Marlies Glasius | University of Amsterdam (original) (raw)

Authoritarianism by Marlies Glasius

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

Configurations of actors that have the power to significantly affect people’s lives, and that sys... more Configurations of actors that have the power to significantly affect people’s lives, and that systematically seek to duck accountability by silencing, keeping secrets from or lying to people they affect, should be considered as functional equivalents to authoritarian regimes. This chapter re-examines the definition of authoritarian practices, based on the preceding empirical chapters. It considers to what extent gaining knowledge about authoritarian practices is possible, and how to delineate the boundaries of the concept. It examines the two core components of authoritarian practices: disabling voice and disabling access to information. It then discusses configurations of actors engaging in authoritarian practices, and the common understandings between them. In the latter part of the chapter, the focus shifts to the accountability demanders, assessing sources of vulnerability and strength, and indicating significant global developments affecting the affordances of various groups of “information professionals”. It concludes by making the case for more research on transnational authoritarian practices.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

This chapter examines institutional authoritarian practices surrounding child sexual abuse by the... more This chapter examines institutional authoritarian practices surrounding child sexual abuse by the Catholic clergy. It starts with a focus on the handling of allegations against five priests at two sites within the Catholic Church: the Irish diocese of Cloyne and the Salesian order’s Australia-Pacific province. From there, it widens out to consider broader patterns associated with covering up clergy abuse in other Irish dioceses and elsewhere in the Salesian order, contextualizing them within to national-level Church initiatives to handle child sexual abuse complaints and the Vatican’s responses. By applying an authoritarian practices perspective, the chapter shows how the Catholic Church’s main organizational and cultural features – shared to a varying extent by other religious institutions – may foster silencing, secrecy and lies. A culture of obedience impeded internal critiques and whistleblowing. Church doctrines encompassed various forms of secrecy. Reputation was naturally believed to be best protected by secrecy, not by reform. The Church’s governance structure facilitated keeping sensitive information restricted. Sex in general, and ordained priests having sexual urges in particular, was a taboo subject. And a sense of clerical superiority facilitated devaluing and disbelieving the voices of victims. While Pope Francis I has made important changes in the Church’s handling of clerical abuse, the Catholic Church’s main organizational and cultural features persist.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

The chapter examines corporate authoritarian practices in the context of copper and cobalt mining... more The chapter examines corporate authoritarian practices in the context of copper and cobalt mining by multinational corporations in Katanga, DRC. It starts with a focus on the Swiss multinational Glencore and the Chinese state-owned company CNMC Huachin, before zooming out demonstrate broader patterns of silencing, secrecy and lies by other multinational mining corporations operating in the region. This ‘overdetermined’ case suitable exposed various configurations of actors engaged in corporate-led authoritarian practices surrounding the mines. Concessions came about, and tax evasion was facilitated by, high-level engagement with state and regional politicians. Corporations and state actors kept secrets from and told lies to local communities, NGOs and state environmental agencies about environmental impact. Corporations, local traders and a host of security services colluded to exploit, deceive and occasionally silence artisanal miners. In Chinese companies, workers were routinely fired when voicing discontent. Corporate social responsibility expectations, and increased attention to transparency in the extractive sector in particular, appear to have impacted corporate behaviour. However, for some companies, such expectations have actually increased incentives for corporate sabotage of accountability. While the consequences of increased involvement of corporations headquartered in non-democratic states such as China and Kazakhstan still require further study, the evidence does not such that these companies are necessarily more likely to engage in accountability than western-based companies.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

This chapter deals with the United Nations Security Council’s “ISIL (Da’esh) & Al-Qaida Sanctions... more This chapter deals with the United Nations Security Council’s “ISIL (Da’esh) & Al-Qaida Sanctions List”, which mandates asset freezes and travel bans against terrorist suspects, as an example of a formal multilateral authoritarian practice. Neither the existence of the list nor the names of those who are on it is a secret. Yet the practice of listing is surrounded with secrecy (and occasionally, lies) and disables the voices of those listed vis-à-vis the listing institution by putting a firewall between them. The chapter first examines two cases of listed individuals: the Belgian couple Nabil Sayadi and Patricia Vinck, and the Egyptian banker Youssef Nada. It then zooms out to establish a broader patter of disabling voice and disabling access to information. It concludes that the sanctions list and the accountability sabotage associated with it have become ‘stabilized’ since its inception in the wake of 9/11. The concepts of self-shielding, ally-shielding, and pre-emptive governance of risk are deployed to explain the stabilization and functioning of this formal multilateral authoritarian practice.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

