NPR: Bonnie Bassler, bacterial communities
NPR: Hinckley Family
CARE program (Computer Assembly Re-furbishment and Enhancement)
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Friday, November 30, 2007
Twin Oaks Community
I don't think I ever posted a link to Twin Oaks Intentional Community. I think all of you might find it interesting, and there is a 3 week visitor program (I intially did that just out of curiosity, then stayed for the summer). It's been great during this course to have had this experience to tie a lot of the ideas to.
It was initially begun to simulate Walden 2, BF Skinner's book, but as it's a true democracy, its goals and workings have changed very organically over time. I could do a whole update about the community, and how much it represents the ideals of things (resilience especially comes to mind) that have come up repeatedly during the course. If I can remember enough things about the place, I will do a more full update, but I really encourage you to visit the link. It's what got me interested in all of the forms of shared housing (co-op, cohousing) that I have incorporated into my life plans.
It was initially begun to simulate Walden 2, BF Skinner's book, but as it's a true democracy, its goals and workings have changed very organically over time. I could do a whole update about the community, and how much it represents the ideals of things (resilience especially comes to mind) that have come up repeatedly during the course. If I can remember enough things about the place, I will do a more full update, but I really encourage you to visit the link. It's what got me interested in all of the forms of shared housing (co-op, cohousing) that I have incorporated into my life plans.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
Photographs from the Edible Schoolyard, New Orleans, main campus
It turns out I chose a great weekend to visit the Edible Schoolyard. This Saturday was their first "open garden" open to the school's parents, the neigborhood, and anyong who wanted to come. I went on a tour with the school chef.
The school is a charter school, K-8, opened last year (though the building had been a school for at least 50 years). They apparently have a second, smaller campus now, with 45 students, but I didn't see that one. Those are the basics.
The not-so-basics is that the majority of the school's lesson plans are based around food and gardening, with an emphasis on outdoor activities and classes. It really brought me back to my own experiences and memories of childhood at a New Orleans public school. By far, my most vivid memories are from lunchtime (not recess), field trips, and when we got to have class outside. (Also, one time that I stacked some books for my teacher really efficiently, but that doesn't apply here.) All of those things are all day every day at this school! If they can really manage to work in a regular curriculum on top of it, these kids are definitely going to be much more engaged than the average schoolchild.
Further thoughts that my visit engendered as photo captions below:
Most of the gardens are of edible foods. This is the herb garden, which was the first thing I saw upon entering. Apparently during the first year, before they were able to get much of the land workable, the kids asked if they could just start some raised gardens, and this was one of the pods that were completely student-initiated. That giant palm-looking plant in the back is lemongrass! My parents have one at their house, and they'd begun to doubt that lemongrass really got that big.
During the tour, which was mainly outside of the building, she mentioned that while there is tons of rennovations to be done inside and out, the priority for the school is rennovating the outside of the building first. First, obviously, because of the focus of the school on gardening. But before taking this course, I still would have found the painted external walls (like above) a little bit superficial. Now I recognize, and so does the school, how important the veneer is. The window frames are crumbling away, and the panes are nearly opaque with dust. But it's not depressing when all around it is a green and vibrant garden.
Another thought I had as I relived some of my own schooldays--how many recess playgrounds are just blacktop? Like melts-in-the-summer, burns-your-feet-through-your-rubber-soles blacktop? My sense is most urban ones anyway. How will kids ever appreciate unpaved earth if that's all they know, if that chemical tar smell is associated with the fun of recess? An ESY summer project was to replace the blacktop section with a brick courtyard, with spots for shade trees throughout. Again, even though I hadn't seen the original blacktop, I was amazed at how drastically the renovation must have improved the look and feel of the area.
My mom, who lives in the neighborhood, even noted how spruced up the neighborhood around had begun to look. Whereas most people don't really want to live near a school, this one seems to be a potential central point for the surrounding community.
They have plans to involved the surrounding community more. This open garden I attended was the first, but it will become a monthly tradition. They will also eventually participate in a nearby farmer's market with some of the kids. Since it's a charter school, anyone can attend it, but as they are getting better established, more kids from the nearby area have begun to attend this year.
Hmm...that photo ended up looking more like a prison yard than I intended. But I wanted to show a volunteer working in the garden alongside how urban the surrounding area is. During the tour, our guide said 98% of the students lived under the poverty line(!).
This is a vegetable garden. The guide pointed out that one grade planted it and the next class had to carry it out. This teaches an important lesson in patience and long-term investment in a project. But students would also learn the lesson that there is value in creating something even if you yourself can't use it. They in turn probably inherit projects that the class ahead of them started.
To me, the garden of plants not edible (to humans, anyway) has clear implications in teaching about ecology. And by extension, using Capra's analogy, communities. They can learn that pragmatism, with its focus on results and actions, does not have to be a focus on immediate results. There is both an aesthetic and critical importance to having certain insects in a garden.
___
Lastly, although I didn't get a picture to illustrate it, my favorite example of one of the community-building tools was for consensus. The faculty does aim to involve the kids in all aspects of the decision making, and while consensus would be particularly hard in a K-8 setting, there is at least some attempt at it. The scarecrow-making process tried to acommodate everyone's preferences. That's how they ended up with a policeman-scarecrow (with cheetah legs and a panther tail), and a soldier-scarecrow (holding a child, and with a clown's head). Scary...
The school is a charter school, K-8, opened last year (though the building had been a school for at least 50 years). They apparently have a second, smaller campus now, with 45 students, but I didn't see that one. Those are the basics.
The not-so-basics is that the majority of the school's lesson plans are based around food and gardening, with an emphasis on outdoor activities and classes. It really brought me back to my own experiences and memories of childhood at a New Orleans public school. By far, my most vivid memories are from lunchtime (not recess), field trips, and when we got to have class outside. (Also, one time that I stacked some books for my teacher really efficiently, but that doesn't apply here.) All of those things are all day every day at this school! If they can really manage to work in a regular curriculum on top of it, these kids are definitely going to be much more engaged than the average schoolchild.
Further thoughts that my visit engendered as photo captions below:
Most of the gardens are of edible foods. This is the herb garden, which was the first thing I saw upon entering. Apparently during the first year, before they were able to get much of the land workable, the kids asked if they could just start some raised gardens, and this was one of the pods that were completely student-initiated. That giant palm-looking plant in the back is lemongrass! My parents have one at their house, and they'd begun to doubt that lemongrass really got that big.
During the tour, which was mainly outside of the building, she mentioned that while there is tons of rennovations to be done inside and out, the priority for the school is rennovating the outside of the building first. First, obviously, because of the focus of the school on gardening. But before taking this course, I still would have found the painted external walls (like above) a little bit superficial. Now I recognize, and so does the school, how important the veneer is. The window frames are crumbling away, and the panes are nearly opaque with dust. But it's not depressing when all around it is a green and vibrant garden.
Another thought I had as I relived some of my own schooldays--how many recess playgrounds are just blacktop? Like melts-in-the-summer, burns-your-feet-through-your-rubber-soles blacktop? My sense is most urban ones anyway. How will kids ever appreciate unpaved earth if that's all they know, if that chemical tar smell is associated with the fun of recess? An ESY summer project was to replace the blacktop section with a brick courtyard, with spots for shade trees throughout. Again, even though I hadn't seen the original blacktop, I was amazed at how drastically the renovation must have improved the look and feel of the area.
My mom, who lives in the neighborhood, even noted how spruced up the neighborhood around had begun to look. Whereas most people don't really want to live near a school, this one seems to be a potential central point for the surrounding community.
They have plans to involved the surrounding community more. This open garden I attended was the first, but it will become a monthly tradition. They will also eventually participate in a nearby farmer's market with some of the kids. Since it's a charter school, anyone can attend it, but as they are getting better established, more kids from the nearby area have begun to attend this year.
Hmm...that photo ended up looking more like a prison yard than I intended. But I wanted to show a volunteer working in the garden alongside how urban the surrounding area is. During the tour, our guide said 98% of the students lived under the poverty line(!).
This is a vegetable garden. The guide pointed out that one grade planted it and the next class had to carry it out. This teaches an important lesson in patience and long-term investment in a project. But students would also learn the lesson that there is value in creating something even if you yourself can't use it. They in turn probably inherit projects that the class ahead of them started.
To me, the garden of plants not edible (to humans, anyway) has clear implications in teaching about ecology. And by extension, using Capra's analogy, communities. They can learn that pragmatism, with its focus on results and actions, does not have to be a focus on immediate results. There is both an aesthetic and critical importance to having certain insects in a garden.
___
Lastly, although I didn't get a picture to illustrate it, my favorite example of one of the community-building tools was for consensus. The faculty does aim to involve the kids in all aspects of the decision making, and while consensus would be particularly hard in a K-8 setting, there is at least some attempt at it. The scarecrow-making process tried to acommodate everyone's preferences. That's how they ended up with a policeman-scarecrow (with cheetah legs and a panther tail), and a soldier-scarecrow (holding a child, and with a clown's head). Scary...
from the drive
On the drive to New Orleans, I was listening to Stephen Covey's lectures of the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I'd listened to it before, after getting over the impression that it was aimed at go-getter businessperson types. But re-listening to some of them in the car, I was struck with how so many of his ideas have the same goals of asset-building and highlight building social capital to realize a lot more goals than you can as individuals. If I had a print version of the book, it would be easier to reference, but the in a broad sense, the way he defines "habits" is the sustainability. It's the underying assets that you need in order to continually use without depleting. And his definition of "effective" could be interpreted as developing. Anyway, just part of the long drive...nothing I could use in a paper, just interesting how many places I've been seeing the same ideas, at their very basic, since starting this semester.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
The levels of analysis for your paper, using communities/liberal democracy as example:
Micro-level
Theoretical approaches to civil society, notions of citizenship [book: Civil Society]. Connection/relation of individual to the group.
Philosophy as a religion, belief system based on faith. Broader philosophy informs expectations at both levels. This will inform what you believe about liberal democracies and why you think it is (or isn’t) superior)
Mid-level
Example: citizenry in a liberal democracy (in the sense of valuing the individuals). Look at liberal democracy, start pulling out individual ideas. What’s the relationship between liberal democracies and how we in the US work? In terms of social institutions (e.g. government, market for ordering and setting framework of relationship between individuals and group). Three regulating entities in US liberal democracy—state/government, market/capitalism, civil society/community. Looking at the different philosophies of how these regulate, and how they regulate specifically to us. One obvious idea: individual as the unit of value. So our rules/regulations try to capture that.
EG: Bill of Rights and Constitution. (Side note: Some same concepts similar in all modern societies; difference may be in how they are instituted versus where you’re studying, in this case, the US. Think compared to the USSR, which also valued the individual in theory).
Micro-Level
Looking at the key practical questions when differentiating between modern societies.
Example of key terms/working definition: “Individual.” How is this conception embodied in the institutions?
Key ideas: Find normal standards, both ideal and in practice. Context is important (time period an important part context, as someone brought up the fact that the ideas of equality in the constitution were penned at a time when slavery was the norm)...
Constitution: open to interpretation. It specifies process, guilt-in standards about debate, discussion, making a collective decision of some kind.
How do you sharpen your focus?
Be able to move comfortably between narrow focus and abstract theoretical level. Start with your own clear definition of community=further from geographical boundary, think longer term sustainability. So, place and process important. Then think: what are the factors of success that make a difference. Rank these factors and variables as more or less important by your own or others’ standards. More key terms: Sustainability, capacity, resilience.
Ways to search for literature
Some terminology: community, community development, community organizing, social capital, community competence, empowerment. Keep in mind different aspects of these terms when reading literature.
EG: LR’s definition somewhat place-bound, also captures community-building, which is a particular process beyond simple growth. At macro view, what are you looking for? Involve people in decisions that affect their lives. So, some faith in ability of people to come together and solve their own problems. How is the capacity used for change and restructure?
Measuring success of community-building: impact on place, individual, process. So, moving in directions of practical questions…individuals: e.g. Resources, what do they feel, value, believe? Not always able to capture individuals’ talent to create collective community. [Discussion of Austin vs. Temple’s merits].
Allegiance and commitment—trust in the process, even if a given decision not consistent with what I want. Reciprocity—if that process works more likely to participate. Process dimension—what can you look at described as variables, speaking to this trust people place. Characteristics of community, community building process and of organizer/catalyst/activist—the person mindful of what’s necessary for the other two things to happen.
Things to think about in each of these three areas:
Community characteristics: Involves some conceptualization of what a health community looks like, “should” be. How or were where is the community? (Generally, and around a specific issue.) [Jefferson(?) insisted on an informed citizenry). Awareness, motivation. Is there a geographic dimension? Do people identify with the place, organization? Get sense of existing cohesion? If so, around what? Indication of existing capacity to adapt, respond? Assess whether there are already mechanisms in place for members to come together and discuss? Issue of leadership. Is there any? What is its nature? How did it emerge? Any track record in terms of solving problems? In part, LR’s same idea as building community.
Process of building community characteristics: Gauge degree of participation. Ideally, you want widespread participation, having the means (procedure-wise) to participate. Interactions between organizations, individuals in community, need good communications system in place. Faith in process, seeing value as individual in being part of the community. No use substituting other’s judgment for the common people (elite). People can decide without entire technical knowledge. Institutions allow people to come together to make important decisions (schools, universities, activist groups). Are there processes in place that allow leaders to emerge or to be identified? Are there things in community allowing to practice leading? E.g... Over-supervised children’s play not always helpful.
Activist’s characteristics: Do they understand the community? How decisions do or don’t get made? Can you determine the commitment of other catalysts? An element of trust between individual and community at large? Community builder experienced? How? How relevant? Are they eligible, adaptable, patient?
Remember the key areas at the micro levels, and the practical questions you would ask to assess them? In research, think more “what are my research questions” what are hypotheses? What are variables that capture the research questions? How can I asses/observe these variables?
Faith/believe vs. reason/logic (i.e. “Truth”) are they mutually exclusive? Some argue science only way. Or, possible common-sense, experience. Experienceàthis leads to “truth,” what work in the sense of keeping you moving. Keeping improving the human condition as that definition continues to evolve. Learning by doing vs. studying not mutually exclusive.
“Third Places”—gathering places; bowling alleys, bars, churches.
Next week: reading for summit; more on East Austin.
Micro-level
Theoretical approaches to civil society, notions of citizenship [book: Civil Society]. Connection/relation of individual to the group.
Philosophy as a religion, belief system based on faith. Broader philosophy informs expectations at both levels. This will inform what you believe about liberal democracies and why you think it is (or isn’t) superior)
Mid-level
Example: citizenry in a liberal democracy (in the sense of valuing the individuals). Look at liberal democracy, start pulling out individual ideas. What’s the relationship between liberal democracies and how we in the US work? In terms of social institutions (e.g. government, market for ordering and setting framework of relationship between individuals and group). Three regulating entities in US liberal democracy—state/government, market/capitalism, civil society/community. Looking at the different philosophies of how these regulate, and how they regulate specifically to us. One obvious idea: individual as the unit of value. So our rules/regulations try to capture that.
