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2 The state and processes of change This chapter considers the impact of ‘Thatcherism’ and ‘Reaganomics’ and the extent to which the British and American states were restructured during the 1980s. It argues that, despite the neoliberal project, the state proved largely resistant to long-run shrinkage. It suggests, furthermore, that some of the gradual change mechanisms that were employed by policymakers in this period did not always create lasting or sustained institutional shifts. Much has been made of ‘Thatcherism’ and the extent to which Margaret Thatcher
wants to do something to show we're not all wasting our time’ (BBC News 2020 ). The singular declaration of a US president of the transformation of the Taliban from recognition as a terrorist organisation to a potential counterinsurgent highlights the powerful effect that acts of recognition, mis-recognition and non-recognition of armed non-state actors (ANSAs) can have in the course of civil conflict. This is only one speech by a US leader in a long-lasting conflict, and it may not in the long run have an impact, but it was an unusually visible
This study explores the normative dimension of the evolving role of the United Nations in peace and security and, ultimately, in governance. What is dealt with here is both the UN's changing raison d'être and the wider normative context within which the organisation is located. The study looks at the UN through the window of one of its most contentious, yet least understood, practices: active involvement in intra-state conflicts as epitomised by UN peacekeeping. Drawing on the conceptual tools provided by the ‘historical structural’ approach, it seeks to understand how and why the international community continuously reinterprets or redefines the UN's role with regard to such conflicts. The study concentrates on intra-state ‘peacekeeping environments’, and examines what changes, if any, have occurred to the normative basis of UN peacekeeping in intra-state conflicts from the early 1960s to the early 1990s. One of the original aspects of the study is its analytical framework, where the conceptualisation of ‘normative basis’ revolves around objectives, functions and authority, and is closely connected with the institutionalised values in the UN Charter such as state sovereignty, human rights and socio-economic development.
Public politics in a new state On 22 June 1921 the royal yacht Victoria , bearing King George V and Queen Mary, arrived in Belfast harbour, accompanied by an imposing flotilla comprising two battleships, two cruisers and a formation of destroyers. The royal party disembarked at Donegall Quay. From there the king and queen, escorted by mounted cavalry, proceeded in an open, horse-drawn carriage along High Street and Castle Place, and then through Donegall Place to the City Hall, where the king presided over a
2 Nation-building and state-building, 1809–1944 She did not love her country, only her plot and shack, A few yards of the stream, and the lava, rough and black. (Guðmundur Friðjónsson, ‘The widow by the stream’, cited in Karlsson 1995: 36) The aim of this chapter is to provide a brief but necessary historical background to the emergence of the present arrangement of five nation states and three Home Rule territories in the Nordic region. It proposes to do so in a comparative and thematic fashion, organising the material around the twin concepts of nation
In our discussion on livestock until now, we have looked mostly at the nature of the colonial state, while touching briefly upon the reactions of various indigenous sections to government policies. In the present chapter, we will look much more closely at indigenous reactions to government policies, especially in the context of famine relief. These
type, which can be termed scapegoating , occurred alongside Russia’s political reformulation in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and was driven by the more authoritarian vision for Russia articulated by Vladimir Putin. The third and chronologically most recent type is nullification . This accompanied the consolidation of the present hybrid semi-authoritarian Russian state. It refers to a targeted
1 Consumer and consumerism under state socialism: demand-side abundance and its discontents in Hungary during the long 1960s György Péteri1 Can consumption in state-socialist societies constitute a relevant field for the student of social issues related to overflow situations? So skeptical readers may wonder, and I cannot blame them. Of course, the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about these societies is shortages rather than excesses, insufficiency rather than plenty, a lack of almost everything rather than abundance. Indeed, shortages and their
7 State developments and Travellers’ responses, 1968–2000 Part II showed how the 1960s was a time of crisis and change for Travellers. The shortage of stopping places was no longer masked by increased mobility through motorisation, while tighter controls on the siting of caravans after 1960 restricted Travellers’ access to privately owned permanent sites. Added to the changed spatial environment was settled society’s perception of Travellers as social failures, and that their lifestyle was inappropriate in late twentiethcentury Britain. At the same time, there
1 •• How (not) to make a durable state Natalia Sobrevilla Perea The great transformations brought by the age of revolution at the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth resulted in the final dismemberment of the composite Hispanic Monarchy (monarquía española) and the emergence of over a dozen new states, which embarked on the process of creating nations. This was not only the case as regards the new republics that arose in the Spanish transatlantic possessions from Mexico to Chile but also with respect to Spain, which had to