This chapter examines extraordinary rendition, involving many political actors across the globe b... more This chapter examines extraordinary rendition, involving many political actors across the globe but led by the CIA, as a case study of informal multilateral authoritarianism. It focuses on the silencing, secrecy and disinformation surrounding rendition rather than on the treatment of those detained as such. The chapter starts with detailed accounts of two cases: so-called ‘high-value detainee’ Abu Zubaydah, who ended up in Guantanamo Bay, and the simpler case of Abu Omar, kidnapped in Italy and kept in detention in Egypt. It then zooms out to examine broader multilateral authoritarian practices relating to rendition both in so-called ‘high-value’ and ‘bilateral’ cases. The extraordinary rendition programme was a classic ‘covert op’. Its primary actors were always aware of how controversial it was and were devoted to its secrecy. Long after the existence of the programme as such was exposed, members of the CIA still went to tremendous lengths to keep the sites at which ‘high value detainees’ were held secret. More broadly, members of the US Administration maintained the consistent claim, against all the evidence, that ‘enhanced interrogation’, i.e. torture, saved lives.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

This chapter considers two migrant groups that are affected by very different extraterritorial au... more This chapter considers two migrant groups that are affected by very different extraterritorial authoritarian practices in the same ‘host’ country. It begins by focusing on the Dutch-Turkish newspaper Zaman Vandaag, driven out of business by extraterritorial authoritarian practices, and on the murder of the Dutch Iranian separatist Ahmad Mola Nissi. The chapter then zooms out to demonstrate broader patterns of extraterritorial authoritarian practices vis-à-vis people of Turkish and Iranian descent in the Netherlands. It shows that national governments, or sections within them, have the ability to sabotage accountability to people beyond their borders, in particular their own nationals, disabling their voice and disabling their access to information through secrecy and lying. They do not do so alone. They engage in these practices together with and sometimes through other political actors, ranging from migrant community members and religious leaders to criminals. The vulnerability of the targets of extraterritorial authoritarian practices may depend on the bilateral relations between the country of residence and country of origin, but also on their own individual autonomy and positionality vis-a-vis home and host country.

Routledge Handbook of Illiberal Practices, 2022

This chapter provides a discussion of the concept of illiberal practices as a unit of analysis. I... more This chapter provides a discussion of the concept of illiberal practices as a unit of analysis. It illuminates the distinction between illiberal and authoritarian practices, and suggests how a practice perspective can provide a more socially relevant and resonant understanding of illiberalism. The chapter ends with two brief case studies that will give concreteness to the concept of illiberal practices as well as illuminating their ubiquity and transnational aspects.

Journal of International Relations and Development, 2023

The statist focus of comparative politics has withheld from view the ability of powerful actors s... more The statist focus of comparative politics has withheld from view the ability of powerful actors such as transnational corporations to engage in authoritarian practices on their own initiative, in different alliances, regardless of the national regime type in which they find themselves. Focusing on plantation-level interactions, this article analyses how the United Fruit Company and its successor companies could control and exploit its workers, using silencing, secrecy and subterfuge so as to sabotage accountability, from the 1900s to the early 2000s. Over time, the company's practices evolved from violent repression and mass dismissals to manipulating trade unions to a mix of engagement, deception, and outsourcing to evade accountability. This corresponded to scalar shifts: the company always operated transnationally, but workers moved from local to national and finally transnational organising, curtailing the company's room for manoeuvre. Spatially, the company's physical control over its plantation workers could be as forceful as that of a national state, but its 'territory' has been one of shape-shifting network nodes, becoming even more 'porous' in the twenty-first century. This spatial mobility and ambiguity has in turn been deployed by the company to sabotage accountability to its workers.

Authoritarian Practices in a Global Age, 2023

Struggles over accountability have become central to contemporary politics. Not only states, but ... more Struggles over accountability have become central to contemporary politics. Not only states, but also institutions like universities, charities, churches, companies and international organizations are now widely deemed to be subject to an ‘accountability paradigm’. The premise of this book is that with the proliferation of expectations of accountability, incentives for powerholders to find ways of sabotaging accountability have also proliferated. It attaches the adjective “authoritarian” to such practices. It will show how, instead of focusing exclusively on authoritarian regimes, or on authoritarian personalities, political scientists can and should study (that is, define, operationalize, observe, classify, analyse) authoritarian practices. Authoritarian practices in a global age also go “beyond the state” in the sense that they cross borders, and that they are not carried out by government agents alone. In this book, we see them working together with each other as well as with international organization staff, religious leaders, criminal enterprises, or corporate entities.

This chapter introduces and elucidates a practice-oriented concept of authoritarianism. It opens with a brief history of authoritarianism as a political science concept, concluding that its evolution has culminated in an exclusively state-centred, negative and election-focused usage that produces blind spots in empirical observation. Two conceptual moves are made to get to a redefinition. First, the chapter identifies authoritarian practices, rather than authoritarian systems, as the unit of analysis. Second, it introduces the concept of “accountability sabotage”. Authoritarian practices are then defined as “a pattern of actions, embedded in an organized context, sabotaging accountability to people over whom a configuration of actors exerts a degree of control, or their representatives, by disabling their voice and disabling their access to information”. Each element of this definition is clarified in turn. In the concluding section, a distinction is made between authoritarian practices – the main subject of this book - and illiberal practices.

