MIND THE GAP: IUE MODEL EU TEAM LATVIA HITS THE UK

Every year the students of the IR and EU department of our University take part in the Model EU simulation game organized by SUNY New Paltz.  We have been simulating the small and beautiful (and currently economically broke) country of Latvia for the last 2 years.  As a Post-Soviet specialist I felt it was only fair that we choose a country in the EU that I had in-depth knowledge about regarding its former socialist structure and later transition to market economy and democracy.  Of course with the current EU financial crisis Latvia has turned from former Baltic tiger to current EU laggard.  With the highest unemployment numbers in the EU, Latvia faces many economic hurdles and will not be able to (and is not willing to) join the Eurozone as it had previously planned.  For Turkish students, used to thinking about a large country such as Turkey with much more economic power and different geographic setting, simulating Latvia was
quite a challenge.  First, students had to make sure to play their roles as “Latvians” and not revert to their Turkish identities when any voting regarding Turkey was taking place.  Second, students also had to understand the difficulties of being a small state, with limited military personnel and budget which limited the amount of contribution this particular state could make to larger EU projects involving peacekeeping and security.  Third, Latvia, being a Baltic state, is located in a very different geographic setting than Turkey and it has many security concerns regarding some of its neighbors, the most strained relationship being with its largest neighbor Russia.  And fourth, some states of the EU have been more affected than others with regards to the current economic crisis.  While the PIGS (Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain) have grabbed much of the headlines, other states such as Latvia and Hungary are also experiencing some of the most economically difficult times since they made their transition to a market economy a little over 2 decades ago.  All of these were issues that students had to keep in mind as they became “Latvians” for 4 days at SUNY ModelEU.
As is customary, one year SUNY ModelEU is held in NY and the next year in a European city.  Our own University even held the event on our campus one year.  Until last year Çiğdem Kentmen of our department was the faculty advisor, and then it was decided at last year’s department meeting that I should take over the torch.  Or maybe I should not lie, I wholeheartedly volunteered to go to NY so that I may catch up with friends back home and see NY again after about a year away.  When time came around for this year’s Model EU, we were pleasantly surprised to learn that it would be held at the University of Exeter in the UK.  Having been to London only once before, the chance to visit the UK seemed like a great idea and having the event held at one of the most prestigious universities in the country was also a great opportunity for networking.  The only caveat in all of this was the fact that I would have to be there on my birthday, an occasion which I generally tend to spend with friends and family.  With the many prophecies of 2012 (and obviously some of Mayan origin that do not seem to bode well for the future), I felt that perhaps this would be the beginning of a new cosmic start for me.  So the planning began to take 4 students (Gizem Alp, Efe Mehmet Carlık, Barış Can Başkan and Eralp Tüzüner) on a university trip to Exeter.  Without consulting my Lonely Planet guide, I knew that if one was travelling south of London, a couple of hours down the road one would eventually hit Stonehenge.  Alas, not only was Model EU a wonderful opportunity for my students but the perfect excuse to also get some R&R – via Stonehenge.  In a cosmic turn of events, one of the students selected to come on the trip (Gizem) also had the same birthday as myself (although she was born just a bit later than I was) and so both of us were fated to not only celebrate together but to make our new cosmic starts for 2012 in the same place.
 We arrived in London first and spent our first night having British ale, the traditional fish and chips and the touristy photo snapping tour of Piccadilly Circus and Trafalgar Square.  The next day we got up bright and early and decided to travel to the Tower of London and London Bridge. Travelling by Tube, the famous London metro, we were surrounded by “Mind the Gap” signs everywhere telling us to watch ourselves as we got on and off the train for the gap between the train and the platform.  Although for Londoners this is nothing extraordinary, for us, the scholarly tourists, it certainly created photo opportunities. Upon arrival at London Bridge, we were pleasantly surprised with the weather and had unexpected sunshine throughout the day.  In fact one of the students was even dissapointed that we had not seen the famous London rain during the day – something the weather made up for in the evening as heavy rains started to pour on us out of nowhere.  After taking a stroll in the Tower of London neighborhood we hopped on a double decker tour bus and took in all of the wonderful sites that London has to offer ranging from The Parliament building, Big Ben, The Marble Arch and Buckingham Palace in addition to many other tourist hot spots …..  We later decided to take a tour of the National Gallery – a wonderful art museum housing some of the greatest 13th-19th century artwork.  Our day ended with us taking one of the last trains out of Paddington Station to Exeter.  One of the students noted that he had seen the same station in one of the Harry Potter movies.  In fact, most of our surroundings seemed quite familiar as we had seen most sights in different movies throughout our lives.
We arrived in Exeter past midnight and then had to wake up early in the morning to make our trip to Stonehenge.  Stonehenge was certainly an experience of a lifetime.  As we arrived at this fascinating site, dating back nearly 5000 years, we saw signs warning us of the high winds but we had no idea that they could be this strong.  As one concludes a full circle tour around the site, it is possible to live all 4 seasons back to back.  High winds almost blew us away on arrival, then we were greeted with sunshine and a rainbow only to confront dark clouds bringing small showers a few minutes later.  It is truly an amazing experience and standing there one can understand why this place in particular was chosen as a spot for what is most likely some ritualistic practices.  It was my birthday, and of course, I had to make a ritualistic birthday wish at this holy place.  With hopes of a new cosmic beginning for myself, we left Stonehenge and travelled to Bath, a beautiful city renowned for its ancient spas.  Bath is an ancient city with a population of about 84,000 people.  There are so many things to see in the city but we were limited in time and had to settle for a tour of Bath Abbey and the main town square.
Although we had a very busy day we were not able to rest upon returning to the hotel because Model EU was about to have its welcoming dinner.  After seeing many familiar faces from the previous year’s Model EU, I met several new people and many new excited students who could not wait to take on the role of an EU member state.  Our university’s Latvia team spent the evening socializing with newfound friends and then spent the night at a local disco.  I, as the older member of the team (and freshly in my new older age) decided to call it a night.  I must say that I certainly admire my students energy that allowed for them to sightsee the whole day, attend dinner and then go partying all night.

