In Memoriam: Hayward Alker

We deeply regret to inform SIR web visitors viewers of the passing of Hayward R. Alker, holder of the John A. McCone Chair in International Relations in USC College, on August 24, 2007.

Hayward Alker was honored posthumously at the 2008 meeting of the International Studies Association (of which he was a past president) with the Susan Strange Award. The Susan Strange Award was established in 1998 to recognize Susan Strange for her unique and extraordinary role within the International Studies Association and the worldwide community of scholars. This award recognizes a person whose singular intellect, assertiveness, and insight most challenge conventional wisdom and intellectual and organizational complacency in the international studies community.

Tributes to Hayward Alker:

International Political Sociology

Volume 2 Issue 1 Page 75-81, March 2008

Heikki Patomäki (2008) Learning from Alker: The Fifth Lesson
doi:10.1111/j.1749-5687.2007.00033.x

International Political Sociology

Volume 2 Issue 1 Page 82-84, March 2008

James Der Derian (2008) ‘‘The Alker Effect" doi:10.1111/j.1749-5687.2007.00034.x

International Relations

Professor Brand Named

Carnegie Scholar

The Carnegie Corporation of New York announced April 4 that Laurie Brand, director and professor of the USC School of International Relations, has been named a 2008 Carnegie Scholar.

One of only 20 academics to receive the Carnegie award, Brand will use the prestigious two-year grant to pursue a research project about the relationship between post-colonial Middle Eastern states and Islam.

SIR Faculty Publications

"Fighting for Foreigners:
Immigration and Its Impact on Japanese Democracy" by Apichai W. Shipper

$35.00s cloth, Available in November, 232 pages, 6 x 9, 7 tables
ISBN: 978-0-8014-4715-0

Although stereotypically homogenized and hostile to immigrants, Japan has experienced an influx of foreigners from Asia and Latin America in recent decades. In Fighting for Foreigners, Apichai W. Shipper details how, in response, Japanese citizens have established a variety of local advocacy groups-some faith based, some secular-to help immigrants secure access to social services, economic equity, and political rights.

Drawing on his years of ethnographic fieldwork and a pragmatic account of political motivation he calls associative activism, Shipper asserts that institutions that support illegal foreigners make the most dramatic contributions to democratic multiculturalism. The changing demographics of Japan have been stimulating public discussions, the political participation of marginalized groups, and calls for fair treatment of immigrants. Nongovernmental organizations established by the Japanese have been more effective than the ethnically particular associations formed by migrants themselves, Shipper finds. Activists who initially work in concert to solve specific and local problems eventually become more ambitious in terms of political representation and opinion formation. As debates about the costs and benefits of immigration rage across the developed world, Shipper's research offers a refreshing new perspective: rather than undermining democracy in industrialized society, immigrants can make a positive institutional contribution to vibrant forms of democratic multiculturalism.

The SSRC-Abe Fellowship Committee has recently awarded Shipper a grant for his book project, Immigration Politics in Japan, the U.S. and Sweden."

Gerardo Munck has two new major publications "Regimes and Democracy in Latin America: Theories and Methods" (Oxford University Press) is an edited volume that assesses the state of current knowledge on democracy in Latin America and identifies new research frontiers in the study of Latin American politics. [More...]

"Passion, Craft, and Method in Comparative Politics" (Johns Hopkins University Press) is a collaborate work with Richard Snyder that includes a set of interviews with the most prominent scholars in comparative politics since World War II. The book traces key developments in the field during the twentieth century and offers a wealth of insights into contemporary debates about the state of knowledge in comparative politics. [More...]

"Passion, Craft and Method in Comparative Politics" (Johns Hopkins U. Press) has just been named one of "the best 25 books of 2007" by the Spanish edition of "Foreign Policy" . You can find the reference at: http://www.fp-es.org/los-25-libros-de-fp-2007

"Lessons from the Bloc" by Robert D. English, Associate Professor of International Relations and the author of Russia and the Idea of the West: Gorbachev, Intellectuals, and the End of the Cold War (Columbia Univesrsity, 2000). [More...]

"The Diplomatic Corps as an Institution of International Society" edited by Paul Sharp and Geoffrey Wiseman has been published by Palgrave (ISBN#0-230-00165-3). The diplomatic corps is one of the most obvious manifestations of the international society of states. Nevertheless, the body of diplomats which constitutes it in every capital city and home of international organizations has been almost completely neglected by contemporary international scholarship.