This book challenges the assumption that authoritarianism is necessarily a phenomenon located at ... more This book challenges the assumption that authoritarianism is necessarily a phenomenon located at the level of the state, and that states as a whole are therefore either democratic or authoritarian. Its central aim is to shed light on manifestations of authoritarianism that are not confined to the ‘territorial trap’ of the modern state, and are not captured by the concept of an authoritarian regime. Redefining authoritarianism from a practice perspective allows us to understand how authoritarian practices unfold and evolve within democracies and in transnational settings, in what circumstances they thrive, and how they are best countered. Authoritarian Practices in a Global Age provides a parsimonious framework for recognizing and analyzing contemporary manifestations of authoritarianism beyond the state, and a number of empirical case studies.

The empirical chapters cast a wide net. They comprise a study of transnational repression by authoritarian states; two chapters on informal and formal multilateral collaboration in anti-terrorist policies; a chapter on corporate and public-private authoritarian practices in the mining sector; and a chapter on cover-ups of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. The concluding chapter draws out commonalities and unique features from the case studies, thereby setting out a research agenda for future studies. Authoritarian practices, once operationalized as demonstrated in this book, can and must be classified and compared, and causal connections established with other phenomena such as violence, corruption or inequality, if we are to suggest ways of responding to them.

International Journal of Communication, 2018

Concern about how digital communication technologies contribute to a decline of democracy and the... more Concern about how digital communication technologies contribute to a decline of democracy and the rise of authoritarian tendencies abounds in academic and public debate. In this conceptual contribution-which connects insights from new media studies, critical security studies, human rights law, and authoritarianism research-we argue that the threats citizens may be exposed to in a digitally networked world can be grouped into three categories: (1) arbitrary surveillance, (2) secrecy and disinformation, and (3) violation of freedom of expression. We introduce the twin concepts of digital illiberal and authoritarian practices to better identify and disaggregate how such threats can be produced and diffused in transnational and multi-actor configurations. Illiberal practices, we argue, infringe on the autonomy and dignity of the person, and they are a human rights problem. Authoritarian practices sabotage accountability and thereby threaten democratic processes. We use the example of the U.S. National Security Agency's massive secret data-gathering program to illustrate both what constitutes a practice and the distinctions as well as the connections between illiberal and authoritarian practices in the digital sphere.

International Studies Quarterly, 2020

Recent decades have witnessed a global cascade of restrictive and repressive measures against non... more Recent decades have witnessed a global cascade of restrictive and repressive measures against nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). We theorize that state learning from observing the regional environment, rather than NGO growth per se or domestic unrest, explains this rapid diffusion of restrictions. We develop and test two hypotheses: (1) states adopt NGO restrictions in response to nonarmed bottom-up threats in their regional environment ("learning from threats"); (2) states adopt NGO restrictions through imitation of the legislative behavior of other states in their regional environment ("learning from exam-ples"). Using an original dataset on NGO restrictions in ninety-six countries over a period of twenty-five years (1992-2016), we test these hypotheses by means of negative binomial regression and survival analyses, using spatially weighted techniques. We find very limited evidence for learning from threats, but consistent evidence for learning from examples. We corroborate this finding through close textual comparison of laws adopted in the Middle East and Africa, showing legal provisions being taken over almost verbatim from one law into another. In our conclusion, we spell out the implications for the quality of democracy and for theories of transition to a postliberal order, as well as for policy-makers, lawyers, and civil-society practitioners.

This article highlights three main problems with current conceptualizations of authoritarianism: ... more This article highlights three main problems with current conceptualizations of authoritarianism: they constitute a negative or residual category, focus excessively on elections and assume that authoritarianism is necessarily a state-level phenomenon. Such ‘regime classifications’ cannot help us comment intelligently on public concerns that politicians like President Rodrigo Duterte, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Prime Minister Viktor Orban or President Donald Trump are essentially ‘authoritarian’ leaders. This article proposes that, in order to provide political scientists with better tools to distinguish between contemporary threats to democracy and interpretations imbued by left-liberal prejudice, authoritarianism studies must be reoriented towards studying authoritarian as well as illiberal practices rather than the fairness of national elections alone. The article defines and illustrates such practices, which exist in authoritarian, democratic and transnational contexts. Comparative analysis of authoritarian and illiberal practices will help us understand conditions in which they thrive and how they are best countered.

