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Just Rewards? Communism's Hard Bargain with the Citizen-Consumer
JUST REWARDS? COMMUNISM’S HARD BARGAIN WITH THE CITIZEN-CONSUMER Patrick Patterson University of California, San Diego The National Council for Eurasian and East European Research 2601 Fourth Avenue Suite 310 Seattle, WA 98121 TITLE VIII PROGRAM Project Information* Principal Investigator: Patrick Patterson NCEEER Contract Number: 821-12g Date: August 6, 2008 Copyright Information Individual researchers retain the copyright on their work products derived from research funded through a contract or grant from the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research (NCEEER). However, the NCEEER and the United States Government have the right to duplicate and disseminate, in written and electronic form, reports submitted to NCEEER to fulfill Contract or Grant Agreements either (a) for NCEEER’s own internal use, or (b) for use by the United States Government, and as follows: (1) for further dissemination to domestic, international, and foreign governments, entities and/or individuals to serve official United States Government purposes or (2) for dissemination in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act or other law or policy of the United States Government granting the public access to documents held by the United States Government. Neither NCEEER nor the United States Government nor any recipient of this Report may use it for commercial sale. * The work leading to this report was supported in part by contract or grant funds provided by the National Council for Eurasian and East European Research, funds which were made available by the U.S. Department of State under the Title VIII program. The analysis and interpretations contained herein are those of the author. -
Recent Changes in European Welfare
Program for the Stud,. of German,. and Europe Working Paper Series #7.6 Recent Changes in European Welfare State Services: A Comparison of Child Care Politics in the United Kingdom, Sweden, Germany, and the Netherlands· by Jet Bussemaker , Faculty of Social & Cultural Sciences Dept. of Political Science & Public Administration/Gender Studies Vrije Universiteit. Amsterdam De Boelelaan 1081c 1081 HV Amsterdam, The Netherlands M. [email protected] Abstract This paper examines recent policies and politics of services, in particular child care services in European welfare states. It is argued that social (care) services are becoming an increasingly political issue in postindustrial societies and are at the very center of welfare-state restructuring. Some countries have recently developed new policy pro grams for child care-but there are important differences among these programs. To understand these differences as well as some common features, the paper argues that it is necessary to examine the institutional organization of child care and short-term political factors as well as the rationales articulated in political debates to support or im pede various policies. The paper concludes that a comprehensive system of child care provisions is still far off in most countries, despite a rhetoric of choice and postindustrial care and labor-market patterns. ·This working paper was written while I was a viseing scholar at the Center for European Studies, Harvard University. Almost all West European welfare states have been confronted by mounting new phenomena since the late 1970s, such as the withering away of the policy-informing idea of "full employ ment for all," growing female labor-market participation, demographic change (aging, fertili ty), increasing social differentiation (living-arrangements, migration), and the growing influ ence of European integration on domestic policy-to mention just some problems. -
The Brookings Institution Center on the United
THE BROOKINGS INSTITUTION CENTER ON THE UNITED STATES AND EUROPE Second Annual Raymond Aron Lecture IN DEFENSE OF DECADENT EUROPE Speakers: Tony Judt Gilles Andreani Introduction: Philip Gordon November 16, 2005 [TRANSCRIPT PRODUCED FROM A TAPE RECORDING] P R O C E E D I N G S MR. GORDON: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Let me welcome you all here, and apologies for the late start. There are a number of people still fighting the elements, but I thank you for doing your best to get here. I'm Phil Gordon, the director of the Center on the United States and Europe here at Brookings. It's really a great pleasure for me to welcome you to the second annual Raymond Aron lecture here. Aron, as everybody knows, was the prominent French scholar, philosopher, political commentator, journalist who was best known for his willingness to follow his ideas wherever the evidence took him rather than supporting the conventional wisdom of the day. He also combined great theoretical and historical work with a deep appreciation for the dilemmas of the policymaker and the need to apply those ideas to the real world. He had very little time for intellectuals who couldn't think about the realities of the real world. And finally, he also stood quite strongly for a strong U.S.-French and U.S.- European relationship at a time when that itself wasn't always fashionable. I think in all of those ways he is sort of a symbol for what we aspire to do here, combining theoretical historical work with the dilemmas of the policymaker and the real world. -
