The Council of Europe: 50 years of European cooperation

1999 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 497-505
Author(s):  
Daniel Tarschys
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
European Identity ◽  
Council Of Europe ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
European Cooperation ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Fundamental Values

The post-war European credo – never again a Europe given over to totalitarian terror and war, but a Europe of peace and freedom – led to the creation in May 1949 of the Council of Europe with the clear political and ideological alignment to build a Europe of common values (democracy, human rights and the Rule of Law), to which the practice of market economy was added. The promotion of those fundamental values constituted the Council's specific mandate and raison d'être together with ever-increasing cooperation patterns. After the end of the Cold War, the organization became the pre-eminent European political institution welcoming, on an equal footing and in permanent structures, the democracies of Europe freed from communist oppression. The Kosovo conflict calls for a hardening of the European resolve to base its future on the defence of human dignity, respect for the individual, the Rule of Law and pluralist democracy, indispensable in fostering a common European identity. Setting-up of regional and European cooperation and integration structures has been an important step forward, but must be complemented by the conviction and determination to forge a common European destiny.

MI5, the Cold War, and the Rule of Law

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Keith Ewing ◽  
Joan Mahoney ◽  
Andrew Moretta
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Limited Extent ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Statutory Authority ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The Way

This title is concerned with the powers, activities, and accountability of MI5 principally in the period from 1945 to 1964. It was a body without statutory authority, with no statutory powers, and with no obvious forms of statutory accountability. It was established as a counter-espionage agency, yet was beset by espionage scandals on a frequency that suggested if not high levels of incompetence, then high levels of distraction and the squandering of resources. The book addresses the evolution of MI5’s mandate which set out its role and functions and to a limited extent the lines of accountability, the surveillance targets of MI5, and the surveillance methods that it used for this purpose, with a focus in two chapters on MPs and lawyers, respectively; the purposes for which this information was used, principally to exclude people from certain forms of employment; and the accountability of MI5 or the lack thereof for the way in which it discharged its responsibilities under the mandate.

Epilogue

2019 ◽  
pp. 241-244
Author(s):  
John Mulqueen
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Berlin Wall ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
The Us ◽  
Revolutionary Party ◽  
The Cold War

The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War caused ructions in the WP; the party split in 1992 when ‘reformers’ broke away to create Democratic Left. The ‘reformers’ contended that the WP should become ‘a reconstituted party affirming its adherence to the rule of law’. The ‘reformers’, or ‘liquidators’, who included six of its seven parliamentary deputies, were accused of attempting to destroy the WP. What was left of the ‘revolutionary’ party retained its Cold War assumptions, pointing the finger at the CIA, no less, claiming that it might have had a role in fomenting the split. Drawing a global picture, the WP highlighted the ‘counter-revolutionary’ role of the US in such countries as Cuba, Vietnam, Angola, and Grenada. The reformers highlighted the WP’s ‘historical baggage’ and association with ‘criminality’ – the Official IRA.

scholarly journals Illiberal peacebuilding in Angola

2011 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 287-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ricardo Soares de Oliveira
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Poverty Alleviation ◽  
Civil Liberties ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Making Sense ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Liberal Peace ◽  
Post War ◽  
Liberal Peacebuilding

ABSTRACTAngola's oil-fuelled reconstruction since the end of the civil war in 2002 is a world away from the mainstream liberal peacebuilding approach that Western donors have promoted and run since the end of cold war. The Angolan case is a pivotal example of what can be termed ‘illiberal peacebuilding’, a process of post-war reconstruction managed by local elites in defiance of liberal peace precepts on civil liberties, the rule of law, the expansion of economic freedoms and poverty alleviation, with a view to constructing a hegemonic order and an elite stranglehold over the political economy. Making sense of the Angolan case is a starting point for a broader comparative look at other cases of illiberal peacebuilding such as Rwanda, Lebanon and Sri Lanka.