This Open Access book offers a synthetic reflection on the authors’ fieldwork experiences in seve... more This Open Access book offers a synthetic reflection on the authors’ fieldwork experiences in seven countries within the framework of ‘Authoritarianism in a Global Age’, a major comparative research project. It responds to the demand for increased attention to methodological rigor and transparency in qualitative research, and seeks to advance and practically support field research in authoritarian contexts. Without reducing the conundrums of authoritarian field research to a simple how-to guide, the book systematically reflects and reports on the authors’ combined experiences in (i) getting access to the field, (ii) assessing risk, (iii) navigating ‘red lines’, (iv) building relations with local collaborators and respondents, (v) handling the psychological pressures on field researchers, and (vi) balancing transparency and prudence in publishing research. It offers unique insights into this particularly challenging area of field research, makes explicit how the authors handled methodological challenges and ethical dilemmas, and offers recommendations where appropriate.

This introduction to the Special Issue on ‘Authoritarian rule of populations abroad’ develops a n... more This introduction to the Special Issue on ‘Authoritarian rule of populations abroad’ develops a new theory to better understand how authoritarian rule is exercised over populations abroad and to connect this extraterritorial dimension to the character and resilience of contemporary authoritarian rule. Authoritarian states today have various motivations for tolerating or even sponsoring their population's mobility, and they have learnt to manage and offset the risks population mobility poses to them. The key to understanding the particularities of authoritarian mobility management is that it does not approach its populations, abroad or at home, as citizens with rights. The authoritarian state can adapt to the specific assets and insecurities of populations abroad with policies to include or exclude them as subjects or outlaws, as patriots or traitors, or as clients. The article concludes that authoritarian rule should not be considered a territorially bounded regime type, but rather as a mode of governing people through a distinct set of practices.

Highlights • An ‘extraterritorial gap’ in political geography and comparative politics impedes an... more Highlights
• An ‘extraterritorial gap’ in political geography and comparative politics impedes analysis of authoritarian power abroad.
• Authoritarian rule from the home state continues to be exercised over populations abroad.
• It treats nationals abroad as subjects or outlaws; patriots or traitors; clients or brokers, but never as citizens.
• Authoritarianism should be studied as a mode of governing people through a set of practices, not as a territorial regime.

Global Civil Society by Marlies Glasius

1999), has been translated into seven languages. Her book on the idea of global civil society wil... more 1999), has been translated into seven languages. Her book on the idea of global civil society will be published in 2003.

We shed light on the discontent with and the appeal of democracy by interviewing some of the most... more We shed light on the discontent with and the appeal of democracy by interviewing some of the most committed critical citizens: core activists in street protests. Based on interviews in Athens, Cairo, London, and Moscow, we found that they rejected representative democracy as insufficient, and believed democracy to entail having a voice and a responsibility to participate intensively in political decision-making. Activists saw themselves as engaged in prefigurative politics by fostering democratic practices within the movement and, ultimately, in society, but also raised concerns about internal power dynamics reproducing existing inequalities and exclusions. The insistence by activists that citizens have both a right and a duty to participate should be taken more seriously by political scientists and policymakers, not just as a threat to democracy and democratization, but as an opportunity. However, contemporary social movements are not straightforward sites of prefiguration, but sites of struggle between experimental and traditional forms of organizing, between inclusive aspirations and exclusive tendencies.

Authoritarianism in a Global Age, 2023

Routledge Handbook of Illiberal Practices, 2022

Journal of International Relations and Development, 2023

Authoritarian Practices in a Global Age, 2023

International Journal of Communication, 2018

International Studies Quarterly, 2020

We are conditioned to believe that nations take stands in international politics en bloc, that go... more We are conditioned to believe that nations take stands in international politics en bloc, that governments represent the views of the nation, and that what other people in that country might think is domestic politics 1 This nationalism is not a fanatical insistence on the superiority of one nation over another; it means to consider nation-states as the natural and only way to divide up the world. As the 'prime divisor', it takes precedence over all other possible categorisations.

This volume explores how the idea of civil society has been translated in different cultural cont... more This volume explores how the idea of civil society has been translated in different cultural contexts and examines its impact on politics worldwide. Comparing and contrasting civil society in Latin America and Eastern Europe, Western Europe and the United States, Africa and South Asia, and the Middle East, the contributors show that there are multiple interpretations of the concept that depend more on the particular political configuration in different parts of the world than on cultural predilections. They also demonstrate that the power of civil society depends less on abstract definitions, and more on the extent to which it is grounded in the context of actual experiences from around the world.

