This thesis explores how UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace, and security and its ensuing National Action Plans for gender equality inform justifications of international intervention. I ask the following questions: how does Resolution 1325 and its ensuing National Action Plans for gender equality construct subjectivities of gender? How have states appropriated these gendered subjectivities in the legitimation of conflict? I review feminist, postcolonial, and poststructuralist literatures to argue that Resolution 1325 is aligned with broader United Nations governmental strategies for framing and justifying international intervention. Resolution 1325 produces dualistic subjectivities of gender, where women are constructed either as victims or as empowered, albeit within the limits deemed acceptable in masculinized contexts. I analyze the case of German National Action Plans for gender equality and the official policy texts related to its intervention in Afghanistan. I demonstrate that the foreign policy of a seemingly progressive state embraces Resolution 1325's dualistic subjectifications of women in conflict to construct logics that legitimize the Afghan intervention. My study findings show that Germany discursively constructs women and gender equality in accordance with the UN's guidelines and its good governance framework, which do not challenge existing structures of masculinity. In addition, they function as a means through which Germany legitimizes neoliberal and neocolonial policies as acceptable, ultimately failing to challenge the international war system. / Master of Arts / This thesis analyzes UN Security Council Resolution 1325's influence on the development of German gender equality policy and German foreign policy towards intervention in Afghanistan. I ask how the visions of gender produced in Resolution 1325, which primarily frame women as victims or only as empowered, inform the approach of Germany to Afghanistan. I find that German gender equality policy and policy towards Afghanistan are heavily influenced by the UN's framing of gender, as these ideas allow for Germany to justify its role in Afghanistan as a means to empower women further or save them from victimization. This allows Germany to maintain its role as a progressive humanitarian state by aligning its justification for the mission with the UN's broad objectives. However, doing so sets a dangerous precedent by legitimating intervention so long as it fits within the confines of the UN's notion of acceptability. Ultimately, my work shows that gender and attention to women functions to "clean" the German intervention in Afghanistan and portray it as progressive in accordance with the UN's values despite the inherent militarism of the intervention.

This thesis is an endeavor to develop a more thorough and nuanced understanding of the relationship between international and local actors in the post-Dayton state-building process in Bosnia. While state-building in Bosnia has received a considerable amount of attention and study, apprehension and depiction of the relationship between the international community and Bosnian governing officials has remained relatively homogeneous. This dominant account of the relationship has been that it is a contentious and oppositional one. To criticize the approach I highlighted two of its problematic aspects. These were the conception of the state, in the abstract, as a highly unified and cohesive entity. And, the depiction of internal and external as isolated and fixed actor-identities. The central argument of this thesis is that the international community and the nationalist parties (representing respectively the external and internal state actors) have become united in a mutually advantageous and mutually-reinforcing process of sharing power, responsibility, and blame. This process has been apparently oppositional but effectively cooperative, so that the outcome of twelve years of state-building has been the continued relevance and effective entrenchment of both the international community and the nationalist parties in the Bosnian state.

This thesis focuses on international intervention and statebuilding in post-2001 Afghanistan. It offers an alternative lens, a network lens, to understand the complexity of internationally sponsored state re-building and transformation. It therefore analyses how political power is assembled and flows through political networks in statebuilding, with an eye to the hitherto ignored endogenous political networks. The empirical chapters investigate the role and power dynamics of Afghan political network in re-assembling and transforming the post-2001 state once a political settlement is reached; how everyday political network practices shape the nature of statehood and governance; and subsequently how these power dynamics and practices contribute towards political order/violence and stability/instability. This thesis challenges the dominant wisdom that peacebuilding is a process of democratisation or institutionalisation, showing how intervention has unintentionally produced the democratic façade of a state, underpinning by informal power structures of Afghan politics. The post-2001 intervention has fashioned a ‘network state’ where the state and political networks have become indistinguishable from one another: the empowered network masquerade as the state. This study suggests that a new political order is emerging in post-2001 Afghanistan where political stability is a function of patron-client relations, opportunistic practices of bargaining and expropriation of public resources for political network gain as well as the instrumentalisation of identities. In light of this analysis, it concludes with the implications of the research findings for the future of Afghanistan. It posits that a successful international military exit from Afghanistan and post-2014 state survival may depend primarily on the political stability of the empowered political networks. This research is based on extensive fieldwork, including participatory observation and interviews (more than 130 interviews) with key informants over 16 months in Afghanistan.