The next several days of Model EU were spent discussing many different issues that are currently on the EU agenda, although items related to the economy were by far the most heated.  Since this is a simulation after all, some students (although not those from our University) even threatened to leave the EU, leave the Eurozone and to block further agreement on all issues.  Many students finally realized the pitfalls of unanimous voting and sometimes the benefits of qualified majority voting, although when representing a country as small as Latvia, this also has its down side.

After Model EU ended, our students had acquired a firm grasp of the EU, its institutions, Latvia’s particular situation in the EU and how to drink all night and look fresh in the morning without letting on to their professors that they were still hung over.  They carried out all of these tasks with great success.  Now onto planning for next year’s Model EU…

Itır Bağdadi

İZMİR LIFE HILTON INTERVIEWS – January 2012

Asst. Prof. Dr. Işık Gürleyen has commented on Contemporary Turkish Foreign Policy to the İzmir Life monthly magazine. The interview can be reached from the following link.

http://ireuizmir.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/izm_life.pdf

 

MODEL BİRLEŞMİŞ MİLLETLER (ONUMUN)

Uluslararası İlişkiler ve AB Bölümü öğrencilerinden Ecem Sekizkardeş, Sıla Boz, Şeyma Güngör, Kamer Aydın ve Tolga Yelmen, hocalarımızdan Yrd. Doç. Dr. Balkan Devlen ile birlikte 28 – 31 Ekim 2011 tarihlerinde Ukrayna’nın Odesa kentinde düzenlenen Model Birleşmiş Milletler (ONUMUN) Konferansına katıldılar. Türkiye’den konferansa kabul edilen tek üniversite İzmir Ekonomi Üniversitesi olurken öğrencilerimiz üniversitemizi en iyi şekilde temsil ettiler. Dört farklı komisyonda küresel sorunları tartışan ve çözüm önerileri ortaya koyan öğrencilerimiz konferanstaki performansları ile göz doldurdular. Konferans organizasyon komitesi önümüzdeki yıllarda da İEÜ’den heyetleri tekrar katılımcı olarak görmek istediklerini ifade ettiler.