Global Civil Society, 2002

Community Development, 2012

Based on research conducted in Athens, Cairo, London and Yerevan the article analyses the relatio... more Based on research conducted in Athens, Cairo, London and Yerevan the article analyses the relationship between activists engaged in street protests or direct action since 2011 and NGOs. It examines how activists relate to NGOs and whether it is possible to do sustained activism to bring about social change without becoming part of a ‘civil society industry’. The article argues that while at first glance NGOs seem disconnected from recent street activism, and activists distance themselves from NGOs, the situation is more complicated than meets the eye. It contends that the boundaries between the formal NGOs and informal groups of activists is blurred and there is much cross-over and collaboration. The article demonstrates and seeks to explain this phenomenon, which we call surreptitious symbiosis, from the micro- perspective of individual activists and NGO staff. Finally, we discuss whether this surreptitious symbiosis can be sustained and sketch three scenarios for the future.

Glasius, Marlies and Ishkanian, Armine (2014) Surreptitious symbiosis: engagement between activists and NGO's. VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations . ISSN 0957-8765 (In Press)

Journal of Civil Society, 2005

International Encyclopedia of Civil Society, 2010

Anheier, Helmut. K and Glasius, Marlies and Kaldor, Mary, (eds.) Global Civil Society 2001. Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK, pp. 3-22. ISBN 9780199246441, 2001

I n January , Fatou Bensouda, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), annou... more I n January , Fatou Bensouda, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), announced the opening of the court's tenth and most recent country investigation, into alleged crimes perpetrated in Georgia during the brief  Russo-Georgian War. The crimes to be investigated may include murder, destroying enemy property, attacks on a peacekeeping mission , deportation, and ethnic persecution. Bensouda intends to make arrests, put suspects on trial, and, if they are found guilty, have them convicted and punished. Meanwhile, even as Bensouda prepared this newest case, the ICC was still prosecuting a suspect in the court's very first investigation, from , against Dominic Ongwen, a commander of the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army. These two cases can thus serve as bookends to the ICC's short history, illustrating the long arc between initial investigations and eventual trials, and highlighting the complexity and contingency of international criminal justice. In this article we ask what—if anything—is the point of all this effort, and what can and should we expect from international criminal courts? After more than a decade of work, the accomplishments of the International Criminal Court are highly contested. The court has been accused of bias, of spoiling peace negotiations , of hindering successful transitions to democracy, and of being disconnected from the needs of conflict-affected populations.  We will not address these controversies here. Instead we focus on a more theoretical question: How can international trial and punishment constitute a suitable response to episodes of mass violence? The Statute of the ICC itself provides several indications. Its Preamble proclaims that " the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole must not go unpunished, " that it is " determined to put an end to Ethics & International Affairs, , no.  (), pp. –.

From Theory to Practice, 2011

This article investigates the potential impact of an international criminal trial on a post-confl... more This article investigates the potential impact of an international criminal trial on a
post-conflict society. It assesses the claims of legal expressivism, which conceptualizes
criminal justice as a message sending mechanism that can enunciate societal
condemnation of atrocities, establish an authoritative historical record, and
strengthen respect for the rule of law. This article examines the trial of Charles
Taylor before the Special Court for Sierra Leone. First, the discursive messaging by
the prosecution and defence is analysed. Second, this article conducts an empirical
enquiry into the reception of these messages by opinion leaders in Liberia.
Departing from the literature on expressivism, it will be shown that the trial proceedings,
not only the verdict and sentence, have expressivist potential. In the
second part of the enquiry, an attentive elite audience in Monrovia was found to
hold complex views. The Taylor trial did not stigmatize particular behaviour, but
there is some evidence of so-called ‘historical truths’ being validated, despite the
Court’s doubtful perceived legitimacy. Many respondents discerned a deterrent
effect of the trial, with youth leaders, in particular, using terms exactly consonant
with expressivist theory. For them, the trial ‘sends a message’or ‘tells future leaders’
that one cannot wage aggressive war or commit human rights violations without
being called to account. This suggests that trial proceedings can indeed function as
a mechanism of deterrence by sending messages.

In: Dubravka Zarkov and Marlies Glasius, eds. Narratives of Justice In and Out of the Courtroom, Springer., 2014

In Dino Abazovic and Mitja Velikonja, eds. Post-Yugoslvia: New Cultural and Political Perspectives, 2014

Encyclopedia of Global Studies, 2012

Published in: Jude Howell and Diane Mulligan, ed. Gender and Civil Society, Routledge, 2004

This article focuses on the interplay of the women's movement and the pro-family movement with st... more This article focuses on the interplay of the women's movement and the pro-family movement with state delegates in the negotiations on the International Criminal Court. It discusses the origins of their interest in the ICC, their presence at the ICC negotiations, the manner of their lobbying activities, and their relations with other NGOs and state representatives. It then discusses two issues in the negotiations in which these two movements were on opposite sides: the use and definition of the term 'gender' and the inclusion of 'forced pregnancy' as a crime in the ICC statute. In the conclusion, the article assesses this episode in order to draw some general conclusions about the right to participate in UN forums as 'civil society representatives'.

