Kyrgyzstan is an interesting example of a relatively weak state, which for its brief period of independence has already ousted two presidents, experienced two revolutions, survived two interethnic ...conflicts and yet remained intact. This book explores this apparent paradox and argues that the schism between domestic and international dimensions of state and regime security is key to understanding the nature of Kyrgyz politics. The book shows how the foreign policy links to the Manas Air Base, used by the US military and essential for supplying their forces in Afghanistan, the economic arrangements necessary for sustaining the base, both inside and outside Kyrgyzstan, and the myriad of different actors involved in all this, combined to overshadow points of friction to ensure stable continuance of the status quo. Overall, the book shows how broad geopolitical forces and complex local factors together have a huge impact on the formation of Kyrgyz foreign policy.
Kemel Toktomushev is a Research Fellow in the Institute of Public Policy and Administration, University of Central Asia.
Introduction
1. One world, rival theories
2. Foreign policy and regime security of weak states
3. Development of Kyrgyz foreign policy
4. Military security and foreign policy
5. Manas Air Base
Conclusion
An incisive analysis of the use of the press for propaganda purposes during conflicts, using the first Gulf War and the intervention in Kosovo as case studies.
As the contemporary analysis of ...propaganda during conflict has tended to focus considerably upon visual and instant media coverage, this book redresses the imbalance and contributes to the growing discourse on the role of the press in modern warfare.
Through an innovative comparative analysis of press treatment of the two conflicts it reveals the existence of five consistent propaganda themes: portrayal of the leader figure, portrayal of the enemy, military threat, threat to international stability and technological warfare. As these themes construct a fluid model for the analysis and understanding of propaganda content in the press during conflicts involving British forces, they also provide the background against which the author can discuss general issues regarding propaganda. Amongst the issues which have become increasingly relevant to both recent academic debate and popular culture, the author tackles the role of the journalist in war coverage, the place of the press in a news market dominated by ‘instant’ visual media and the effectiveness of propaganda in specific cultural and political context.
This book will appeal to advanced students and researchers in war studies, media studies/propaganda and psychology.
For a decade Russia has been dismantling communism and building capitalism. Describing a deeply flawed fledgling market economy, Capitalism Russian-Style provides a progress report on one of the most ...important economic experiments going on in the world today. It describes Russian achievements in building private banks and companies, stock exchanges, new laws and law courts. It analyzes the role of the mafia, the rise of new financial empires, entrepreneurs and business tycoons, and the shrinking Russian state. Thane Gustafson tells how the Soviet system was dismantled and the new market society was born. He argues that this new society is changing constantly, so that any assessment of success and failure would be premature. Identifying investment as vital to preserving Russia's status as a major industrial power, in his final chapter he examines the prospects for an economic miracle in Russia in the twenty-first century.
After the collapse of the USSR, Kyrgyzstan chose a path of economic and political liberalization. Only a few years later, however, the country ceased producing anything of worth and developed a ...dependence on the outside world, particularly on international aid. Its principal industry, sheep breeding, was decimated by reforms suggested by international institutions providing assistance. Virtually annihilated by privatization of the economy and deserted by Moscow, the Kyrgyz have turned this economic "opening up" into a subtle strategy to capture all manner of resources from abroad. In this study, the author describes the encounters, sometimes comical and tinged with incomprehension, between the local population and the well-meaning foreigners who came to reform them.
In 1991, a small group of Russians emerged from the collapse of the Soviet Union and enjoyed one of the greatest transfers of wealth ever seen, claiming ownership of some of the most valuable ...petroleum, natural gas and metal deposits in the world. By 1997, five of those individuals were on Forbes Magazine's list of the world's richest billionaires. These self-styled oligarchs were accused of using guile, intimidation and occasionally violence to reap these rewards. Marshall I. Goldman argues against the line that the course adopted by President Yeltsin was the only one open to Russia, since an examination of the reform process in Poland shows that a more gradual and imaginative approach worked there with less corruption and a wider share of benefits.
The Piratization of Russia is an accessible, timely and topical volume that is required reading for those with an interest in Russian reform. Its appeal will range from students, academics, economists and politicians to the interested lay-reader keen to understand Russia's problems and learn how they could have been avoided.
Marshall I. Goldman is Davis Professor of Russian Economics, Emeritus at Wellsley College and Associate Director of the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard, USA.