A NEW BOOK ON TURKEY: “TURKEY SINCE 1989: ANGRY NATION”

I have been invited some weeks ago to intervene live on two Romanian radio stations and talk about elections in Turkey. The subject seemed to raise some interest and I gladly accepted. However, the elections were not the only matter of concern. One of the interviewers asked at a given moment about when I would publish something in Romanian about the Turkish political history in general and the developments of the last decade in particular. The question honoured and somehow puzzled me at the same time. I have written a few pieces on both Romanian and Turkish politics with a special focus on state nationalism, citizenship, and language and minority politics. Encouraged by some people from Romania and Britain, and by questions such as the one above, I may even take up the more difficult task of writing a book on the suggested topic.

However, I have recently started reading a volume written by a person I happen to know, namely Kerem Öktem. The title of that piece is TURKEY SINCE 1989: ANGRY NATION. Kerem, whom I met in 2005 during a conference at London School of Economics and Political Science, managed to produce such a concise and dense text that I feel a bit discouraged in my own project. The book is worth reading for a number of reasons. First, it is sharply but carefully critical of the Turkish Republic. Instead of demolishing irresponsibly traditional myths of the establishment, Kerem prefers to evaluate the ways in which they have been built and the costs they presuppose in this country’s contemporary politics. The book indicates the “deep state” as the main culprit in a sort of grand historical trial that  is implicitly demanded in each paragraph. Despite the accusatory tone, it is easy, however, for an initiated reader at least, to see that Kerem Öktem loves his country. He loves it so much that he wants it cleaned of shadows of the past, especially murderous acts against which his judgments may be too harsh and even unfair sometimes. For love of the nation. Overall, the book is guided by a particular dichotomy that Kerem sees throughout the last Turkish century: that between the state’s politics of modernisation and the reality of human life on the ground. At page 39, he also suggests that this “reality of human life” in Turkey has manifested itself historically through an “internal demand for change”.

This is exactly what I think that books like ANGRY NATION should give more attention to. While being obviously busy with the unmasking of the deep, or guardian state as source of all evil, the text does not offer a coherent history, even if brief, of the people’s demand for change in this country. This is a problem that most historians of modernity seem not to have comprehended: there is too much accusative cry about the horrors associated with nation-states in the twentieth century, but little if any “history of resistance” to them.

I would be very happy if I could produce one day a political history of the resistance of non-national, non-state, non-majority, human life in modern Romania, or Turkey. I can already hear those voices lost in the dust of a history preoccupied, as Fernand Braudel warned about more than thirty years ago, too much with heroes and grand discourses of states and too little with lower but infinitely more human talk of life per se. My first contribution to this project has already been made: the dissertation I am close to present abroad contains the pieces making possible a coherent starting point. The year to come will offer me the opportunity to explore and refine the immense material I have managed to gather. So, the answer to the question posed by the radio interviewers indicated above is quite simple: the book is being prepared; however, it may not be eventually about Turkey, or Romania, but about people living in countries called Turkey, or Romania. I would also be the happiest if at least some of our students come to understand the importance of thinking history in terms other than those taught in “national” educational systems. Eugen Weber has opened this “Pandora’s box” decades ago when showing, in PEASANTS INTO FRENCHMEN (1976), how a nation is literally made through public education. We can at least talk then about possibilities of life beyond, if not post, the modern national spaces and time of this world.

Dragos C. Mateescu, 18 July 2011, Izmir

İZMİR LIFE HILTON INTERVIEWS

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Filiz Başkan has commented on the June 12, 2011 elections to the İzmir Life monthly magazine. The interview can be reached from the following link.

http://ireuizmir.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/sc3b6ylec59fi.pdf

OUR STUDENTS VISITED GETTYSBURG COLLEGE, USA

In an effort to promote scholarly exchange among undergraduate students studying “Contemporary Issues in Turkish Politics” Sıla Boz and Ayşenur Ayça Kahraman, two students from our department, presented papers from the course in Pennsylvania upon invitation by Gettysburg College in the USA. Those present in the audience included the Rector of Gettysburg College, students who take the course in the USA as well as faculty members. Two students from Gettysburg College will come to Izmir University of Economics to present their papers in July 2011, concluding the first time such an exchange between our department and another department in the USA has taken place.