Human Rights Quarterly, 2009

As a new institution, the International Criminal Court needs to gain legitimacy not just with st... more As a new institution, the International Criminal Court needs to gain legitimacy
not just with states, but also in global civil society. This article surveys
current debates in civil society about whether the interests of the victims
are being served and whether justice is being done, in relation to the ICC’s
current investigations. It will discuss the most salient sources of debate and
controversy under four headings: perceived selectivity or even bias of the
Court, whether ICC investigations are detrimental to peace-building efforts,
the detachment of the Court from the lived reality of local populations and
victims, and the issue of compensation to victims.

African Affairs, Jan 2009

As a new justice institution, the International Criminal Court needs to gain legitimacy not just... more As a new justice institution, the International Criminal Court needs to
gain legitimacy not just with states, but also in civil society, both at the
global level and in the societies in which it intervenes. This article, based
on interviews, NGO documents, newspaper articles, and participatory observation,
looks at civil society relations with the ICC in relation to its most
recent and least publicized investigation, in the Central African Republic
(CAR). It charts the role of civil society organizations, local and international,
in the opening of the investigation, and it discusses the initial responses
of civil society figures and victims in the CAR to the investigation.
It finds that, unlike in any of the other situations, the ICC’s involvement in
the CAR has been largely instigated by local civil society figures, and that,
as a result, it operates in a quite receptive context. However, the slow pace
of investigations and trials, the meagre outreach to date, and the Court’s
probable lack of capacity to provide victims with physical and material security
a

Journal of Civil Society, 2008

The International Journal of Transitional Justice, 2012

This article examines the discourses of the prosecution and the defence in the case of Charles T... more This article examines the discourses of the prosecution and the defence in the case of
Charles Taylor before the Special Court for Sierra Leone. It contributes to current debates
about the legitimacy and utility of international criminal justice, which have tended to
neglect the examination of actual trials, and particularly the role of the defence. We draw
on the legal doctrine of ‘expressivism’ to theorize the connection between normative
legitimacy, actual support and the utility of international criminal justice as dynamic and
partly determined in court. We conclude that the Taylor trial demonstrates three
interrelated obstacles to the fulfilment of the expressivist promise: that a tension
between criminal proceedings against a single person and truth telling about mass
violence necessarily exists; that discourses do not appeal to all audiences equally, and
that those which appeal to western audiences are likely to be privileged; and that these
weaknesses will usually be exposed and exploited by the defence, weakening the legitimacy
of case and court. In order to develop expressivism as an empirical theory, the
elements of the actors, the audiences and the stage in the posited ‘courtroom drama’
require further research.

European Journal of International Law, 2012

in their dealings with populations affected by the crimes they are concerned with. They are begin... more in their dealings with populations affected by the crimes they are concerned with. They are beginning to formulate responses to these criticisms. This article will first outline the nature of these critiques and the courts' responses. Then it will take inspiration from classical and recent theories in legal sociology and legal anthropology to assess whether there is a theoretical basis for the demand for democracy. It concludes that there is no viable argument that would support requiring a direct democratic basis for international criminal courts, but there are clear points of departure for insisting that they should pursue wider social aims, for identifying these aims, and for identifying principles that can guide the conduct of relationships with affected populations.

This article examines the discourses of prosecution and defense in the case of Radovan Karadžić b... more This article examines the discourses of prosecution and defense in the case of Radovan Karadžić before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. It focuses on what happens in the courtroom-a site mostly neglected in the literature on transitional justice-and the consequences courtroom discourses may have for societies in transition. Our theoretical point of departure is the concept of "expressivism," which is an attempt to theorize courts' potential to send messages as a key feature in thinking about the relationship between normative legitimacy, support,

Many people in the world lead intolerably insecure lives. In many cases, insecurity is the conseq... more Many people in the world lead intolerably insecure lives. In many cases, insecurity is the consequence of conflicts in which civilians are deliberately targeted with impunity. In an era of global interdependence, Europeans can no longer feel secure when large parts of the world are insecure.

SÜDOSTEUROPA, 2008

This article analyses the European Unionʹs state-building policies with ref-

Security Dialogue, 2008

This article shows how human security has functioned as both a paradigm-shifting and a bridging ... more This article shows how human security has functioned as both a
paradigm-shifting and a bridging concept, with its most significant
implications being, first, the shift from a focus on state security to one
on human rights, and, second, the indivisibility of physical and
material security. The article will argue that, despite attempts at
narrowing and appropriation, human security has lost neither its
radical edge nor its holistic character; however, the bulk of the literature
on the subject is theoretical, and there has not been a serious
enough effort to operationalize the term so as to enable a real shift in
policymaking. The second half of the article is an attempt to operationalize
human security while respecting its paradigm-shifting and
holistic character. It discusses necessary connections with wider
policy shifts before outlining ways in which current intelligence,
development, military and ‘state-building’ practices would have to be
transformed to serve human security. Finally, a sketch is drawn of the
ideal ‘human security worker’ of the future and the contexts in which
she might work.

