Reassessing Putin's project : reflections on IR theory and the West

Putin's aim was not to isolate Russia from international society but to challenge the West's claim to define its norms

Nation Branding and Policy transfer: Insights from Norden. EL-CSID Working Paper Issue 2018/22 • October 2018

Recent years have seen an interesting development in practices and policies of nation branding. Alongside an emphasis in which nation branding programmes seek to activate desires of conspicuous consumption in consumers, or to use branded messages to attract investment, there has also been a growing emphasis placed on policy transfer as a part of nation branding strategies. Thus, we see countries emphasising the possibility of exporting (amongst others) their educational, environmental, gender, criminological and even administrative policies, models and approaches. Instead of jealously guarding points of possible competitive advantage the message is instead apparently benevolent, a declaration that such countries may have something to offer that they are willing to share for the greater good. To date, this shift towards the incorporation of policy transfer within nation branding practices has received only limited analysis (e.g. Marsh and Fawcett 2011a; 2011b). Questions that arise, therefore, include: why are countries increasingly shifting their nation branding programmes in this direction? What do they seek to gain by engaging in such exports? And should we take the ostensibly beneficent nature of such practices at face value? The aim of this working paper is therefore to consider what the shift to policy transfer may tell us about the developing politics of nation branding, with particular focus placed on how policy transfer can be seen as a form of branded identity politics that arguably belies its apparently benevolent intentions by reaffirming hierarchical geopolitical imaginaries that remain premised on a politics of leveraging perceived competitive advantage. However, while the paper indicates why such a shift in nation branding strategies may be attractive, it also considers the potential pitfalls and limitations of such an approach. The working paper first discusses the shift towards nation branding through policy transfer at a general level, before ending with a discussion that draws on examples from Norden – the countries of which frequently populate the upper echelons of numerous nation branding and benchmarking indices, which have historically presented themselves as a model for export, and which, following an extended period of post-Cold War identity crisis and doubt, have more recently rediscovered a sense of self-confidence and self-identity, not least manifest in a resurrection of ideas of Nordic knowledge exports and policy transfer that re-instantiates more historical notions of Nordic exceptionalism

Estimating Intertemporal Allocation Parameters using Synthetic Residual Estimation

We present a novel structural estimation procedure for models of intertemporal allocation. This is based on modelling expectation errors directly; we refer to it as Synthetic Residual Estimation (SRE). The flexibility of SRE allows us to account for measurement error in consumption and for heterogeneity in discount factors and coefficients of relative risk aversion. An investigation of the small sample properties of the SRE estimator indicates that it dominates GMM estimation of both exact and approximate Euler equations in the case when we have short panels with noisy consumption data. We apply SRE to two panels drawn from the PSID and estimate the joint distribution of the discount factor and the coefficient of relative risk aversion. We reject strongly homogeneity of the discount factors and the coefficient of relative risk aversion. We find that, on average, the more educated are more patient and more risk averse than the less educated. Within education strata, patience and risk aversion are negatively correlated

From fratricide to security community : re-theorising difference in the constitution of Nordic peace

This article utilises a revisionist account of the emergence of Nordic peace in the 19th century to open up space for rethinking and re-theorising the constitutive dynamics underlying security communities. While the Nordic case is often considered a prime example of a security community the article argues it did not emerge in the way usually claimed. First, security did not figure as a key constitutive argument as assumed by traditional security community theorising; second, togetherness did not emerge because of difference being traded for enhanced similarity. In fact, security was side-lined and difference re-interpreted rather than erased in forging ontologically safe identities

Inhomogeneous quadratic congruences

We investigate the density of integer solutions to certain binary inhomogeneous quadratic congruences and use this information to detect almost primes on a singular del Pezzo surface of degree 6.Comment: 24 page

Averages of shifted convolutions of d3(n)d_3(n)

We investigate the first and second moments of shifted convolutions of the generalised divisor function $d_3(n)$.Comment: 22 page

Nation branding and development : poverty panacea or business as usual?

According to nation branding consultants, problems of underdevelopment and global inequality are, to a significant extent, a product of the negative images peddled by charities and the broader development industry. While such images secure donations, it is argued they deter more sustainable investments. In contrast, consultants argue that concerted nation-branding strategies offer much better solutions to problems of underdevelopment. This article subjects such claims to critical examination and argues that while the diagnosis of the problem may have some merit, the solution offered is more problematic. This is because nation-branding practices are inherently status quo oriented and reflective of a neoliberal understanding of the nature of (under)development. Moreover, nation branding also entails a troubling commodification of identity and culture as well as unsettling implications in respect of extant understandings of ‘good governance’. Finally, the article suggests that the dichotomy drawn between aid and nation branding cannot be upheld; rather, it is a device used to legitimise a market for the services of nation-branding consultants

Nation branding and policy transfer : insights from Norden

Recent years have seen an interesting development in practices and policies of nation branding. Alongside an emphasis in which nation branding programmes seek to activate desires of conspicuous consumption in consumers, or to use branded messages to attract investment, there has also been a growing emphasis placed on policy transfer as a part of nation branding strategies. To date, this shift towards the incorporation of policy transfer within nation branding practices had received only limited analysis. Questions that arise, therefore, include: why are countries increasingly shifting their nation branding programmes in this direction? What do they seek to gain by engaging in such exports? And should we take the ostensibly beneficent nature of such practices at face value? The aim of this working paper is therefore to consider what the shift to policy transfer may tell us about the developing politics of nation branding

The construction and deconstruction of the EU’s neighbourhood

The chapter argues that the ENP has functioned as a mechanism of geopolitical ordering for how the EU approaches the areas immediately beyond its borders. It is, however, one premised on a particular mindscape or geospatial vision that infuses the ENP with an imperial impulse. Despite this, the chapter argues that the EU’s ability to order the neighbourhood is limited by the actions and preferences of partner countries and other neighbours whose constitutive capabilities should not be discounted. One consequence is that the geospatial construction of the neighbourhood and the construction of the EU more generally are mutually imbricated