The course “Contemporary Issues in Turkish Politics” at IEU was conducted in partnership with the same course offered at Gettysburg College. After discussing class readings with their lecturer students from IEU then interacted with their counterparts in the USA via Skype once a month to examine and analyze currents events in light of the assigned material. Students were then paired with students in the other university and given four assignments to work on as teammates. Taking the personality of the students into consideration myself and Dr. Yasemin Akbaba, the instructor of the course at Gettysburg College, tried to create the most compatible and effective teams. This experience was a rewarding one for the students involved because it gave them a chance to interact, using new and advanced technology, with other students in another part of the world studying the same material. Not only was it an academically beneficial experience, it also served to contribute to intercultural communication.

  

APPLIED WORKSHOP TALKS: FERİT AÇIL

Every Wednesday, the instructors of IREU 452 Applied Workshop organize a series of talks by professionals on career issues. Speakers may come from the business circles and academia. Last week, Applied Workshop welcomed Mr Ferit Açıl who is the Regional Manager at Inteltek. He shared his career experiences with our students and gave valuable advice on job talks.

ALL ELECTIONS LEAD TO YAP (NEW AZERBAIJAN PARTY): THE 2010 AZERBAIJAN PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS

On November 3rd 2010 I boarded a flight to Baku, Azerbaijan to participate in the OSCE’s election observation mission in the November 7, 2010 parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan as a short-term observer.  As far as election observations go, this was certainly not my first mission, nor was it the first time that I had been in Azerbaijan.  I expected no surprises and felt that it would be quite a routine trip to a friendly state and environment that I have decided would be worthy of me dedicating the rest of my academic career to analyzing.  Although many of my expections materialized, I was stunned to witness the results of the economic boom in Azerbaijan, which was quite visible since my last visit to the country only 15 months earlier.

Azerbaijan is a beautiful country, with breathtaking views of mountains, great wine, wonderful people, and oh, yes – oil.  The country has a population of approximately 8.3 million people (according to the latest statistics of the CIA Factbook) with a landmass that (again according to the same source) is slightly smaller than Maine.  As far as geography goes, Azerbaijan has been blessed with the natural resource, or as some would argue the natural curse, of oil along with some friendly (Turkey, Georgia), some not-so-friendly (Armenia) and some questionable (Russia, Iran) neighbors.  Sandwiched in between its kinstate of Turkey, its former big brother Russia and its religious bretren in Iran, Azerbaijan has truly been at the borderland of identity crossroads.  The country speaks Azerbaijani Turkish, which is almost identical to the Anatolian Turkish spoken in Turkey, practices predominantly the Shiite sect of Islam (though after three-quarter of a century under Soviet control religious observation is not very high) and most of the population speaks Russian comfortably.  The resulting identity is one where many Azeris feel a connection to Turkey, Iran or Russia.  The different regions of the country are also close to these different and sometimes clashing identities.  What brought Azerbaijan international fame is the amount of oil reserves that they have been blessed with.  The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline project, dubbed “the deal of the century” was backed enthusiastically by the Americans and the West and was seen as a way to decrease the West’s dependence on Middle Eastern and Russian energy products.  Azerbaijan, since its independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, has made significant investments in its energy sector and today is a major player in oil and gas markets.  This focus on oil and gas however has left Azerbaijan with an economy that is highly dependent on oil and in need of diversification.

Having geography on its side in terms of natural resources, Azerbaijan is also cursed with the same geography.  Ever since 1988 Azerbaijan has been embroiled with its neighbor Armenia in a frozen conflict over the territory of Nagorno Karabakh, legally belonging to Azerbaijan but a de facto state of its own (sans its ethnic Azeri population and run by the Karabakhi Armenians) since the Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement of 1994.  The Karabakh conflict has led to significant territorial loss for Azerbaijan along with a large number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) that continue to pose problems for the future stability of the state.  There are an estimated 590,000 IDPs in Azerbaijan as of 2009 (according to the Internal Displacement Organization website), and considering that the population is a little over 8 million, this constitutes a significant number.