Science and Politics During the Cold War – The Controversial Case of Sexology in Communist Romania

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
pp. 87-107
Author(s):  
Luciana Jinga ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Sexual Revolution ◽  
Informal Networks ◽  
Science And Politics ◽  
Sexual Science ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Stable Family ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Cold War

The paper investigates how formal/informal networks of scientists, while facilitating the scientific West-East transfer in the Cold War context, shaped the scientific field of sexology by imposing personal scientific credos, in a particular national context. The paper shows that in the Cold War context, sexual science was present in Communist Romania, but neither as imitation of the regional scholarship, nor as a simple reproduction of western advancements in the field. The post-war Romanian scholarship in the field of sexology was the result of scientific interests of Stefan Milcu – long time party protégée and respected member of the international scientific community – and of its personal circle that included remarkable personalities such as Victor Săhleanu or Tudor Stoica. Presenting the public with information about sexual and re­productive functions, and sometimes even elaborated descriptions of sexual techniques, certainly was never meant to enhance the individual gratification or provoke any form of sexual revolution. The Romanian production of sex/educational manuals and of sexology works was part of a state policy towards a better, stable, family life, aiming for collective and social happiness.

How Policy Fields Are Born: The Rise of Democratic Security in Argentina

2018 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-161 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guillermina Seri ◽  
Mary Rose Kubal
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Democratic Politics ◽  
Security Measures ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Authoritarian Government ◽  
Policy Fields ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
Democratic Life ◽  
The Cold War

AbstractThis essay maps the transformation of security from a symbol of authoritarian government under the Cold War paradigm of National Security into a public good and a policy field acknowledged as legitimate and democratic by politicians and policy experts. Using present-day Argentina as an example, we show how security ideas gain dominance across the political spectrum, displacing and subordinating democratic politics conceived in terms of rights. As institutions increasingly accept security measures and pre-emptive risk management, a securitising discourse – despite its claims to advocate for the ‘citizen’ – trumps governance and the rule of law. Appealing to citizens’ concerns and rights, the new forms of securitisation may yet undermine democratic life.

The Non-Interventionary Norm Prevails: an Analysis of the Western Sahara

1995 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-81 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karin Von Hippel
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
International Peace ◽  
Western Sahara ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
International Commitments ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Governmental Institutions ◽  
Domestic Affairs ◽  
The Cold War

Fears that the supposedly sacred norm of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of other states has eroded in the last few years are not entirely groundless. Excuses to intervene, that now receive sanction by the Security Council of the United Nations, include humanitarian concerns, as in Somalia and Rwanda, international peace and security, as in Kuwait and Bosnia, and the denial of democracy, as in Haiti, all of which differ from the interventions of the cold war years. As Thomas Buergenthal has pointed out, ‘Once the rule of law, human rights and democratic pluralism are made the subject of international commitments, there is little left in terms of governmental institutions that is domestic.’

scholarly journals The Clash within a Civilisation

2014 ◽  
Vol 38 ◽  
pp. 51-63
Author(s):  
Jan Erik Lane
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Institutional Innovation ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Muslim Countries ◽  
Peaceful Settlement ◽  
Clash Of Civilisations ◽  
The Cold War

At the end of the last century, there was much talk about a future clash of civilisations, replacing the Cold War confrontation. However, the development of events in the early 21rst century has turned the focus upon the clash within one of the largest civilisations of the World: Islam and the Muslim countries. The outcome of the political violence from the civil wars and Salafist terrorism is deaths and casualties beyond imagination. Why cannot the Moslem countries regulate their religious tensions - Sunni-Shia, Salafist jihadism - through institutional innovation, allowing for peaceful settlement and the rule of law?

The Rule of Law under Surveillance

2020 ◽  
pp. 168-204
Author(s):  
Ewing Mahoney
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Rule Of Law ◽  
The State ◽  
Parliamentary Democracy ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Legal Advice ◽  
Legitimate Reason ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Radical Movements

This chapter addresses the surveillance of lawyers. Lawyers had no immunity from MI5 surveillance during the Cold War, and progressive lawyers had even less. However, just as the surveillance of MPs was an affront to the principles of parliamentary democracy that MI5 was under a mandate to defend, the surveillance of lawyers was just as great an affront to the Rule of Law, another core liberal value that the Service was bound to respect and sustain, albeit that it did neither convincingly. There is no legitimate reason why lawyers should be targeted, unless there was reason to believe that they were involved in espionage or subversion, of which there is evidence of neither. In the absence of any such suspicion, radical movements are entitled to confidential legal advice, as are radical individuals involved in litigation, while lawyers who provide support for unpopular causes are entitled to expect freedom from harassment by the State.

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