STATE FRAGILITY, THE PEACEBUILDER'S CONTRACT, AND THE SEARCH FOR THE LEAST BAD STATE

This paper develops two claims that follow from two general conclusions from recent re-search on peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction. The first is that international peacebuilders are fairly good at ending violence and at producing stability, but are less talented at creating liberal states. In order to understand why, Section I develops the concept of the "peacebuilders' contract", which is intended to map the kinds of strategic interactions that are likely to unfold between peacebuilders and local élites and capture why these interactions are likely to favour the status quo preferred by local forces. Fol-lowing on the general recognition that international peacebuilders are limited in what they can produce, the second conclusion concerns the need for peacebuilders to be more strategic in their thinking and to be satisfied with producing small victories that can sup-port the emergence of decent governments which provide the foundations for future movements towards a positive peace. These observations and their implications are ap-plicable not only to post-war interventions, but also to the broader international agenda of fixing states.peacebuilding; failed states; postconflict administration

Accommodating migration to promote adaptation to climate change

This paper explains how climate change may increase future migration, and which risks are associated with such migration. It also examines how some of this migration may enhance the capacity of communities to adapt to climate change. Climate change is likely to result in some increase above baseline rates of migration in the next 40 years. Most of this migration will occur within developing countries. There is little reason to think that such migration will increase the risk of violent conflict. Not all movements in response to climate change will have negative outcomes for the people that move, or the places they come from and go to. Migration, a proven development strategy, can increase the capacity of communities to adapt to climate change. The fewer choices people have about moving, however, the less likely it is that the outcomes of that movement will be positive. Involuntary resettlement should be a last resort. Many of the most dire risks arising from climate-motivated migration can be avoided through careful policy. Policy responses to minimize the risks associated with migration in response to climate change, and to maximize migration’s contribution to adaptive capacity include: ensuring that migrants have the same rights and opportunities as host communities; reducing the costs of moving money and people between areas of origin and destination; facilitating mutual understanding among migrants and host communities; clarifying property rights where they are contested; ensuring that efforts to assist migrants include host communities; and strengthening regional and international emergency response systems.Population Policies,Climate Change Mitigation and Green House Gases,Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Climate Change Economics,Voluntary and Involuntary Resettlement

Shipboard Crisis Management: A Case Study.

The loss of the "Green Lily" in 1997 is used as a case study to highlight the characteristics of escalating crises. As in similar safety critical industries, these situations are unpredictable events that may require co-ordinated but flexible and creative responses from individuals and teams working in stressful conditions. Fundamental skill requirements for crisis management are situational awareness and decision making. This paper reviews the naturalistic decision making (NDM) model for insights into the nature of these skills and considers the optimal training regimes to cultivate them. The paper concludes with a review of the issues regarding the assessment of crisis management skills and current research into the determination of behavioural markers for measuring competence

Squarks in Tevatron Dilepton Events ?

We consider unusual events in the CDF and D0 dilepton+jets sample with very high ET(lepton) and ET(missing). It is possible, but very unlikely, that these events originate from top quark pair production; however, they have characteristics that are better accounted for by decays of supersymmetric quarks with mass in the region of 300 GeV.Comment: 5 pages, 2 postscript (eps) figures, uses sprocl.sty (included

Authority, intervention, and the outer limits of international relations theory

Actualmente, las ciencias sociales y las humanidades están plagadas de diversos conceptos, locuciones, léxicos, modismos y eslóganes que pretenden reformular la manera en que los académicos reflexionan sobre lo “global” y su relación con lo “local” —ámbito que ha sido igualmente reconceptualizado—. La utilidad de estos conceptos y marcos no reside en su capacidad de representarlo todo para el conjunto de los académicos, sino en que permiten destacar las nuevas estructuras emergentes en la política global, realzar la manera en que dichas estructuras son creadas y en qué sentido son responsables de las nuevas redes de actores, así como subrayar el desarrollo de nuevos discursos y prácticas que rompen y engranan lo local y lo global. Este texto analiza la tendencia en la teoría de las Relaciones Internacionales a conjugar estado, autoridad y territorio. En la medida en que esta unión dificulta la comprensión de la complejidad de las relaciones y de los procesos globales, es necesario prestar atención a las contribuciones recientes que disocian dichos conceptos y que generan nuevas formas de comprender la organización y la práctica de la política global, y analizar especialmente el concepto de autoridadThe social sciences and the humanities are presently littered with various concepts, phrases, vocabularies, idioms, and slogans that are intended to resituate how scholars think about the “global” and its relationship to a reconceptualized “local”. The utility of these concepts and frameworks is to be found not in their ability to be all things to all scholars, but rather in their capacity to highlight newly emergent structures in global politics, how those structures are created by and are responsible for new networks of actors, and the development of new discourses and practices that collapse and telescope the local and the global. This text explores the tendency of International Relations to collapse state, authority and territory. As far as that bundling makes it more difficult to understand complex global relationships and processes, it is necessary to pay attention to the recent contributions that unbundle these concepts generating new insights into the organization and practice of global politics, and specially to analyze the authority concept

Can Residential Build to Rent provide a profitable low risk investment option?

Purpose : Recently there has been a refocusing on the yields of investment assets. Accordingly, as risks to income yields rise, this research investigates how residential Build to Rent (BtR) may provide an effectively diversified portfolio. Emergence of this new investment sector requires a comparison between the rate of return of (BtR) and other asset classes. We seek to ascertain how BtR can be used by investors to reduce risk and provide diversification benefits within a mixedasset portfolio. Methodology:The research methodology adopted utilised secondary data produced by a reputable research organisation, coupled with personal interviews with major participants within the BtR sector. Findings: Diversification of assets within an investment portfolio reduces the total risk and volatility of an investment portfolio based upon the Markowitz (1952) Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) model. Analysis of BtR performance against other traditional asset classes including traditional investment property, proved BtR a valuable inclusion, reducing risk and providing valuable returns. Discussion:Limited UK based research material on BtR as an investment option for institutions (and individuals), indicates its relatively short history as an investment option. Accordingly, some reliance was placed upon traditional private residential rental data. Despite this, the BtR investment asset in a mixed asset portfolio proved a source of l

Risk Management training: the development of simulator-based scenarios from the analysis of recent maritime accidents.

This paper reviews several case studies to highlight some of the current risk management issues raised by recent maritime casualties. It provides an overview of how these issues have led to research-led developments in simulator-based maritime risk management training and assessment. One development is the design of effective training courses through a better understanding of the nature of the skill requirements