EG: Bill of Rights and Constitution. (Side note: Some same concepts similar in all modern societies; difference may be in how they are instituted versus where you’re studying, in this case, the US. Think compared to the USSR, which also valued the individual in theory).
Micro-Level
Looking at the key practical questions when differentiating between modern societies.
Example of key terms/working definition: “Individual.” How is this conception embodied in the institutions?
Key ideas: Find normal standards, both ideal and in practice. Context is important (time period an important part context, as someone brought up the fact that the ideas of equality in the constitution were penned at a time when slavery was the norm)...
Constitution: open to interpretation. It specifies process, guilt-in standards about debate, discussion, making a collective decision of some kind.
How do you sharpen your focus?
Be able to move comfortably between narrow focus and abstract theoretical level. Start with your own clear definition of community=further from geographical boundary, think longer term sustainability. So, place and process important. Then think: what are the factors of success that make a difference. Rank these factors and variables as more or less important by your own or others’ standards. More key terms: Sustainability, capacity, resilience.
Ways to search for literature
Some terminology: community, community development, community organizing, social capital, community competence, empowerment. Keep in mind different aspects of these terms when reading literature.
EG: LR’s definition somewhat place-bound, also captures community-building, which is a particular process beyond simple growth. At macro view, what are you looking for? Involve people in decisions that affect their lives. So, some faith in ability of people to come together and solve their own problems. How is the capacity used for change and restructure?
Measuring success of community-building: impact on place, individual, process. So, moving in directions of practical questions…individuals: e.g. Resources, what do they feel, value, believe? Not always able to capture individuals’ talent to create collective community. [Discussion of Austin vs. Temple’s merits].
Allegiance and commitment—trust in the process, even if a given decision not consistent with what I want. Reciprocity—if that process works more likely to participate. Process dimension—what can you look at described as variables, speaking to this trust people place. Characteristics of community, community building process and of organizer/catalyst/activist—the person mindful of what’s necessary for the other two things to happen.
Things to think about in each of these three areas:
Community characteristics: Involves some conceptualization of what a health community looks like, “should” be. How or were where is the community? (Generally, and around a specific issue.) [Jefferson(?) insisted on an informed citizenry). Awareness, motivation. Is there a geographic dimension? Do people identify with the place, organization? Get sense of existing cohesion? If so, around what? Indication of existing capacity to adapt, respond? Assess whether there are already mechanisms in place for members to come together and discuss? Issue of leadership. Is there any? What is its nature? How did it emerge? Any track record in terms of solving problems? In part, LR’s same idea as building community.
Process of building community characteristics: Gauge degree of participation. Ideally, you want widespread participation, having the means (procedure-wise) to participate. Interactions between organizations, individuals in community, need good communications system in place. Faith in process, seeing value as individual in being part of the community. No use substituting other’s judgment for the common people (elite). People can decide without entire technical knowledge. Institutions allow people to come together to make important decisions (schools, universities, activist groups). Are there processes in place that allow leaders to emerge or to be identified? Are there things in community allowing to practice leading? E.g... Over-supervised children’s play not always helpful.
Activist’s characteristics: Do they understand the community? How decisions do or don’t get made? Can you determine the commitment of other catalysts? An element of trust between individual and community at large? Community builder experienced? How? How relevant? Are they eligible, adaptable, patient?
Remember the key areas at the micro levels, and the practical questions you would ask to assess them? In research, think more “what are my research questions” what are hypotheses? What are variables that capture the research questions? How can I asses/observe these variables?
Faith/believe vs. reason/logic (i.e. “Truth”) are they mutually exclusive? Some argue science only way. Or, possible common-sense, experience. Experienceàthis leads to “truth,” what work in the sense of keeping you moving. Keeping improving the human condition as that definition continues to evolve. Learning by doing vs. studying not mutually exclusive.
“Third Places”—gathering places; bowling alleys, bars, churches.
Next week: reading for summit; more on East Austin.
Monday, October 22, 2007
On the advantage of the WTO: If a big state negotiated with a small state, it wouldn’t be giving much up by walking away from the negotiations. If all the small states are working through the WTO, the big state would be walking away from all of them at once, in which case it has a lot more to lose. The large group of trade becomes self-sustaining because cost becomes much higher to defect/walk away, even for a hegemon.
This interest has nothing to do with altruism (fits in with neoliberal institutionalism). You set up the game this way. Self interested actors will cooperate and not compete rationally.
Trade and the Environment; interaction—International Political Economy
IR
International Security (war, alliances); not much at the second level of analysis (one example is the democratic peace)
International Political Economy (trade, environment); theories more often at the second level of analysis.
Note on the term “liberalism”—free trade, free economics (though in US, democratic more interested in protectionism, so it’s confusing).
Benefits of Free Trade (according to liberal theories)
Takes advantage of comparative advantage. Both countries do better by trading. “Autarky” is when there is no trade. Tariffs reduce the amount of trade, therefore the benefit of advantage.
By specializing, you might get even more efficient, with economies of scale. Free trade bad for monopolies by increasing competition. Domestic competitors might have barriers to entry, for instance, but international competitors may be well established.
Variety
Counterarguments (arguments FOR protectionism):
Why would you have normative protectionist strategy?
In the same way you should diversify a portfolio to reduce risk, specialization could be risky (eg. If that industry fails).
It might be hard to switch over people from one job to the specialty your country has the comparative advantage in. People don’t want to do that—a sector of society will oppose it. “Embedded liberalism”—you have to take care of the potential loser from trade or they will oppose it. Close to US domestic meaning of “liberal”). How can you protect the people who have to switch over? Slow down specialization, possibly by inhibiting free trade in the short term. The real-world idea that to promote free trade, you need some amount of protectionism.
Security/national defense. Certain things you don’t want to depend on others for (guns, oil, food). Eg. Japan protects its rice industry. This one particularly often wrongly cited because it’s hard to argue against.
Infant industries. Industries too “sensitive” (inefficient). But then they won’t give up their protection; you don’t want to give up your domestic monopoly. No incentive to become more efficient.
Balance of trade (Trade deficit)—tariffs could balance it out. Liberals would argue against tariffs as the tool. Your own currency depreciates, then your exports would go up, so trade would balance naturally.
If you have a comparative advantage in high-wage jobs, low-wage jobs go away, poor hurt; embedded liberalism says not to hurt the poor. Social safety net (welfare, job retraining, unemployment insurance) and protectionism.
What if Pareto-efficiency makes poor worse off? Liberal theories—more government revenue from the richer rich can redistribute the income. But rich won’t want to help. What about other countries’ poor? “Protectionism” refers to protection of your own country. Domestic redistribution (embedded liberalism) with global free trade the big win/win welfare maximization.
Spillover effects—liberal economics=no difference between potato chips and computer chips. But computer chips will give you extra spillover to other high-income/high-tech industries. Also, education levels if you specialize in high-tech will be higher, meaning more skills in various areas. If you need to protect a high-end industry to avoid specializing in low-tech, benefits in long-term outweigh short term costs.
(Krugman’s): strategic Trade Policy—the example of Boeing and Expressjet. Inefficiencies of a subsidy more than made up for by the capture of the rest of the market. Very rare.
Protectionism as a tactic or threat—if another country is doing it, we threaten retaliatory tariffs in order to get them to drop theirs. Game of chicken, with the potential for both to lose/fail, because in order to credible threaten, you may have to actually do it, then things spiral.
Capital Controls
Restriction of money flowing in and out of a country. Investment, usually, in stocks, companies. Country may want to have control over shocks in economy. Eg a 1929-esque spiral for an entire country. Shock/spiral might not happen so quickly if there are restrictions. Even if everyone had capital controls, there would still be foreign investment. Investors look for countries without capital controls. Country chooses between poverty and instability. Currently, countries removing capital controls. Represents, to some people, a diminution of autonomy of states. Cannot control own monetary policy. Not technically imperialism. Countries can set selves apart, like Albania. Or Chile can set up some capital controls—and they didn’t lose foreign investment, but retained control. Chile’s economy—investors willing to invest because it’s stable. Investors don’t think they’ll have to pull money out, so no worry that it would be more difficult to. Regaining this autonomy after gaining stability.
(aside 1997 Asian Financial Crisis: 80’s and 90’s saw a rapid deregulation of capital controls. “hot money” allowing quick removal, and 3 month loans, for example. Then, there was overproduction in Asia, and when that became apparent, people pulled their money out of the countries, accelerating the crash. In a single year, there were double digit losses in GDP. The mobile capital really exacerbated the problem of overproduction. Capital controls somewhat put back in.
The reduction of capital controls from the Western liberal idea of free trade. IMF probably worsened matters by recommending further liberalization, when Asian countries probably needed some level of protection at this point.)
Environment
Everything we read was partially international, but there are really two parts to differentiate between:
International effects on domestic environment (Eg acid rain between Canada and US)
Effects on international environment (Eg global warming)
“Race to the Bottom” comparative advantage can come from low environmental regulations (also, labor standards). So, countries have incentives to pollute, even with local problems results (lead poisoning example).
Local environmental standards—think classical liberalism, interconnectedness. There is no real isolated environment that won’t affect us. But good to differentiate between local and inherently global. Some thing that individual rationalism will not make the collective good. Law could fix the collective decision problem.
Excludable? (can you prevent someone from taking advantage of it?)
Rival? (depletable?)
Yes
No
Yes
Private good (eg pizza)
Common Pool Resource (“tragedy of the commons”; Eg Atmosphere in depletable sense; global fisheries)
No
Club Good/collective Good (once your are allowed membership in the country club, everyone can swim in the poll without depleting)
Public good (Eg swimming in the ocean)
A lot of focus on common pool resources because of tragedy of the commons, lose-lose prisoner’s dilemma.
Wijkman: Solutions—enclosing the commons, privatization. Classic collective action problem—could maybe come to an agreement with smaller compensation. Ideal international management (example with ocean fisheries auctioned, non-winners compensated).
This interest has nothing to do with altruism (fits in with neoliberal institutionalism). You set up the game this way. Self interested actors will cooperate and not compete rationally.
Trade and the Environment; interaction—International Political Economy
IR
International Security (war, alliances); not much at the second level of analysis (one example is the democratic peace)
International Political Economy (trade, environment); theories more often at the second level of analysis.
Note on the term “liberalism”—free trade, free economics (though in US, democratic more interested in protectionism, so it’s confusing).
Benefits of Free Trade (according to liberal theories)
Takes advantage of comparative advantage. Both countries do better by trading. “Autarky” is when there is no trade. Tariffs reduce the amount of trade, therefore the benefit of advantage.
By specializing, you might get even more efficient, with economies of scale. Free trade bad for monopolies by increasing competition. Domestic competitors might have barriers to entry, for instance, but international competitors may be well established.
Variety
Counterarguments (arguments FOR protectionism):
Why would you have normative protectionist strategy?
In the same way you should diversify a portfolio to reduce risk, specialization could be risky (eg. If that industry fails).
It might be hard to switch over people from one job to the specialty your country has the comparative advantage in. People don’t want to do that—a sector of society will oppose it. “Embedded liberalism”—you have to take care of the potential loser from trade or they will oppose it. Close to US domestic meaning of “liberal”). How can you protect the people who have to switch over? Slow down specialization, possibly by inhibiting free trade in the short term. The real-world idea that to promote free trade, you need some amount of protectionism.
Security/national defense. Certain things you don’t want to depend on others for (guns, oil, food). Eg. Japan protects its rice industry. This one particularly often wrongly cited because it’s hard to argue against.
Infant industries. Industries too “sensitive” (inefficient). But then they won’t give up their protection; you don’t want to give up your domestic monopoly. No incentive to become more efficient.
Balance of trade (Trade deficit)—tariffs could balance it out. Liberals would argue against tariffs as the tool. Your own currency depreciates, then your exports would go up, so trade would balance naturally.
If you have a comparative advantage in high-wage jobs, low-wage jobs go away, poor hurt; embedded liberalism says not to hurt the poor. Social safety net (welfare, job retraining, unemployment insurance) and protectionism.
What if Pareto-efficiency makes poor worse off? Liberal theories—more government revenue from the richer rich can redistribute the income. But rich won’t want to help. What about other countries’ poor? “Protectionism” refers to protection of your own country. Domestic redistribution (embedded liberalism) with global free trade the big win/win welfare maximization.
Spillover effects—liberal economics=no difference between potato chips and computer chips. But computer chips will give you extra spillover to other high-income/high-tech industries. Also, education levels if you specialize in high-tech will be higher, meaning more skills in various areas. If you need to protect a high-end industry to avoid specializing in low-tech, benefits in long-term outweigh short term costs.
(Krugman’s): strategic Trade Policy—the example of Boeing and Expressjet. Inefficiencies of a subsidy more than made up for by the capture of the rest of the market. Very rare.
Protectionism as a tactic or threat—if another country is doing it, we threaten retaliatory tariffs in order to get them to drop theirs. Game of chicken, with the potential for both to lose/fail, because in order to credible threaten, you may have to actually do it, then things spiral.
Capital Controls
Restriction of money flowing in and out of a country. Investment, usually, in stocks, companies. Country may want to have control over shocks in economy. Eg a 1929-esque spiral for an entire country. Shock/spiral might not happen so quickly if there are restrictions. Even if everyone had capital controls, there would still be foreign investment. Investors look for countries without capital controls. Country chooses between poverty and instability. Currently, countries removing capital controls. Represents, to some people, a diminution of autonomy of states. Cannot control own monetary policy. Not technically imperialism. Countries can set selves apart, like Albania. Or Chile can set up some capital controls—and they didn’t lose foreign investment, but retained control. Chile’s economy—investors willing to invest because it’s stable. Investors don’t think they’ll have to pull money out, so no worry that it would be more difficult to. Regaining this autonomy after gaining stability.
(aside 1997 Asian Financial Crisis: 80’s and 90’s saw a rapid deregulation of capital controls. “hot money” allowing quick removal, and 3 month loans, for example. Then, there was overproduction in Asia, and when that became apparent, people pulled their money out of the countries, accelerating the crash. In a single year, there were double digit losses in GDP. The mobile capital really exacerbated the problem of overproduction. Capital controls somewhat put back in.
The reduction of capital controls from the Western liberal idea of free trade. IMF probably worsened matters by recommending further liberalization, when Asian countries probably needed some level of protection at this point.)
Environment
Everything we read was partially international, but there are really two parts to differentiate between:
International effects on domestic environment (Eg acid rain between Canada and US)
Effects on international environment (Eg global warming)
“Race to the Bottom” comparative advantage can come from low environmental regulations (also, labor standards). So, countries have incentives to pollute, even with local problems results (lead poisoning example).
Local environmental standards—think classical liberalism, interconnectedness. There is no real isolated environment that won’t affect us. But good to differentiate between local and inherently global. Some thing that individual rationalism will not make the collective good. Law could fix the collective decision problem.
Excludable? (can you prevent someone from taking advantage of it?)