abstract: Ethno-nationalist politicians and criminals in Mostar espoused a discourse of ethno-exclusionist sociocultural relations as a superstructure for the public in order to establish ethnocratic kleptocracies where they concealed their criminal colonization of residential and commercial property through manipulating the pre-Bosnian War discourse on property relations. This is not to argue that some or most of these politicians and criminals did not believe in their virulent nationalist rhetoric, but instead that the effects of the discourse created well-used pathways to personal, not community, wealth. Elites used the Yugoslav economic crisis and perceived past grievance to enflame growing tensions between ethnicities and social classes. I use Mostar as an object of analysis to examine the creation of Bosnian Croat and Bosniak ethnocratic regimes in this divided city. However, I focus more on the Bosnian Croat regime in the city because it envisioned Mostar as its capital, making the city the site of its political competition among factions. Even though ethno-nationalist politicians and criminals still hold a level of power in Mostar, the IC did succeed in instituting a high level of property restitution, which does not necessarily imply return, because the IC was able to impose rule of law when it acted in an organized manner. Also, the ethnocratic regimes were weakened due to regional economic and political factors that undercut the regimes' hold over the population. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. History 2013

Gentrification emerged as a middle-class interest in renovating houses in old city cores. The process changed in parallel with the economic and political restructuring during the last decade. In this period, urban regeneration became an urban strategy used by the local governments as well as a mask for gentrification. It aimed at restructuring the urban land in line with the preferences of wealthier groups rather than the social needs of existing residents. The governments intend to remove poor images of cities through the displacement of poor inhabitants. This, in turn, increases the risk of dilapidating the authenticity of the existing social, cultural, and historic fabric of the regeneration areas. Against this trend, international conservation agencies promote rehabilitation projects to benefit existing communities of historic neighborhoods. In line with the international declarations, they intend to rehabilitate socio-economic conditions of long term inhabitants along with the conservation of historic heritage. Accordingly, the unique architecture of Fener and Balat neighborhoods has been the focus of international efforts during the last decade. Besides, the neighborhoods attracted the local governments&rsquo / interest and were declared as urban regeneration area in 2006. In this regard, thesis intends to compare Rehabilitation of Fener Balat Districts Program (RFBDP) based on the partnership of Fatih Municipality and EU and Fener Balat Neighborhoods Regeneration Project (FBNRP) based on a model of Fatih Municipality and private sector partnership, with a focus on conserving existing communities and preventing displacement.

[pt] Esta dissertação tem como objetivo analisar as discriminações, exclusões e violências produzidas pelos discursos que constituíram a intervenção e a operacionalização da zona de exclusão de aérea (ZEA) autorizada em 2011 para proteção de civis na Líbia. A análise segue a partir de uma série de fechamentos e limitações contidas na literatura tradicional e dominante sobre a intervenção, os quais impossibilitam uma leitura que dê conta das violências produzidas e legitimadas pelos discursos e práticas da intervenção. À vista disso, a dissertação parte de um entendimento de que os discursos não somente constroem as representações de identidade dos sujeitos, como também criam as condições de possibilidade à realização de determinadas ações. Por isso, no caso da intervenção na Líbia, as diferentes articulações discursivas presentes na literatura acadêmica, nos discursos políticos, na mídia internacional e em documentos oficiais serão analisadas a fim de compreender como a autorização de uma zona de exclusão aérea para fins humanitários pode ser lida a partir de uma ambiguidade constitutiva, uma vez que os mesmos discursos e práticas que possibilitaram e legitimaram ações em prol da vida e da proteção de civis, também autorizaram um conjunto de violências, exclusões e discriminações. / [en] This dissertation aims to analyse the discriminations, exclusions and violences producted by discourses that constituted the intervention and the operationalization of a no-fly zone (NFZ) authorized in 2011 for the protection of civilians in Libya. The analysis follows from a series of closures and limitations contained in the mainstream and dominant literature on the intervention, which preclude a reading that takes account of the violences producted and legitimated by discourses and practices in the Libyan intervention. In view thereof, the dissertation adopts an understanding that discourses not only construct the representation of the subjects identity, but also create the conditions of possibility to the accomplishment of certain actions. Therefore, in the case of the intervention in Libya, the different discursive articulations present in the academic literature, political discourses, international media, and official documents will be analysed in order to understand how the authorization of a no-fly zone for humanitarian purposes can be read as from a constitutive ambiguity since the same speeches and practices that enabled and legitimated actions for life and the protection of civilians also authorized a set of violences, exclusions and discriminations.