1. Russia's Financial Bucaneers: The Wild and Wooly East 2. Setting the Stage: The Russian Economy in the Post-Communist Era 3. The Legacy of the Czarist Era: Untenable and Unsavory Roots 4. It's Broke, So Fix It: The Stalinist and Gorbachev Legacies 5. Privatization: Good Intentions but the Wrong Advice at the Wrong Time 6. The Nomenklatura O ligarchs 7. The Upstart Oligarchs 8. FIMACO: The Russian Central Bank and Money Laundering at the Highest 9. Corruption, Crime and the Russian Mafia 10. Who Says There Was No Better Way? 11. Confidence or Con Game: What Will it Take?
'A tale of the making of rich oligarchs in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union and of the mafia’s role in these reforms.' - The Independent Review
'A clear, freewheeling account of ...the insider-dominated transfer of public property to a small number of "oligarchs."' - Foreign Affairs
'A testament to his longtime argument that Russia could have -- and should have -- done more to see to it that ordinary people were not left behind by the hastily envisioned new market economy.' - Moscow Times
When President George W. Bush launched an invasion of Iraq in March of 2003, he did so without the explicit approval of the Security Council. His father's administration, by contrast, carefully ...funneled statecraft through the United Nations and achieved Council authorization for the U.S.-led Gulf War in 1991. The history of American policy toward Iraq displays considerable variation in the extent to which policies were conducted through the UN and other international organizations.
InChannels of Power, Alexander Thompson surveys U.S. policy toward Iraq, starting with the Gulf War, continuing through the interwar years of sanctions and coercive disarmament, and concluding with the 2003 invasion and its long aftermath. He offers a framework for understanding why powerful states often work through international organizations when conducting coercive policies-and why they sometimes choose instead to work alone or with ad hoc coalitions. The conventional wisdom holds that because having legitimacy for their actions is important for normative reasons, states seek multilateral approval.
Channels of Poweroffers a rationalist alternative to these standard legitimation arguments, one based on the notion of strategic information transmission: When state actions are endorsed by an independent organization, this sends politically crucial information to the world community, both leaders and their publics, and results in greater international support.
For better or worse, the former Soviet republics of Central Asia have largely completed their post-independence transitions. Over more than a decade, they have established themselves as independent ...states whose internal regimes and external relations have characteristic patterns and vulnerabilities both individually and as a group. The purpose of this volume is to assess both what has been accomplished and the trends of development in the region, especially its leading states. How sound are the foundations of this "bulwark against the spread of terrorism" in Eurasia?
EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. Drawing on decolonial perspectives on peace, statehood and development, this illuminating book examines post-liberal statebuilding in ...Central Asia. It uses ethnographic fieldwork in Southern Kyrgyzstan to offer a detailed examination of community security and peacebuilding discourses and practices. Through its analysis, the book highlights the problem with assumptions about liberal democracy, modern statehood and capitalist development as the standard template for post-conflict countries, which is widespread and rarely reflected upon.
Russia has been on a wild roller-coaster ride for the past three decades with no end in sight. Just in the past year as the global financial crisis deepened, the conventional perception of Russia has ...changed from a "safe haven" from the economic tsunami to one of the hardest hit larger markets in the world. The Russia Balance Sheet provides comprehensive, balanced, and accurate information on all key aspects of Russia's developments and their implications for the United States and other nations. The book argues that, after the strained Bush-Putin years, the Obama administration must seize the initiative to define both its policy toward Russia and the agenda for the many multilateral meetings already planned. * The book offers policy prescriptions for both the United States and Russia. It is imperative that the Obama administration establish an explicit Russia policy rather than subordinating it to other issues in order to enable the administration to make necessary tradeoffs and follow up on promises. An interagency group for Russia has been created under the leadership of the National Security Council's senior director for Russia; this group should determine the Russia policy and issue an NSC directive. As a new Russia policy is crafted and an NSC directive on Russia adopted, President Obama should make a public statement on his Russia policy. * Ideally, President Obama would declare his determination to finally persuade the US Congress to graduate Russia from the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the Trade Act of 1974. As for Russia, it should accede to the World Trade Organization (WTO) to secure its successful international integration and an improvement of its legal standards. The Kremlin needs to introduce transparent procurement procedures for major investments to relieve infrastructure bottlenecks. Property rights must be reinforced and renationalization stopped to ease the problems in banking and energy production. Finally, with the first full-scale summit between Presidents Obama and Medvedev to take place in Italy in July 2009, the authors argue that the two presidents should recommit to fulfilling the April 2008 Sochi Declaration and to reestablishing a broader organized cooperation mechanism between the two countries, like that of the Gore-Chernomyrdin Commission, to promote action and accountability.