Rival? (depletable?)
Yes
No
Yes
Private good (eg pizza)
Common Pool Resource (“tragedy of the commons”; Eg Atmosphere in depletable sense; global fisheries)
No
Club Good/collective Good (once your are allowed membership in the country club, everyone can swim in the poll without depleting)
Public good (Eg swimming in the ocean)
A lot of focus on common pool resources because of tragedy of the commons, lose-lose prisoner’s dilemma.
Wijkman: Solutions—enclosing the commons, privatization. Classic collective action problem—could maybe come to an agreement with smaller compensation. Ideal international management (example with ocean fisheries auctioned, non-winners compensated).
Tuesday, October 9, 2007
little to big to little again
(oh, and I forgot the link that got me thinking on the below topic, Costa Rica's referendum on the free trade agreement with the US. For better or worse, the topic was at least discussed and understood by the population it affected before it passed.)
In class last week, Professor Rhodes talked about the often-underestimated capabilities of a community to understand for itself the decisions it can make. We had been talking about Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth presentation and its value in taking the argument to "the people," who will be just as affected (in this case, by climate change) as those making the decision. I brought up the fact that maybe Al Gore wasn't bringing the full scientific understanding to the people, but he was at least summarizing the work that had been done. I'm trying to find the best way to put what I'm trying to add on to what we talked about in class, but it has to do with the balance between trust in the system and contribution to the system.
In class, when I brought up the fact that Al Gore's presentation is a simplification of the process that at least gets people to trust that the experts really aren't trying to pull one over, Professor Rhodes gave the qualified agreement, but emphasized that people do have more capabilities of understanding than usually credited with. I have been thinking about things that cloud this understanding. And I think a large part of it is distrust in the system (in this case, I would be thinking of the country at large), and this leads to a lack of motiviation and engagement in the decision-making process (another concept emphasized in class).
My thinking is colored by the other classes I'm taking, and this week in International Policy we went over some aspects of Game Theory, about why and when people priorotize their individual goals over the common goals, even if the overall payoff for the common goals is greater. (This is in some ways the crux of why I am interested in public policy). Two of the "solutions" to the Prisoner's Dilemma (in getting the "rational individual"'s decision that's best for him personally to coincide with the one that's best for the group) is to make the group that's making the decision smaller, and to make it known the group will make similar decisions in the future. Therefore, I think of the ideas of community that we are getting at are similar to the solution to the social problem--a finite group whose members all have some connection to each other, and foresee making decisions together in the future.
With fewer decisions being made at the local level, people have less of a reason to form a community that will attempt to understand the problems that are going to affect them. With less reason and motivation to understand problems of varying effect on the individuals, there will more more of an assumption that people aren't capable or willing to understand their problems. Which in turn is going to lead to politicians and extra-community leaders making decisions that will affect them.
OK, this is a little pessimistic, but it's a sort of overarching vicious circle that I can see as a problem in our country being so huge.
I wonder what sense of personal responsibility the children at the Edible Schoolyard will be gleaning from their experience. Will they be more likely to feel empowered when they see the connections they have to the world around them? Or will a small bastien of control in New Orleans seem artificial to them as they grow up and start experiencing the crushing frustrations of most adults trying their best to make a change to the city they love?
In class last week, Professor Rhodes talked about the often-underestimated capabilities of a community to understand for itself the decisions it can make. We had been talking about Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth presentation and its value in taking the argument to "the people," who will be just as affected (in this case, by climate change) as those making the decision. I brought up the fact that maybe Al Gore wasn't bringing the full scientific understanding to the people, but he was at least summarizing the work that had been done. I'm trying to find the best way to put what I'm trying to add on to what we talked about in class, but it has to do with the balance between trust in the system and contribution to the system.
In class, when I brought up the fact that Al Gore's presentation is a simplification of the process that at least gets people to trust that the experts really aren't trying to pull one over, Professor Rhodes gave the qualified agreement, but emphasized that people do have more capabilities of understanding than usually credited with. I have been thinking about things that cloud this understanding. And I think a large part of it is distrust in the system (in this case, I would be thinking of the country at large), and this leads to a lack of motiviation and engagement in the decision-making process (another concept emphasized in class).
My thinking is colored by the other classes I'm taking, and this week in International Policy we went over some aspects of Game Theory, about why and when people priorotize their individual goals over the common goals, even if the overall payoff for the common goals is greater. (This is in some ways the crux of why I am interested in public policy). Two of the "solutions" to the Prisoner's Dilemma (in getting the "rational individual"'s decision that's best for him personally to coincide with the one that's best for the group) is to make the group that's making the decision smaller, and to make it known the group will make similar decisions in the future. Therefore, I think of the ideas of community that we are getting at are similar to the solution to the social problem--a finite group whose members all have some connection to each other, and foresee making decisions together in the future.
With fewer decisions being made at the local level, people have less of a reason to form a community that will attempt to understand the problems that are going to affect them. With less reason and motivation to understand problems of varying effect on the individuals, there will more more of an assumption that people aren't capable or willing to understand their problems. Which in turn is going to lead to politicians and extra-community leaders making decisions that will affect them.
OK, this is a little pessimistic, but it's a sort of overarching vicious circle that I can see as a problem in our country being so huge.
I wonder what sense of personal responsibility the children at the Edible Schoolyard will be gleaning from their experience. Will they be more likely to feel empowered when they see the connections they have to the world around them? Or will a small bastien of control in New Orleans seem artificial to them as they grow up and start experiencing the crushing frustrations of most adults trying their best to make a change to the city they love?
Monday, October 8, 2007
Explanation of the term “neoconservative”: US foreign policy debate on how to treat the USSR. Three positions:
1. Rollback—existence of Soviets on the planet were a danger by existing because they would expand/infect world, destroy our freedom. Partly realist. Also worry about the idea “catching on”—liberal notion of “why should you care about people far away.” So partly classical liberalism (we are all connected).
2. Containment—military and political flavor. Quarantine the threat. Do not cooperate. Idea that since our system is better, the communists will eventually collapse.
3. Détente—We don’t have to contain it—that would make the world more dangerous. So we should interact, trade, exchange.
Détente—democratic and Kissinger and Nixon parties associated. “We can live with communism forever.” Other countries freedom doesn’t matter. Very realist, the democrats came around to it in the 70’s.
But there was a backlash—helping was viewed as morally outrageous. Senator Jackson said they need to take a harder line. Became “neoconservative”—deal with USSR because of internal workings, not foreign policy. Not neorealist. Idea of regime changes came around.
(Interdependence continued)
What is the explanation for weak states pushing around strong states (oil crisis again)? Sensitivity (can be though of as short-term). Why was US sensitive, but not vulnerable? Other supply sources of energy. And changes to demand (fuel efficiency). If we’d been vulnerable, war more likely. What is their (K and N) version of interdependence? They add “complex interdependence”—we have many more ties between people than just business to business (“globalization”). The interconnected NGO’s, easier travel, nonstate actors. So, even more things would be lost as a result of war. Recent events suggest this is not the reason for not invading during embargo (2 wars since in Middle East). True that we give up a lot of the inter-dependence, but that still didn’t stop us.
Complex interdependence=the web of [??] matters (think Freedom Fries).
Liberalism—obstacles to collective action
Olson—Do groups act in their own self-interest? Do gropus of rational individuals act in the group’s self-interest?
Public good—everyone benefits.
Collective good—members of the group benefit.
People more likely to free-ride—all of the benefit and none of the cost. This is why we have underprovision of public goods. We are net worse off.
Only a few ways to get it done:
Coercion: “Hegemon” can punish. Forces individual self-interest (eg labor union requires picketing, or you’d lost your job). Hegemonic coercion. Collective action problem (League of Nations).
Hegemonic leadership—a single actor benefits enough to do it rationally (in the mining road example, the mine company itself benefits enough to make the road). Charging the freeriders would be a form of coercion (ie a toll on the road for the miners). Hegemonic coercion sometimes a form of hegemonic leadership. Taxation an example of coercion.
Small group can overcome the problem of freeriding. No anonymity. Only transparency. This facilitates cooperation. “K-group” where K is a small number. This insight from observations of cartels. Smaller=easier. True for all.
So, do we see as little cooperation as predicted? Keep in mind some non-financial benefits can make an action rational even if it seems pure altruistic. Or ethics may drive to “irrational” decision. Enlisting in army and voting are examples. Patriotism is an ethos that makes you act irrationally. These examples are pervasive. Is this true for states? Consider later, when we get to “norms.” For the rest of today we’re going to assume states act on rational self-interest.
Neoliberalism (Neoliberal institutionalism)
Non-normative. (classical assumes no different between individual and common(?).
Even if states selfish and not altruistic, cooperation possible between states. Beating realists at own game (starting with same assumptions, but different potential outcome). Set up so mutual benefit from selfishness.
Axelrod—Prisoner’s Dilemma an depend on how likely to repeat interaction in the future. If played over and over, then the payoffs change. So cost of defecting is now also the likelihood of other side defecting in future. Try to get it so if you cooperate, it’s better for me to cooperate. “tit for tat” won the competition/simulation. You cooperate last time, I cooperate this time. Same for defection. Evolution of the cooperators surviving.
Relative Gains vs. Absolute Gains
If both countries get absolute gains in a trade deal, but country B gets a relative gain, will country A support the deal? Realists say no. Neoliberals say yes.
Country A
Country B
GDP
5
5
GDP (with trade)
7
8
Normative only in that structures that would promote this should be constructed. Anyway, what will state A actually do in the above situation? When will a state not care about relative gains?
No switch in dominance (but may think about it more carefully if dominance lessened against certain states)
Is the other state a rival? I.e. If A/B is US/UK vs. US/USSR
Idea of a “friend” vs. “rival.” Walt, remember, said there are other factors besides power. Balance of Power Vs. Balance of Threat (determined by aggressive intentions). By Waltz prescription, it’s better to be poorer as there’s no relative loss, even if a friend. We should suffer, so they suffer more. Not a popular idea, so democrats and republicans both favor open trade.
Order of countries preferences
Cooperate
Defect
Cooperate
2
2
1
4
Defect
4
1
3
3
Countries acting rationally, in their own self-interest, end up in Box 4 (both defecting)
Oye— Getting from box 4à1. Olson’s idea of having a small group of people. Detecting defection is easier—Defection is less attractive. Or Axelrod’s prescription—repeat iterations (“lengthening the shadow of the future”) so tit-for-tat can become a prescription and rational decision. Alter the payoffs (directly, not just shadow of the future). One idea is the one of “hostages,” making it so you and others suffer more if you defect. Put your own troops in harm’s way (similar to First Move Advantage scenario.). Publicize a treaty. Everyone knows if you break it, no one trusts you, not just the person you broke it with (Wilson’s idea). How do you lengthen the shadow of the future? Don’t fling open doors—becomes a one-shot game if they stab you in the back. Peace negotiations, slow etc. Start seeing several rounds of them, each one becomes more and more likely. How an you increase your ability to discern what is defection (worst misperception is they cooperate but you think they are defecting).
Transparency and “norms” help with misperception.
Set a norm—if the norm/agreement is 100 missiles per year, 100 is cooperation. If only 50/yr, 100 is defection. Norms needed to clarify cooperation and defection.
Reduce number of players. Better to have local trade agreements rather than, for example, the WTO. Total gains vs. individual gains again. How do you split up the total gains?
An individual may gain more from something that benefits less overall. All of these things can be done by institutions. Building, norms, rules for example.
Keohane most famous for explaining why institutions can do this increase in cooperation.
§ They provide information, which creates transparency. Eg. International Atomic Energy Agency.
§ Reduction of transaction costs. Cooperation more costly if you need lawyers, negotiations; cumbersome. Institutions can reduce those costs. Economies of scale.
§ They lengthen the shadow of the future. If you screw over someone, you might have to face them the next day (at the UN, for example, on a different issue the next day). That’s why there are very few vetoes in the UN).
§ Institutions can also provide for enforcement. Punishment if a country defects. Possibly less likely to use violent means. Institutions have smaller numbers, more likely to carry out enforcement as it’s a collective good.
1. Rollback—existence of Soviets on the planet were a danger by existing because they would expand/infect world, destroy our freedom. Partly realist. Also worry about the idea “catching on”—liberal notion of “why should you care about people far away.” So partly classical liberalism (we are all connected).
2. Containment—military and political flavor. Quarantine the threat. Do not cooperate. Idea that since our system is better, the communists will eventually collapse.
3. Détente—We don’t have to contain it—that would make the world more dangerous. So we should interact, trade, exchange.
Détente—democratic and Kissinger and Nixon parties associated. “We can live with communism forever.” Other countries freedom doesn’t matter. Very realist, the democrats came around to it in the 70’s.
But there was a backlash—helping was viewed as morally outrageous. Senator Jackson said they need to take a harder line. Became “neoconservative”—deal with USSR because of internal workings, not foreign policy. Not neorealist. Idea of regime changes came around.
(Interdependence continued)
What is the explanation for weak states pushing around strong states (oil crisis again)? Sensitivity (can be though of as short-term). Why was US sensitive, but not vulnerable? Other supply sources of energy. And changes to demand (fuel efficiency). If we’d been vulnerable, war more likely. What is their (K and N) version of interdependence? They add “complex interdependence”—we have many more ties between people than just business to business (“globalization”). The interconnected NGO’s, easier travel, nonstate actors. So, even more things would be lost as a result of war. Recent events suggest this is not the reason for not invading during embargo (2 wars since in Middle East). True that we give up a lot of the inter-dependence, but that still didn’t stop us.
Complex interdependence=the web of [??] matters (think Freedom Fries).
Liberalism—obstacles to collective action
Olson—Do groups act in their own self-interest? Do gropus of rational individuals act in the group’s self-interest?
Public good—everyone benefits.
Collective good—members of the group benefit.
People more likely to free-ride—all of the benefit and none of the cost. This is why we have underprovision of public goods. We are net worse off.
Only a few ways to get it done:
Coercion: “Hegemon” can punish. Forces individual self-interest (eg labor union requires picketing, or you’d lost your job). Hegemonic coercion. Collective action problem (League of Nations).
Hegemonic leadership—a single actor benefits enough to do it rationally (in the mining road example, the mine company itself benefits enough to make the road). Charging the freeriders would be a form of coercion (ie a toll on the road for the miners). Hegemonic coercion sometimes a form of hegemonic leadership. Taxation an example of coercion.
Small group can overcome the problem of freeriding. No anonymity. Only transparency. This facilitates cooperation. “K-group” where K is a small number. This insight from observations of cartels. Smaller=easier. True for all.
So, do we see as little cooperation as predicted? Keep in mind some non-financial benefits can make an action rational even if it seems pure altruistic. Or ethics may drive to “irrational” decision. Enlisting in army and voting are examples. Patriotism is an ethos that makes you act irrationally. These examples are pervasive. Is this true for states? Consider later, when we get to “norms.” For the rest of today we’re going to assume states act on rational self-interest.