This diploma thesis deals with the postconflict reconstruction in Afghanistan from the american invasion in 2001 with the special focus on institutional reforms which were implemented there and whether these reforms caught on and function properly. Firstly, I deal with the conclusions which the theoretics of institutional economics came to regarding the role of institutions in economic development, how economic and political institutions come to existence and develop and if it is possible to change country's instituional environment. The institutions which lead to economic growth are above all equality before law, equality of opportunities, rule of law and free bussiness and trade. However, not all countries developed this optimal instituional framework because of different economic and political history. These countries then suffer from poverty and instability and in many of these cases the international community intervene to change this unfavourable situation. However, as many these unsuccessful interventions show, to change the country's institutional environment is not easy. Spontaneously or from below developed institutions are deeply rooted in society and if they are not in accordance with new institutional reforms, they will probably not function properly or will even lead to opposite results. In the case of Afghanistan, many years of civil war resulted in creation of war economy and total fall of state institutions while this power vacuum wal filled by rise of local warlords who, with the help of armed militias, seized control over number of regions and made a living by illegal trade. The reform process started after the successful military invasion in 2001 and after the fall of Taliban regime with the goal to establish liberal democracy of western type in Afghanistan was not successful. Most of the country is again under the control of Taliban, economy consists mostly of opium growing and illegal trade and the country is still extremely poor and instable and in spite of the change of formal rules actually nothing has changed- Afghanistan is still war economy and fallen state.

This study explores the relationship between international intervention and the ethnification of politics and seeks to explain the degree to which international involvement affects the degree of ethnification of politics. Deriving from explanations that suggest that the ethnification of politics is attributed to the greater interethnic trust facilitated through credible institutions, this study argues that the ethnification of politics is lower in cases where the greater involvement by the international intervention in local institution-building can be observed. Using the method of structure focused comparison, the suggested hypothesis is tested on two cities in Bosnia and Hercegovina – Mostar and Sarajevo. Data was collected through a manual empirical analysis and the tracing of historical institution-building actions by the international community in each city. The main finding shows relative support for the causal relationship; however, the observed causal mechanism is different to the expected one. This signals that the degree of international involvement in local institution-building processes cannot, in isolation, explain variation on the ethnification of politics. Thus, further research is needed to both identify additional causal factors and build the interaction effects that can explain the observed variation.

No description available.

