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

Kinetic Theory of a Dilute Gas System under Steady Heat Conduction

The velocity distribution function of the steady-state Boltzmann equation for hard-core molecules in the presence of a temperature gradient has been obtained explicitly to second order in density and the temperature gradient. Some thermodynamical quantities are calculated from the velocity distribution function for hard-core molecules and compared with those for Maxwell molecules and the steady-state Bhatnagar-Gross-Krook(BGK) equation. We have found qualitative differences between hard-core molecules and Maxwell molecules in the thermodynamical quantities, and also confirmed that the steady-state BGK equation belongs to the same universality class as Maxwell molecules.Comment: 36 pages, 4 figures, 5 table

Learning from your investors: can the geographical composition of institutional investors affect the chance of success in international M&A deals?

We produce new evidence on whether management which is keen to make foreign acquisitions can benefit from consultation with information-intensive institutional investors who have expertise in the target foreign markets. This research suggests that, in such instances, management should recognise the benefit of effective two-way communication before embarking on such costly strategies. Consistent with theoretical literature, we propose that this can be explained by the fact that complex valuation information is dispersed among many economic agents and management may only have limited access to such data. This research shows that the likelihood of both cross-border deal completion and medium-term cross-border deal success through time depends upon management learning from and getting the support of key institutional investors with regional (foreign) expertise. The theoretical information economics model presented by Dye and Sridhar in 2002 states that the information flow between management and capital markets should be viewed as two way. This study offers empirical evidence in support of their theory. This study offers insights into the positive effect of establishing a proactive investor relations programme for the recruitment of dedicated foreign institutional investors before embarking on cross-border M&A. The results indicate that management should closely monitor the share register and identify those investors who are transient and those who are, in contrast, dedicated. Attention then needs to be directed to establishing effective communication with the dedicated investors with regional expertise

The Trump foreign policy record and the concept of transformational change

While there has been debate about the extent to which US foreign policy has been transformed since President Trumpfirst took office in 2017, the concept of transformational policy change has not been defined with any degree of precision. The purpose of this article is, primarily, to establish such a definition. It does this by drawing upon a number of the literatures that address domestic policy processes, in particular the work of Karl Polanyi, to suggest that transformational change rests upon paradigmatic shifts, the reconfiguration of interests, large scale institutional re-ordering and changed logics. Application of the definition to the Trump foreign policy leads us to conclude that while the Trump foreign policy owes much to the militant internationalism of the Bush years its understanding of nations and“globalism”and abandonment of a defining moral purpose represent, although incipient, partial and variegated, the beginnings of transformational change

Re-thinking Regionalism: Europe and East Asia in Comparative Historical Perspective

Regionally-based processes of political and economic integration, security cooperation, and even social identification have become increasingly important and prominent parts of the international system. Nowhere have such processes gone further than in Western Europe. Somewhat surprisingly, similar patterns of regional integration have been steadily developing in East Asia - a region many observers consider unlikely to replicate the European experience. What are the factors that encourage regional political cooperation and economic integration? Are there common forces encouraging such outcomes in very different geographical areas and at very different moments in history? This paper uses an historically grounded comparative approach to examine the historical pre-conditions that underpinned the formation of the European Union, and then contrasts them with the situation in East Asia today. While the overall geopolitical and specific national contexts are very different, the East Asian experience may ultimately generate relationships and structures that are more like the European Union's than some of the sceptics imagine

Racial and Imperial Thinking in International Theory and Politics: Truman, Attlee and the Korean War

- Connects the background ideas of race and empire to world politics - Uses case of Truman and Attlee in the Korean War - Argues that liberal-realist internationalists’ assumptions about the US-led post-war order obscure those background ideas and fail to understand the character of the post-war order - Argues liberal-realist internationalism is akin to a legitimating ideology rather than an explanatory theory - Argues that such failings render liberal internationalism inadequate to explain or prescribe ways for the United States/West to manage the ‘rise of the rest’ today This article connects the background ideas of race and empire to world politics by looking at the world views and actions of Truman and Attlee in the Korean War. The article argues that liberal-realist internationalists’ assumptions about the US-led post-war order obscure those background ideas and fail to understand the character of the post-war order. I consider two kinds of ‘background ideas’—policy-makers’ and those embedded in liberal internationalism. Put together, these ideas render liberal-realist internationalism akin to a legitimating ideology rather than an explanatory theory. More broadly, and in the longer run, such failure to comprehend the character of the post-war order, and the roles of race, empire and periphery war in it, renders the theory inadequate to explain or prescribe ways for the United States/West to manage the ‘rise of the rest’ today

When ends Trump means: continuity versus change in US counterterrorism policy

This article utilizes a historical materialist informed framework to analyse change and continuity in US counterterrorism policy. Although Donald Trump’s “America First” discourse conveyed a “new” approach to counterterrorism, in practice his administration has largely reinforced pre-existing tendencies, expanding the military campaigns against ISIS and al-Qaeda. In accordance with America’s longstanding objectives in the global south, which centre on stabilizing existing patterns of capitalist political-economic relations, the US continues to police transnational security challenges “from below”. The article calls for increased sensitivity to the means-ends calculus in American statecraft. It argues that tactical shifts at the policy level (the means) should be situated in relation to historical considerations and the structural and material factors (the ends) that impact US foreign policymaking across presidential administrations

Heterogeneity and Strategic Choices: The Case of Stock Repurchases

Strategic decisions are fundamentally tough choices. Theory suggests that managers are likely to display bounded rationality. Empirics on the other hand assume rationality in choice behavior. Recognizing this inherent disconnect between theory and empirics, we try to account for behavioral biases using a theoretically consistent choice model. The traditional approach to modeling strategic choice has been to use discrete choice models and make inference on the conditional mean effects. We argue that the conditional mean effect does not capture behavioral biases. The focus should be on the conditional variance. Explicitly modeling the conditional variance (in the discrete choice framework) provides us with valuable information on individual level variation in decision-making. We demonstrate the effect of ignoring the role of variance in choice modeling in the context of firm’s decisions to conduct open market repurchases. We show that when taking into account the heterogeneity in choices, manager’s choices of conducting open market repurchases displays considerable heterogeneity and that not accounting for such heterogeneity might lead to wrong conclusions on the mean effects

Bush the transnationalist: a reappraisal of the unilateralist impulse in US foreign policy, 2001-2009

This article challenges the common characterisation of George W. Bush’s foreign policy as “unilateral.” It argues that the Bush administration developed a new post-9/11 understanding of terrorism as a transnational, networked phenomenon shaped by the forces of globalisation. This led to a new strategic emphasis on bi- and multilateral security co-operation and counterterrorism operations, especially outside of Afghanistan and Iraq, driven by the perceived need to counter a transnational security challenge present in multiple locations. This (flawed) attempt to engage with transnational security challenges supplemented the existing internationalist pillar of the Bush administration’s foreign policy. Highlighting the transnational realm of international relations and the ways in which the Bush administration was able to co-opt other states to tackle perceived transnational challenges also shows the high importance the administration attached to concerted action even as it frequented eschewed institutional multilateralism