Neoliberalism (Neoliberal institutionalism)
Non-normative. (classical assumes no different between individual and common(?).
Even if states selfish and not altruistic, cooperation possible between states. Beating realists at own game (starting with same assumptions, but different potential outcome). Set up so mutual benefit from selfishness.
Axelrod—Prisoner’s Dilemma an depend on how likely to repeat interaction in the future. If played over and over, then the payoffs change. So cost of defecting is now also the likelihood of other side defecting in future. Try to get it so if you cooperate, it’s better for me to cooperate. “tit for tat” won the competition/simulation. You cooperate last time, I cooperate this time. Same for defection. Evolution of the cooperators surviving.
Relative Gains vs. Absolute Gains
If both countries get absolute gains in a trade deal, but country B gets a relative gain, will country A support the deal? Realists say no. Neoliberals say yes.
Country A
Country B
GDP
5
5
GDP (with trade)
7
8
Normative only in that structures that would promote this should be constructed. Anyway, what will state A actually do in the above situation? When will a state not care about relative gains?
No switch in dominance (but may think about it more carefully if dominance lessened against certain states)
Is the other state a rival? I.e. If A/B is US/UK vs. US/USSR
Idea of a “friend” vs. “rival.” Walt, remember, said there are other factors besides power. Balance of Power Vs. Balance of Threat (determined by aggressive intentions). By Waltz prescription, it’s better to be poorer as there’s no relative loss, even if a friend. We should suffer, so they suffer more. Not a popular idea, so democrats and republicans both favor open trade.
Order of countries preferences
Cooperate
Defect
Cooperate
2
2
1
4
Defect
4
1
3
3
Countries acting rationally, in their own self-interest, end up in Box 4 (both defecting)
Oye— Getting from box 4à1. Olson’s idea of having a small group of people. Detecting defection is easier—Defection is less attractive. Or Axelrod’s prescription—repeat iterations (“lengthening the shadow of the future”) so tit-for-tat can become a prescription and rational decision. Alter the payoffs (directly, not just shadow of the future). One idea is the one of “hostages,” making it so you and others suffer more if you defect. Put your own troops in harm’s way (similar to First Move Advantage scenario.). Publicize a treaty. Everyone knows if you break it, no one trusts you, not just the person you broke it with (Wilson’s idea). How do you lengthen the shadow of the future? Don’t fling open doors—becomes a one-shot game if they stab you in the back. Peace negotiations, slow etc. Start seeing several rounds of them, each one becomes more and more likely. How an you increase your ability to discern what is defection (worst misperception is they cooperate but you think they are defecting).
Transparency and “norms” help with misperception.
Set a norm—if the norm/agreement is 100 missiles per year, 100 is cooperation. If only 50/yr, 100 is defection. Norms needed to clarify cooperation and defection.
Reduce number of players. Better to have local trade agreements rather than, for example, the WTO. Total gains vs. individual gains again. How do you split up the total gains?
An individual may gain more from something that benefits less overall. All of these things can be done by institutions. Building, norms, rules for example.
Keohane most famous for explaining why institutions can do this increase in cooperation.
§ They provide information, which creates transparency. Eg. International Atomic Energy Agency.
§ Reduction of transaction costs. Cooperation more costly if you need lawyers, negotiations; cumbersome. Institutions can reduce those costs. Economies of scale.
§ They lengthen the shadow of the future. If you screw over someone, you might have to face them the next day (at the UN, for example, on a different issue the next day). That’s why there are very few vetoes in the UN).
§ Institutions can also provide for enforcement. Punishment if a country defects. Possibly less likely to use violent means. Institutions have smaller numbers, more likely to carry out enforcement as it’s a collective good.
Monday, October 1, 2007
Preventive war vs. preemptive war
Preventive War: if something might arise at some point in the future because of changing power levels (power=army, nuclear weapons). For instance, A looks at B, sees the trajectory, attacks to prevent [graph in notes]. But also makes sure war is either inevitable or highly likely, or else you will be starting a war that wouldn’t have happened. Reactions different depending on how you view country B (friend or foe). Also, if A’s trajectory going down, A might start the war to steal B’s steady but low wealth/power, or to completely destroy them to ensure you they never are above you in the power structure.
Preemptive War: the threat is NOW. And it’s to your advantage to attack first. “First move advantage.” And you think the other side might attack you. So high likelihood of attack imminently vs. attack down the road. The greater the First Mover Advantage is, the more likely preemptive war. Shelling: “The mutual fear of surprise attack.” To stabilize a situation, try to eliminate the First Mover Advantage. Possibilities—have weapons on each side that could survive First Strike (harden silos; stipulate one warhead per missile).
Nuclear weapons—more nukes, less war (Waltz). Benefit to attacker is reduced. Attacking with nukes becomes suicide, but conventional attack also faces risk of nuke counter. Assumes rational decision makers—why not concerned with maverick leaders? There would be some rational people along the chain of command, and even crazy people have to realize the complete gravity of nuclear war. You don’t have to be perfectly rational to recognize how huge an impact it will have.
Problems:
§ nonstate actors having access to nuclear weapons (difficulty: no clear “return address,” so mutually assured destruction out; some don’t have the same survival requirement—people sacrifice themselves and fellows in the name of a cause).
§ Nuclear inheritance: state with civil war, or little command and control, nukes could no longer belong to rational states.
§ B getting nukes means B has gotten much more power, approaching another more powerful state [graph in notes]. When you first develop them, you are very susceptible to First Strike Advantage from the state whose power you might overtake or approach. International opinion/disapproval has proved not a significant deterrent.
But, interesting point one which the article written: US vs. USSRà no nuke wars, no conventional wars. Prior to nukes, 2 major wars. Then only proxy wars.
Iran with nukes would have its own Munroe Doctrine—its own authority in the Middle East, and Us doesn’t want that.
Realismàfrom snapshots to dynamism.
Power and rising power. Is D’s rise to power [graph included in notes of A, B, C at steady powers, D on trajectory to overtake all].
Gilpin: What does the great power do? Ultimately maybe a choice of fighting to stay on top, or acquiescing. But states rarely jump to one of these extreme options. Try to slow the rise of State D. Eg: Constraining them economically. Or increase own power (eg technological innovation), limiting foreign policy commitments—instinct of state as they grow leads to imperial overstretch—realization that imperialism not so beneficial. So retrenching important. What does it mean to acquiesce in this situation. What did Britain give US (with Munroe Doctrine)? Influence—material benefits, yes. What else to rising powers want that others already have? Benefits of treaties, trade, other benefits to status (besides just prestige, glory) (think of 5 UN veto states=5 nuke/powerful states). If a country has power but not prestige, country could get frustrated at this imbalance—it could become belligerent. So, should big power grant membership?
What should you do? Depends on who they are—how aligned are you interests/how do you define them (status quo, revolutionary. Control vs. Values). Why did UK acquiesce to US when the UK still had significant power? No disagreement on most areas of IR. UK saw US running half the world, and it didn’t really upset the fundamentals of the international order that existing powers had set up (borders etc). But someone preferring for example an exclusive economic zone might be worth fighting.
US vs. China policy:
Bush I’s grand strategy post Cold War in 1990’s (article reading). Implicitly—knock down any rising power, convince other countries they don’t need to grow in military power to protect their interests. So, what convinces them? We offer to protect them. US provides global security. People would have no need to even think of challenging us—so we can knock them down if they get uppity. This plan could not be implemented till Bush II—Cheney/Wolfowitz came up with it while in charge, then Clinton elected. Then, BushII: Iraq was knocked down. Libya convinced not to challenge. For a while, seemed successful.
So what are we going to do regarding China? Several examples of how we are appeasing China given in class. We don’t seem to be doing any convincing/quashing. Why “no” tension between Bush and China? Best guess is 9-11—switch to seeing China as ally on War on Terror—we saw a greater threat to bandwagon against.
Liberalism
Realism focuses on conflict—zero sum competition.
Liberalism focuses on cooperation—positive-sum outcomes.
Positive sum gains from cooperation only achieved by giving up some amount of state autonomy. Liberals argue it is worth the trade. So liberalism is also a normative theory. More normative than realism. Think realism and balance of power as a law, not a strategy.
Variants of liberalism:
Classical liberalism: “utopian liberalism.” Humans will improve over time. Become more rational. Realize there are better ways of doing things than in the past. Leads to cooperation, no warfare.
Based on economic interdependence: Benefits from economic cooperation and trade that are lost when people are fighting. So costs of warfare go up by including the losses incurred.
Democratic Peace Theory: liberal democratic states don’t go to war against each other.
Neoliberal institutionalism: “Neoliberalism.” Specific term in IR field, but does have other meanings in other fields.
Classical liberalism
Eg: Locke, Crousse, Sully
Locke—“natural law.” Right and wrong exist, and are waiting to be discovered. So, progress possible as man discovers these law.
Crousse—suggestion of League of Princes, like UN. Recommended Turkey have a seat before a Christian state. Not based on civilization. Has come to pass in UN. Trade important. Economic interdependence something always part of classical liberalism.
The goal of elimination war. Use of force illegal in most liberal theory. Defense OK, but not the first punch.
Arms control and disarmament—have only enough for defense but not attack. Increase in weapons leads to increase in war.
Locke’s state of nature. Rationality prevents violence.
Abolish imperialism—illegal to conquer. No changing borders by force. Borders sacrosanct, no state may disappear. Whenever this happened before, theory argues, it was before we understood why it was bad.
Kant: states not monarch’s property. If anything, joint property of people. Normative: people should be who are in control of the states. It is right because it’s the people who pay the costs (eg. Going to war). Of the people by the people, for the people etc.
Means for reducing the prospect of war. Everyone wants this. Why does Kant believe he has found the achievable utopia/ What is mechanism for perpetual peace? Republicanism=liberal democracy (he is anti-“democracy” of his time; democracy mean despotism. Do people in this democracy support the leader? The people subject to manipulation, populism, fascism. Not necessarily good—Hitler had support of people. Unmediated connection between people and leader is bad. So notion of republicanism, division between executive and legislative, represented by people. This mediation seen as something to prevent fascism, dictators, despotism. So important to properly specify “liberal democratic peace.”). So, Kant says with these republics, we get perpetual peace. Decision for war in hands of people, people don’t want wars because they pay the price. Why wouldn’t a despot be just as averse to potentially losing a war? Despot does not see tangible costs of war. See potential territory, gold, but costs not as apparent than if you’re a peasant. “The glory of its ruler [despot] consists in his power to order thousands of his people to immolate themselves [for his “sport”].” Not enough to have just republics. Also need institutions of controls. Idea of serious/phony treaties. Getting rid of the “bad” treaties.
Wilson: Public treaty can be made insincere by secret treaties that violate. States can’t be annexed if everyone agrees not to recognize your gains. Makes it not worth fighting, even winning.
Kant: Forcing republican state elsewhere not part of the game plan. States don’t interfere with internal conflict. What will we interfere with in another states? Nothing. We only regulate the external affairs of states (stop aggression, false treaties). State A won’t even interfere with state B’s having an army. And it’s true in international law now, this is illegal.
On what basis are these states constituted? What is basis of state for classical liberals? Original idea: freeze states as-are (Kant—no states may grow, shrink or disappear. Conquest is over). But as we got more normative info, recognition deserved by all people self-determination.
When is a people a people? Ethno-national self-determination. War caused by people’s desire for this self-determination. As long as one group rules another, you have “casus belli”. No complaints of imperialism. Hard to define a group. Hard to draw a border even if you can define them. That is why further evolution over the last few decades saying Wilson’s idea is crazy. Now liberal ideal is multi-ethnic states. Monoethnic states are considered classical liberalism. Now separating ethnicities for peace considered realist (even if they want to get along they can’t get along. The Security Dilemma eliminated by eliminating ethnic mingling).
Interdependence
With trade, both countries better off. Stop trade, both worse off. War generally interrupts trade. More you trade, more you have to lose; the less likely war. More trade=less war.
Angell (1910)—argues there is no benefit for invaders anymore. But times badly since WWI happened 4 years later. Before that, no war since Napoleon (1815). So this theory lost credibility. A long time before people started these arguments again (Keohane and Nye in the 1970’s attempted to rehabilitate). Myth of “new” globalization. One measure is % trade over GDP. [chart in notes shows graph of this over time—we are only just now again re-approaching the amount of trade we had just before WWI]. So purely economic independence did not save Europe.
Do Keohane and Nye say the same thing? Motivated by the oil crisis of the 1970’s. Oil embargo from PEC after Yom Kippur war. Tiny states of Middle East imposing a huge problem. Why didn’t US just crush them? Historically “realistically” odd. Sensitivity vs. vulnerability. [Think about liberal arguments that war will become less likely]. Think about whether this theory is persuasive to you.
Preventive War: if something might arise at some point in the future because of changing power levels (power=army, nuclear weapons). For instance, A looks at B, sees the trajectory, attacks to prevent [graph in notes]. But also makes sure war is either inevitable or highly likely, or else you will be starting a war that wouldn’t have happened. Reactions different depending on how you view country B (friend or foe). Also, if A’s trajectory going down, A might start the war to steal B’s steady but low wealth/power, or to completely destroy them to ensure you they never are above you in the power structure.
Preemptive War: the threat is NOW. And it’s to your advantage to attack first. “First move advantage.” And you think the other side might attack you. So high likelihood of attack imminently vs. attack down the road. The greater the First Mover Advantage is, the more likely preemptive war. Shelling: “The mutual fear of surprise attack.” To stabilize a situation, try to eliminate the First Mover Advantage. Possibilities—have weapons on each side that could survive First Strike (harden silos; stipulate one warhead per missile).
Nuclear weapons—more nukes, less war (Waltz). Benefit to attacker is reduced. Attacking with nukes becomes suicide, but conventional attack also faces risk of nuke counter. Assumes rational decision makers—why not concerned with maverick leaders? There would be some rational people along the chain of command, and even crazy people have to realize the complete gravity of nuclear war. You don’t have to be perfectly rational to recognize how huge an impact it will have.
Problems:
§ nonstate actors having access to nuclear weapons (difficulty: no clear “return address,” so mutually assured destruction out; some don’t have the same survival requirement—people sacrifice themselves and fellows in the name of a cause).
§ Nuclear inheritance: state with civil war, or little command and control, nukes could no longer belong to rational states.
§ B getting nukes means B has gotten much more power, approaching another more powerful state [graph in notes]. When you first develop them, you are very susceptible to First Strike Advantage from the state whose power you might overtake or approach. International opinion/disapproval has proved not a significant deterrent.
But, interesting point one which the article written: US vs. USSRà no nuke wars, no conventional wars. Prior to nukes, 2 major wars. Then only proxy wars.
Iran with nukes would have its own Munroe Doctrine—its own authority in the Middle East, and Us doesn’t want that.
Realismàfrom snapshots to dynamism.
Power and rising power. Is D’s rise to power [graph included in notes of A, B, C at steady powers, D on trajectory to overtake all].
