Workshop on War and Democracy

On March 2–3, 2008, INSER supported a workshop at the UW focused on the effects of war on liberal democracy. "War and Democracy: The Domestic Political Consequences of International Conflict" was organized by professors of political science Elizabeth Kier, University of Washington, and Ronald Krebs, University of Minnesota. The workshop brought together an interdisciplinary group of political scientists, historians, sociologists, and law professors to focus on three questions: How does war shape the transition to and durability of democracy? How does war influence the structures of democratic governance? And how does war influence associational life and collective action? The workshop also included reflections on the balance between security and liberty and on the future of war and liberal democracy. The organizers have contacted presses about publishing an edited volume of the workshop papers, tentatively entitled In War’s Wake: International Conflict and the Fate of Liberal Democracy, and the following have agreed to review the manuscript for publication: Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, MIT University Press, and the Security and Governance series at Routledge Press.

International Rivalry Lecture from February

On February 22, 2008, Christopher Darnton spoke on "Overcoming International Security Rivalry: Argentine-Brazilian Rapprochement in Comparative Perspective." Darnton asked: "Under what conditions do countries engaged in a security rivalry with one another set aside their legacy of hostility and begin to cooperate?" Conventional wisdom in international relations theory holds that a common foe is the most likely source of cooperation between adversaries, but we know little about the mechanisms through which this factor is likely to matter, the degree and stability of cooperation it is likely to produce, or the circumstances under which its effects will most strongly be felt. Darnton derives alternative hypotheses from realism and constructivism and tests these against an argument emphasizing the parochial interest of state security agencies in a position to veto cooperation. Darnton argues that the global and bipolar nature of the Cold War provides a potential common threat for rival countries that line up against the same superpower, and he examines the evolution of rivalries among Western Bloc countries from 1945 to 1989. After discussing the relevant theories and an overview of rivalries during the Cold War, Darnton presented a structured, focused comparison of four attempts at bilateral cooperation between Argentina and Brazil, rivals from the colonial era until finally achieving rapprochement in 1980. This analysis draws on interviews with foreign policy analysts and practitioners in both Argentina and Brazil as well as on published primary and secondary sources in English, Spanish, and Portuguese obtained from more than five months of fieldwork in South America.

See the full report at http://cluster.ischool.washington.edu/caenser/Documents/darnton.htm.

Nuclear Defusing talk from January

On January 25, 2008, Emanuel Adler spoke on “Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don't: Performative Power and the Strategy of Conventional and Nuclear Defusing.” Prof. Adler’s work seeks to initiate a new round of strategic intellectual innovation in an era when threats posed by non-state terrorist organizations and their state supporters do not resemble Cold War threats. Based on an interpretative sociological reading of the concepts of power, security, and rationality, it argues that a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” dilemma is to the post–Cold War era what the danger of surprise or unintended nuclear war was to the Cold War: the defining structural threat of international politics. The dilemma leaves states confronting asymmetrical warfare with the choice of reacting with force to a terrorist act or practicing appeasement. Neither approach, however, can achieve the goal of putting an end to terrorism. Deterrence sustains the dilemma by providing a rationale for why force should be used and self-restraint is irrational. Adler proposes a third option—defusing, which may be accomplished by denial (preventing provocateurs from dragging states into the use of force) and “restructuration” (transforming the structure and rules of the situation). Defusing relies on “performative power”—the capacity to project a dramatic and credible performance on the world stage and to decouple social actors, their audiences, and their most deeply held strategic beliefs. The force of the argument is illustrated by examples from the global war on terror, the 2006 Lebanon War, and the Iranian nuclear crisis. See the full report at http://cluster.ischool.washington.edu/caenser/Documents/adler.htm

January Lecture on Nuclear Logic

On January 11, 2008, Etel Solingen spoke on “Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia and the Middle East.” Solingen’s talk was based on her most recent book: Nuclear Logics: Alternate Paths in East Asia and the Middle East, published by Princeton University Press (2007), in which she examines why some states seek nuclear weapons while others renounce them. Looking closely at nine cases in East Asia and the Middle East, Solingen finds two distinct regional patterns. In East Asia, the norm since the late 1960s has been to forswear nuclear weapons, and North Korea, which makes no secret of its nuclear ambitions, is the anomaly. In the Middle East, the opposite is the case, with Iran, Iraq, Israel, and Libya suspected of pursuing nuclear-weapons capabilities, with Egypt as the anomaly in recent decades. The full report is at http://cluster.ischool.washington.edu/caenser/Documents/solingen.htm

Upcoming Lecture

On Friday, March 7, 2008, the Department of Political Science (a partner of INSER) will host Stephen E. Hanson (University of Washington Boeing International Professor of Political Science and Director, Ellison Center for Russian East European and Central Asian Studies), who will speak on “Ideology, Uncertainty, and Democracy: Party Formation in the Third Republic France, Weimar Germany, and Post-Soviet Russia.” The event will take place at 9:30 am to noon and from 2:30 to 5:00 pm, Gowen 1A.

Talk on Friday

Reminder: February 29, 2008, Scott Gartner of University of California, Davis, will speak in the UWISC series on the psychological costs of the war on its participants: "Suicide and Fragging: Strategy and Military Dysfunction." The talk will take place in 317 Thompson Hall at Noon.

Afghani Students at Evans School

The Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs, a partner of INSER, is welcoming as many as 21 government and nonprofit officials from Afghanistan to study public administration and policy. The students are pursuing Master of Public Policy and Administration (MPPA) degrees at Kabul University and work for organizations including the Afghan Ministries of Justice, Finance, and the Interior; Afghan National Assembly; and the United Nations.

Over the next three months, these students will pursue intensive studies in leadership, management, and international development and relations, leveraging the Evans School’s strengths in program development and evaluation, public/private/nonprofit partnerships, strategic management, and public policy. They will have the opportunity to learn first hand from public and nonprofit professionals and will work with Evans School faculty members to begin their master’s theses.

The Evans School hosts this program in partnership with the Afghan eQuality Alliances Program, a Global Development Alliance sponsored by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) through a cooperative agreement with Washington State University. The program is managed by Sanjeev Khagram, associate professor of public affairs and international studies (and member of the INSER Strategic Planning Committee), and Shannon Mills, director of executive education at the Evans School.