| 1. |
- Brenner, Björn
(författare)
-
ISLAMIST GOVERNANCE HAMAS STYLE: Readings from the Palestinian experiment in Islamic democracy
- 2014
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This study investigates how the Palestinian Islamists in Hamas came to govern following their success in the 2006 parliamentary elections. The study poses the overarching research question: How can Hamas's governance in the Gaza Strip between 2006 and 2012 be characterised and understood? Hamas has attracted particular research interest, partly due to its seemingly contradictory conduct, and partly due to the fact that this was the first case of Islamists in the Arab world to ascend to power by democratic means. On the one hand, Hamas has led an armed struggle against Israel. On the other hand, Hamas has participated in electoral processes in a peaceful and democratic fashion. As a result of this, the case of Hamas relates to two scholarly debates in particular - the nature of Islamism and the nature of Hamas. There is also a strong extra-scientific relevance to the study, as Hamas remains a powerful force in the Israeli-Palestinian arena. How Hamas is dealt with will have repercussions on when and in what shape the pending Palestinian state will materialise. The study addresses the research question by focusing on how the new government perceived and reacted to three key challenges to its exercise of power: relating to the political system and the main opposition party; countering violent radicalisation and local splinter groups; and re-establishing societal order and reforming the legal system. The study finds that the Hamas government lacked the necessary organisation, knowledge and experience to carry out its duties. It also finds that the government perceived itself to be subjected to an imminent threat of being overthrown. The study shows that while the Hamas government was far from fulfilling the democratic promises it had set out in its reform programme, it did not proceed to change the political system into any Islamic theocracy governed by sharia. As the analysis concludes, Hamas's governance could be characterised neither as singularly authoritarian and Islamic, nor as merely democratic and secular. Rather, Islamist governance Hamas style has been a blurred combination of all these traits together, firmly guided by a far-reaching ideological pragmatism and a continuously perceived necessity for further power consolidation.
|
|
| 2. |
- Larsdotter, Kersti, 1974-
(författare)
-
Military Interventions in Internal Wars : The Study of Peace or the Study of War?
- 2011
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- This thesis sets out to increase our understanding on how to conduct successful military interventions in internal wars, such as the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. But, instead of investigating different variables which might contribute to success, the focus is on the practice of knowledge production. Numerous scholars have focused on how to conduct military interventions in internal wars successfully. However, research is conducted in different disciplines, such as Peace Studies and War Studies. According to interdisciplinary advocates, this might impede a rational advancement of knowledge. The aim of this thesis, therefore, is to scrutinise whether military interventions in internal wars are understood and approached differently in different disciplines, and to investigate whether these differences result in different knowledge about how to conduct successful military interventions in internal wars. The investigation has been conducted in two steps. In the first step – focusing on theory – research on peace operations and counterinsurgencies was compared, regarding underlying assumptions, independent and dependent variables, causal mechanisms and methodology. Several differences were identified. Not only are the underlying assumptions, theories, and variables different between the two research areas of peace operations and counterinsurgencies, there are also differences in methodological approaches, such as the unit of analysis. These differences could imply that disciplines frame the way we understand the object of study and how we conduct research. In the second step – focusing on practice – the ISAF mission in Afghanistan was interpreted from the two disciplinary perspectives. Several differences were identified here as well, suggesting that disciplinary approaches influence our knowledge of how to conduct successful military interventions in internal wars. Departing from the differences found between the two research areas in the first part of the thesis, different ways to overcome these differences are suggested. Following these suggestions, research on military interventions in internal wars might become more rational, potentially increasing our understanding of how to conduct these operations successfully.
|
|
| 3. |
- Malm, Anders
(författare)
-
Operational Military Violence : A Cartography of Bureaucratic Minds and Practices
- 2019
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Western use of military violence is becoming increasingly centralised, partly through the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (or more commonly referred to as “drones” in the literature). Drone technology allows control and command of military operations to be put under one roof, and as military organisations traditionally have a close dependence on technological developments, procedures and regulations for centralised command and control have developed in close concert with advances in drone technology. Apart from technological innovations, there are other aspects that contribute to the growing centralisation of military violence. The increasing military sensitivity about public and media criticism regarding casualties and ‘collateral damage’ underlines the need for Western military organisations to take central control of military missions and the use of violence.What are the characteristics and consequences of this centralisation and how does it affect military practitioners’ relation to violence? The literature on military violence has slowly become aware that something has happened in Western military organisations’ relations to the use of force and has made some attempts to answer these questions. The tentative (short) answer is that military violence is becoming increasingly bureaucratised in the wake of this centralisation, and its human consequences are lost in bureaucratic routines and procedures. But so far the research on the bureaucratisation of violence has been delimited to investigations of either the theoretical procedures themselves (e.g. analysis of military doctrines), or field studies of drone operators or airmen’s work of ‘dropping bombs’. A major gap in the literature exists as the main organisational function for retaining control and command over violence – the operational level and the staff work performed there – is largely left aside in the research. Of particular interest here is how the work at operational levels of military organisations contributes to a bureaucratic institutionalisation of violence.This thesis aims to fill some of this gap through ethnographic investigations of operational military work and the training of ‘targeteers’ – staff officers working with the operational governance of military violence. In addition, the thesis also sets the current bureaucratisation of violence in a modern historical perspective, where the nation of Sweden stands as an example of how political incentives for military reformations form the foundation of a bureaucratisation of violence. The results of these investigations illustrate how bureaucratisation of violence leaves death and violence aside, and offers detailed insights into how the procedures, routines and the language of bureaucracy form the main points of reference for military practitioners’ view of their work. In addition, the analysis shows how military masculinity is reshaped from traditional warrior ideals to encompass norms of ‘the rational bureaucrat’. What is salient in these results is that they open up an otherwise closed off part of military practice and facilitates for public debates about military violence. Particularly regarding the central findings that some military practitioners do not regard violence as an outcome of their work, and that the bureaucratic operational work operates to reduce and even remove the (enemy) Other as a (human) point of reference in contemporary military work.