Gilpin: What does the great power do? Ultimately maybe a choice of fighting to stay on top, or acquiescing. But states rarely jump to one of these extreme options. Try to slow the rise of State D. Eg: Constraining them economically. Or increase own power (eg technological innovation), limiting foreign policy commitments—instinct of state as they grow leads to imperial overstretch—realization that imperialism not so beneficial. So retrenching important. What does it mean to acquiesce in this situation. What did Britain give US (with Munroe Doctrine)? Influence—material benefits, yes. What else to rising powers want that others already have? Benefits of treaties, trade, other benefits to status (besides just prestige, glory) (think of 5 UN veto states=5 nuke/powerful states). If a country has power but not prestige, country could get frustrated at this imbalance—it could become belligerent. So, should big power grant membership?
What should you do? Depends on who they are—how aligned are you interests/how do you define them (status quo, revolutionary. Control vs. Values). Why did UK acquiesce to US when the UK still had significant power? No disagreement on most areas of IR. UK saw US running half the world, and it didn’t really upset the fundamentals of the international order that existing powers had set up (borders etc). But someone preferring for example an exclusive economic zone might be worth fighting.
US vs. China policy:
Bush I’s grand strategy post Cold War in 1990’s (article reading). Implicitly—knock down any rising power, convince other countries they don’t need to grow in military power to protect their interests. So, what convinces them? We offer to protect them. US provides global security. People would have no need to even think of challenging us—so we can knock them down if they get uppity. This plan could not be implemented till Bush II—Cheney/Wolfowitz came up with it while in charge, then Clinton elected. Then, BushII: Iraq was knocked down. Libya convinced not to challenge. For a while, seemed successful.
So what are we going to do regarding China? Several examples of how we are appeasing China given in class. We don’t seem to be doing any convincing/quashing. Why “no” tension between Bush and China? Best guess is 9-11—switch to seeing China as ally on War on Terror—we saw a greater threat to bandwagon against.
Liberalism
Realism focuses on conflict—zero sum competition.
Liberalism focuses on cooperation—positive-sum outcomes.
Positive sum gains from cooperation only achieved by giving up some amount of state autonomy. Liberals argue it is worth the trade. So liberalism is also a normative theory. More normative than realism. Think realism and balance of power as a law, not a strategy.
Variants of liberalism:
Classical liberalism: “utopian liberalism.” Humans will improve over time. Become more rational. Realize there are better ways of doing things than in the past. Leads to cooperation, no warfare.
Based on economic interdependence: Benefits from economic cooperation and trade that are lost when people are fighting. So costs of warfare go up by including the losses incurred.
Democratic Peace Theory: liberal democratic states don’t go to war against each other.
Neoliberal institutionalism: “Neoliberalism.” Specific term in IR field, but does have other meanings in other fields.
Classical liberalism
Eg: Locke, Crousse, Sully
Locke—“natural law.” Right and wrong exist, and are waiting to be discovered. So, progress possible as man discovers these law.
Crousse—suggestion of League of Princes, like UN. Recommended Turkey have a seat before a Christian state. Not based on civilization. Has come to pass in UN. Trade important. Economic interdependence something always part of classical liberalism.
The goal of elimination war. Use of force illegal in most liberal theory. Defense OK, but not the first punch.
Arms control and disarmament—have only enough for defense but not attack. Increase in weapons leads to increase in war.
Locke’s state of nature. Rationality prevents violence.
Abolish imperialism—illegal to conquer. No changing borders by force. Borders sacrosanct, no state may disappear. Whenever this happened before, theory argues, it was before we understood why it was bad.
Kant: states not monarch’s property. If anything, joint property of people. Normative: people should be who are in control of the states. It is right because it’s the people who pay the costs (eg. Going to war). Of the people by the people, for the people etc.
Means for reducing the prospect of war. Everyone wants this. Why does Kant believe he has found the achievable utopia/ What is mechanism for perpetual peace? Republicanism=liberal democracy (he is anti-“democracy” of his time; democracy mean despotism. Do people in this democracy support the leader? The people subject to manipulation, populism, fascism. Not necessarily good—Hitler had support of people. Unmediated connection between people and leader is bad. So notion of republicanism, division between executive and legislative, represented by people. This mediation seen as something to prevent fascism, dictators, despotism. So important to properly specify “liberal democratic peace.”). So, Kant says with these republics, we get perpetual peace. Decision for war in hands of people, people don’t want wars because they pay the price. Why wouldn’t a despot be just as averse to potentially losing a war? Despot does not see tangible costs of war. See potential territory, gold, but costs not as apparent than if you’re a peasant. “The glory of its ruler [despot] consists in his power to order thousands of his people to immolate themselves [for his “sport”].” Not enough to have just republics. Also need institutions of controls. Idea of serious/phony treaties. Getting rid of the “bad” treaties.
Wilson: Public treaty can be made insincere by secret treaties that violate. States can’t be annexed if everyone agrees not to recognize your gains. Makes it not worth fighting, even winning.
Kant: Forcing republican state elsewhere not part of the game plan. States don’t interfere with internal conflict. What will we interfere with in another states? Nothing. We only regulate the external affairs of states (stop aggression, false treaties). State A won’t even interfere with state B’s having an army. And it’s true in international law now, this is illegal.
On what basis are these states constituted? What is basis of state for classical liberals? Original idea: freeze states as-are (Kant—no states may grow, shrink or disappear. Conquest is over). But as we got more normative info, recognition deserved by all people self-determination.
When is a people a people? Ethno-national self-determination. War caused by people’s desire for this self-determination. As long as one group rules another, you have “casus belli”. No complaints of imperialism. Hard to define a group. Hard to draw a border even if you can define them. That is why further evolution over the last few decades saying Wilson’s idea is crazy. Now liberal ideal is multi-ethnic states. Monoethnic states are considered classical liberalism. Now separating ethnicities for peace considered realist (even if they want to get along they can’t get along. The Security Dilemma eliminated by eliminating ethnic mingling).
Interdependence
With trade, both countries better off. Stop trade, both worse off. War generally interrupts trade. More you trade, more you have to lose; the less likely war. More trade=less war.
Angell (1910)—argues there is no benefit for invaders anymore. But times badly since WWI happened 4 years later. Before that, no war since Napoleon (1815). So this theory lost credibility. A long time before people started these arguments again (Keohane and Nye in the 1970’s attempted to rehabilitate). Myth of “new” globalization. One measure is % trade over GDP. [chart in notes shows graph of this over time—we are only just now again re-approaching the amount of trade we had just before WWI]. So purely economic independence did not save Europe.
Do Keohane and Nye say the same thing? Motivated by the oil crisis of the 1970’s. Oil embargo from PEC after Yom Kippur war. Tiny states of Middle East imposing a huge problem. Why didn’t US just crush them? Historically “realistically” odd. Sensitivity vs. vulnerability. [Think about liberal arguments that war will become less likely]. Think about whether this theory is persuasive to you.
Friday, September 28, 2007
Source List: To Be Updated as I get more
Legend:
gray text unknown
blue text - broad level of theory/analysis
green text - mid-level of theory/analysis (edible schoolyard theory-specific)
red text - specific/close level of theory/analysis (NOLA edible schoolyard theory-specific)
Books
Journal Articles
gray text unknown
blue text - broad level of theory/analysis
green text - mid-level of theory/analysis (edible schoolyard theory-specific)
red text - specific/close level of theory/analysis (NOLA edible schoolyard theory-specific)
Books
- (? book?) The Edible Schoolyard. Capra, Fritjof; Comnes, Leslie; Cook, Esther; Hawkins, David; Jackson, Wes; McCullough, Yvette; Waters, Alice. Center for Ecoliteracy, 2522 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94702, 1999
- The agrarian roots of pragmatism. 1st ed.Thompson, Paul B. and Hilde, Thomas C.Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2000; section: "Armen Marsoobian -- The edible schoolyard: agrarian ideals and our industrial milieu"
Journal Articles
- School-based research and initiatives: fruit and vegetable environment, policy, and pricing workshop. M Settings - Preventive Medicine, 2004 - Elsevier
- Hungry for change: chef Alice Waters is convinced that the path to awakening students' minds to their environment is through their stomachs, so she's helped them build a schoolyard--and make it edible. (education). Jennifer Bogo. Audubon 104.2 (March-April 2002): p30(4). (1848 words)
- Environmental Justice Education: Empowering Students to Become Environmental CitizensJ Peloso - Penn GSE Perspectives on Urban Education, 2007
- Shpard, P.M., Northridge, M.E., Prakash, S. & Stover, G. (2002). Preface: Advancing environmental justice through community-based participatory research. Environmental Heath Perspectives, 100 (20), 139-140
- Agrawal, A. "Enchantment and Disenchantment: The Role of Community in Natural Resource Conservation." World Development 27.4 (1999):629-.
- [website]: http://www.edibleschoolyard.org/
- [website]: http://www.esynola.org/
- [website]: http://www.ecoliteracy.org/
- Bullard, R.D. (2002). Second National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit: Executive summary. Retrieved October 20, 2007 from http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/summit2/summit%20exec%20sum%202002.pdf
- The Center of Ecoliteracy. (2003). Education for sustainibility: Findings from the evaluation study of the Edible Schoolyard. Retrived October 20, 2007 from http://www.ecoliteracy.org/publications/pdf/ESYFindings-DrMurphy.pdf
- [citation??] Findings from the evaluation study of the edible schoolyardJM Murphy - 2003 - Berkeley, CA: Center for Ecoliteracy
- [CITATION] Greening Inner-city Schools: The Edible Schoolyard and Student AchievementBR Eichorn - 2005 - Whitman College
- [newsletter?] Land Use, Healthy Eating and Health Disparities Case StudiesCC JCNI, W Fargo - cahpf.org. Community Garden: Martin Luther King, Jr., Middle School Edible Schoolyard
- [article?] Urban community food systems and the role of permaculture. Accessed 10/24/07 http://www.regional.org.au/au/soc/2002/3/gamble.htm
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Universitas
Only related to that fact that I'm in a large university for the first time in a long while, I'm overcome lately at how clear the synergistic effects of pooling human ingenuity can be. I think I'm lucky to be at the LBJ school in particular (I've been in equally demanding, but much more competitive academic settings in the past, and I would never have been inspired to write a post like this about them). The cooperative learning environment is what I believe will make the most significant social contribution. Possibly the more competitive law and business schools will bring greater achievement of a certain kind to the individual students, but I wonder at how much new ground is covered when "networking" there has different connotations from what I describe below.
This feels obvious, and will be obvious to anyone already at the university. But just think! Individuals who have amassed a great deal of knowledge, in some cases a lifetime's worth, every day stand for 3 hours and try to pour this knowledge into as many ears as can sign up for courses. But not only that, a TA or even student, for instance, can make their own connections between wildly disparate classes they are taking, and the idea can spontaneously emerge, not necessarily because the student is intellectually superior, but because they are exposed to a rare combination of ideas. I think pinpointing that the student does not necessarily have to be a genius to have a significant idea or contribution really shows the way in which they are a node in a system, that their community is as much responsible for the burgeoning idea as the individual herself (or himself).
I know we talked about this in the first two classes, and I think in some ways the focus on pragmatism and land-grant universities, as well as my natural distaste for elitist ideas, made this concept not as obvious to me. But, as Professor Rhodes said, "how do we be elite without being elitist?" We clearly have to recognize that a university is a great resource, but by no means the only one. We also need to make sure that these brilliant, spontaneously-generated ideas make it outside of the university setting, where they can actually be of use.
Incidentally, from Wikipedia:
The word university is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, roughly meaning "community of teachers and scholars".
This feels obvious, and will be obvious to anyone already at the university. But just think! Individuals who have amassed a great deal of knowledge, in some cases a lifetime's worth, every day stand for 3 hours and try to pour this knowledge into as many ears as can sign up for courses. But not only that, a TA or even student, for instance, can make their own connections between wildly disparate classes they are taking, and the idea can spontaneously emerge, not necessarily because the student is intellectually superior, but because they are exposed to a rare combination of ideas. I think pinpointing that the student does not necessarily have to be a genius to have a significant idea or contribution really shows the way in which they are a node in a system, that their community is as much responsible for the burgeoning idea as the individual herself (or himself).
I know we talked about this in the first two classes, and I think in some ways the focus on pragmatism and land-grant universities, as well as my natural distaste for elitist ideas, made this concept not as obvious to me. But, as Professor Rhodes said, "how do we be elite without being elitist?" We clearly have to recognize that a university is a great resource, but by no means the only one. We also need to make sure that these brilliant, spontaneously-generated ideas make it outside of the university setting, where they can actually be of use.
Incidentally, from Wikipedia:
The word university is derived from the Latin universitas magistrorum et scholarium, roughly meaning "community of teachers and scholars".
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Capra: Hidden Connections [book]
Concept/Connection 1
Recognize that there is an important link between matter and process. This is a departure from the Cartesians (starting with "I think therefore I am") who see the brain and the mind as separate areas of study. Capra argues that they truly are aspects of one and the same system.
Similarly, The Santiago Theory of Cognition connects this process of cognition with the essense of life itself. With this and other series of metaphor, I think Capra is drawing the conlucsion that just as humans (a collection of cells working together) are a life form, a social network or community (a collection of humans working together) is also a life form in its own right.
In this same argument for what constitutes life, he seems to stress that pure cognition is not really what defines it, any more than DNA or RNA (which he argues out of the picture earlier on). Therefore, as I see his arguments laid out, a social network itself would be more of a life form than a truly conscious AI, or computer program that could exactly mimic every neuron capability in a human's brain.
Concept/Connection 2:
Process
/ \
Form ---- Matter
These are the three aspects that define anything. The fourth, overarching aspect which connects to all of them is Meaning (I can't draw the pyramid of the four aspects here, however), though meaning wasn't considered a legitimate aspect of the study of social sciences until the positivists of the time eased up on the "measuring" (echoes of the Capra article of weeks ago with the unhelpful stress on the measuring of things, which generally focuses on the 'matter' or sometimes 'form' because they are easiest to quantify and describe).
Interesting quote and example about the work of Giddens, who was one of the first to transition to more integrative theories of studying social phenomena:
The interaction between social structures and human agency is cyclical, according to Giddens. Social structures are both the precondition and the unintended outcome of people's agency. People draw upon them in order to engage in their daily social practices, and in so doing they cannot help but reproduce the very same structures.For example, when we speak we necessarily draw upon the rules of our language, and as we use language we continually reproduce and transform the very same semantic structures. Thus social structures both enable us to interact and are also reproduced by our interactions. Giddens calls this the "duality of structure," and he acknowledges the similarily to the circular nature of autopoietic* networks in biology.p78-79
*(simply, things that can create, or in this case continually re-create, themselves; this is what Capra feels is the defining characteristic of life)
Other
A section on power notes that having authorities (those that have the knowledge to make a decision and act) are sometimes necessary in a group which may encounter conflicts of interest. It is not by nature an evil, but if power passes to someone who is not an authority, it ceases to be helpful and becomes potentially exploitative.