The Revisionist Imperative: Rethinking Twentieth Century Wars* I
The 2012 George C. Marshall Lecture in Military History The Revisionist Imperative: Rethinking Twentieth Century Wars* I Andrew J. Bacevich Abstract What students want (and citizens deserve) is an account of the past that illuminates the present. The conventional narrative of the twenti- eth century, exalting World War II as an episode in which Anglo-Amer- ican good triumphs over Nazi evil, is no longer adequate to that pur- pose. Today, the “lessons” that narrative teaches mislead rather than guide. The moment is ripe for revisionism. Historians need to respond to the challenge, replacing the familiar and morally reassuring story of a Short Twentieth Century with a less familiar and morally ambiguous story of a still unfolding Long Twentieth Century. ot long before his untimely death the historian Tony Judt observed that “For many American commentators and policymakers the message of the twenti ethN century is that war works.”1 Judt might have gone even further. Well beyond the circle of experts and insiders, many ordinary Americans even today at least tacitly share that view. * This essay derives from the George C. Marshall Lecture on Military History, delivered on 7 January 2012 at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association, Chicago, Il linois. The Marshall Lecture is sponsored by the Society for Military History and the George C. Marshall Foundation. 1.Tony Judt, “What Have We Learned, If Anything?” New York Review of Books, 1 May 2008. Andrew J. Bacevich is professor of history and international relations at Boston University. A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, he received his Ph.D. -
“I Am Afraid Americans Cannot Understand” the Congress for Cultural Freedom in France and Italy, 1950–1957
“I Am Afraid Americans Cannot Understand” The Congress for Cultural Freedom in France and Italy, 1950–1957 ✣ Andrea Scionti Culture was a crucial yet elusive battlefield of the Cold War. Both superpowers tried to promote their way of life and values to the world but had to do so care- fully. The means adopted by the United States included not only propaganda and the use of mass media such as cinema and television but also efforts to help shape the world of highbrow culture and the arts. The Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF), an organization sponsored by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), offered U.S. policymakers and intellectuals the opportunity to provide indirect support for anti-Communist intellectuals without being openly associated with their activities. Although the CCF represented one of the main instruments for the United States to try to win the hearts and minds of postwar Europe, it also created new challenges for U.S. Cold War- riors. By tying themselves to the European intelligentsia, they were forced to mediate between different societies, cultures, and intellectual traditions. This article looks at the contexts of France and Italy to highlight this interplay of competing notions of anti-Communism and cultural freedom and how the local actors involved helped redefine the character and limits of U.S. cultural diplomacy. Although scholars have looked at the CCF and its significance, es- pecially in the Anglo-Saxon world, a focus on French and Italian intellectuals can offer fresh insights into this subject. The Congress for Cultural Freedom was the product of a convergence of interests between the CIA’s recently established Office of Policy Coordination (OPC) and a small number of American and European intellectuals, many of them former Communists, concerned about the perceived success of the Soviet cultural offensive in Western Europe. -
State-Building and Political Change: Options for Palestine 2011
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY i CENTER ON INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION State-building and political change: Options for Palestine 2011 Elizabeth Sellwood March 2011 NYU State-building and political change: Options for Palestine 2011 CIC NEW YORK UNIVERSITY CENTER ON INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION The world faces old and new security challenges that are more complex than our multilateral and national institutions are currently capable of managing. International cooperation is ever more necessary in meeting these challenges. The NYU Center on International Cooperation (CIC) works to enhance international responses to conflict, insecurity, and scarcity through applied research and direct engagement with multilateral institutions and the wider policy community. CIC’s programs and research activities span the spectrum of conflict, insecurity, and scarcity issues. This allows us to see critical inter-connections and highlight the coherence often necessary for effective response. We have a particular concentration on the UN and multilateral responses to conflict. Table of Contents State-building and political change: Options for Palestine 2011 Acknowledgments 2 Executive Summary 3 Introduction 5 What are the PA’s practical achievements? 6 What are the constraints facing the PA and its leadership? 7 Political options for September 2011 9 Business as usual 9 The idea 9 The process 9 How would this affect the political context and the situation on the ground? 10 State declaration/recognition options 11 The idea 11 Possible processes 12 How would this affect the -
