Experimentation and innovation in police reform: Timor-Leste, Solomon Islands and Bougainville

The plural character of policing provision in most countries is now widely acknowledged, though rarely reflected in the practical police reform programming undertaken by donors. While much of the literature on international police assistance focuses on its modest results and innate limitations, less attention has been paid to those still relatively rare programmes that have sought to engage with the local realities of plural policing. This is particularly so in the conflict-affected and fragile settings where such assistance is typically provided. In this article, we present three case studies of policing innovation and experimentation from Timor-Leste, Solomon Islands and Bougainville, respectively, set in the context of the recent and very different post-conflict interventions in each place. While not wishing to overstate the impact of these modest programmes, we highlight their potential contribution to fostering productive relations across the multiple social orders and sources of authority found in many post-colonial, post-conflict and otherwise fragile contexts. We tentatively conclude that the most significant contribution of these kinds of initiative is likely to lie beyond the realm of institutionalised policing and, specifically, in relation to larger processes of social and political change, including state formation, under way in these places

Right-Financing Security Sector Reform

Security sector reform (SSR) in post-conflict environments encompasses a broad range of efforts to improve capacity, governance, performance, and sustainability. The fiscal implications of SSR decisions often are neglected, however. The negative consequences of this neglect include unsustainable reforms, the squeezing out of other vital sectors, and ultimately under-provision of security itself. This paper argues for a “right-financing” approach to SSR that strikes an appropriate balance between current needs and the goal of building a fiscally sustainable security sector. The paper offers four policy proposals: first, build fiscal dimensions of the security sector into peace agreements, post-conflict needs assessments, development strategies, and expenditure planning; second, align short-run policies with long-term budgetary realities; third, move to a “service-delivery” model based on provision of law-and-order and justice services to the citizens; and finally, strengthen international capacities to support these right-financing policies.Security sector reform; fiscal sustainability; service delivery

Influences and echoes of Indonesia in Timor-Leste

This paper presents four case studies that highlight how Indonesia and Timor-Leste remain intricately entwined at the social, political, cultural and personal levels. Abstract Since 1999, when a United Nations (UN) transitional administration was established in the wake of the East Timorese vote for independence from Indonesia, the case of Timor-Leste has been a relative mainstay in research and policy debates on post-conflict reconstruction. Timor- Leste is often characterised by scholars as a ‘postconflict’ country and, as a consequence, compared to other countries that have recently emerged from political strife. While this focus is understandable, it has also meant that surprisingly little scholarly attention has focused on the connections, points of similarity and interrelations between Timor- Leste and its near neighbour and former occupier Indonesia. Only recently have researchers begun to explore the multiple dimensions of Timor-Leste/ Indonesian relations and unpack the relationship across a range of disciplines

More Than Just Policing: Police Reform in Post-conflict Bougainville

This brief summarises the findings of an independent evaluation of the Bougainville Community Policing Project (BCPP), which was conducted in late 2012 on behalf of the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade.1 Broadly speaking, the BCPP has two elements, which provide advisory support to the Autonomous Region of Bougainville's two separate but linked policing organisations: the Bougainville Police Service (BPS) and the Community Auxiliary Police (CAP). The BPS consists of approximately 200 officers based in the three urban centres (Buka, Arawa, and Buin) and, sitting under it, are nearly 350 members of the CAP, based in their own communities throughout rural Bougainville.AusAI

Police Development in Papua New Guinea: The Need for Innovation

Since the late 1980s, a succession of Australian-funded programs has sought to strengthen the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary (RPNGC). The results of these efforts have, to say the least, been extremely modest. This article critically examines the underlying approach to donor assistance to the RPNGC, arguing, among other things, that it has failed to engage with the realities of normative and regulatory pluralism in Papua New Guinea’s famously diverse social landscape. More fulsome acknowledgement of these plural realities, and the adoption of more innovative approaches to internal security provision that can harness and better align the strengths of different providers is likely to yield better results than a continuing reliance on state police alone

Police Development in Papua New Guinea: The Need for More Innovation

Since the late 1980s, a succession of Australianfunded programs has sought to strengthen the Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary (RPNGC). Australia is now on its ninth discrete police development program in the past 25 years. The latest program — known as the Papua New Guinea – Australia Policing Partnership Phase IV — sees 50 Australian Federal Police deployed to Port Moresby and Lae, providing advisory support to the RPNGC. The initiative forms part of the deal on asylum seeker processing concluded by the prime ministers of Australia and Papua New Guinea, Kevin Rudd and Peter O'Neill, on the eve of the 2013 Australian election.AusAI

The links between security sector reform and development

Executive summary: This paper explores the relationship between security and development, with a focus on how different types of violence inhibit development in fragile and conflict-affected states. This paper is based upon a comprehensive literature review of separate pieces of research including academic studies, datasets and policy analysis. It explores statistics and figures that illustrate the barriers that insecurity poses to achieving development outcomes in fragile and conflict-afflicted states. It also examines these dynamics in detail in four countries: Afghanistan, Solomon Islands, South Sudan and Timor-Leste. The assignment was not to come up with policy recommendations per se; rather it was to present a comprehensive synopsis of how different types of violence shackles and inhibits development in fragile and conflict-affected states. The research team believes that the material presented will be of use to inform policy debate and development, including in the field of security sector reform. The analysis is contextualised by focusing on three types of violence: political, criminal and interpersonal. The barriers these different types of violence pose to development is presented throughout the report, and embedded in the country case studies. The statistics uncovered in the course of the project are stark and unnerving. These statistics, among others, are used to highlight the barriers that different types of violence pose to development. It is not only the financial cost, but also the broader institutional and social costs that generate a series of barriers for meaningful development. Through synthesising these statistics, this paper contributes to the understandings of the links between security and development, paving way for policy recommendations and lines of action for Australia and development practitioners

Transnational Crime in the Pacific - A Conversation Starter

This In Brief draws out some of the key themes raised during a recent policy workshop on transnational crime, hosted by the School of International, Political and Strategic Studies and facilitated by the State, Society and Governance in Melanesia Program, the Australian National University. Convened by Senator Brett Mason, Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs, the workshop on 12 May 2014 brought together government officials, practitioners and academics to discuss a longstanding area of policy concern in Australia and the region.AusAI

Resonantly enhanced second-harmonic generation using III-V semiconductor all-dielectric metasurfaces

Nonlinear optical phenomena in nanostructured materials have been challenging our perceptions of nonlinear optical processes that have been explored since the invention of lasers. For example, the ability to control optical field confinement, enhancement, and scattering almost independently, allows nonlinear frequency conversion efficiencies to be enhanced by many orders of magnitude compared to bulk materials. Also, the subwavelength length scale renders phase matching issues irrelevant. Compared with plasmonic nanostructures, dielectric resonator metamaterials show great promise for enhanced nonlinear optical processes due to their larger mode volumes. Here, we present, for the first time, resonantly enhanced second-harmonic generation (SHG) using Gallium Arsenide (GaAs) based dielectric metasurfaces. Using arrays of cylindrical resonators we observe SHG enhancement factors as large as 104 relative to unpatterned GaAs. At the magnetic dipole resonance we measure an absolute nonlinear conversion efficiency of ~2X10^(-5) with ~3.4 GW/cm2 pump intensity. The polarization properties of the SHG reveal that both bulk and surface nonlinearities play important roles in the observed nonlinear process