While I found the other chapters interesting, I mostly skimmed them because I think the most clear ideas he has here relating to community and social theory are above. If I had more time, I would write up on the chapter "The Networks of Global Capitalism," as I am finding myself drawn again and again to this idea of "global community" (and finding in what ways that is not an oxymoron). However, for the scope of this class, and what I am trying to focus my research topic on, I will hold off :)
First Microbes, Now Plants!
Clever plants chat over the network
This is just a brief brainwave because I don't feel it's particularly on-topic. But a lot of articles recently have really made me question our assumptions about the distinctions we as humans make between life-forms. But between microbes and plants (above link) forming these networks, to the recently dead parrot with the intelligence of a child (how intelligent are other animals that simply can't express themselves in human sounds?), I really am rethinking a lot of things. And this is coming from someone who for 15 years has been a vegetarian for moral reasons. I think a lot of this has also been informed by Capra's book, but more on that in its own post.
Monday, September 24, 2007
Susan Strange; Global Change and Theoretical Challenges ch9 "Toward a Theory of Transnational Empire";
US hegemony has not declined, as some think it has looking at the chaos of the world around it. Arguement is that it's the misuse of the structural power (undiminished) of the US hegemony that has caused the problems.
Structural Power: (as opposed to relational power, getting another country to do what you want) the ability of a country to determine the way in which certain basic social needs are provided.
Four societal needs for modern world economy: security knowledge production credit.
Production: the kind of purely polictical command (socialist) is shrinking; Entirely market-signalled (some basic food markets) is shrinking; geared towards national markets (governments can adjust with policies); transnational corporations (TNGs). Any TNGs have a significant interest in not pissing off Washington b/c of the huge market share of the territorial US
Argues that US structural power not import/export numbers reliant, but if it can be estimated at all, it is the total alue of goods and service produced by large companies responsive to policy decisions taken by the US govt.
Knowledge: power to determine what knowledge shall be sought. Eg, the continued dominance of US in most of hte high-tech industries. US banks in transborder data flows.
Security: The only structure where US shares power (ie with the USSR at the time). rest of the world relies on either US or USSR as balance, backup.
Argues we need to redefine empires, both in their simple meaning, and in whether we view them as "bad." The American nonterritorial empire preferable to a Soviet or Japanese one. Easier to integreate into American society (as 'semicitizens' can tell you).
This article is rather old, but I wonder if she is addressing the direction of the US's power. Now it would be especially interesting to take that into account with Russia and China re-emerging.
This lady sure is high on America! Would she be surprised to find out other countries have nationalistic slogans, none of which are "We're #2"?
Structural Power: (as opposed to relational power, getting another country to do what you want) the ability of a country to determine the way in which certain basic social needs are provided.
Four societal needs for modern world economy: security knowledge production credit.
Production: the kind of purely polictical command (socialist) is shrinking; Entirely market-signalled (some basic food markets) is shrinking; geared towards national markets (governments can adjust with policies); transnational corporations (TNGs). Any TNGs have a significant interest in not pissing off Washington b/c of the huge market share of the territorial US
Argues that US structural power not import/export numbers reliant, but if it can be estimated at all, it is the total alue of goods and service produced by large companies responsive to policy decisions taken by the US govt.
Knowledge: power to determine what knowledge shall be sought. Eg, the continued dominance of US in most of hte high-tech industries. US banks in transborder data flows.
Security: The only structure where US shares power (ie with the USSR at the time). rest of the world relies on either US or USSR as balance, backup.
Argues we need to redefine empires, both in their simple meaning, and in whether we view them as "bad." The American nonterritorial empire preferable to a Soviet or Japanese one. Easier to integreate into American society (as 'semicitizens' can tell you).
This article is rather old, but I wonder if she is addressing the direction of the US's power. Now it would be especially interesting to take that into account with Russia and China re-emerging.
This lady sure is high on America! Would she be surprised to find out other countries have nationalistic slogans, none of which are "We're #2"?
Washington Post; "In Syrica, Iraq's Fate Silences Rights Activists"; Knickmeyer; Oct 2006
Syria, the last Baath-rule country, now isolated since the assassination of the Lebanese PM, now is even less likely to risk discussion of democritizing their country. Firstly because crackdowns are harder (talk of democracy is siding with US=traitorous), but also because at least things are better in Syria than they are in Iraq.
Washington Post; "Embittered Insiders Turn Against Bush"; Baker; Nov 2006
Even some fellow-war-architects turn against Bush on the management of the war. Republicans angry at the midterm defeat--feel if Rumsfeld had been fired earlier, the election would have gone differently. Perle: "If I had know n that hte US was going to essentially establish an occupation, then I'd say, 'Let's not do it,' and instead find another way to target Hussein." Though some say these neocons are just trying to avoid culpability for the war.
Adelman "The whole philoscopy of using American strength for good in hte world, for a foreign policy that is really value-based instead of balanced-power-based, I don't think is disproven by Iraq. But its certainly discredited."
Adelman "The whole philoscopy of using American strength for good in hte world, for a foreign policy that is really value-based instead of balanced-power-based, I don't think is disproven by Iraq. But its certainly discredited."
NYT; "Iraq may be prime place for training of militants, CIA Report concludes"; Jehl; 2005
"A new classified assessment by the CIA says Iraq may prove to be an even more effective training ground for Eslamic extremists than Afghanistan was in Al Aaeda's early days, because it is serving as real-world laboratory for urban combat." So those who survived are particularly experienced in urban combat.
Washington Post; "US Figures Show Sharp Rise in Terrorism-State Dept will not put Data in Report"; Glasser; Apr 2005
Because of the sharp increase in reported terror activity, the numbers were not included in a report to congress on the success of the war. Rice et al argued the definition changed, to be more inclusive, so comparing data year to year not accurate. Numbers made public otherwise, just not in report.
San Francisco Chronicle; "In these times, do as ancient Romans did--and survive; negotiate with foes, slash committments"; Arquilla; 2005
Our sense of dominance since becoming the sole military superpower has been more of one of siege--constant small battles. But our military is less flexible than it was for it's post-Pearl Harbor transformation.
Look to Rome at a similar time: "At the political level, Rome sought not to alienate but to attract" (soft power).
"If we muffled our rhetoric about spreading democracy, the world would breathe a huge sigh of relief."
Look to Rome at a similar time: "At the political level, Rome sought not to alienate but to attract" (soft power).
"If we muffled our rhetoric about spreading democracy, the world would breathe a huge sigh of relief."
Types of misperception: (these are first level of analysis because based on human failings)
Fundamental attribution error (state acting rationally but you interpret as evil intent).
First state assumes other state acting rationally (could be, for example, bureaucratic politics, if they are not considered possible reasons for action).Eg: some psychological factors cause irrational actions (Jervis lists many):groupthink (sort of a type of misperception)Mirror-imaging—when you look at others, you assume they are like you (sort of opposite of fundamental attribution error). Both of these are biased on assumptions of intent not based in fact. Culture is a key concept here: what is it? Beliefs/values that are society-wide.
(more of Jervis:)instrumental goals become reified, even after significant changes. Like a treaty you assume is as important as ever. It’s human nature to hang onto ideas, even after utility outlived.Eg: anti-ballistic missile treaty. But then Cold War ended, so we might want a missile defense for rogue states. The fact that it was an instrument for an original, specific problem is forgotten.Eg NATO originally against Soviets
Having past experiences with traumatic events will color reactions. Eg: Hitler::Milosovic/Saddam/Akhmadinjad comparisons. We take the lesson to never appease anyone.
Tend to see the behavior of others as more centralized.
If the bad guy does something we like—it’s our influence, not that they turned good, or chance. But we learn lesson to repeat whatever we did, whether or not it was actually influential.
Not misperception, but worth thinking about: propaganda. Should not affect why the STATE goes to war—just why citizens back it.
Bureaucratic Politics
How do people in government decide what policies to favor (covered last class)
How does government enact the eventual choice?
Your interest narrower than national interest (Morgenthau) (your job, you agency’s survival).
Standard Operating Procedure (SOP): For example, something made sense in the past, but may be no longer applicable).
How do interests get aggregated? Different groups [come?] up with difference courses of action. Meetings with individuals—lobbying, personal decisions. So it really depends on the government set up how the ideas are pulled together.
How do decisions get implemented?
§ Agencies may not comply—failure to succeed (if truly an impossible goal, not really bureaucratic politics.
§ Someone who didn’t like the policy in the first place could delay, sabotage till no longer applicable. Eg. People who disagreed with giving weapons to Afghanistan.
So there, rational decision processes that get waylaid.
Groupthink: Closely related to individual errors, but always occur group of individuals. First image theory, but different from simple misperception. Eg: Bay of Pigs. Somewhat personal psychology of wanting to belong to a group. But also, lack of access to power (Eg: Colin Powell’s eventual “support” of the war). Is this real reason, or just a justification? Since if you always kowtow, there is no real power to preserve.
Groups can make this additional mistake over the individual—by recognizing misperception but not saying anything. Not always the case.
Is groupthink ever good? Eg military, pro-ethnic diversity (racists rejected, silenced)
Patterns with bad groupthink. Difficulty with after the screw-up, admitting mistakes.
Other Jervis reading (spirals): *fundamentally important reading*
Point touches on one Morgenthau.
“One’s prescription is another’s proscription”
Deterrence—to threaten the other side
Appeasement—give them what they want, don’t provoke them.
Which do you do? Depends on what? Incorrect decision leads to loss of security, annihilation. Interesting problems are when outcomes include your own downfall. Jervis describes states generally threatening. Prescription: threaten and aggressor, appease a status-quo state. Can’t necessarily determine what kind of state it is by its specific demands. Threatening a status quo state leads to spiral of threat/aggression.
Status quo
Aggressive
Threaten
Transformed to revolutionary state=
WAR
Back down=
PEACE
Appease
PEACE
“give an inch, it takes a mile” = WAR
They can’t be a appeased, and now you’re fighting a stronger state.
What helps you determine its intentions? Military trends? No—actions of a state give you no way to know for sure. Intent commonly misperceived (as we saw today).
Sawyer—why is Osama a “hero” to some? Muslims feel attacked, they change their intent as a result of our action, our policies which are seen as attacking them. Examples of US attack on world of Islam: troops in Saudi Arabia (Arabian Peninsula where infidels should not be). East Timor vs. Indonesia—Osama viewed it as hurting an Islamic state for the sake of creating a Catholic state, even if the Indonesians did not feel that way. Even if US invited onto Arabian Peninsula, elsewhere we appear to be the aggressor. Blocking Islamic charitable donations. All of these are policies that may have valid goals, but they aren’t examined in terms of how outsiders would perceive them. Long list of reasons for why Muslim people would hate US for what we do not who we are.
Realism and Change
Up to now, our realism studies have been snapshot theories. Realism theory predicts the simple thing that will always remain true. But things sometimes will change somewhat. EG power changes, relative power changes.
Why does relative power of states change? War could cause it; economic conditions; shocks (eg drought) leads to economic change; technology.
How often do states expand when they have the ability? White says never. Is this offensive or defensive realism? Could be either. So power expansion doesn’t tell us if they’re revolutionary or status quo.
Has the drive for territorial colonialism gone away? Since realism doesn’t change, where has this drive gone? Economic control of territories, eg quid pro quo with Saudi Arabia. Financial markets controlled by US.
So form of the power dynamic has changed; people may have realized the cost of territorial colonialism.
Ottaway and Lacina: New forms of international interventions. Humanitarian, generally. Who benefited, who lost? Hard power to increase soft power. So truly humanitarian not intended to benefit the intervener. So, how’s Kosovo doing now? Now Albanians discriminate against the Serbs. Is that good?? We still have 17,000 troops in Kososvo. The constant is that the strong like to meddle in the affairs of the weak. Also, not much sign that it really works.
Hegemonic Stability
(reading: Kindleberger on the 1929 Depression)
Two definitions:
Hegemon: more power than all the other states combined (unipolarity)
Hegemon: state with more power than any individual state. This is the functional definition which is part of the hegemonic stability theory.
Hegemon can keep the peace (by being the “world’s policeman”). Any nations fight, and the hegemon has enough power to have its way despite the will of others.
Hegemonic stability also applies to economic stability (Kindleberger’s focus more on economics). Think subprime failure of this year—all aspects of world economy quickly affected. But why didn’t we get a sudden depression? The Fed can provide liquidity for the entire world. Because the US can provide enough resources to back up markets worldwide. If everyone in the world had equal power/money, no one country could bail out the whole world crisis by adding liquidity. This is the advantage of an economic hegemon. Public good can be provided, either as security, or lender of last resort. Otherwise, all states would have to coordinate interest rates etc. (Gilpin and Copeland).
Does the hegemon benefit less than the smaller powers?
Note: Image opposes previous images that small states would join together against the larger.
Fundamental attribution error (state acting rationally but you interpret as evil intent).
First state assumes other state acting rationally (could be, for example, bureaucratic politics, if they are not considered possible reasons for action).Eg: some psychological factors cause irrational actions (Jervis lists many):groupthink (sort of a type of misperception)Mirror-imaging—when you look at others, you assume they are like you (sort of opposite of fundamental attribution error). Both of these are biased on assumptions of intent not based in fact. Culture is a key concept here: what is it? Beliefs/values that are society-wide.
(more of Jervis:)instrumental goals become reified, even after significant changes. Like a treaty you assume is as important as ever. It’s human nature to hang onto ideas, even after utility outlived.Eg: anti-ballistic missile treaty. But then Cold War ended, so we might want a missile defense for rogue states. The fact that it was an instrument for an original, specific problem is forgotten.Eg NATO originally against Soviets
Having past experiences with traumatic events will color reactions. Eg: Hitler::Milosovic/Saddam/Akhmadinjad comparisons. We take the lesson to never appease anyone.
Tend to see the behavior of others as more centralized.
If the bad guy does something we like—it’s our influence, not that they turned good, or chance. But we learn lesson to repeat whatever we did, whether or not it was actually influential.
Not misperception, but worth thinking about: propaganda. Should not affect why the STATE goes to war—just why citizens back it.
Bureaucratic Politics
How do people in government decide what policies to favor (covered last class)
How does government enact the eventual choice?
Your interest narrower than national interest (Morgenthau) (your job, you agency’s survival).
Standard Operating Procedure (SOP): For example, something made sense in the past, but may be no longer applicable).
How do interests get aggregated? Different groups [come?] up with difference courses of action. Meetings with individuals—lobbying, personal decisions. So it really depends on the government set up how the ideas are pulled together.
How do decisions get implemented?
§ Agencies may not comply—failure to succeed (if truly an impossible goal, not really bureaucratic politics.
§ Someone who didn’t like the policy in the first place could delay, sabotage till no longer applicable. Eg. People who disagreed with giving weapons to Afghanistan.
So there, rational decision processes that get waylaid.
Groupthink: Closely related to individual errors, but always occur group of individuals. First image theory, but different from simple misperception. Eg: Bay of Pigs. Somewhat personal psychology of wanting to belong to a group. But also, lack of access to power (Eg: Colin Powell’s eventual “support” of the war). Is this real reason, or just a justification? Since if you always kowtow, there is no real power to preserve.