Mary Martin and Mary Kaldor, eds. The European Union and Human Security, 2010

Routledge eBooks, Oct 2, 2012

This article offers an analysis of precisely how civil society and its relation to democracy were... more This article offers an analysis of precisely how civil society and its relation to democracy were conceptualised by its East European and South American proponents in their pre-democratic contexts, through an examination of declarations, newspaper articles, samizdat essays, diaries, letters from prison, academic articles and prize acceptance speeches written at the time. The analysis of these source materials is organised under three main themes: the first concerns activists' understanding of the nature of the regime, its aims and its relation to society; the second relates to the features of the emergent civil society the writers of these documents desired, observed, and helped to create; and the final section discusses their strategies and aspirations in relation to 'democratisation'. On the basis of an analysis of commonalities in ideas across these two very different regional and ideological contexts, hypotheses are formulated as building blocks for a political theory of civil society under authoritarian rule, which may apply in yet other, contemporary contexts.

Ethics & International Affairs, 2016

I n January , Fatou Bensouda, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), annou... more I n January , Fatou Bensouda, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), announced the opening of the court's tenth and most recent country investigation, into alleged crimes perpetrated in Georgia during the brief  Russo-Georgian War. The crimes to be investigated may include murder, destroying enemy property, attacks on a peacekeeping mission, deportation, and ethnic persecution. Bensouda intends to make arrests, put suspects on trial, and, if they are found guilty, have them convicted and punished. Meanwhile, even as Bensouda prepared this newest case, the ICC was still prosecuting a suspect in the court's very first investigation, from , against Dominic Ongwen, a commander of the Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army. These two cases can thus serve as bookends to the ICC's short history, illustrating the long arc between initial investigations and eventual trials, and highlighting the complexity and contingency of international criminal justice. In this article we ask what-if anything-is the point of all this effort, and what can and should we expect from international criminal courts? After more than a decade of work, the accomplishments of the International Criminal Court are highly contested. The court has been accused of bias, of spoiling peace negotiations, of hindering successful transitions to democracy, and of being disconnected from the needs of conflict-affected populations.  We will not address these controversies here. Instead we focus on a more theoretical question: How can international trial and punishment constitute a suitable response to episodes of mass violence? The Statute of the ICC itself provides several indications. Its Preamble proclaims that "the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole must not go unpunished," that it is "determined to put an end to

Nonprofit and civil society studies, 2022

Definition Human rights, as the term expresses, are inalienable, universal basic rights inhering ... more Definition Human rights, as the term expresses, are inalienable, universal basic rights inhering in the individual by virtue of being human. Such rights can be understood normatively as moral entitlements, empirically as objects of political struggle, or positively, as legal rights based on international law. In the latter case, the rights catalogued in the two almost universally ratified core conventions, the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Convention on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), are common points of reference. Many human rights organizations and movements operate on the basis of a moral or political understanding of human rights, but often primarily refer to existing legal norms in their advocacy work, as the latter are directly connected to obligations to which states have bound themselves.

Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material inf... more Disclaimer/Complaints regulations If you believe that digital publication of certain material infringes any of your rights or (privacy) interests, please let the Library know, stating your reasons. In case of a legitimate complaint, the Library will make the material inaccessible and/or remove it from the website. Please Ask the Library: http://uba.uva.nl/en/contact, or a letter to: Library of the University of Amsterdam, Secretariat, Singel 425, 1012 WP Amsterdam, The Netherlands. You will be contacted as soon as possible.

Journal of International Criminal Justice, 2015

Global Civil Society 2005/6

European Journal of International Law, 2012

Depuis 2011, des mobilisations citoyennes massives se developpent dans des contextes tres differe... more Depuis 2011, des mobilisations citoyennes massives se developpent dans des contextes tres differents et autour de revendications essentiellement nationales. Pourtant, certains aspects des revolutions arabes, du mouvement des indignes et d’Occupy ou des manifestations pour plus de democratie au Mexique ou en Russie partagent certains points communs qui les font resonner les uns avec les autres. Cet article se propose de les explorer en passant en revue les reseaux et connexions, un contexte global, des emotions et des valeurs partagees. La seconde partie du texte montre que cette resonnance repose sur l’articulation de trois valeurs qui sont au cœur des revendications et de l’identite de chacun de ces mouvements: la democratie, la dignite et la justice sociale. Ces elements suggerent la necessite de depasser le cadre analytique des nouveaux mouvements sociaux, notamment en raison de l’articulation etroite de considerations culturelles et socio-economiques dans chacun de ces mouvements mais aussi de s’interroger sur les limites ontologiques du rapport au monde et au politique de ces mouvements et qui deviennent saillants lorsque les enjeux qu’ils ont souleves dans la societe se placent dans l’arene de la politique institutionnelle.