Confronting Soviet Power Confronting Soviet Paul C
Confronting Soviet Power Confronting Soviet Paul C. Avey Power U.S. Policy during the Early Cold War For many, the behav- ior of the United States in the early Cold War highlights the inºuence of ideas in foreign policy. According to this view, American liberalism directly faced off against Soviet Communism after World War II. This caused the United States to abandon collaboration, deªne the Soviet Union as an enemy, and implement a series of combative policies. In other words, Soviet power became a threat because the Soviet Union was a Communist dictatorship.1 To be sure, works in the realist tradition contend that balance of power concerns motivated U.S. policy. Yet these explanations often sidestep the role of ideas,2 blur the role of power and ideas,3 or incorporate ideas into their analysis.4 In short, many scholars accept that ideas were critical in pushing the United States to confront the Soviet Union and Communism. A close look at early Cold War history, however, suggests that U.S. policy was often inconsistent with the most prominent ideational explanations for U.S. behavior toward the Soviets. For instance, the United States genuinely at- tempted to engage the Soviet Union in the early postwar period despite aware- ness of the totalitarian nature of Soviet Communism. In addition, U.S. policy initially tolerated Communist groups beyond the Soviet Union and later tar- geted them to prevent Soviet expansion. Finally, the United States did not seri- Paul C. Avey is a Ph.D. candidate in political science at the University of Notre Dame. -
Europe's Broken Conscience
NEW EPILOGUE: EUROPE'S BROKEN CONSCIENCE. Those recognized as the "Fathers of Europe", responded in conscience to the spectacle of ruins left by European politics in the first half of the twentieth century. They knew that: "to serve right and to fight against the dominion of wrong is and remains the fundamental task of the politician." 1 As Hannah Ahrendt wrote in 1945: "The problem of evil will be the fundamental problem of postwar intellectual life in Europe – as death became the fundamental problem after the last war."2 The Fathers of Europe clearly understood that a radical break with the European past was necessary. After the Second World War and the onset of the Cold War, they saw it to be their task to reconcile France and Germany and to unify Europe. The Governments of the six states who concluded the ECSC Treaty in 1951, fundamentally agreed on: (1) The purposes to be pursued: reconciliation, peace, solidarity and federal unity; (2) The road to follow: concrete actions and the fusion of essential interests; and (3) The method of common action: creating supranational institutions capable of giving direction to their future common destiny. This agreement on the peaceful organization of common action has been solid enough to provide the constitutional foundation for peaceful cooperation in an enlarging European Union. Still, European conscience is fragile. Already in 1954, it was too weak in the French National Assembly to accept a European Defense Community. It was partly restored through the creation of EEC and Euratom, but soon faded, during the Gaullist era in France, again. -
Nordic Solidarity with the Liberation Struggles ~-- in Southern Africa, and Challenges for Democratic Partnerships Into the 21St Century
Report of the conference _Nordic Solidarity with the Liberation Struggles ~-- in Southern Africa, and Challenges for Democratic Partnerships into the 21st Century 11-14 February 1999 Organized by The Robben Island Museum, The Mayibuye Centre and The Nordic Africa Institute SOLIDARITY If only you could take my hand, If only you could do it today, I will use your right hand And you mine, For understanding, Equality, And solidarity. We would be ottrselves The two of us. We would struggle tagether You and me. The gap between us is temporal That's when solida rity counts. My shortage is the minor Of life of in-equality. It reflects you in yesterdays You might not have, But your mother did Sacrificing for your security, For you to render solidarity. I should not sh iver, I should not cry When we are in solidarity. The nights should be brig/Jt And the future wide, When you render solidarity. We would be finn in our undertakings, We would eliminate the cause That grieves your people and mine The causes which pain you and me. We would do it the two of us We would do it all the way. We would destroy the seeds of oppression We would destroy the roats of exploitation. Their existence is disastrous Too painful for you and me. Solida rity is not a myth, It is a living philosophy. It transcends the bars of colour A language for deaf and blind SOLIDARITY, A language international. Ben Amathila Stockholm, 9 Jalmary 1975 Foreword This is a report on the conference Nordic Solidarity with the Liberation Struggles in SOLlthern Africa, and Clwllenges for Democratic Partnerships into the 21st Century, jointly organized by The Robben Island Museum and The Mayibuye Centre in Cape Town, and The Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala. -