Groups can make this additional mistake over the individual—by recognizing misperception but not saying anything. Not always the case.
Is groupthink ever good? Eg military, pro-ethnic diversity (racists rejected, silenced)
Patterns with bad groupthink. Difficulty with after the screw-up, admitting mistakes.
Other Jervis reading (spirals): *fundamentally important reading*
Point touches on one Morgenthau.
“One’s prescription is another’s proscription”
Deterrence—to threaten the other side
Appeasement—give them what they want, don’t provoke them.
Which do you do? Depends on what? Incorrect decision leads to loss of security, annihilation. Interesting problems are when outcomes include your own downfall. Jervis describes states generally threatening. Prescription: threaten and aggressor, appease a status-quo state. Can’t necessarily determine what kind of state it is by its specific demands. Threatening a status quo state leads to spiral of threat/aggression.
Status quo
Aggressive
Threaten
Transformed to revolutionary state=
WAR
Back down=
PEACE
Appease
PEACE
“give an inch, it takes a mile” = WAR
They can’t be a appeased, and now you’re fighting a stronger state.
What helps you determine its intentions? Military trends? No—actions of a state give you no way to know for sure. Intent commonly misperceived (as we saw today).
Sawyer—why is Osama a “hero” to some? Muslims feel attacked, they change their intent as a result of our action, our policies which are seen as attacking them. Examples of US attack on world of Islam: troops in Saudi Arabia (Arabian Peninsula where infidels should not be). East Timor vs. Indonesia—Osama viewed it as hurting an Islamic state for the sake of creating a Catholic state, even if the Indonesians did not feel that way. Even if US invited onto Arabian Peninsula, elsewhere we appear to be the aggressor. Blocking Islamic charitable donations. All of these are policies that may have valid goals, but they aren’t examined in terms of how outsiders would perceive them. Long list of reasons for why Muslim people would hate US for what we do not who we are.
Realism and Change
Up to now, our realism studies have been snapshot theories. Realism theory predicts the simple thing that will always remain true. But things sometimes will change somewhat. EG power changes, relative power changes.
Why does relative power of states change? War could cause it; economic conditions; shocks (eg drought) leads to economic change; technology.
How often do states expand when they have the ability? White says never. Is this offensive or defensive realism? Could be either. So power expansion doesn’t tell us if they’re revolutionary or status quo.
Has the drive for territorial colonialism gone away? Since realism doesn’t change, where has this drive gone? Economic control of territories, eg quid pro quo with Saudi Arabia. Financial markets controlled by US.
So form of the power dynamic has changed; people may have realized the cost of territorial colonialism.
Ottaway and Lacina: New forms of international interventions. Humanitarian, generally. Who benefited, who lost? Hard power to increase soft power. So truly humanitarian not intended to benefit the intervener. So, how’s Kosovo doing now? Now Albanians discriminate against the Serbs. Is that good?? We still have 17,000 troops in Kososvo. The constant is that the strong like to meddle in the affairs of the weak. Also, not much sign that it really works.
Hegemonic Stability
(reading: Kindleberger on the 1929 Depression)
Two definitions:
Hegemon: more power than all the other states combined (unipolarity)
Hegemon: state with more power than any individual state. This is the functional definition which is part of the hegemonic stability theory.
Hegemon can keep the peace (by being the “world’s policeman”). Any nations fight, and the hegemon has enough power to have its way despite the will of others.
Hegemonic stability also applies to economic stability (Kindleberger’s focus more on economics). Think subprime failure of this year—all aspects of world economy quickly affected. But why didn’t we get a sudden depression? The Fed can provide liquidity for the entire world. Because the US can provide enough resources to back up markets worldwide. If everyone in the world had equal power/money, no one country could bail out the whole world crisis by adding liquidity. This is the advantage of an economic hegemon. Public good can be provided, either as security, or lender of last resort. Otherwise, all states would have to coordinate interest rates etc. (Gilpin and Copeland).
Does the hegemon benefit less than the smaller powers?
Note: Image opposes previous images that small states would join together against the larger.
The American Conservative: "Jacobin in Chief: Exporting the French Rev. to the world"; Ryn; 2005
"It should by now be obvious that, in his foreign policy views at minimum, hte president of the U.S. is no conservative. He is a Jacobin nationalist."
"...ideologically charged missionary spirit that bears a striking resemblance to that of hte Jacobins who led the French Revolution."
"The neoconservatives have transformed the old American exceptionalism, which counseled isolation form the world, into an assertive, ideologically intense nationalism, whose smugness seems to know no bounds."
"[in media commentary] neo-Jacobin thinking is todya challenging an older, more diffuse and less vigorous liberalism for pre-eminence."
"According to Irving Kristol, the reputed godfather of neoconservatism, today's US is 'ideological, like the Sovet Union of yesterday.' His son William insists that for America vigorously to promote its universal principles abroad, it must have great military and other governmental might. The old conservative suspicion of strong, centralized federal govenment must be abandoned. According to the elder Kristol, it has been the role of neoconservatism 'to convert the Republican party and conservatism in general, against their will,' to this new conception of government."
"Burke [British father of conservatism] warned specifically against 'liberty' in the abstract."
"...ideologically charged missionary spirit that bears a striking resemblance to that of hte Jacobins who led the French Revolution."
"The neoconservatives have transformed the old American exceptionalism, which counseled isolation form the world, into an assertive, ideologically intense nationalism, whose smugness seems to know no bounds."
"[in media commentary] neo-Jacobin thinking is todya challenging an older, more diffuse and less vigorous liberalism for pre-eminence."
"According to Irving Kristol, the reputed godfather of neoconservatism, today's US is 'ideological, like the Sovet Union of yesterday.' His son William insists that for America vigorously to promote its universal principles abroad, it must have great military and other governmental might. The old conservative suspicion of strong, centralized federal govenment must be abandoned. According to the elder Kristol, it has been the role of neoconservatism 'to convert the Republican party and conservatism in general, against their will,' to this new conception of government."
"Burke [British father of conservatism] warned specifically against 'liberty' in the abstract."
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Washington Post; "The 'Bush Doctrine' experiences Shining Moments"; Milbank; 2003
A week of good things (Libyan's agreeing to inspections, France and Germany working hard with Iran to get it in line) are credited to the Iraq strike and the capture of Saddam. Other countries recognize the US's power and move to accomodate it.
Imperialism Old and New; Ch13: "Farewell To Empire"; 1962
What was colonialism all about? Argues that it was less of an economic thing and more of a prestige thing. While private companies may have made profit from the labor and resources of a colony, the official input shows more money/resources going into the colony. There was some fear of competition from other European powers, and what they might gain (hence the scramble for Africa).
after the world wars, the ruling powers lost all cred. independence was imminent.
Soviets claimed Russian was never imperialist/colonial, but just because their conquered territories were continguous, no other distinction can be made. As other more overtly overseas colonies were liquidated, Russia retained control of all its Turkic territories.
Some lasting effects of imperialism good. Author doubts world attitude would ever be pro-imperialism again, though.
after the world wars, the ruling powers lost all cred. independence was imminent.
Soviets claimed Russian was never imperialist/colonial, but just because their conquered territories were continguous, no other distinction can be made. As other more overtly overseas colonies were liquidated, Russia retained control of all its Turkic territories.
Some lasting effects of imperialism good. Author doubts world attitude would ever be pro-imperialism again, though.
Washington Post; "The Illusion of 'Managing' China"; Kaga; 2005
The idea/phrase of "managing" the rise implies enough time to keep under our own control, and enough time to think through things and not do anything rash. History provides no comfort that this will be the case. A new power arises rarely without the resulting war to really reassess the power differentials. China's rise will be controlled by China, not us.
The Australian; "The rise of China will not be peaceful at all"; Mearsheimer; 2005
China will grow economically over the next decades until neighboring states + US will join together against it. The goal of every state is not only power, but hegemony in the anarchastic inter-country system.
States that gain regional hegemony have a further aim: to prevent other geographical areas from being dominated by other great powers.
China probably won't compete miltarily with Russia/Japan, but will find other ways to dictate behavior. Will also eventually try to push US out of Asia. China, strategically so, would prefer a militarily weak Japan and Russia as the US has a militarily weak Canada and Mexico.
US will go to all lengths to weaken China, even in Asia region alone. Likely will behave as toward USSR during cold war.
"[depressing]... but the fact is that international politics is a nasty and dangerous business and no amount of goodwill can ameliorate the intense security competition that sets in when an aspiring hegemon appears in Eurasia."
States that gain regional hegemony have a further aim: to prevent other geographical areas from being dominated by other great powers.
China probably won't compete miltarily with Russia/Japan, but will find other ways to dictate behavior. Will also eventually try to push US out of Asia. China, strategically so, would prefer a militarily weak Japan and Russia as the US has a militarily weak Canada and Mexico.
US will go to all lengths to weaken China, even in Asia region alone. Likely will behave as toward USSR during cold war.
"[depressing]... but the fact is that international politics is a nasty and dangerous business and no amount of goodwill can ameliorate the intense security competition that sets in when an aspiring hegemon appears in Eurasia."
Washington Post; "US Sanctions with Teeth"; Ignatius; Feb 2007
Old "sanctions" didn't work, eg in Cuba. But North Korea and Iran's sanction different--certain banks can be cut off entirely from the dollar system. Because of globalization, this quarantine basically extends to the entire network. Part of the Patriot Act. Specific banks targeted for egregiously supporting terrorism in some way, but the effect, since host countries suffer, is all countries look more closely for front companies or money laundering operations
New York Times; Tyler; US Strategy plan calls for insuring no rivals develop; 1992
Document from Defense Department, on post-cold war era:
"[The United States] must sufficiently account for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership or seeking to overturn the established political and economic order."
"the document was provided to the NYT by an official who believes this post-cold war strategy debate should be carried out in the public domain."
The document implicitly most fears Germany and Japan (!).
What was the aftermath of this report's draft leak??
"[The United States] must sufficiently account for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership or seeking to overturn the established political and economic order."
"the document was provided to the NYT by an official who believes this post-cold war strategy debate should be carried out in the public domain."
The document implicitly most fears Germany and Japan (!).
What was the aftermath of this report's draft leak??
"Fundamental Attribution Error"
The injury we do and the one we suffer are not weighed in the same scale.~ Aesop
Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.~ George Orwell
(more...)
Every war when it comes, or before it comes, is represented not as a war but as an act of self-defense against a homicidal maniac.~ George Orwell
(more...)
Monday, September 17, 2007
Russian Transportation/Greenhouse Gas data sources
Policy:
- Questionable source? http://countrystudies.us/russia/65.htm
- A chapter in this book deals with Russia policy: http://www.springerlink.com/content/pk3777/?p=eeff9f7c2a744853978987a10703bc93&pi=0
- Kyoto LongTerm Changes: http://www.aucc.ca/_pdf/english/programs/cepra/Final_paper_Cad_team.pdf
- On cooperation between EU and Russia, using Russia to bridge Europe and Asia.
- Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_policy_of_Russia (note citations! could be useful)
Data:
- http://webdab.emep.int/
- http://cdr.eionet.europa.eu/ru
- http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/rutoc.html
- http://www.pnl.gov/aisu/pubs/transcmgt.pdf
- http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cdb/cdb_advanced_data_extract_fm.asp?HYrID=2003&HYrID=2002&HYrID=2001&HYrID=2000&HYrID=1999&HYrID=1998&HYrID=1997&HYrID=1996&HYrID=1995&HYrID=1994&HYrID=1993&HYrID=1992&HSrID=30248&HCrID=643&yrID=1992&continue=Continue+%3E%3E
- http://unstats.un.org/unsd/cdb/cdb_years_on_top.asp?srID=29500&Ct1ID=&crID=643&yrID=1980%2C1981%2C1982%2C1983%2C1984%2C1985%2C1986%2C1987%2C1988%2C1989%2C1990%2C1991%2C1992%2C1993%2C1994%2C1995%2C1996%2C1997%2C1998%2C1999%2C2000%2C2001%2C2002%2C2003%2C2004
- http://www.unescap.org/ttdw/statabs/countryoverview2.asp?Country=Russian%20Federation (the)
- http://www.unescap.org/ttdw/statabs/index.asp?topic=All%20Topics#advanced
- http://yosemite.epa.gov/oar/globalwarming.nsf/UniqueKeyLookup/SHSU5BVPKS/$File/russianfed_cs.pdf
- http://www.icao.int/icao/en/env/clq01/5-gorlov.PDF
- http://www.icao.int/icao/en/env/clq01/gorlov.pps
- https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/rs.html
- http://www.rosavtodor.ru/en/information.php?id=7
The Web of War; Ch 8 "The Abacus of Power"
Balance of Power; Clausewitz (Prussian soldier; On War)
- A dominant nation can preserve the peace simply by its ability to keep inferior nations in order.
-or- - A nation which is too powerful endangers the peace
"balance of power" misleadingly simple
"Most believers in the balance of power think that a world of many powerful states tends to be more peaceful." (Waltz's article referenced bipolarity as the other great-peacekeeper besides nuclear power). "In the nuclear age...two great power were prefereable to eight. The danger of a crisis that slipped from control was diminished if two powers dominated the world." (only quoted here as a link to the Waltz article).
"...no historian ...produced evidence to confirm that a power system of seven strong states was more conducive teo peace than a system of two strong states. The idea relies much on analogies" ('two legged table unsteady'; bicycles; virtues of free economic competition)
Balance of power: not a formula for peace, but for national independence. Prevents the rise of a nation to world dominance.
Survey of wars from 1700-1815 in the reading suggests decicive victories, strong victors, lead to longer periods of peace. Idea of a neat ledger of power at the end of the war, the ideal time to measure it.
Wars begin with diplomacy breakdown, in turn caused by both sides having conflicting estimates of their bargaining power. "It is not the actual distribution of power that is vital: it is rather the way in which national leaders think that power is distributed." "War is a disbute about the measure of power" p114
Wars after 1815 shorter, more decisive, with longer periods of peace. However, the agreement about nations' bargaining power (i.e. wars with a clearly superior country, even if level is not precise) rarely lasted as long as one generation..
Fear of trounced country rising again gives co-victors reason to stay united rather than fight each other for further dominance setting on the ladder. Also, seeing allies during a war's military strength may inhibit countries from attacking them (ie US and Russia after WWII).
Balance of power replaced with Balance of Terror in the nuclear age. Some argue two powers now more stable. Others argue stalemates exists prior to nuclear capabilities.
"Agreement depends not only on an assessment of the might of hthe enemy but a prediction of the costs and profits of fighting rather than negotiating." "War itself is a dispute about measurement; peace on the other hand marks a rough agreement aout measurement." p122
Nations' assessing their strength:
- military strength
- predictions of outside nations reaction
- perceptions of internal unity (their own and enemy's)
- memory of forgetfulness of realities of war
- perceptions of prosperity and ability to sustain a war
- nationalism and ideology
- personality and mental qualities of the leaders.
