{"title":"Is Transparency Excluded Where Autonomous Weapons Systems Are Concerned?","authors":"Dominika Iwan","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.2016403","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.2016403","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The paper explores mechanisms of transparency utilized by states to address security challenges caused by the development of autonomous weapons systems. The purpose of this paper is to answer whether transparency measures are able to ensure compliance with international humanitarian law in the context of autonomous weapons systems. The dogmatic and comparative methods were used to analyze the role of transparency in balancing international obligations with domestic interests. Because of domestic security, introducing new regulations on autonomous weapons systems is counter-productive. Transparency contributes to a better optimization of secrecy and information, while soft law, paradoxically, is better suited to widening common standards of conduct with weapon systems.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"72 5 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116246561","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"At War with Congress: War Powers Disputes during the Trump Administration","authors":"Kelly A. McHugh","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.2010554","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.2010554","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT During his four years in office, Congress made historic challenges to President Donald Trump’s authority as Commander in Chief, twice invoking the 1973 War Powers Resolution. The first resolution, passed in 2019, expressed disapproval of the U.S.’ logistical and material support for Saudi Arabia’s campaign against the Houthi rebel movement in Yemen. The second challenge occurred in 2020 after Trump authorized a drone strike that killed Iranian Major General Qassam Soleimani. In response, Congress passed a WPR that stipulated that any future military action against the regime would require express legislative authorization. Using a case study approach, this essay examines why Congress chose to employ the WPR as a policy tool after decades of dormancy. Ultimately, I argue that a confluence of factors compelled majorities in both chambers of Congress to use the War Powers Resolution to make a powerful rebuke of the administration’s policy. Drawing on a wealth of existing literature about the factors that impede or compel Congressional activism in use-of-force debates, I find that in both cases, members of Congress faced strong moral, legal, and strategic incentives to act, with few attendant political risks. As such, while the passage of two wars powers resolutions represented an important milestone in interbranch relations, it likely does not presage a new era of Congressional assertiveness in war powers. Keywords: U.S. foreign policy; Donald Trump; Congress","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"68 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130298348","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Assault on the Catalan Parliament: Catalan Nationalism versus Spanish Democracy","authors":"David Ortega","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.2010553","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.2010553","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Although not as renowned as the assault on the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021, on October 27, 2017 some of the elected representatives of the Catalan Parliament, those who are in favor of Catalonia’s independence from Spain, unilaterally declared Catalonia’s independence against the Spanish Constitution, Spanish laws and the decisions of the courts. This article studies the main violations of Spanish democracy that occurred in those three years from 2015 to 2017, plunging Catalonia into a territory at the edge of security and democracy.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"3 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-12-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131790269","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Challenges To Democratic Consolidation In Ecuador - Space For Opposition And Indigenous Representation Under Rafael Correa And Lenin Moreno","authors":"Girisanker Sb, Vrinda Aravind","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.1978844","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.1978844","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The illiberal democratic trend currently sweeping the world has emerged as a major obstacle for democratic consolidation, leading to its acceptance as the ‘new normal” of democracy. This trend has been successfully reversed in Ecuador, but the country has encountered and still grapples with several obstacles that must be overcome in order to return to the democratic consolidation route. The study focuses on the issues of consolidation, emphasizing the space allotted for participatory democracy by the ruling elite’s. The study examines Rafael Correa’s and Lenin Moreno’s governments in the context of the democratic consolidation framework to determine their strategic actions, behavior, and interests. The scope of the investigation will be limited with the focus made-on the space allowed for the opposition and indigenous community representation, from 2008 to 2021, to determine the extent to which Ecuador’s liberal democratic process is being consolidated.