Conflict, Intervention and the Decline of the Developing State

The contemporary international system is characterized by change and continuity in fundamental socio-political processes and economic relationships that constitute the foundation on which state and non-state interactions unfold. In particular, post-Cold War fin de siècle international politics, rather than producing a new era of global peace, economic prosperity, and symmetrical interdependence, is instead characterized by a widening scope and intensity of geopolitical fluidity and socio-economic effervescence which tend either to (1) undermine state sovereignty, (2) assail human rights practices, or (3) impel the key actors (great powers and major international organizations) of the international system to adopt a foreign policy posture of Aintervention@ with the goal of managing the global political economy. The ever-increasing negative effects of transnational social forces tend to generate the pervasive force of a liberal cosmopolitan moral view of international relations that increasingly sanctions both military and non-military interventions to maintain the existing structure of states and international society. The consequence is that states, in particular weak developing states, are progressively losing their individual identities, rights, and obligations vis-à-vis civil society, in the wake of the external impositions. In other words, the high incidence of violent ethnopolitical conflicts as well as the dislocative effects of weak developing economies are increasingly undermining the twin pillars of non-intervention and state sovereignty. Conflict/peacekeeping interventions and economic dislocation/external policy impositions now constitute the most formidable sources of assault on the decision-making autonomy, territorial integrity, and overall sovereignty of the developing state

Strategies of Sino-American Rivalry in Africa: From 2000 to COVID-19

In this article it is argued that Sino-American rivalry in Africa is based on competing strategies utilized by each power to enhance their interests and bilateral ties on the continent, as well to try and outdo each other in image projection and overall influence expansion. These strategies of rivalry and power enhancement revolve around promoting close military ties and transactions on the continent; the framing of the continent in the language of securitization and strategic importance; and the perennial utilization of discourse or narrative that frames the other as detrimental to the interests of African states. These strategies of containing the others power preponderance or influence have expanded to include what is now referred to as vaccine diplomacy on the part of China, and during the Trump Administration the raising of loud alarm bells of China trying to dispossess Africa through what could be referred to as the debt trap. The consequences of these competing strategies enhance the following: authoritarianism in some key African states; increased jihadism in some regions of Africa as a reaction to the presence of the two major powers on the continent; weapons implicated in state violence and war crimes; and less money available for development as a result of resources being diverted to militarization. The ongoing pandemic will add another dimension to the US - China rivalry as both powers try to project an image of being the most concerned about Africa on as it relates to combating the virus

The violent frontline: space, ethnicity and confronting the state in Edwardian Spitalfields and 1980s Brixton

This article discusses in comparative terms the relationship between space, ethnic identity, subaltern status and anti-state violence in twentieth century London. It does so by comparing two examples in which the control of the state, as represented by the Metropolitan Police, was challenged by minority groups through physical force. It will examine the Spitalfields riots of 1906, which began as strike action by predominantly Jewish bakers and escalated into a general confrontation between the local population and the police, and the Brixton riots of 1981, a response to endemic police harassment of mainly Caribbean youth and long-term economic discrimination in that area of South London. It will begin by dissecting the association of physical metropolitan space with the diasporic ‘other’ in the Edwardian East End and post-consensus South London, and how this ‘othering’ was influenced both by the state and the anti-migrant far right. It will then interrogate the difficult relationship between the Metropolitan Police and Jewish and Caribbean working class communities, and how this deteriorating relationship exploded into in extreme violence in 1906 and 1981. The article will conclude by assessing how the relationships between space, identity and violence influenced long-term national and communal narratives of Jewish and Caribbean interactions with the British state

Globalization, State Failure, and Collective Violence: The Case of Sierra Leone

The focus of this article is the interaction of negative globalization, state failure, and collective violence (and collapse). The relationship between these is analyzed in the context of long term, intermediate, and precipitating factors to propose a conceptual framework. Sierra Leone is utilized as a case study

The Military and Human Rights in a Post-Cold War Africa

In many parts of Africa, dictatorships and the blatant violation of human rights are under challenge by democratic reforms. The potential for a serious conflict between democratic pressures and brutal and selfish militarism abounds in many parts of the continent. The events that have been unfolding in Togo and Zaire since the latter part of 1991 serve as a grim warning that the trend towards democracy and its accompanying emphasis on respect for human rights is not irreversible. The transitional governments or democratic forces may have to deal with a large, powerful, and disgruntled military that perceives itself as losing its exclusive privileges acquired under the old order. This article focuses on how and to what extent human rights observance could be threatened by: (1) the inevitable interaction and clash between political and economic democracy; (2) the tension created between the intersection of domestic African economic policies and external major power requirements; and (3) institutional insecurity emanating from the actual and potential conflicts between entrenched privileges (the desire to protect and enhance corporate interests) enjoyed by the military and the current push for economic and political human rights embedded in the drive towards democracy in Africa