If these combine to make a nation think it's powerful, war may be soon... Confidence a big overarching factor. Optimism usually precedes a war.
Dissertation: Critiques of Rational Deterrence Theory; Kuperman
Rational Deterrance Theory: Country A won't be aggressive to Country B unless the potential gains far outweigh the potential losses (connects back to the idea of why Waltz argues for a safer world, armed to the teeth with nuclear arms.)
Most common critiques undermining this rational cost/benefit theory: misperception, domestic politics, external considerations, prospect theory, bureaucratic politics, computational limitations.
Most common critiques undermining this rational cost/benefit theory: misperception, domestic politics, external considerations, prospect theory, bureaucratic politics, computational limitations.
- Misperception (Jervis): Calculated or innocent misperception means decisions cannot be rational. However, misperception is a part of rational deterrance theory--otherwise the theory would predict that no wars would be lost by its starter.
- Domestic Politics (R Lebow, J Stein): country leaders are indeed rational, and therefore seek to optimize their personal wellbeing.
- External considerations: some of the benefits in the equation may be more long-term, therefore making a country seem like it's acting irrationally.
- Prospect Theory: decision-makers value prospective losses more highly than objectively equivalent prospective gains. Therefore, decision wouldn't be made on just net outcome. The potential gains would have to be significantly higher than losses.
- *Bureaucratic politics: sometimes the rational decision may not be implemented because of this. However, such paths are usually bypassed for crucial military decisions.
- *Lack of computational abilities. Not the same as misperception. Reasons: crisis pressures, bureaucratic politics, cognitive limitations. Last one: state cannot make rational decisions for the same reasons humans can't: information processing demands are too great. JS Mill "[human behavior stems from habit rather than rational calculation.]"
*Author feels these are legitamite alternatives.
Fiascos; "Why So Many Miscalculations?"
Imperfections of group decisions; Effects of group cohesiveness; groupthink
Main idea: Groupthink=fiasco
"The potentially detrimental effect of group cohesiveness were emphasized by another theorst, Wilfred Bion, an eminent group therapist. Bion described how the efficienty of all working groups can be adversely affected by the preconscious myths and misconceptions of their mutually dependent members--that is, by shared basic assumptions that tend to preserive the group without regard for the work at hand."
p 4
Conceptions of political decision making (p6)
Main idea: Groupthink=fiasco
"The potentially detrimental effect of group cohesiveness were emphasized by another theorst, Wilfred Bion, an eminent group therapist. Bion described how the efficienty of all working groups can be adversely affected by the preconscious myths and misconceptions of their mutually dependent members--that is, by shared basic assumptions that tend to preserive the group without regard for the work at hand."
p 4
Conceptions of political decision making (p6)
- "rational actor" theory--aims to determine the ends of the political actor by means of the policy he has chosen.
- Taking into account "organizational rigidities" such as routines and procedures of bureaucratic organizations that grind out platitudes about what can be done to attain objectives.
- Intrusions of the games of domestic and local bureacratic politics into the dangerous competitive games of international relations.
- group dynamics approach: paying closer attention to the behavior of the small group of decision-makers
Groupthink: when someone deviates from the group's reasoning, rather than explore the new line of thought, subtle "ganging up" takes place trying to bring them back in line. Group cohesion becomes all important.
Quote: "The invidiousness [of the Orwell-esque word] is intentional: Groupthink refers to a deterioration of mental efficiency, reality testing, and moral judgment that results from in-group pressures."
Major defects in decision-making policy:
- Groups discussion limited to a few (often 2) courses of action, not a survey/range.
- Objectives filled and values implicated by decision not examined.
- No reexamination of decision preferred by the majority for less obvious failures.
- No reexamination of decisions initially rejected by majority.
- No attempt to get more information from experts.
- Little interest in facts/opinions that don't support their initial majority vote.
- Little discussion on how chosen policy to be hindered by bureaucratic inertia, sabotaged by politics etc. Therefore, no contingency plans.
Washington Post; "China's Law on Taiwan Backfires Anti-Seccesaion Measure Hurts Efforts Abroad"; Cody; Mar 2005
China passed a law codifying its stance that China will now allow Taiwanese independence. They saw it as a way to stave off Taiwan's president Chen from getting any ideas (he was asserting independance more, changing names from People's Republic of China to Taiwan etc.). Chinese officials were surprised when other countries condemned the law, so they backed down on it a bit, disappointed that it had cooled relations between themselves and Taiwan, rather than just laid out the relationship more clearly. Now, Taiwanese seem more strongly behind Chen's sentiments of independance.
TomPaine.com; "Bush's Widening Credibility Gap"; Khouri; Jan 2005
Five problems identified with Bush's inauguration speech, as interpreted by those who experience US foreign policy first hand:
- Emphasis on freedom and liberty, when in the developing world, more basic rights are at the fore: national liberation, development, dignity, justice.
- Lip service to freedom and democracy in contrast to enduring support for autocrats and dictators, even since the Cold War's end.
- Support of Israel by US seen as many Arabs in the region as a support of the subjugation of Palestinians--not liberty. This point identified as the single biggest reason for Arab skepticism of US promises and rhetoric.
- Simplistic accusations of terrorists fighting freedom, rather than the reasons they themselves give, make US policies seem artificial, masking ulterior motives.
- Pre-emptive warfare seems to be the norm for the US--hints of what may come with Afghanistan and Iran concerning.
"The gap between rhetoric and policy is simply too wide, and has been for many, many years."
Washington Post; "Japan-China Oil Dispute Escalates Relationship Already Uneasy as Tokyo Accuses Beijing of Tapping Diputed Fields"; Faiola; Oct 2005
An oil field which potentially straddles Chinese/Japanese waters, is at the center of a debate between China and Japan. Old grievances seem close to the surface. China is drilling within their own waters, but the field itself seems to be what's under dispute, and negotiations did not go well.
Quote
"We need to take proper measures even at the risk of making the situation more volative. We need to remind China that we are ready and willing to defend our territory and interests."
-Katsuei Hirasawa
Also mention of Japan's extreme loathe to take any measures that could possibly aggressive since WWII.
Quote
"We need to take proper measures even at the risk of making the situation more volative. We need to remind China that we are ready and willing to defend our territory and interests."
-Katsuei Hirasawa
Also mention of Japan's extreme loathe to take any measures that could possibly aggressive since WWII.
K Waltz, “The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: More May Be Better,” in Betts, Conflict and the Cold War
Basic argument: the spread of nuclear weapons would in fact have a pacifying effect on international relations. The more deadly the potential retaliation, and also the less certain others' capabilities are, the more countries will stay in line. The risks are too high for almost any potential gain.
Other points: The distinction between defense (having a strong shield, say, of anti-missile systems) vs. deterrance (having the capability to strike back with such strength the risk of attacking you although you are defenseless is not attractive).
Also a bit on the idea that worry about new nuclear states not having the capability to really develop and control nuclear arms is a bit condescending--after all, the 2/3 major powers managed our developmental stages just fine. A country won't develop a nuclear arms without the proper technicians and officials in place.
My reactions: While all of the potential arguments I could think of are dealt with, I feel the weak point is in the first argument: "It hasn't happened so far, why does that make the future seem even more dire?" I don't think it does make the future seem any more or less dire that we have so far made it through more than half a century will multiple nuclear states. The worry that he doesn't address is that once that row of dominoes that is the "stabilizing" deterrant effect of multiple countries with a large arsenal of nuclear weapons is put into play, we really just need a handful of bombings to create catastrophe. While it is reasonable to remind oneself that the leader of a country would be mindful of the responsibility required in having nuclear capabilities, it is not assured the ease of world catastrophe would be prevented by logical thinking.
Other points: The distinction between defense (having a strong shield, say, of anti-missile systems) vs. deterrance (having the capability to strike back with such strength the risk of attacking you although you are defenseless is not attractive).
Also a bit on the idea that worry about new nuclear states not having the capability to really develop and control nuclear arms is a bit condescending--after all, the 2/3 major powers managed our developmental stages just fine. A country won't develop a nuclear arms without the proper technicians and officials in place.
My reactions: While all of the potential arguments I could think of are dealt with, I feel the weak point is in the first argument: "It hasn't happened so far, why does that make the future seem even more dire?" I don't think it does make the future seem any more or less dire that we have so far made it through more than half a century will multiple nuclear states. The worry that he doesn't address is that once that row of dominoes that is the "stabilizing" deterrant effect of multiple countries with a large arsenal of nuclear weapons is put into play, we really just need a handful of bombings to create catastrophe. While it is reasonable to remind oneself that the leader of a country would be mindful of the responsibility required in having nuclear capabilities, it is not assured the ease of world catastrophe would be prevented by logical thinking.
First Post
This is an experiment. A place to keep all my thoughts about my various readings in one place, and maybe link between them.
realism, continued
Morgenthau: how does he differ from previous realists? Formalizes the theory. Does he believe in reality that all states want to increase power? Some want to expand, some want to preserve. Imperialist and revolutionary power. But are there other types of states (theories not always emphasizing goodness of fit). “Reality is deficient in this respect.” So why is the theory so useful? Better to be prepared for the worst. Is there a down-side to using a theory this way? Misperception, misuse of resources. He never makes explicit these reasons and downsides.
Analytic and normative aspects of theory. Realism—analytic: “States maximize power.” Normative: “As a state, you should act this way to keep power balanced.” But the second statement in theory unnecessary if the first statement is true.
Balance of Power: Various meanings. Be specific what you mean when you use it.
Measurement: “correlation of forces.” (Sonets(??)); balance can favor ones(?)
Balance of Power as strategy/choice: think Bismarck. Smaller states joining to balance a larger power. Eg., in a system of five powers, you always need to be allied with three.
As a law of international politics. Something states do naturally (as opposed to the “strategy” definition). Eg. Waltz
Morgenthau: Definition of “power”: some elements:
Geography (eg UK is island, Switzerland has mountains). Difficulty to invade (thing Russia vs Belgium). However, not manipulable, must adapt, compensate.
Natural resources: not always correlated; need to concert to power; stronger power wanting to have close alliance, colonize; economic power=potential military power, autonomy. Ability to mobilize, build your own military. Ability to survive an embargo.
Population—from which military can arise, allowing people to continue industry back home. Also take into account rough technological equivalence. You can afford more losses. Iran’s “human waves.” (Iran’s only superiority was numbers).
National morale. Percent of citizen willing to fight (think Vietnam).
(Levels of analysis
people—Machiavelli, Morganthau
states—
International system—Waltz )
[Theories:
Bandwagoning
Balance of Power
“Birds of a Feather” (<-constructivist)
Balance of Threat (similar to collective security; not realist strategy/policy)]
Waltz: explicit differences between Waltz’s “Theory of International…” and other realists. Machiavelli, for example, says states act how they do because of human nature (humans want power, therefore states want power). Waltz however focuses on the anarchy of states; his theory rooted in the international system. Known as “structural realist” or “neorealist.”
Neorealist: breaks down into defense (Waltz) and offensive)
Waltz: Balance of Power as law. Inevitability, though state may put choice and intention behind it—ally with weaker states against stronger. (When would a state sally with larger power? If you have no choice, Melians should have bandwagoned, for instance). But does this happen in reality? In a real-life analogy, does it seem logical (wouldn’t you want to befriend the biggest kid on the block?). But Waltz’s smaller alliances preserve a state’s autonomy. Ideology (“birds of a feather”) doesn’t matter—smaller power causes alliances more than anything. Even if big states pacifist—intentions are transient (second level of analysis), but power in enduring.
States looking to survive, no maximize power. “States can seldom survive trying to maximize power as goal.” Because it creates enemies, puts your security at risk.
Walt: Waltz’s student. State doesn’t balance on basis of power—law is wrong. States will, instead, make alliances based on how much a state is a threat. (Also disagrees with “birds of a feather”). One state attacks another, its threat gets bigger, not necessarily its power. Alliances still against the “big” country. Four variables to assess:
1. Power
2. Offensive (military) power
3. Proximity
4. Aggressive intentions. Past performance a good indicator of future actions. So a powerful state may be an attractive ally if it is pacifist/not empirical.
Mearscheimer: Structuralist/neorealist; offensive realist. Different from Waltz because he advises: attack. Because otherwise they will one day be coming after you. Why doesn’t balancing behavior solve this, as Waltz says (when others will ally against you). Think League of Nations. Alliances will be abandoned before an actual attack. Underbalancing, “buck passing.”
Does it pay to be aggressive in the international system? Still debated.
Offense/defense balance: What condition determines whether offense or defense is “right?” How easy is it to conquer another state, all else equal? Answer depends, for example, on military technology, terrain. If all world were Switzerland, defensive balance would make sense. If all were Belgium, offensive would be the norm.
Soft Power (Nye): Part of realism. Difference between definition in academia (where it originated) and in political/media realm. Hard power—military. People do what you want because of threat (implied or explicit). Soft power—no threat. Attractiveness of main state. Can be from propaganda, active convincing.
Money—hard power generally. Economic power money lent with strings attached. Economic sanctions—coercive mechanisms (but if people voluntarily ask your help because of a strong economy, that’s soft power. But most people mean “economic power” as coercive economic power, therefore, technically, hard power). Using hard power to create soft power (eg. Aid during earthquakes, tsunami).
China more attractive because of noninterference. Soft power theory says that smaller countries will begin working with China, not US.
Diplomacyàleverageàcoercionàhard power (quid pro quo—carrot of stick=hard power).
China, Russia, India alliance against sanctions for Iran. What is basis of alliance? Economic interest?
Why do many countries ally with Russia currently? Inconsistent with realism unless fighting would be in vain (bandwagoning).
State as rational actor
Coercion theory (Thomas Shelling): states presented with choices, picks choice that maximizes its well-being. Give other states choices so the best choice is what we want: Defy/sticks vs. concede/carrots. Coercian is positive-sum (“positive sum”—not always equal wins in the win-win equation. If Melians’ had given up, they would have lost something, but been better off than how it would have been. The Athenians, too, would have lost less, though).
Terrorism: Threatening civilians for a political concession from leaders. Eg. US Sanctioning all of Iraq by any definition was terrorism. (Historically, terror (civilians targeted) was at the end of a war. No, with the nuclear age, terror can start it out. We act to coerce, not weaken militarily, but coercion often linked to civilian targets.?)
There is some distinction between coercion and terror.
Blainey: Similar theory in that states act rationally all the time. Rationally and optimally not same. Optimally requires perfect info. So why do we get wars? Miscalculation about power, or measures of power between countries uncertain. Most often when there is no war for a long time—war is out only measure of power. Both sides thing they can win.
Some alternatives to rational actors:
Fundamental attribution error. Jervis looking at psychology. Our “bad” decisions have justifications; others’ are evil. This is a form of misperception.
Bureaucratic politics
Individuals making decision have narrow interests
Standards operating procedures (SOPs)—thing in terms of what’s allowed, what’s already been done?
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