Azerbaijan’s history of elections has seen its fair share of experiments with democratization and growing authoritarianism.  Overall, since independence from the Soviet Union, there have been four parliamentary elections and five presidential elections.  The worrying trend in Azerbaijan and in many of the post-Soviet transition states has been growing authoritarian tendencies.  The elections create a facade of democracy, with formal election procedures, but many times the results are pre-determined.  I was lucky enough to have witnessed the 2008 Presidential elections in Azerbaijan on a previous OSCE mission and along with this latest election, I can comfortably state that as far as elections go in Azerbaijan, the results are never a surprise to anyone.  In some cases the candidates are quite popular and are guaranteed election (or re-election), but in other cases when candidates associated with the government are running against more popular opposition candidates the chances are that the opposition will find it quite difficult to make it out of the ballot box.  The 2010 parliamentary elections, in that sense, did not offer any surprises other than the lenghths that election officials went to to secure the triumph of their candidates.

On my previous mission in 2008 I was stationed in the Jalalibad region which is located close to the Iranian border in southern Azerbaijan.  My general observations in the area were that there was a clear segregation of men and women, where women were generally confined to the household, the area needed development and that there was no major social activity present among residents to foster more social capital.  On this mission I was lucky to be stationed in a future tourist hot spot for the country, the region of Qebele, which is full of lush forests, fresh fruits and vegetables, waterfalls and other sites of natural beauty.  Located approximately 4-6 hours west from the capital of Baku, the region seems to offer a mountain resort getaway for locals and statesmen alike.

Being a Turkish female observer in Azerbaijan  comes with many benefits.  In addition to the linguistic ease with which I could communicate with election officials and voters, I was treated like an honored guest from a brother state everywhere I went.  Almost at every polling station I visited I was greeted with the famous saying of the deceased and idolized former President Heydar Aliyev with regards to Turkey, “one nation, two states”.  The residents were delighted that a Turkish sister had come to visit them.  In my conversations with them I realized that many of the residents in these rural areas spend most of their free time watching Turkish television and many are addicted to Turkish soap operas.  The infamous Turkish show “Valley of the Wolves” (Kurtlar Vadisi) is such a popular show that most men I met in the most rural parts of Jalilabad had their ringtones set to play its generic music.  Being a woman in this territory also led to some funny experiences like the men who wanted to take pictures with me because they were not used to meeting foreign women.  I posed for so many photographs that I ended up feeling like Cindy Crawford on a tour of the Caucasus.

On this last observation mission to Azerbaijan I expected nothing out of the ordinary during the elections.  All of the pre-election investigation and reporting of the OSCE clearly indicated that the elections were unlikely to be held in a free and fair manner and that in many cases the irregularities seemed so obvious that many voters might not even show up to vote.  There are many different reasons that underlie why this was the case and some of them are not specific to this election alone.  Azerbaijan, like some of the other post-Soviet states, has been undergoing a more authoritarian consolidation under the Aliyev dynasty.  Before father Heydar Aliyev passed away in 2003 he was successfully able to transfer power to his son İlham Aliyev who is currently the President of Azerbaijan.  What has aided the Aliyevs is the economic growth that has been motored by the oil and gas industry.  As a rentier state Azerbaijan has had very impressive growth rates due to its oil-driven economic boom.  This is quite evident for those of us who regularly visit the country and can see significant changes with every trip.  As those in power (and their political party vehicle of the New Azerbaijan Party – or YAP as its known with its Azeri initials) have consolidated their hold over the political sphere they have also limited the indepedence of the media and civil society.  In just one example during the OSCE briefing we were told that while the ruling party candidates received over 4 hours of media air time the opposition received less than 1 minute.  This discrepancy with regards to access to resources and the media has had detrimental affects at the ballot box for opposition parties.  Corruption also runs quite deep in post-Soviet societies and is a legacy of the Soviet times.  In many cases I personally felt that most of the blatant irregularities were not orchestrated from the top, as the victory of government candidates was assured  in some areas due to their popularity, but was carried out by lower-level officials as a show of their loyalty.   To become a district that has shown more than a certain amount of support to the opposition, even if the ruling party’s candidate wins, might lead to changes in the regional management of the city or town.  Some irregularities could be seen as an effort to avoid this. In a country with a population of 8.3 million, there are over 0.5 million registered YAP members.  It is impossible to avoid coming into contact with a member of this party at every level of state organization, be it rural or urban.  It is somewhat reminiscent of the Communist Party’s hold not too long ago.

