som en genre – en genre der generelt giver stærke konnotationer til intimidering, frygt, aggression, magt og tvang. Vi kombinerer Retoriske Genrestudiers (RGS) teoretiske ramme med resultater fra teoretiske og empiriske analyser af trusler for at nå frem til en mere nuanceret og fyldestgørende forståelse af trusler. Sproglige trusler er som udgangspunkt ikke at finde i gængse oversigter over genrer, og man lærer heller ikke om dem i skolen. Derfor designede vi et spørgeskema der skulle teste hvor genkendelige trusler egentlig er. Selvom trusselsforskere rapporterer at trusler har en bemærkelsesværdig variation i deres formmæssige og kontekstuelle træk, kategoriserede størstedelen af vores respondenter testemnerne som trusler, på trods af at de ikke fik præsenteret nogen tekstuel, kontekstuel eller layoutmæssig ramme for fortolkningen. Dette indikerer at truslen er en genkendelig genre. Vi argumenterer for at truslen hører under en bredere kategori af illegitime genrer: genrer der generelt set har skadelige eller ubehagelige konsekvenser for samfundet, og som almindeligvis påvirker deres ofre negativt. Den måde illegitime genrer tages op på i samfundet, deres uptake, adskiller sig meget fra hvordan andre genrer tages op. De der benytter illegitime genrer, undgår ofte aktivt at navn-give dem, hvilket indebærer at de grupper der reagerer på illegitime genrer, på ganske betydelig vis er med til at definere dem. Dette studie bidrager til forskning i sproglige trusler, idet genreteori kaster lys over vigtige situationelle faktorer der påvirker fortolkningen af en tekst som en trussel – dette er et særligt omstridt spørgsmål i forhold til trusler der er indirekte formuleret. Studiet bidrager også til genreteori ved at pege på et nyt område genreforskere kan undersøge, nemlig illegitime genrer. Undersøgelser af illegitime genrer har også bredere samfundsmæssig relevans da de belyser forskellige slags problematisk, retorisk opførsel der kan have destruktive konsekvenser for det enkelte menneske og for den demokratiske samfundsorden bredt set. ; Denne artikel anlægger et nyt perspektiv på studiet af sproglige trusler ved at argumentere for at de kan karakteriseres som en genre – en genre der generelt giver stærke konnotationer til intimidering, frygt, aggression, magt og tvang. Vi kombinerer Retoriske Genrestudiers (RGS) teoretiske ramme med resultater fra teoretiske og empiriske analyser af trusler for at nå frem til en mere nuanceret og fyldestgørende forståelse af trusler. Sproglige trusler er som udgangspunkt ikke at finde i gængse oversigter over genrer, og man lærer heller ikke om dem i skolen. Derfor designede vi et spørgeskema der skulle teste hvor genkendelige trusler egentlig er. Selvom trusselsforskere rapporterer at trusler har en bemærkelsesværdig variation i deres formmæssige og kontekstuelle træk, kategoriserede størstedelen af vores respondenter testemnerne som trusler, på trods af at de ikke fik præsenteret nogen tekstuel, kontekstuel eller layoutmæssig ramme for fortolkningen. Dette indikerer at truslen er en genkendelig genre. Vi argumenterer for at truslen hører under en bredere kategori af illegitime genrer: genrer der generelt set har skadelige eller ubehagelige konsekvenser for samfundet, og som almindeligvis påvirker deres ofre negativt. Den måde illegitime genrer tages op på i samfundet, deres uptake, adskiller sig meget fra hvordan andre genrer tages op. De der benytter illegitime genrer, undgår ofte aktivt at navn-give dem, hvilket indebærer at de grupper der reagerer på illegitime genrer, på ganske betydelig vis er med til at definere dem. Dette studie bidrager til forskning i sproglige trusler, idet genreteori kaster lys over vigtige situationelle faktorer der påvirker fortolkningen af en tekst som en trussel – dette er et særligt omstridt spørgsmål i forhold til trusler der er indirekte formuleret. Studiet bidrager også til genreteori ved at pege på et nyt område genreforskere kan undersøge, nemlig illegitime genrer. Undersøgelser af illegitime genrer har også bredere samfundsmæssig relevans da de belyser forskellige slags problematisk, retorisk opførsel der kan have destruktive konsekvenser for det enkelte menneske og for den demokratiske samfundsorden bredt set.