The foreign aid system: Regime or hegemonic vehicle?

Establecido inicialmente para remediar los problemas de control del poder en Occidente durante la época de la Guerra Fría, el sistema de ayuda extranjera parecía cobrar los tintes de un régimen internacional, y por ello sujeto a interpretación según la teoría de regímenes en los estudios de economía política internacional. Este artículo cuestiona la relevancia de esa teoría para explicar el sistema de ayuda actual en base a los objetivos geopolíticos, mercantiles y de seguridad para los que ha sido establecido por los gobiernos occidentales, concretamente el gobierno de Estados Unidos como poder hegemónico. A través de la perspectiva de la economía política internacional, y más concretamente de las versiones sociológicas de constructivismo y del trabajo reciente sobre las políticas mundiales desnacionalizadas, se puede obtener una visión más clara y exhaustiva de las funciones en evolución del sistema de ayuda. Este artículo analiza brevemente algunos de los enfoques más prometedoresEstablished originally to help remedy Western powers’ problems of control in the Cold War era, the foreign aid system would seem to qualify as an international regime, and thus open to interpretation according to regime theory in international political economy studies. This article questions that theory’s relevance for explaining today’s aid system, in light of the geopolitical, mercantile and security purposes to which it has been put by Western governments, especially the United States as hegemonic power. Clearer and more comprehensive insights into the aid system’s evolving roles can be gained through international political economy approaches, especially sociologicallyinformed versions of constructivism and recent work on de-nationalized global politics. This article briefly discusses some of the more promising approache

Angola 'failed' Yet 'successful'

The analysis seeks to respond to key questions about Angola posed in the project's guiding purposes and methodology. These appear in three clusters: 1. What are the historical taproots of conflict in Angola, and of its weak uneven state and political institutions? 2. What formal and informal forces and incentives are at work in Angola's territorial political economy that affect state and political resilience or weakness? 3. What aspects of the integration of Angola's political economy into international systems may help explain the persistence of weak state and political institutions

Civil Society Studies: Two Compendia Compared

This review of two substantial collections concludes as follows: The International Encyclopedia of Civil Society is a massive set of programme notes about the game, profiles of some teams, playing grounds and major figures on-field and off. It covers some fine points of the game as played in the well-paid professional leagues, especially in the United States. Some of its nuggets of information are of good quality. But the peculiar logic of its design and selection of topics, the mixed quality of writing and editing, and the lack of user-friendliness set limits to its overall usefulness for scholars and practitioners. For any book priced at more than 800 Euros, one could reasonably expect a higher standard. The International Encyclopedia offers uneven, and generally mediocre value for (a lot of) money. By contrast, The Oxford Handbook of Civil Society, offers a range of deep-going interpretations of what is at stake in the game, how its rules have been influenced by powerful interests, and how the playing fields have been confined and made anything but level. In the rigour of the research underpinning a good number of chapters and in the clarity of contrasting arguments, the Handbook offers depth and coherence accessible to both newcomers and specialists. With its substantial essays probing politics and social life, the Handbook is sure to become a significant point of reference as research and debate in civil society studies continue

Global well-posedness of the 3-D full water wave problem

We consider the problem of global in time existence and uniqueness of solutions of the 3-D infinite depth full water wave problem. We show that the nature of the nonlinearity of the water wave equation is essentially of cubic and higher orders. For any initial interface that is sufficiently small in its steepness and velocity, we show that there exists a unique smooth solution of the full water wave problem for all time, and the solution decays at the rate $1/t$.Comment: 60 page

Papering Over the Gap. Dutch Policy and Post-Independence Fragility in Angola, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique

How does one of globalisation’s winners relate to some of its losers? For decades the Netherlands has proclaimed its commitment to peace, security, equitable growth and decent governance in Angola, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique. But it is also committed to serving such objectives as interpreted by other powerful interests, not least being global enterprise and international financial institutions. Global relations affecting these three battered and still crippled states illustrate tendencies whereby the Dutch, among other rich countries, continue papering over the gaps between policy and practice, aims and outcomes

Civic Space: Shrinking from the outside in?

Restrictions on NGOs and others promoting civil liberties have caused alarm about «shrinking civic space» perpetrated by their domestic regimes. Yet because most camps in the world’s civil societies are left unmolested (indeed many are growing) and because non-domestic sources of constraint often play decisive roles, there are reasons to re-think the issues and ask how, and for whom, civil spaces are shaped. This exploratory article draws attention to forces set in motion from central, transnational levels that affect civic spaces: securitization; constraints on organized labour; marketization; transnational non-state actors; citizen disengagement driven by state retrenchment; and social media. As problematized in most policy, activist and scholarly writings, outside forces affecting civic space for emancipatory camps are often ignored, despite their being more susceptible to counteraction from outside than are repressive regimes. These issues await deeper investigation and discussion.Las restricciones a las ONG y otras entidades que promueven las libertades civiles han causa-do alarma sobre el «espacio cívico cada vez más reducido» establecido en sus regímenes internos. Sin embargo, debido a que la mayoría de los campamentos en las sociedades civiles del mundo no son molestados (de hecho, muchos están creciendo) y debido a que las fuentes de restricción no domésticas a menudo desempeñan un papel decisivo, existen razones para repensar los problemas y preguntar cómo y para quién los espacios civiles adquieren forma. En este artículo exploratorio, se llama la atención sobre las fuerzas puestas en movimiento desde los niveles centrales y trans-nacionales que afectan a los espacios cívicos: la titulización, las limitaciones al trabajo organizado, la comercialización de actores transnacionales no estatales, la desvinculación ciudadana impulsa-da por la reducción del Estado y las redes sociales. Como se ha problematizado en la mayoría de los escritos políticos, activistas y académicos, las fuerzas externas que afectan al espacio cívico para los campamentos de emancipación a menudo se ignoran, a pesar de que resultan más susceptibles a la contrarrestación externa que los regímenes represivos. Estas cuestiones esperan una investigación y discusión más profundas