Beyond the Cold War: New Directions for Labor Internationalism

[Excerpt] Achieving real solidarity across national borders and around the globe is a difficult undertaking, one which little in our experience has prepared us for. Language barriers, differences in cultures and political traditions, very different styles of unionism — all these make simple communication, let alone real understanding of foreign workers\u27 interests and concerns, difficult. Unfortunately, the AFL-CIO\u27s official agency for helping us sort through these difficulties — the Department of International Affairs (DIA) — is not much help in doing so. In fact, as I argue here, the DIA is often an obstacle to building real solidarity. After making this case, I will make some suggestions for how U.S. unions can move toward solidarity by avoiding the DIA structure — through direct participation in the International Trade Secretariats (ITSs), like the Metalworkers Federation mentioned above, and through forming sister union relationships with relevant unionists in other countries. But, eventually, the DIA must be opened up to reflect the broad and diverse interests of labor\u27s rank-and-file rather than the narrow sectarian face it has shown the world for the past several decades

Containment and territorial transnational actors: Israel, Hezbollah and Hamas

Containment has been salient in intellectual and policy debates for 60 years. It informed US foreign policy towards the USSR and, later, the so-called rogue states. The endurance of containment beyond the Cold War suggests that it possesses the quality of transferability: the capacity of a grand strategy from the past to transcend the circumstances that gave rise to it, to suggest what should be emulated and what avoided in future policies. Drawing on the notion of transferability and on the method of structured, focused comparison, this article uses Israel’s foreign policy towards Hezbollah and Hamas to argue that containment is transferable from the state level to a state/territorial transnational actor (TNA) relationship, albeit with permutations. This argument is examined in relation to four issues: the circumstances under which containment arises; its applicability to territorial TNA; the objectives sought by implementing containment; and the role of legitimacy as a component of containment. In so doing the article seeks to make a contribution to the debate on containment. While there is a rich literature on state containment, research on containing territorial TNA is extremely limited

Farewell, Iron Curtain! Rewriting European Cold War History as Entangled Histories

Der Sammelband Beyond the Divide: Entangled Histories of Cold War Europe hat sich zum Ziel gesetzt, die vielfältigen Verbindungen und Wechselbeziehungen in Europa während des Kalten Krieges nachzuverfolgen. Es ist die erste von zwei Publikationen, die aus der Konferenz „East-West cultural exchange and the Cold War“ (Jväskylä, 2012) entstanden sind. Zusammen mit 14 Autor_innen erkunden Simo Mikkonen und Pia Koivunen transnationale Netzwerke im Europa des Kalten Krieges und verschieben ihre Perspektive weg von Staaten auf halb- und inoffizielle Ebenen. Dabei offenbaren die Kapitel einen vernachlässigten Teil der Europäischen Geschichte des Kalten Krieges, deuten aber auch auf das Bedürfnis weiterer Forschung zu Grenzlinien jenseits der Teilung des Kalten Krieges hin.The edited volume Beyond the Divide: Entangled Histories of Cold War Europe aims at tracing the manifold connections and interactions in Europe during the Cold War. It is the first of two publications to proceed from the conference “East-West cultural exchanges and the Cold War” (Jväskylä, 2012). Together with 14 contributors, Simo Mikkonen and Pia Koivunen explore transnational networks in Cold War Europe and redirect their focus from the state-to-state level to unofficial and semi-official bodies. Thereby the chapters reveal a neglected part of European Cold War History, but they also point to the need for further research on borderlines beyond the Cold War divide

Nuclear Politics, Past and Present: Comparison of German and Japanese Anti-Nuclear Peace Movements

This article addresses the question of what has contributed to the difference between German and Japanese nuclear politics in the post-Fukushima era. Germany has decided to phase out nuclear energy, but Japan has done the opposite. The origin of this difference can be traced back to the development of the anti-nuclear peace movement in the early 1980s. West Germans turned against nuclear energy as well as nuclear weapons, whereas Japanese peace activists carefully avoided the nuclear energy issue because of their concern over U.S.-Japan relations. The West German peace movement in the following years was in a position to foster cooperation between East and West Germans, whereas the Japanese movement missed the chance to go beyond the Cold War mentality

German-German Relations in the Fields of Sport, with Particular Reference to the Olympic Games 1952-1972

This thesis explores the surprising phenomenon of the existence of joint German-German teams in the three successive Olympic years of 1956, 1960 and 1964. This unusual example of cooperation – in the midst of Cold War hostilities - between the two antagonistic Germanys, West and East, was caused by: • the idealistic though illusionary conviction of Avery Brundage, influential President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), that German-German cooperation in the field of Olympics, as initiated by him, would also result in closer political relations between the Federal Republic (FRG) and the German Democratic Republic (GDR): ‘a development in which politicians have patently failed’, he remarked; • the interest and hope of the GDR leadership that participation with the FRG in joint Olympic teams would open doors for international recognition of their country, a status the East struggled to achieve; • the expectation by leaders of the West German sports movement that cooperation with the GDR in the Olympic field would result in improved relations: this despite reservations in official quarters that striving for better relations with East Germany ran the risk of alienating its Western allies; • the concern of West German sports leaders that to spurn the Brundage initiative might leave the field free for Germany’s Olympic presence to become the sole domain of the GDR. In spite of much behind the scenes squabbling, West-East cooperation gathered pace in the 1950s, only to end with the summer Games at Mexico City in 1968. The demise of the experiment was preceded by an IOC decision of 1965 to abandon its support for a joint German team and to grant full recognition to a separate team of the GDR, as well as to the Federal Republic. With their aim achieved, the GDR lost interest in further joint ventures and the 1972 Munich Games witnessed the participation of two antagonistic German teams. The history of German-German Olympic cooperation remains a neglected theme in modern sports history. As well as exploring the origins, developments and unravelling of West-East cooperation – set within a changing diplomatic and sporting context – the thesis examines the return to more realistic, albeit cold, German-German relations. Avery Brundage’s dream was over, but it was remarkable that in the midst of the Cold War cooperation prevailed for over a decade

The End of the Cold War: Its Dynamics and Critical Factors

This essay will discuss the end of the Cold War and the critical factors which influenced its ending. It has been suggested that the Cold War actually was the ideological conflict between the Soviet Union and the United States. However, the conflict between the superpowers has triggered the military confrontation and security approach in the world after the end of the Second World War. As a result, many countries, especially the Third World countries became victims of the ideological rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union

Re-imagining the Borders of US Security after 9/11: Securitisation, Risk, and the Creation of the Department of Homeland Security

The articulation of international and transnational terrorism as a key issue in US security policy, as a result of the 9/11 attacks, has not only led to a policy rethink, it has also included a bureaucratic shift within the US, showing a re-thinking of the role of borders within US security policy. Drawing substantively on the 'securitisation' approach to security studies, the article analyses the discourse of US security in order to examine the founding of the Department of Homeland Security, noting that its mission provides a new way of conceptualising 'borders' for US national security. The securitisation of terrorism is, therefore, not only represented by marking terrorism as a security issue, it is also solidified in the organisation of security policy-making within the US state. As such, the impact of a 'war on terror' provides an important moment for analysing the re-articulation of what security is in the US, and, in theoretical terms, for reaffirming the importance of a relationship between the production of threat and the institutionalisation of threat response. © 2007 Taylor & Francis