scholarly journals A ritual approach to deterrence: I am, therefore I deter

2020 ◽  
pp. 135406612096603
Author(s):  
Maria Mälksoo

How can ritual help to understand the practice of deterrence? Traditional deterrence scholarship tends to overlook the active role of deterring actors in creating and redefining the circumstances to which they are allegedly only reacting. In order to address the weight of deterrence as a symbol, collective representation and strategic repertoire, this article proposes to rethink deterrence as a performative strategic practice with ritual features and critical binding, releasing and restraining functions. I posit a ritual account of deterrence to better grasp the performance, credibility and the presumed effect of this central international security practice. An understanding of deterrence as a ritual-like social practice probes the scope of rational deterrence theory, replacing its ‘I think, therefore I deter’ presumption with a socially and politically productive ‘I am, therefore I deter’ logic. Drawing on the example of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s enhanced Forward Presence, the proposed conceptualization of extended deterrence as an interaction ritual chain in allied defence, solidarity and community-building offers novel insights about the deterrence and collective identity nexus. Extended deterrence has much more than deterrence at stake: how an alliance practices deterrence tells us more about the alliance itself than about the nature of threats it responds to. The tripwire posture of the enhanced Forward Presence highlights the instrumentality of ritualization for mediating ambiguity in extended deterrence.

Scriptura ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 120 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin D. Giffone

Has biblical scholarship become irrelevant to modern secular societies? Are the threats to the viability of biblical scholarship of the same nature as the threats to other areas of the humanities (history, philosophy, literature), or is there a qualitative difference? What about the role of technology in biblical research and biblical education? What is the future of the institutions of biblical scholarship such as universities, seminaries, journals, and academic presses? What is the role of biblical scholars in secular and post-secular societies, as contrasted with scholars in/from emerging communities? This essay argues that the problem of “validation” lies at the heart of biblical scholarship’s irrelevancy within the broader secularity of modern world and that this problem is even more evident in the scholarly discourse coming from regions like Eastern Europe and South Africa. However, the loss of authority of biblical scholarship more generally represents an opportunity for these communities. Rather than becoming enamoured of validation from the North Atlantic world, Bible-reading communities must cultivate their own forms of validation based in their unique histories with the Bible, and the affinities between their own histories/cultures and the cultures that produced the Old and New Testament texts.


2015 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-120
Author(s):  
Petra Kiss

Since August 1945 atomic weapons have become significant factors in international relations, every state with great ambitions has aspired to get atomic secrets. The primary goal of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) created in 1949 was – possessing the United States’, a nuclear power’s, security guarantee – to deter the Soviet agression. The first strategic documents of the Alliance were written with this very purpose. However, in the 1950s there was a shift in the allied nations’ policies, which influenced NATO’s strategic thinking as well, so in 1957 a real different strategic concept was adopted. Gaining technological superiority became the most important goal, which led to development and intense production of nuclear weapons. This article examines the emerging role of nuclear weapons and the changing strategy of the Alliance between 1949 and 1957.


Ocean Science ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (5) ◽  
pp. 1353-1365
Author(s):  
Tillys Petit ◽  
M. Susan Lozier ◽  
Simon A. Josey ◽  
Stuart A. Cunningham

Abstract. Wintertime convection in the North Atlantic Ocean is a key component of the global climate as it produces dense waters at high latitudes that flow equatorward as part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC). Recent work has highlighted the dominant role of the Irminger and Iceland basins in the production of North Atlantic Deep Water. Dense water formation in these basins is mainly explained by buoyancy forcing that transforms surface waters to the deep waters of the AMOC lower limb. Air–sea fluxes and the ocean surface density field are both key determinants of the buoyancy-driven transformation. We analyze these contributions to the transformation in order to better understand the connection between atmospheric forcing and the densification of surface water. More precisely, we study the impact of air–sea fluxes and the ocean surface density field on the transformation of subpolar mode water (SPMW) in the Iceland Basin, a water mass that “pre-conditions” dense water formation downstream. Analyses using 40 years of observations (1980–2019) reveal that the variance in SPMW transformation is mainly influenced by the variance in density at the ocean surface. This surface density is set by a combination of advection, wind-driven upwelling and surface fluxes. Our study shows that the latter explains ∼ 30 % of the variance in outcrop area as expressed by the surface area between the outcropped SPMW isopycnals. The key role of the surface density in SPMW transformation partly explains the unusually large SPMW transformation in winter 2014–2015 over the Iceland Basin.


