Negotiating regional security and arms control in the Middle East: the ACRS experience and beyond

In this contribution, Jones focuses initially on the experience of Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) and the reasons why this group stalled. The sources of tension that emerged in ACRS, and which ultimately led to its suspension, derived mainly from different views on the relationship between the nuclear and other issues in these talks, as well as the composition of ACRS and its role as a group of the multilateral track of the peace process. Jones emphasizes that regional security discussions in the Middle East must address multiple threats on multiple levels, and ACRS was never politically equipped to do so. Thus, despite the real, if limited, success of ACRS, any real security regime in the Middle East will be the product of a much more inclusive process which recognizes the essential importance of cooperatively addressing multiple security challenges, including those related to the problems of social and economic upheaval in the region. Jones concludes with an argument that the time may be ripe to embark on such a process in the wake of the war in Iraq and other far-reaching indicators of change in the region.     

THE ACRS EXPERIENCE AND ITS RELEVANCE TO THE WMDFZ CONFERENCE

This article examines the arms control logic that was applied to the only regional arms control talks that have taken place in the Middle East to date: the Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) working group that was part of the multilateral track of the Madrid peace process in the early 1990s. It highlights both the successes and major constraints of the ACRS talks in an effort to assess what might be relevant to the weapons of mass destruction-free zone conference proposed for later this year. In addition to the basic arms control dilemmas that will continue to challenge this conference—as they did ACRS—the article suggests that current conditions in the Middle East are even less conducive to regional dialogue than they were in the earlier period, due to the internal upheavals in several key Arab states, and the specific challenge of Iran's move to develop a military nuclear capability.     

THE EUROPEAN UNION'S EVOLVING ENGAGEMENT WITH IRAN

In 2003, the “E3”—Germany, France, and the United Kingdom—engaged Iran in talks over Tehran's nuclear program and were joined in negotiations the next year by the European Union (EU). Given the dim prospects of success for these talks, why did the E3/EU pursue nuclear negotiations with Iran? This article's three-track analysis attempts to answer that question by examining the emergence of the EU nonproliferation policy prior to the E3/EU-Iran talks, analyzing the European-Iranian relationship as it pertains to cooperation and negotiations over nonproliferation and other issues, and considering contemporary influences on the E3/EU. The European Union was ultimately unsuccessful in its negotiations with Tehran, but its efforts were worthwhile. In the future, the organization can play a vital nonproliferation role; today, the circumstances that hampered previous European efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear standoff have improved and could be capitalized on by the European Union and the international community.     

第19届国际信息融合会议及获奖论文评述

总结了第19届国际信息融合会议的总体情况和主要特点，通过对大会报告、分会场报告以及国际信息融合界一些著名专家团队发表论文情况的统计分析，提炼出国际信息融合界普遍关注的焦点和难点问题；通过对获奖论文的分析，了解到受大会评奖委员会一致认可的年度优秀成果和技术进步点；最后，面向高层信息融合中的不确定性处理，对信息融合领域的发展进行展望。     

“GOOD COP/BAD COP” AS A MODEL FOR NONPROLIFERATION DIPLOMACY TOWARD NORTH KOREA AND IRAN

Scholarly and popular literature in the recent past has framed nonproliferation diplomacy toward both Iran and North Korea as an example of “good cop/bad cop,” a social-psychological strategy borrowed from law enforcement to describe a process for forcing a confession by subjecting a target to stressful emotional contrast. This article examines those two cases, roughly covering the period since 2003, when the most recent attempts to deal with the Iranian and North Korean proliferation threats began, in light of criteria for employment of the good cop/bad cop strategy. There is some evidence that within the framework of the six-party talks with North Korea and within the framework of the EU-3-U.S. diplomacy toward Iran, the players seeking nonproliferation have adopted good cop/bad cop roles to that end. The article concludes, however, that while there are similarities to the interrogation room technique, the complexity of the international political environment as compared to the interrogation room has prevented the states involved from successfully adopting or effectively exploiting good and bad cop roles. Substantial and exploitable differences of interest among them, and the availability of alternative “escape routes” for the target state, raise serious questions about the applicability of the good cop/bad cop strategy to these two nonproliferation cases, and even about its applicability in future nonproliferation challenges.     

Smart Power and Military Force: An Introduction

Abstract

Smart power is comprised of two elements: the quest for building society among states and between states and non-state actors; as well as the desire for cleaner forms of power projection. This special issue explores how states continue to fumble over achieving the optimum mix of hard and soft power across several country cases and themed articles. This set of contributions suggests that smart power is not unlike a ‘Swiss Army Knife’ analogy: multifunctional and challenging to choose the right combination of ideational and material tools.     