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"10 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-10-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133121158","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Nuclear Deviance: Stigma Politics and the Rules of the Nonproliferation Game","authors":"Ryan Shaffer","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.2001931","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.2001931","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"26 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131950899","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A “Post-Copenhagen” Analysis of China’s Securitization of the Uyghur: A Counterproductive Securitization?","authors":"Christopher Baker‐Beall, R. Clark","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.2020037","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.2020037","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This article adopts a post-Copenhagen approach to securitization theory in order to critically analyze the security policies developed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) that have targeted the Uyghur community in Xinjiang province. The article explores the relationship between the language of security and threat, which has been invoked by the PRC leadership, and its role in justifying every-day and exceptional security practices that have been enacted against the Uyghurs since the start of the 1990s. The article makes two important claims. First, the article argues that the securitization of the Uyghur has proved counter-productive, potentially creating the very security threat that the securitization of an issue is supposed to prevent. Second, the article suggests that the role of various audiences, both domestic and international, even in an authoritarian or illiberal state like China, play a key role in the securitization process and the legitimization of the security measures that have been enacted against the Uyghur community.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"64 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127742590","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"COVID-19 in Georgia: State Emergency as Political Non-law and Its Impact on Pluralism","authors":"Tamar Gamkrelidze","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.1972288","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.1972288","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT The article scrutinizes COVID-19-related state of emergency which tested and hence exposed vulnerability of certain values of liberal democracy where it has been fragile. It opened a window of opportunity for governments to operate in a political non-law realm through introduction of state emergency measures. Georgia was no exception, its political space has been particularly affected by the COVID-19-related state of emergency. Hence the research is interested in why the state emergency was damaging for democracy in Georgia? The article argues that by introduction of state of emergency the Georgian Dream government ushered Georgia—a hybrid democracy with rather limited history of power-sharing and weak democratic institutions—in a “state of exception,” in a sense put forward by Carl Schmitt. This political act further flattened political diversity through limiting the space for political pluralism.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130622487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"When Civilians are Targets: The Fatal Effects of State Sponsored Religiously Motivated Terrorism","authors":"Brittnee Carter","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.1972287","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.1972287","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This research investigates the link between ideology and state sponsorship of terrorist and militant groups on the propensity to attack civilian targets. I argue that religiously motivated terrorist and militant groups have a predisposition toward civilian attacks and that states will intentionally sponsor these groups because of their willingness to target civilians. The results find that religiously motivated groups attack civilian targets at higher rates when they have the resources of state sponsorship. As a result, counterterrorism and counterinsurgency measures require multilateral cooperation in hardening targets, eradicating state financing of terrorist groups, and reducing conspicuous Western presence.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"9 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131807145","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Translating Ideas into Actions: Analyzing Local Strategic Work to Counter Violent Extremism","authors":"Robin Andersson Malmros","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.1971524","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.1971524","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT Despite the growing importance of local action to counter violent extremism (CVE), empirical research on the local organization and management of CVE is scarce, especially regarding public administrators’ strategic work to translate policies and recommendations into frontline practice. Based mainly on ethnographic data and departing from new institutional theory, the paper refines our understanding of the symbolic, material, and relational work used to translate a diverse flow of ideas into concrete action in diverse institutional settings. Due to the institutional complexity, the cultural skill of the local CVE coordinator is identified as pivotal to successfully legitimizing and implementing CVE efforts.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"28 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122860675","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The State in Private Security: Examining Mexico City’s Complementary Police","authors":"Logan Puck","doi":"10.1080/17419166.2021.1972286","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/17419166.2021.1972286","url":null,"abstract":"ABSTRACT This study investigates the participation of the Mexico City government in the private security market through the Policía Complementaria (Complementary Police), a grouping of public police forces that provide protection to clients in exchange for a fee. By providing these forces with special powers and advantages, the state can outcompete traditional private security firms and profit handsomely. The state’s encroachment into the market for security raises concerns about democracy, inequality, and policing. Moreover, it challenges traditional conceptions about the relationship between the state and private security.","PeriodicalId":375529,"journal":{"name":"Democracy and Security","volume":"89 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-08-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127190450","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}