2019 ◽  
Vol 193 (3) ◽  
pp. 547-557
Author(s):  
Sławomir Wojciechowski

This year, NATO is celebrating its 70th anniversary and the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty. The Alliance was founded in the early days of the Cold War, but found itself in a new geopolitical situation after the col-lapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the bipolar world. The organi-zation has been transforming ever since and over time this transfor-mation has included both expansion and adaptation to new circum-stances. With the return of Russian neo-imperial ambitions in the re-cent years, NATO has been given new impetus. Emerging threats and challenges, which are mainly of a military nature, have been addressed by NATO through further recent adaptation processes which were based on the return to the core role of the Alliance, namely collective defense and deterrence. This, in turn, has created a boost of NATO ac-tivity on the ground, which means that improvement with regard to interoperability and integration is now in high demand.


Zootaxa ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 3210 (1) ◽  
pp. 50 ◽  
Author(s):  
CLARA MARÍA HEREU ◽  
EDUARDO SUÁREZ-MORALES

In waters of the Northwestern Atlantic pelagic tunicates may contribute significantly to the plankton biomass; however, theregional information on the salp fauna is scarce and limited to restricted sectors. In the Caribbean Sea (CS) and the Gulf ofMexico (GOM) the composition of the salpid fauna is still poorly known and this group remains among the less studiedzooplankton taxa in the Northwestern Tropical Atlantic. A revised checklist of the salp species recorded in the North At-lantic (NA, 0–40° N) is provided herein, including new information from the Western Caribbean. Zooplankton sampleswere collected during two cruises (March 2006, January 2007) within a depth range of 0–941 m. A total of 14 species wererecorded in our samples, including new records for the CS and GOM area (Cyclosalpa bakeri Ritter 1905), for the CS (Cy-closalpa affinis (Chamisso, 1819)), and for the Western Caribbean (Salpa maxima Forskål, 1774). The number of speciesof salps known from the CS and GOM rose to 18. A key for the identification of the species recorded in the region is provided. Studies on the ecological role of salps in several sectors of the NA are scarce and deserve further attention.


2019 ◽  
Vol 210 ◽  
pp. 35-46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Ordóñez ◽  
David Barriopedro ◽  
Ricardo García-Herrera

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (12) ◽  
pp. 2990-3001 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anastasios A. Tsonis ◽  
Kyle L. Swanson ◽  
Geli Wang

Abstract In a recent application of networks to 500-hPa data, it was found that supernodes in the network correspond to major teleconnection. More specifically, in the Northern Hemisphere a set of supernodes coincides with the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and another set is located in the area where the Pacific–North American (PNA) and the tropical Northern Hemisphere (TNH) patterns are found. It was subsequently suggested that the presence of atmospheric teleconnections make climate more stable and more efficient in transferring information. Here this hypothesis is tested by examining the topology of the complete network as well as of the networks without teleconnections. It is found that indeed without teleconnections the network becomes less stable and less efficient in transferring information. It was also found that the pattern chiefly responsible for this mechanism in the extratropics is the NAO. The other patterns are simply a linear response of the activity in the tropics and their role in this mechanism is inconsequential.


2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (22) ◽  
pp. 7697-7712 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yu Nie ◽  
Hong-Li Ren ◽  
Yang Zhang

Abstract Considerable progress has been made in understanding the internal eddy–mean flow feedback in the subseasonal variability of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) during winter. Using daily atmospheric and oceanic reanalysis data, this study highlights the role of extratropical air–sea interaction in the NAO variability during autumn when the daily sea surface temperature (SST) variability is more active and eddy–mean flow interactions are still relevant. Our analysis shows that a horseshoe-like SST tripolar pattern in the North Atlantic Ocean, marked by a cold anomaly in the Gulf Stream and two warm anomalies to the south of the Gulf Stream and off the western coast of northern Europe, can induce a quasi-barotropic NAO-like atmospheric response through eddy-mediated processes. An initial southwest–northeast tripolar geopotential anomaly in the North Atlantic forces this horseshoe-like SST anomaly tripole. Then the SST anomalies, through surface heat flux exchange, alter the spatial patterns of the lower-tropospheric temperature and thus baroclinicity anomalies, which are manifested as the midlatitude baroclinicity shifted poleward and reduced baroclinicity poleward of 70°N. In response to such changes of the lower-level baroclinicity, anomalous synoptic eddy generation, eddy kinetic energy, and eddy momentum forcing in the midlatitudes all shift poleward. Meanwhile, the 10–30-day low-frequency anticyclonic wave activities in the high latitudes decrease significantly. We illustrate that both the latitudinal displacement of midlatitude synoptic eddy activities and intensity variation of high-latitude low-frequency wave activities contribute to inducing the NAO-like anomalies.


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