From Nationalism to Factionalism: Faultlines in the Naga Insurgency

Do ceasefires or peace talks create fragmentation in the insurgent groups? Rather than proposing claims that can offer predictions about armed groups behaviour under ceasefires or peace processes, the analysts tend to focus largely on the dynamics between state and non-state actor. The experts pay little attention to overtime changes in social and local political context which might contribute to propelling a rebel group towards fragmentation and factionalism. The present study intends to fill this gap by exploring the shifting role of public opinion and ethnic support for the peace talks to ascertain whether it can increase the likelihood of factionalism in rebel groups or not. This article applies this approach to the case of Naga National Movement (1947–2015) in India, and finds that the proposed variable appears to have increased the frequency of factionalism in the movement.     

让每一位教师做最好的自己——对教师专业化成长的再思考

教师的成长关系着学生的成长、学校的成长。本文从教师专业成长的实践探索出发,从学生视角对教师角色进行再确认,从个体视角提出＂做最好的自己＂的专业成长目标,深入阐述了教师管理理念、打造教师成长空间及实现教师成长的途径。     

National interests and the power of ‘language’: West German diplomacy and the conference on security and cooperation in Europe, 1972–1975

Based on newly released documents from the German foreign ministry archives, this article investigates Bonn's goals, strategies and negotiation tactics at the Conference on Security and Development in Europe (CSCE). By focusing in particular on the multilateral preparatory talks in 1972/73 when the general Conference framework was negotiated and national and alliance positions were determined, it will be shown that (1) the Federal Republic of Germany was the key Western player at the CSCE, and (2) its policies were largely driven by national, Deutschlandpolitik interests – although on the surface the emphasis was always on a multilateral approach and a united Western (EPC/NATO) position. Furthermore, this article will reveal the significance of the ‘politics of language’ in West German diplomacy; and offer some wider reflections on the importance of language and its symbolism in international relations.     

The impact of operational decisions on the design of salesforce incentives

When facing high levels of overstock inventories, firms often push their salesforce to work harder than usual to attract more demand, and one way to achieve that is to offer attractive incentives. However, most research on the optimal design of salesforce incentives ignores this dependency and assumes that operational decisions of production/inventory management are separable from design of salesforce incentives. We investigate this dependency in the problem of joint salesforce incentive design and inventory/production control. We develop a dynamic Principal‐Agent model with both Moral Hazard and Adverse Selection in which the principal is strategic and risk‐neutral but the agent is myopic and risk‐averse. We find the optimal joint incentive design and inventory control strategy, and demonstrate the impact of operational decisions on the design of a compensation package. The optimal strategy is characterized by a menu of inventory‐dependent salesforce compensation contracts. We show that the optimal compensation package depends highly on the operational decisions; when inventory levels are high, (a) the firm offers a more attractive contract and (b) the contract is effective in inducing the salesforce to work harder than usual. In contrast, when inventory levels are low, the firm can offer a less attractive compensation package, but still expect the salesforce to work hard enough. In addition, we show that although the inventory/production management and the design of salesforce compensation package are highly correlated, information acquisition through contract design allows the firm to implement traditional inventory control policies: a market‐based state‐dependent policy (with a constant base‐stock level when the inventory is low) that makes use of the extracted market condition from the agent is optimal. This work appears to be the first article on operations that addresses the important interplay between inventory/production control and salesforce compensation decisions in a dynamic setting. Our findings shed light on the effective integration of these two significant aspects for the successful operation of a firm. © 2014 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Naval Research Logistics 61: 320–340, 2014     

恩格斯历史合力论核心观点解析

恩格斯历史合力论认为,各种因素相互作用的历史合力是社会发展的终极原因,在历史合力的诸因素中经济因素归根结底起决定作用,而在具体历史时期具体起主导作用的因素是可变的。     

Party preferences and institutional transformation: revisiting France’s relationship with NATO (and the common wisdom on Gaullism)

ABSTRACT

France’s so-called exceptionalism in multilateral security policy is often explained with its Gaullist political culture. However, a closer look shows that Gaullism cannot easily capture different French policies, particularly toward NATO. To unearth what can explain policy variance, this paper asks the question of whether French political parties value NATO differently and, if so, to what effect? Looking at French governments from 1991 to 2014, I argue that political parties in France carry different values, which lead them to interpret NATO’s role for France’s security policy differently. As a result, French parties in power encouraged, delayed, or halted NATO institutional transformation at specific junctures. This argument builds on the insights of the study of ideational factors in IR and the study of party politics in Comparative Politics. Through an analysis of French governments’ policy preferences toward NATO, this paper stresses that institutional transformation can be understood through the study of veto points in conjunction with national preference formation.     

