We are happy to announce that SAGE International has joined the ISN’s worldwide partner network.
Lead by Dr John Bruni, SAGE is an independent, non-profit virtual think tank, consultancy and education service provider based in South Australia. It combines the talents of an interdisciplinary network of Australian and international scholars and researchers analyzing contemporary statecraft and strategy, especially the interface of political, psychological and philosophical motivations and the application of force.
The ISN Digital Library now includes SAGE’s publication series “Ideas and Concepts” with a recent paper on the difficulties of Iran’s foreign policy in Lebanon and another one on Julian Assange entitled “Neither Saint nor Sinner”.
Too few jobs or too many graduates? Image: courtesy of Stefano Benetti
“A socio-economic oasis in a political desert”: this is how Diogo Noivo describes Tunisiain a 2009 briefing paper for the Portuguese Institute of International Relations and Security (IPRIS). It got about by now that the notorious tourist destination is not a paradise for critical spirits and democratically-minded people. But now it seems that even the socio-economic oasis Tunisia was supposed to be is drying out.
A desperate, unemployed university graduate, who was denied the right to have a vegetable stall on the local market in a provincial town and slapped and insulted by the police, burnt himself in protest. Demonstrations organized by otherwise loyal trade unions were not crushed by the government’s security forces for a change and the autocrat Zine El Abidine Ben Ali reacted to the protests by firing his youth minister and allocating more money for the country’s youth programs. However, the angry crowd didn’t let itself calm down by this and Ben Ali returned to his old methods: guns and batons.
In this excellent report, the German-language Swiss public radio reveals the socio-economic causes of this unrest: Tunisia’s good education system brings out tens of thousands of university graduates every year, which the country’s low-tech industries such as textiles and cheap tourism can’t absorb.
Based in Sydney, Australia, the Institute is an independent not-for-profit research organization dedicated to developing the inter-relationships between business, peace and economic development.
The Institute’s flagship project is the Global Peace Index (GPI), a yearly ranking listing 149 nations according to their ‘absence of violence’. The GPI is composed of qualitative and quantitative indicators from highly respected sources, which combine factors internal to a country and external to it.
The Institute for Economics and Peace conducts research in the following areas:
Statistical analyses to identify the structures and causes of peace;
Economic assessment of the value of increased levels of peacefulness to global GDP;
Definition and implication of the “Peace Industry”;
Exploration of multinational attitudinal surveys and their relevance to societal peacefulness;
Analyses of the relationship between peace, markets, costs and profit;
Investigation of the world’s most peaceful industries;
Development of statistical methods to determine how to calculate the probable impact of reducing levels of violence and increasing levels of peacefulness on a company’s market size.
In addition to research, the Institute also conducts education, generates dialogue, and publicizes the output of its activities with a view to impacting the public agenda.
We are delighted to announce that the Centro Argentino de Estudios Internacionales (CAEI) has joined our global partner network.
Based in Buenos Aires, CAEI is a civil society institution that aims to foster understanding of prominent issues on the international agenda from a pluralistic and interdisciplinary perspective. CAEI runs academic programs on all regions in the world, with a special focus on Latin American countries. Several thematic programs cover subjects from the history of international relations to science and technology.
CAEI’s specialty is the Program on Political Phenomenology (PPP), which aims at creating innovative ideas and making theoretical and methodological contributions to the field of area studies.
We’re thrilled to be able to extend our reach in Latin America with CAEI’s support. CAEI’s research will allow our users to get better insights into Latin American politics, as well as a different perspective on global affairs.
We are happy to announce that the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI) has joined the ISN partner network.
Based in Vienna, ESPI provides decision-makers with an independent view and analysis on mid- to long term issues relevant to the use of space, according to its mission. The Institute, led by Prof Dr Kai-Uwe Schrogl, supports a network of experts and centers of excellence working with ESPI in-house analysts.
The ISN Digital Library features two publication series from our newest partner and as we go on, more and more ESPI publications will be included:
ESPI Reports are in-depth studies, which combine thorough independent analysis with perspective and vision as well as policy advice. See for example Spyros Pagkratis‘s report on issues and trends in space policy 2009/2010, or the study by Jana Robinson on the role of extraterrestrial transparency and confidence-building measures.
ESPI Perspectives are short papers, presenting concise analyses and commentary or innovative ideas in the field of space policy. See for example the Perspective by Marcus Hornung, who argues that space might significantly contribute to the creation of a European identity, or the one by Max M Mutschler, who applies lessons learned from the Ottawa process to space-based weapons control.
We are honored to welcome ESPI as a partner. It will significantly enrich our information services in the areas of space policy and space security.