My personal experience in Qebele did not result in my uncovering major corruption or irregularity at the elections.  In fact I witnessed almost no irregularities, which could either be because the elections officials were doing their job well, or because of the real reason which is the fact that most polling stations were aware that we would be visiting them and made sure to look “perfect”.  So the answer to the question of whether or not I saw any corruption at the polling stations and then at the Constituency Election Commission (ConEC) would be “no”.  This does not mean that the elections were not corrupted.  The preliminary report of the OSCE stated that this election had one of the highest cases of ballot stuffing on record in the recent years. It seems to me that some of the cases cited occurred not due to bad will but because of pure incompetence on the part of local officials.  In some cases where the district had very few residents the chairman (or chairwoman) who is always a local could generally be incompetent.  Chairing an election committee is not a full time job and only comes once every few years.  Who cares if ballots are not stamped fully and counted before everyone if you only have 200 voters and your kids are at home waiting for you to have dinner?  One of the first stops we made the day before the election when we were scouting the area was to a village called Laza.  Located on top of a mountain overlooking Russia, this village was pretty difficult to get to.  The only reason we decided to go was because we were advised that it was well worth the trip in terms of scenery.  Normally inacessible during the winter, we were blessed to have sunny autumn weather and made the trek out to this scarcely populated village.  Inside of the village there is no traffic because cars cannot make it through the narrow dirt roads and we had to ditch our vehicle and walk through mud and animal dung to get to the school building where the voting would take place.  The officials were very kind and honored to have our international presence and answered all of our questions with enthusiasm.  The funniest conversation I had with the chairman was when I asked him how far Russia was from the village, his response: “not far, only 1 day by horse”.  It was almost like I was swept back in time.  A single day’s trip on horseback is all it took to get to the Russian Federation.  In this village of a few hundred residents, where everyone knows everyone else, checking the identification of every voter because international observers are there might be a necessity, but in our absence, who could blame them if, for example, Aytan, daughter of the farmer Hikmat, forgot her id and was still allowed to vote because her name was on the voter list (needless to say these characters are products of my imagination and do not exist in reality)?

Another experience that I had was where my team was stationed to observe all night – the ConEc station where all of the different polling stations were bringing in their protocols and the votes were being tabulated for the whole district.  The hospitable head of the district offered us tea and pies his wife had made at home and we were there until 2-3 am waiting for all of the results.  At the end of the night, after all votes had been counted and all protocols signed with us receiving a copy of everything for transparency, we were invited to the guestroom for home-made plum votka and tandoori turkey brought by the Udi Christians of the Nic region.  I have never tasted turkey that delicious, even at the many Thanksgiving dinners I have attended.  Perhaps the votka had an effect but I am sure that the rich farming sector of the region along with the free nature in which the animals are nurtured led to the difference. The real funny part was when I looked around and realized that all of the ballots that came from the different polling stations in the district were in the same room with our votka and our wonderful turkey.  Is this an irregularity? Yes, if one had a devious mind and decided to steal the votes while we were toasting, but no, if you realize that there was limited room in which to put the ballots in the ConEc station.