教育视角下的收入分配公平研究

收入分配公平是反映社会公平的一个重要指标,而越来越严重的收入分配差距对社会公平提出严峻挑战。西方发达国家将教育作为调节贫富差距的主要手段,中国教育因素对收入分配也存在较大影响。拟从教育与收入分配公平的正相关和负相关两个层面来探讨教育促进收入分配公平的对策。     

Mixed rules in multi‐issue allocation situations

Multi‐issue allocation situations study problems where an estate must be divided among a group of agents. The claim of each agent is a vector specifying the amount claimed by each agent on each issue. We present a two‐stage rule. First, we divide the estate among the issues following the constrained equal awards rule. Second, the amount assigned to each issue is divided among the agents in proportion to their demands on this issue. We apply the rule to two real‐world problems: the distribution of natural resources between countries and the distribution of budget for education and research between universities.     

Mediation and the Dynamics of Civilian Victimisation in Intrastate Conflicts in Africa

ABSTRACT

Reports about mass atrocities are often accompanied by demands for action against the perpetrators. Mediation allows third parties to demonstrate their active involvement against civilian victimisation. However, whether mediators are successful in contributing to lower levels of one-sided violence is far from clear. Conflict actors might continue or even intensify violence to enhance their bargaining position during peace talks. Based on our tests with monthly data for intrastate conflicts in Africa we find no support for the expectation that one-sided violence declines in the aftermath of mediation onset. Instead, we observe rather an increase in civilian victimisation.     

非专业英语听说能力提高的教学策略

听说能力是语言综合能力的重要体现,本应受到高度的重视,然而在传统的大学公共英语教学中,“轻听说、重读写”的教学模式造就了一大批读写尚可但张口即结舌的英语习得者。所幸,当前大学英语的教和学双方都开始注重对语言习得读、说、听、写、译5种技能全方位的提高。国家CET考试委员会从1996年初起也正式启用听写等新题型。但近几次的四、六级统考结果统计表明,对于大多数考生来说,听写部分仍是难以突破的关口。针对这一现状,结合多年的教学和阅卷经验,对提高英语听说能力的教学策略进行了探讨。     

基于免疫学的多代理入侵检测系统

在探讨免疫学基本原理的基础上 ,提出了基于免疫学的多代理系统 ,用于联网计算机的入侵检测与反应。在这个框架中 ,基于免疫学的安全代理在联网节点之间漫游 ,监视网络状态。这些代理相互识别对方的活动行为 ,以等级方式进行合作 ,并根据底层安全规则采取相应的行动。移动代理具有学习能力 ,能动态适应周围环境 ,检测出已知与未知的入侵。多代理检测系统同时在不同层次监视联网计算机的活动情况 ,包括用户级、系统级、进程级和数据包级。基于免疫学的多代理入侵检测系统是灵活的、可扩展的和可适应的 ,能够根据管理员的需要与参数配置实时监视网络。     

ENERGY FOR SECURITY:

Though North Korea agreed to partial denuclearization in February 2007, achieving that goal is at best a long way off. A natural gas pipeline linking all of Northeast Asia and promising energy and economic help could help convince the isolated nation to step away from its nuclear programs entirely; it could also provide the nonproliferation and energy security benefits that have eluded the region for so long. These economic benefits could motivate the other nations involved in the six-party talks to deal with North Korea more than if only nuclear reactors were offered.     

浅谈清军“粮台”体制对武警处突后勤的启示

武警部队承担着长期驻守执勤和处置大规模突发事件的重任,如何实现战时与地方维稳应急动员体系相衔接,成为亟待解决的问题。分析了清军“粮台”的特点,结合武警部队实际,研究其对加强军地后勤兼容,提高武警处突后勤保障能力具有重要地启示意义。     

Coping with traps of vulnerability: a review of the impact of post-colonial issues on the independence of South Sudan

In a world virtually free of slavery and colonialism and one mainly driven by the sovereign state rationale, allusion to manifestations or the existence of some form of these phenomena within a state is often received with dumbfounding indifference or denial. However, a form of rule that had continued in South Sudan long after the departure of the British in 1956 was colonial both in its quintessence and flair in that it disenfranchised its citizens and denied them the most basic freedoms, services and development. Under this establishment, resistance against the coercive vision of the state was brutally suppressed for many decades. This state of affairs finally ended in July 2011. Nonetheless, there is a miscellany of unresolved post-colonial issues between the two countries that warrant attention. These include security and the demarcation of borders, the issue of ludicrous transit fees for South Sudan's oil exportation through Sudan, citizenship, external debt repayment, etc. These issues are part of traps inherited from the anti-colonial struggle, which have now supplanted the old ensemble of North–South conflict paroxysm. As a matter of urgency, the two countries will have to wrap up the incomplete process of negotiation on these substantive issues. The talks should be approached with a new mindset based on the new reality of two sovereign states. To the extent that it is widely established that South Sudan and Sudan must coexist peacefully in order to develop into viable entities, such mutual dependency must be based on equality and respect.