This volume challenges the conventional view that the diplomatic corps is a leftover from the ceremony and privilege of a bygone era of "old diplomacy." Its essays trace the historical development of the diplomatic corps. They demonstrate its importance in setting the terms on which everyday international life continues to be undertaken and the way the corps has adapted to a world in which states are
increasingly only one among many actors which require diplomatic representation.

Graduate Students Publish

POIR PhD candidate Jarrod Hayes’ article on Identity and Securitization in the Democratic Peace: The United States and the Divergence of Response to India and Iran's Nuclear Programs has been accepted for publication in ISQ.

Abstract:

While almost a decade old, Ted Hopf's observation that the democratic peace is an observation in search of a theory still holds validity. In particular, the mechanisms behind the democratic peace are poorly understood, making it difficult for scholars to provide a compelling explanation. Underappreciated in the existing work is the role  f identity and the importance this has for driving the democratic peace.With a focus on developing a dyadic democratic peace mechanism and using a case study approach, this paper utilizes the Copenhagen School's securitization framework to examine how identity plays out in the U.S. response to the Indian and Iranian nuclear programs. It finds that in fact identity does play an important role in how security policy is constructed. In policy terms, if the democratic peace does rely on identity to trigger the constraining norms that limit the escalation of conflict to violence, it is unlikely the democratic peace can be spread by force and it is possible that states nominally democratic can be excluded from the community of democracies if their behavior or significant other aspects of their perceived identity are at variance with the accepted democratic identity standard.

Jenifer Whitten-Woodring's paper on Watchdog or Lapdog? Media Freedom, Regime Type and Government Respect
for Human Rights has also been accepted for publication in ISQ (forthcoming 2009)

Abstract
A main justification for press freedom is that free media will act as a watchdog over the government. While we would expect democracies to have free media and autocracies to have government-controlled media, some democracies have government-controlled media, and some
autocracies have free media. How this mismatch between regime type and
media system influences government behavior is a puzzle worth exploring. One of the most widely criticized government behaviors is the violation of physical integrity rights. The question posed here
is, how does media freedom affect government respect for these rights?
In this paper, I theorize that the relationship between media freedom
and government respect for human rights differs, depending on the presence of democratic institutions. The paper's findings support my premise. Specifically, the influence of media freedom on government respect for human rights is negative for the most autocratic regimes
and positive for only the most democratic regimes.

As this year's contributing editor from USC, Yesim Ince is pleased to announce that Jason Enia's article "Peace in its Wake? The 2004 Tsunami and Internal Conflict in Indonesia and Sri Lanka" was selected for publication in this year's Princeton Journal of Public and International Affairs. There was a competitive field of entrants, and Jason's paper earned the highest score in the peer evaluation process among 38 papers, of which only nine were selected to be published in this year's journal.

At the Sixth Annual Pan-European Conference on International Relations in September in Turin, Italy, SIR doctoral candidate Christopher Griffin’s paper on "France, the United Kingdom, and EU Capacities for Military Action in Africa" was chosen one of the top 5 best student papers. . The paper is a comparative strategic analysis, which evaluates French, British, and EU military planning and defense policies, military operations in Africa, and capacities for power projection outside of Europe.

SIR Bannerman Fellow Ronald Osborn's paper Noam Chomsky and the Realist Tradition has been accepted for publication by the Review of International Studies.

POIR Doctoral Candidate Yitan Li's paper: "Pretty Prudent" or Rhetorically Responsive? The American Public's Support for Military Action (with Cooper Drury, Marvin Overby and Adrian Ang) has been accepted for publication in the Political Research Quarterly.

Undergraduate Student

Publications:

SIR major & Neuroscience minor David Livingston's article "A Lonely Walk to Ruin: An analysis of Robert Mugabe Using Erickson's Psychoanalytic Framework" has been published in the Journal of Undergraduate International Studies (University of Wisconsin-Madison. Fall 2007, Vol. 3). Article abstract:The following article provides a psychoanalysis of Robert Mugabe, the President of Zimbabwe. The Mugabe administration has been criticized around the world for corruption, racism, repression, economic mismanagement, and human rights abuses. Mugabe's policies have led to economic collapse (including the world's highest inflation and an 85% unemployment rate), massive starvation, and a controversial land reform projects that have stripped white farmers in Zimbabwe of their land and given it to native Africans. Despite the corruption and criminality of his regime, Mugabe is hailed by many Africans as a hero in the fight for independence. He is currently one of the world's most controversial figures.