Unpacking the Global Campaign to Delegitimize Israel. Drawing The
SWP Research Paper Gil Murciano Unpacking the Global Campaign to Delegitimize Israel Drawing the Line between Criticism of Israel and Denying Its Legitimacy Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik German Institute for International and Security Affairs SWP Research Paper 7 June 2020, Berlin Abstract ∎ In the last two decades, international delegitimization of Israel has become a new mode of operation for those denying Israel’s right to exist. It encompasses a wide range of civil-society and grassroots organizations. ∎ The campaign attempts to imitate the logic of the struggle against the South African apartheid regime – hence to undermine Israel’s inter- national legitimacy in a manner that would lead to its isolation and even- tually cause it to collapse. ∎ In its current phase, the campaign functions as a long-term effort to grad- ually change the discourse and mindset of Israel’s critics in the West. Its main goal is to mainstream delegitimization – hence to reposition anti- Zionism from the radical margins into the mainstream of Western liberal- progressive circles, with specific emphasis on critics of Israel’s policies. ∎ A key strategy to mainstream delegitimization is to blur the differences between criticism of Israeli policy and challenges to Israel’s basic legiti- macy. This includes efforts to turn items of the delegitimization agenda into an integral part of the political debate about Israel. ∎ As a result, many critics of Israel’s policies end up supporting efforts that are led by the delegitimization campaign. The discussion in the West on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is gradually developing into a dichotomous encounter between supporting Israel and its policies unquestioningly or supporting anti-Zionism. -
Part I. History, Diplomacy, Democracy and Development – 11
PART I. HISTORY, DIPLOMACY, DEMOCRACY AND DEVELOPMENT – 11 Part I. History, Diplomacy, Democracy and Development THE MARSHALL PLAN: LESSONS LEARNED FOR THE 21ST CENTURY CHAPTER 1. THE MARSHALL PLAN: HISTORY AND LEGACY – 13 Chapter 1. The Marshall Plan: History and Legacy by Gerard Bossuat The Marshall Plan, officially called European Recovery Program (ERP), was in place from April 1948 to September 1951. Most contemporary actors considered that it played an essential role in the economic successes of postwar Western Europe. The various European programs of modernization greatly benefited from the ERP, since it financed imports essential to reconstruction and modernization. It produced counterparts in European currencies, the allocation of which needs to be clarified, and generated a debate on their use. Moreover, the Marshall Plan was at the origin of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC), created to encourage European unity. The Marshall Plan was a political tool in the hands of the American administration in the context of the Cold War and the defense of the West. What was the role of the Marshall Plan in the development of a consumer society? Was the Marshall Plan Americanizing European societies? The ERP thus also held a socio-cultural dimension. Finally, over the last 60 years the Marshall Plan has become a myth. Whenever our countries are hit by a crisis, the media or politicians ask for a “new Marshall Plan”. The Marshall Plan was, and remains, appreciated, but it also raised criticisms in Europe. So we have to separate what belongs to history and what belongs to the collective memory or to the myth. -
A Review of International Law on the Left: Re-Examining Marxist Legacies by Susan Marks
Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship 2010 Book Review: What's Left? A Review of International Law on the Left: Re-Examining Marxist Legacies by Susan Marks Barbara Stark Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/faculty_scholarship Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Barbara Stark, Book Review: What's Left? A Review of International Law on the Left: Re-Examining Marxist Legacies by Susan Marks, 42 GEO.WASH. INT'L L. REV. 191 (2010) Available at: https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/faculty_scholarship/1276 This Book Review is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in Hofstra Law Faculty Scholarship by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Commons at Hofstra Law. For more information, please contact [email protected]. BOOK REVIEW WHAT'S LEFt? A REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL LAW ON THE LEFT BY SUSAN MARKS BARARA J. STARK* A 2005 BBC poll declared Marx "the greatest philosopher of all time,"' but he has few fans in the United States. As U.S. scholars Thomas Hale and Anne-Marie Slaughter wrote that same year: "Marxism may be out-dated, oversimplified and wrong."2 Although the roots of this peculiarly U.S. antipathy are complex, 3 its influ- ence, especially since the Cold War, is easy to track. Before Sena- tor Joseph McCarthy became an embarrassment, his blacklists and purges gutted the U.S. left.4 Disillusionment with the Soviet brand of Marxism finished the job.