2011 in Peace and Conflict
The Peace and Conflict Monitor digests some of 2011’s most relevant events in peace and conflict.
Embezzlement of Public Funds: A Crime against Humanity in Cameroon
Joseph Agbor Effim studies embezzlement in Cameroon, arguing that the consequent suffering experienced by Cameroonians that follows renders it tantamount to a crime against humanity.
Military Intervention and the Return of Absolute Monarchy: an Impediment to Political Security in Thailand
Thailand is encountering the problematic situation of military intervention and the return of absolute monarchy. Those incidents violate human security, particularly, political security.
How Privatized is War?
Some security analysts believe that the private sector is so firmly embedded in combat and occupation that the phenomenon may have reached the point of no return. The U.S. army estimates that of the $87 billion earmarked in the year 2003 for the broader Iraqi campaigns including Central Asia and Afghanistan, one third has been spent on contracts to private companies. Pujya Pascal discusses corporate adventurism in the context of the latest concerns relating to Private Military Companies.
New People’s Army and the Philippines: No end in sight?
Noriko Hashimoto discusses the prolonged conflict between the government of the Philippines and the communist rebel group, New People’s Army. After giving an overview of the long and tragic history, focusing primarily on the presidencies of Ramos and Arroyo, Hashimoto looks to the underlying factors of poverty and land distribution, and the potential for a negotiated peace.
Comfort Women and the Failure of International Law
Seong Eun Lee discusses the failure of international law to hold states responsible for their use of women as sexual slaves during the Pacific War. The history of international treaties and regulations outlawing such behaviour are briefly reviewed, as is the current state of the former comfort women’s struggle for justice. The author argues that interlocking structures of oppression based on power imbalances of gender and ethnicity have continued to frustrate this struggle in the arena of international law.
Key words: Korea, Japan, comfort women, international law, development, South Asia, World War II, gender, peace and conflict, ethnicity, sexual slavery, justice.
The Logic of the Coup
The Logic of the Coup Author: Ajong Mbapndah Laurean Originally published at Peace and Conflict Monitor on 03/15/2006 In loose terms a coup d’etat can be defined as the unconstitutional action of acceding to political power, often with the use of force. The military often uses this method of taking power, and for a long […]
The Role of Identity in Georgia s Security Policies: Critique of Realism
The BBC reports (May 5, 2004) that the “Georgian leader Mikhail Saakashvili has imposed direct presidential rule in the rebel region of Ajaria. The moves came amid growing pressure on Ajaria’s leader Aslan Abashidze to accept Tbilisi’s authority or resign. The Georgian government has warned Aslan Abashidze that he has only a few hours to step down and avoid bloodshed.” We offer Vahagn Muradyan’s article on the problems of identity in Georgia in explaining its Security Policies.
The business of war
Saddam was captured by regular troops. However, underlying the tactical and strategic operations in Iraq, has been and is an emerging new generation of US military tactics that relies increasingly on sophisticated information and communication technologies, which are not only developed and produced by the civilian industry, but can in fact only be maintained and operated by civilian experts.