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Impact of Extreme Weather Events in the Wartime Okinawa
Get PDFGlobal publics have been noticing the intensity of droughts, wildfires, melting poles, rising sea levels, and typhoons in their daily lives. Policy communities are scrutinizing the nature of the climate change, its human-induced causes and environmental effects. But the effect of climate change does not end with an account of environmental impacts. Climate change has had social and security effects too, as recent arguments on migration pressures (Dalby), resource scarcity (Homer-Dixon), access to rural land (Baechler), and intensification of conflicts (Kelley) emphasize. This article looks back in time and argues that extreme climate and weather phenomena have influenced conflicts not only in recent decades, but relate to the past occurrences too, including the WWII. As narratives of past events tend towards anthropocentric explanations, the presence of weather and climate are often minimalized or bracketed out in favour of intentionality and human agency. Yet wars are complex phenomena, and no human agency can fully account for them. The argument here is that extreme weather events, such as heavy rains, had contributed significantly to the transformation of the battlefield in Okinawa, and to the atrocities committed on the local noncombatant population. It provides a more climate-prone explanation for the final stages of the Pacific War.多文化社会研究, 9, pp.85-101; 2023departmental bulletin pape
South Africa’s Apartheid Regime and its Path to the Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons
Get PDF多文化社会研究, 8, pp.335-349; 2022departmental bulletin pape
Iraqi Occupation and the Dynamics of Societal Risks
Get PDFThe article deals with the Iraq War of 2003, the post-war occupation and recovery efforts
from the perspective of the risk society thesis, exposing the societal risks of post-cold war military strategies. It focuses on three mechanisms with which the United States-led Coalition Provisional Authority endeavored to manage risk: early elections, stable government, and development of civil society. The article finds that there are societal risks associated with the three mechanisms of risk control. It concludes that with the war in Iraq we can identify a new turn in security studies where risk is increasingly human-manufactured, and that it is not enough to cope with such risks through the established mechanisms of risk management
The Dynamics of the Political Dimensions of Marine Space
Get PDFHuman society has viewed marine space as an empty, deep and useless mass of water for most of its recorded past. With the arrival of the modern nation-state came an institutionalization of the relationship between society and the sea, but in a way radically distinct from that with land. In this paper, I suggest that in political science, this historical trend of seeing human society as land-based and the sea as irrelevant is over. The sea is irreversibly becoming more intertwined with our lives. There are two mechanisms which ensure increasing importance of the sea to our society. The first one is territorialization of the sea, manifested by the introduction of the EEZ and other institutions challenging the traditional understanding of the sea in modern international law. The other one is liquefaction of territorial sovereignty as a result of globalization. Increasing movement of information, goods, people, externalities, and identities across boundaries erode territorial sovereignty beyond its traditional meaning. The sea has had a major role in promoting such erosion.
New potential offered by marine space is a new frontier for human society, which may lead to entirely new ways of economic development. They also pose new challenges, and human society will have to devise more effective ways to address negative effects of the promising 'Blue Growth.
Relationship between Safety and Security within the Context of Risk and Intentionality
Get PDFWe now live in an era where various interconnected forms of technological and social risks help shape our lives. Risk can be understood as a challenge to human safety and security. Until recently, risk has been a keyword of safety sciences, which highlight safety and aim at designing more reliable and failure-proof technologies. Thus, risk has been treated as relatively simple, measurable, predictable and manageable phenomenon. Security studies have challenged this technological interpretation of risk, especially because security related hazards may lead to grave social consequences, such as outbreaks of conflicts and wars. Security risks are, therefore, more consequential to human survival, and they are more complex and reflexive than technological risks. This article traces the lineage of both disciplines and examines the concept of intentionality, which has been treated as the main dividing feature present in social but not in technical risks. For an illustration of intentionality, the article draws on an example of biological hazards arising from the deployment of chemical and biological weapons in the Iraq-Iran war. In the end, the article draws upon the complexities of the COVID-19 pandemic, and mentioning Ulrich Beck, it relativizes the concept of intentionality and concludes that even natural and technical risks are being impacted by human judgment, which is in itself rife with imperfections and unintended consequences.多文化社会研究, 7, pp.203-216; 2021departmental bulletin pape
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