1,720,961 research outputs found
The Fall of the Berlin Wall, the Collapse of the USSR and the End of Cold War. A Chain of Surprises 'Too Big' to Be Predicted
Full text linkThe fall of the Berlin Wall, on the night of 9 November 1989, marked the beginning of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. Distinguished scholars of the realist school have developed different theories on the root causes and predictability of the end of the Cold War and have sought to find whether the end of the conflict between the Western and the Eastern bloc was predictable, and under which terms it could be settled.Political Reflection, Vol. 7, No. 1 - Issue 26 (January-February-March 2021). The author gratefully acknowledges the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for supporting this work through grant SFRH/BD/136170/2018
The Twilight Zone of Political Transition: Between Revolution and Democratic Change
Full text linkO´Donnell, Schmitter and Whitehead define transition broadly as "the interval between one political regime and another". Plattner concludes that "they emphasize a particular path to democratic transition – one that is neither violent nor revolutionary, but proceeds from negotiation between an outgoing authoritarian regime and its democratic opposition and often relies upon formal pacts that provide security guarantees to both sides". I wonder whether there is a common and clear pattern to democratic transition, or if rather exists a "twilight zone" in which violence is still permitted as the "vestige" of the vanishing authoritarian regime. In this brief article, I explore the connections between revolution and democracy in political changes.Political Reflection, Vol. 5, No. 4 - Issue 21, October-November-December 2019. The author gratefully acknowledges the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for supporting this publication through grant SFRH/BD/136170/2018
An Update of Democracy's Third Wave
Full text linkAlmost 25 years have passed since Samuel Huntington published his seminal article Democracy´s Third Wave, further expounded in his 1991 book The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century. Both interest and controversy rose in a time the world was changing and the Western idea of democracy was soon to be challenged (and shattered) in unexpected ways. Since then, the world has considerably changed and while the boundaries of politics and geopolitics are blurred by new technologies.
According to Huntington, by the mid-1970s, when the Helsinki Final Act was signed, the United States began to reformulate its foreign policy, and committed itself in supporting the observance of human rights and democratization at the international level. In the Helsinki Final Act was reaffirmed the fundamental principle of refraining from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.
The catch-phrase "the third wave" has come under criticism in the light of the post-Cold War world (Diamond, 2002).Countries undergoing or having undergone a transition to democracy during a wave are subject to democratic backsliding. Political scientists and theorists believe that the third wave has crested and will soon begin to ebb, just as its predecessors did in the first and second waves (Zagorski, 2003). Does Huntington´s "third wave" theory hold on regarding the recent trends and events in world politics? In this brief article, I check if Western democracies – the US and its allies – are still committed in respecting the international principles they should be bound to, or if the democracy's third wave is over.Political Reflection, Vol. 6, No. 1 - Issue 22 (January-February-March 2020). The author gratefully acknowledges the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for supporting this pulbication through research grant SFRH/BD/136170/2018
The Jungle Grows Back. How Can We Redefine the Future World Order in the Tension of Power and Ideas?
Full text linkThirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, peace and stability are challenged every day. The Russian intervention in Ukraine and Georgia (Marsili, 2016), the economic expansion of the People's Republic of China (Marsili, 2015), the nuclear threat from Iran and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the revisionism of the United States (U.S.), and, last but not least, hybrid threats such as international terrorism, jeopardize the world order (Marsili, 2019). The maintenance of world order is the main concern of the international community (Bull, 1997). The cardinal points of international law are lost, and the rule of law is a ghost that wanders around the world: are we back to the jungle? How can we redefine the future world order in the tension of power and ideas?
Attempts to ensure the world order were sought by the international society within the League of Nations during its short life (1920-1946). The League failed to resolve the major political disputes and, finally, failed in its primary purpose, the prevention of another world war (Northedge, 1986: 276–278). The idea of an international governmental organisation (IGO) to prevent future wars or to limit hostilities was resumed after World War II, with the foundation of the United Nations (UN) in 1945.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the following events – disbanding of the Warsaw Pact in July 1991, and dissolution of the Soviet Union (USSR) in December same year – the international structure has ceased to be bipolar and in this vacuum regional powers such as China and the Russian Federation emerged and gained space.Political Reflection, Vol. 6, No. 4 - Issue 25 (October-November-December 2020). The author gratefully acknowledges the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for supporting this work through grant SFRH/BD/136170/2018
Review of the book "A World Divided. The Global Struggle for Human Rights in the Age of Nation-States" by Eric D. Weitz
No full textReview of the book A World Divided. The Global Struggle for Human Rights in the Age of Nation-States, by Eric D. Weitz. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2019, ISBN: 978-0-691-14544-0, 544 pp.Review of the book "A World Divided. The Global Struggle for Human Rights in the Age of Nation-States" by Eric D. Weitz, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2019, ISBN: 978-0-691-14544-0, 544. The author gratefully acknowledges the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal, for supporting this publication through research grant SFRH/BD/136170/2018
From battlefield to political arena. Shifting the clausewitzian paradigm
Full text linkWar and politics are closely interrelated. If it is assumed, as in the case of Clausewitz's famous principle, that "war is a mere continuation of policy by other means... is not merely a political act, but also a truly political instrument, a continuation of political commerce, a carrying out of the same by other means" (Von Clausewitz, 1976), then it should be acknowledged that war is a political act. But Foucault inverts Clausewitz's traditional conception of war and says that politics is the continuation of war by other means (Foucault, 2006: 165). Here the emphasis of the discussion on war moves on politics. So, how to limit conflict within the political arena? The question shifts from the concept of armed conflict (i.e., war) to that of political conflict, in which nations confront against each other with alternate means such assanctions, coercive diplomatic efforts, economic warfare, or as prelude to war (Carisch et al., 2017).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Turkish Eurasianism and its impact on Turkish foreign policy in the post-Cold War Turkey
Full text linkGoing Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Debating Worlds: Contested Narratives of Global Modernity and World Order: By Daniel Deudney, G. John Ikenberry, and Karoline Postel-Vinay (Editors) (Publisher: Oxford University Press 2023)
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