With all of this said, many of the irregularities were not so innocent.  Ballot stuffing, proxy voting, rigging of votes, intimidation of voters are among some the serious offenses conducted during these elections and denying their existence would not be fitting for a scholar of the area.  The results of the election speak for themselves, while the previous parliament had several different political parties, still with the YAP in clear majority, this new parliament is dominated completely by YAP.  Almost all of the opposition candidates have been blocked from political office.  Although YAP received approximately 46% of the vote, many of the independent candidates (who received 48% of the vote) are also closely linked to the YAP or the President personally.  What results is a parliament almost void of opposition.  Democratic theory tells us that actors accept democracy as the best worst option because at least they have a chance of gaining power one day.  If this chance is taken away too obviously, then the opposition may begin to look for other ways to grasp power.  This is the problem that confronts all those aspiring authoritarians  or those in office.  I do not see such a grim future for Azerbaijan, because unlike some other post-Soviet states, there is an existing civil society. This civil society has taken quite a beating (let’s not even mention the case of the “donkey bloggers” who landed in prison after a parody on their blog), and they have lost significant funding, support and access to media.  Yet they are vibrant elsewhere, like on the internet and continue to voice their opposition and continue to take part in the political debate of the country.  I also see hope as I look at my many Azeri friends in government or in bureaucratic offices and how educated and active they are and the future that they will give to their country.  Azerbaijan does not only have natural resources, it also has human resources.  If modernization theory does not prove us wrong in this case (and it has been known to err here and there every once in a while), the future of real democracy in Azerbaijan may not be so grim.  For the time being however and in the near future, it does seem that “all roads lead to YAP.”

Itır Bağdadi

ANSWER THIS: WHAT DO WE PUT IN PLACE OF WHAT IS CLAIMED TO VANISH?

I have participated recently (17-20 November 2010) in a conference in Bucharest, under the title “Academic Intelligence and Security Studies”. It was organised at the Romanian Diplomatic Institute by the newly-established think-tank KROSS, which works together with the University of Bucharest (UB) for the advancement of the study of world politics and European politics. It was a good meeting with old friends and an opportunity to make many others. For instance, I was very happy to see Giovanni Ercolani and Chris Farrands from Nottingham Trent University, or Gabriel Sebe from UB. I was also very happy to make new friends, such as Camil Pârvu, an experienced analyst of Romanian and European politics, or Dragoş Petrescu, already an authoritative voice on communist history and currently a president of the National Commission in Romania for the Study of Securitate Archives. I probably need to remind our younger readers that the term Securitate denominates the secret policy of the Ceauşescu regime in communist Romania.

The days spent in Bucharest were fabulous as usual: excellent intellectual environment, good night life (good live music and food and drink in many pubs and many youngsters interested in communicating with our group of foreigners). The conference itself was intellectually satisfying, too. Its last day especially was full of vivid interventions, occasioned by the heated debate around security in Afghanistan and especially about the notion of ‘stabilisation’. Many of us put an ironic smile on our faces when this charming German lady was explaining to us how difficult it is to get domestic support for the stabilisation process in conflict-ridden areas of the world.

I personally have an impish mind that gets triggered toward even more impishness precisely by this sort of catch-all words, such as ‘stabilisation’. Most participants were intrigued by the how of the matter. I raised the question what to stabilise? Yes, what is that which we would want to put so much money and planning and implementation efforts in order to stabilise? Here the discussion departed from the Afghanistan issue and moved to the metaphysical level of any sort of situation that would demand, in the eyes of conventional security students, some form of stabilisation. Stabilisation of what, I say? Nation-states? Supranational political forms of integration? Villages? Penguin colonies? If we want to stabilise relations between political, cultural, or social entities of the world, could contemporary fixations in the framework of international relations as inter-national relations work? In other words, can current policies of stabilisation/security/development – either under the aegis of national states or initiated by regional organisations such as the EU – afford to propagate the model of the nation-state as telos of stabilisation/security/development itself?

The model of the nation-state has been and continues to be involved as first-rank subjectivity in schemes of political and military action objectifying human life itself as disposable entity and that depending on temporary political imperatives. This is essentially what happened in the context of German national-socialism and Stalinist communism. Those crucial moments in human history showed clearly the extremes that could be reached through the transformation of regimes into political religions developing various forms of imagining the state and the nation, with dramatic consequences for the humans that would not fit into the respective schemes. ‘National’ sovereignties have drawn political geographies that cut through bodies of people. Shall we continue to stabilise the world with such geographies while talking over a beer downtown Brussels, capital of political posmodernity? (sic!)

Dragoş C. Mateescu