|
|
| 4. |
- Weissmann, Mikael, 1977
(författare)
-
Understanding the East Asian Peace Informal and formal conflict prevention and peacebuilding in the Taiwan Strait, the Korean Peninsula, and the South China Sea 1990-2008
- 2009
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The overall purpose of this dissertation is to provide an empirical study of the post-Cold War East Asian security setting, with the aim of understanding why there is an East Asian peace. The East Asian peace exists in a region with a history of militarised conflicts, home to many of the world's longest ongoing militarised problems and a number of unresolved critical flashpoints. Thus, the post-Cold War East Asian inter-state peace is a paradox. Despite being a region predicted to be ripe for conflict, there have not only been less wars than expected, but the region also shows several signs of a development towards a more durable peace. The dominant research paradigm – neorealism – has painted a gloomy picture of post-Cold War East Asia, with perpetual conflicts dominating the predictions. Other mainstream international relations theories, too, fail to account fully for the relative peace. One of the greatest problems for mainstream theories, is accounting for peace given East Asia's lack of security organisations or other formalised conflict management mechanisms. Given this paradox/problem, this dissertation sets out to ask "Why is there a relative peace in the East Asian security setting despite an absence of security organisations or other formalised mechanisms to prevent existing conflicts from escalating into violence?" In order to answer this question, the case of East Asian peace is approached by comparing three embedded case studies within the region: the Taiwan issue, the South China Sea, and the Korean nuclear conflict. It explores the full range of informal and formal processes plus the Conflict Prevention and Peacebuilding Mechanisms (CPPBMs) that have been important for the creation of a continuing relative peace in East Asia between 1990 and 2008. The study furthermore focuses on China's role in the three cases, on an empirical basis consisting of interviews conducted with key persons during more than 1.5 years fieldwork in China. The three cases show that informal processes exist, and that they have furthermore been important for peace, both by preventing conflicts from escalating into war, and by building conditions for a stable longer-term peace. Their impact on the persistence of peace has been traced to a range of different CPPBMs. Returning to the level of the East Asian case, a common feature of many of the identified processes is that they can be understood as aspects or manifestations of the East Asian regionalisation process. Specifically, elite interactions (personal networks, track two diplomacy), back-channel negotiations, economic interdependence and integration, and functional cooperation have together with (China's acceptance of) multilateralism and institutionalisation (of peaceful relations) been of high importance for the relative peace. Whereas formalised conflict management mechanisms and the U.S. presence have also contributed to peace, this dissertation shows their contribution to be much more limited.
|
|
| 5. |
- Ydén, Karl, 1965
(författare)
-
"Kriget" och karriärsystemet. Försvarsmaktens organiserande i fred
- 2008
-
Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Military organizations comprise two contradictory logics of action. The logic of conflict revolves around the use of organized violence against an enemy (at close range). The logic of cooperation characterises interaction with friendlydisposed parties, in order to secure legitimacy and working exchange relations. Previous research highlight tension between these logics of action, but do not study the mechanisms by which it is managed. The present study describes and analyzes how contradictory logics of action are manifested in the Swedish Armed Forces, and how tensions between the logics are managed. By examining everyday practices in training of an elite unit, the study shows junior officers training soldiers according to a construction of “the demands of war”. The training manifests a logic of conflict emphasizing physical stamina, endurance, discipline and a marked social distance between officers and soldiers. The study also shows that middle and higher level officers are almost entirely occupied with white-collar work, albeit in uniform. They interact with the environment, displaying a logic of cooperation imbued in the Armed Forces as a peacetime authority and “Government Employer”, subject to institutional pressures. The study concludes that the logic of conflict in soldier training is largely decoupled from the military administration’s logic of cooperation. The main mechanism producing decoupling is the military career system, in which promotion is a regular feature. Certain positions and assignments are compulsory steps in the career; at low levels training conscripts for “war”, at higher levels carrying out white collar work according conforming to the institutional rules of modern society. The study shows how the career system frames officers’ interactions and produces decoupling between the contradictory logics of action. The two logics of action sharply mark the career system, but they are also shaped and conditioned by the career system’s emphasis on job rotation. The career system constitutes an institutional logic that creates the means-ends relationships by which rewards, status and power are distributed. The logic of the military career system overrides considerations pertaining to soldier training as well as to effective administration. The military career system, rather than the Armed Forces’ official goals, shapes the prevailing logic of the organization.
|
|