Comment les intervenants internationaux peuvent-ils (re)construire des institutions légitimes après un conflit intra-étatique ? En d’autres termes, quels facteurs déterminent le résultat du statebuilding post-conflit ? D’un côté, l’approche dominante, dite « technique », soutient que des ressources significatives (financières, humaines, politiques) permettent aux intervenants internationaux de construire les institutions voulues. Au Kosovo, les acteurs internationaux ont établi une administration internationale dotée de pouvoirs exécutifs et des ressources étendues et maintenues tout au long du processus. Or, le bilan du statebuilding est mitigé. D’un autre côté, le paradigme de la « paix libérale » affirme que la libéralisation (politique et économique) contribue au résultat limité des opérations post-conflit car elle est mal appliquée, illégitime voir dangereuse pour les sociétés sortant de conflits violents. Cette approche néglige aussi bien les facteurs internes que les variations dans les intentions internationales et se base, comme l’approche technique, sur un postulat implicite (erroné) de l’asymétrie porteuse de rapports de pouvoir qui favoriseraient les intervenants internationaux. En conséquence, ces approches ignorent la manière dont les acteurs locaux peuvent résister aux normes et objectifs internationaux.Pour expliquer les variations du résultat du statebuilding international, nous proposons un modèle théorique alternatif en modélisant une approche multicausale et séquentielle d’un jeu à deux niveaux. Notre thèse est la suivante. Les variations dans l’issue du statebuilding sont fonction des interactions stratégiques, elles-mêmes déterminées par les changements dans les préférences et les relations de puissance entre les intervenants internationaux et les élites politiques locales. Le statebuilding est étudié comme un processus interactif, mettant en relation potentiellement trois acteurs clés qui dominent le paysage politique post-conflit. Dans ces conditions, le statebuilding est un succès uniquement si les réformes internationales ne menacent pas le pouvoir politique des élites locales – pouvoir qui s’appuie sur deux piliers, le nationalisme et les pratiques informelles – et que les acteurs internationaux ont mobilisé suffisamment de ressources pour amener les élites locales à adopter et appliquer les réformes désirées.Or, le cas du Kosovo montre que les préférences des acteurs ne s’alignent que très rarement. Le statebuilding international a été instrumentalisé et miné par les préférences divergentes et contradictoires entre les principaux acteurs clés. Les acteurs internationaux ont voulu créer un Etat démocratique et multinational, mais ont privilégié la stabilité car ils ont été confrontés à des élites politiques locales – kosovar-albanaises et kosovar-serbes – préoccupées par le pouvoir et la domination de leur groupe sur autrui et par le maintien du leadership à l’intérieur de leur propre groupe. Entraînant ainsi une multiplication des autorités et à une fragmentation de la légitimité : deux systèmes politiques et sociaux persistent et empêchent la cohésion et le caractère multinational de l’Etat. L’intervention de l’UE a permis de changer le jeu en contribuant à apaiser la situation sur le terrain. Mais des tensions persistent, confortant le compromis. / How can international actors build legitimate institutions following intra-state conflict? In other words, what factors determine the outcome of post-conflict statebuilding? On the one hand, the dominant approach, termed "technical", argues that significant resources (financial, human and political) allow international actors to build the required institutions. In Kosovo, international actors have established an international administration with executive powers, extending and sustaining resources throughout process. However, the success of statebuilding generally is mixed. On the other hand, the so-called "liberal peace" paradigm affirms that liberalization (political and economic) is a contributing factor to the limited success of post-conflict operations because it is either misapplied, illegitimate or even dangerous for societies emerging from violent conflicts. The liberal peace approach neglects these facts and ignores variations in international intentions. It is based, as is the technical approach, on an implicit (erroneous) assumption of an asymmetry in power relationships in favor of international actors. The result is that, these approaches fail to acknowledge the possibility of local actors resisting international standards and objectives.To explain variations in the success of statebuilding, we present an alternative theoretical model where a multi-level, sequential approach is modeled to a two-level game. Our thesis is as follows: variations in the statebuilding success are the function of strategic interactions, themselves determined by changes both in preferences and the power relationships between international actors and domestic political elites. Statebuilding is seen here as an interactive process, potentially linking three key actors who dominate any post-conflict political landscape. In unique conditions, no statebuilding process or international reforms need pose a threat to the political power of local elites - power derived from two pillars, i.e. nationalism and informal practices. Rather, international actors mobilise sufficient resources to induce local elites to adopt and implement the desired reforms.However, the preferences of the actors are very rarely aligned. In the case of Kosovo, it has been shown that international statebuilding has been instrumentalized and undermined by divergent and contradictory preferences among key actors. The international actors’ desire was to create a democratic and multinational state, but they opted for stability instead because they had to deal with local political elites - Kosovar-Albanian and Kosovar-Serb. The latter were concerned about maintaining their power over, and domination of, their group over others as well as maintaining leadership within their own group. This has led to a multiplication of authorities and a fragmentation of legitimacy: two distinct political and social systems persist, preventing the development of a cohesive and multinational state. While EU intervention has brought about a game change and helped to calm the situation on the ground, tensions persist, reaffirming the compromise that has taken place.