Socio, Dec 16, 2013

Mythe de la sécularisation o. r o y De la révolution à la mondialisation y. l e B o t Les « mouve... more Mythe de la sécularisation o. r o y De la révolution à la mondialisation y. l e B o t Les « mouvements des places » g. P l e y e r s e t M. g l a s i u s Contested Meanings in the Eg yptian Revolution s. a. r e n n i c k Cycle révolutionnaire et histoire globale M. M i d d e l l Incertitude du temps révolutionnaire s. W a h n i c h l e d é B a t L'unité des grandes contestations contemporaines M. c a s t e l l s , F. k h o s r o k h a v a r e t a. t o u r a i n e l ' e n t r e t i e n Cuba : Images et révolution, Alfredo Guevara X. d ' a r t h u y s c h a n t i e r s Hugo Chávez P. v a s q u e z l e z a M a Soulèvements contemporains et mobilisations visuelles a. B e r t h o l'état de la question Le recensement e. F i l i P P o v a e t F. g u é r i n-P a c e Les trois démographies h. l e B r a s v a r i a Japon de la période Tokugawa et du début de l'ère Meiji h .

Development and Change, May 1, 2013

Global Cultures of Contestation, 2017

From 2010, the world has witnessed a wave of “square occupations”: from the anti-austerity protes... more From 2010, the world has witnessed a wave of “square occupations”: from the anti-austerity protests in Southern Europe, to the Arab uprisings, to the global Occupy movement. Based on interviews with core activists in Athens, Cairo, London, and Moscow, our research in this chapter shows that the experience of mobilizing or camping in the squares has inspired people to become more active in their neighborhoods and communities in subsequent months and years. The square occupations introduced new ideas and opened new public debates about the economy, systems of governance and democracy, as well as the role of the state and citizens. However, as the movements keep coming up against unresponsive and increasingly repressive state structures, increasing clashes both with those state structures and between progressive and nativist populist movements are to be expected.

International Studies Quarterly, 2020

Recent decades have witnessed a global cascade of restrictive and repressive measures against non... more Recent decades have witnessed a global cascade of restrictive and repressive measures against nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). We theorize that state learning from observing the regional environment, rather than NGO growth per se or domestic unrest, explains this rapid diffusion of restrictions. We develop and test two hypotheses: (1) states adopt NGO restrictions in response to nonarmed bottom-up threats in their regional environment (“learning from threats”); (2) states adopt NGO restrictions through imitation of the legislative behavior of other states in their regional environment (“learning from examples”). Using an original dataset on NGO restrictions in ninety-six countries over a period of twenty-five years (1992–2016), we test these hypotheses by means of negative binomial regression and survival analyses, using spatially weighted techniques. We find very limited evidence for learning from threats, but consistent evidence for learning from examples. We corroborate this...

International Affairs, 2018

prime-minister/the-prime-ministers -speeches/primeminister-viktor-orban-s-speech-at-the-25th-balv... more prime-minister/the-prime-ministers -speeches/primeminister-viktor-orban-s-speech-at-the-25th-balvanyos-summer-free-university-and-student-camp.

Critical Social Policy, 2018

Drawing on interviews conducted with activists from Athens, Cairo and London in 2013, we examine ... more Drawing on interviews conducted with activists from Athens, Cairo and London in 2013, we examine activists’ understandings of, critiques of and concerns around neoliberal policies. We demonstrate that activists often imply, and sometimes explicitly formulate, a fundamental incompatibility between the current economic system and their conceptions of democracy, but also that ‘anti-neoliberal’ is a very inadequate label for describing their political positions and practices. We demonstrate how activists developed deeply interlinked critiques of both the political system and the economic policies that emanated from it. We maintain that at least as important as their discourses were their practices. We analyse how solidarity and self-help practices were perceived as political interventions, rather than acts of charity, through which activists confronted the state with its failure to provide basic services.

Globalizations, 2017

This introduction to the Special Issue on 'Authoritarian rule of populations abroad' develops a n... more This introduction to the Special Issue on 'Authoritarian rule of populations abroad' develops a new theory to better understand how authoritarian rule is exercised over populations abroad and to connect this extraterritorial dimension to the character and resilience of contemporary authoritarian rule. Authoritarian states today have various motivations for tolerating or even sponsoring their population's mobility, and they have learnt to manage and offset the risks population mobility poses to them. The key to understanding the particularities of authoritarian mobility management is that it does not approach its populations, abroad or at home, as citizens with rights. The authoritarian state can adapt to the specific assets and insecurities of populations abroad with policies to include or exclude them as subjects or outlaws, as patriots or traitors, or as clients. The article concludes that authoritarian rule should not be considered a territorially bounded regime type, but rather as a mode of governing people through a distinct set of practices.