Pundits and policymakers often decry the inability of international law to keep pace with technological change. Political scientists expect technological innovation to grant revisionist states with both the means and motive to evade unfavorable legal commitments. In practice, however, only some militarily disruptive technologies are institutionally disruptive. Status quo powers sometimes decline to contest revisionist breakthroughs, and revisionists sometimes concede (or conceal) their innovations instead of leveraging them to contest or evade undesirable rules. When contestation does arise, it is not always resolved in favor of the materially stronger party. If international law is what powerful states say it is, why are some international legal institutions comparatively resilient to militarily impactful technological innovations? This dissertation presents evidence that linguistic nuance, negotiated in ignorance about what the future might bring, can handcuff states to materially disadvantageous interpretations about what technologies are "compliant." To advance this argument, I depart from longstanding assumptions about what makes institutions effective. Norm specificity -- conventionally understood to minimize noncompliance -- works well for known forms of deviations, but unanticipated forms are inevitable. As the technology frontier inexorably expands, specificity dampens the credibility of restrictive analogies, making norms hard but brittle. When this happens, states that care about preserving at least the veneer of legal credibility can be deterred from adopting policies that would otherwise improve their material security. The theory is tested with a mixed-method empirical strategy. Seven case studies, based on thousands of pages of declassified records, are paired with two theoretically-motivated randomized experiments. This evidence shows while that emerging technologies may present states with incentives to evade the rules, the cost of evasive action depends on the perceived credibility of evasive justifications, a function of commitment language. An important finding is that seemingly "ambiguous" language can actually make legal institutions more resilient. In a world where change is understood as the only constant; words are widely viewed as cheap talk; and law is subordinate to politics, these results help explain why technology contestation is not ubiquitous.

Heraldry has been called the "shorthand of history" and with its own specific rules, symbols and shields in use for over eight hundred years, it is still of value today. Heraldry was first used as identification method in battle, but spread to other spheres of society. Heraldry was always part of the military and is still more visible in use by the military than other parts of society. It is these rules, terminology, and symbolism that influenced the choice of topic to understand the meaning of the emblems. Heraldry is a science that studies the rules and terminology of armorial bearings, as well as the colourful and artistic emblems of individuals, families, communities or nations. In ancient times man used symbols to distinguish and to identify with his world view. Ancient man's symbolic illustrative or carved signs evolved from totems being used as emblems of identification with clan members, to flags, badges and shields used in the army and logos used as trademarks. It grew into a science of heraldry with hereditary and regulating rules and systems. Symbols can mean different things to different people, the construction and reconstruction of meaning rely on the different cultural contexts in which it is used. It is these cultural contexts and the cohesion between them that will unveil the deeper meaning and worth of heraldic emblems. The study aims at compiling a catalogue of South African Army military units by presenting the emblems of the different units to understand the significance of the emblem for its users. To achieve this an exploratory and descriptive investigation on heraldry and South African military heraldry was done, defining esprit de corps, symbolism, identity, traditions, indigenous elements and totemism. The study focuses on the period 1994 to 2014 to give a snapshot of emblems in use during this period. It was mostly the emblems of higher headquarters that changed. The colours of the old flag of orange, white and blue changed to green, gold or yellow, red, blue, black and white. In spite of changes, the unit emblem still forged a strong bond of identity amongst members. / Mini Dissertation (MHCS)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Historical and Heritage Studies / MHCS / Unrestricted

Arms export to developing countries is heavily debated. Scholars have presented arguments about both why arms export may be beneficial and why it may be detrimental to development of the receiving country, and empirical results are inconclusive. Existing literature has focused on a broad range of outcomes rather than solely on the developmental aspects of the receiving country. Therefore a remarkable dispute and gap exist in the literature regarding the relationship between arms export and the receiving country’s level of development. In this study I argue that arms export to developing countries will increase the receiving country’s level of development. Development is defined as human rights, strong institutions and economic growth. The empirical findings, based on the comparative analysis of Chile and Argentina 2002-12, indicates support for the hypothesis. The economic growth criteria received the strongest support but also, to a lesser extent, the criteria of human rights and strong institutions. However, in order to draw any greater generalizable conclusion, a greater number of cases needs to be examined as well as the testing for alternative explanations. Such as if the empirically found causality is a case of reverse causation or how the two cases' different processes in their return to democracy had an impact on their level of development.

This thesis examines whether intergovernmental organizations (IGOs) can socialize member states by testing the effect of shared IGO memberships on dyadic arms transfers. IGO socialization is one of many proposed causal mechanisms by which IGO memberships might reduce interstate conflict. This thesis argues that the institutional socialization hypothesis (ISH), which asserts that shared IGO memberships will lead to interest convergence between member states, uses an invalid conceptualization and measurement of socialization. Instead, socialization is re-conceptualized as increased trust between member states, and re-operationalized using dyadic arms transfers as a proxy for trust. The study uses linear regression with cross-sectional panel data from the years 1960 to 1965 to test if the number of shared IGO memberships a dyad has five years prior leads to an increase in the number of arms transfers in a given dyad-year. The results are suggestive of a positive relationship between the number of shared IGO memberships and dyadic arms transfers, but are not conclusive at a 0.05 level of significance.

Simulation and game content includes the levels, models, textures, items, and other objects encountered and possessed by players during the game. In most modern video games and simulation software, the set of content shipped with the product is static and unchanging, or at best, randomized within a narrow set of parameters. However, ideally, if game content could be constantly and automatically renewed, players would remain engaged longer in the evolving stream of content. This dissertation introduces three novel technologies that together realize this ambition. (1) The first, NEAT Particles, is an evolutionary method to enable users to quickly and easily create complex particle effects through a simple interactive evolutionary computation (IEC) interface. That way, particle effects become an evolvable class of content, which is exploited in the remainder of the dissertation. In particular, (2) a new algorithm called content-generating NeuroEvolution of Augmenting Topologies (cgNEAT) is introduced that automatically generates graphical and game content while the game is played, based on the past preferences of the players. Through cgNEAT, the game platform on its own can generate novel content that is designed to satisfy its players. Finally, (3) the Galactic Arms Race (GAR) multiplayer online video game is constructed to demonstrate these techniques working on a real online gaming platform. In GAR, which was made available to the public and playable online, players pilot space ships and fight enemies to acquire unique particle system weapons that are automatically evolved by the cgNEAT algorithm. The resulting study shows that cgNEAT indeed enables players to discover a wide variety of appealing content that is not only novel, but also based on and extended from previous content that they preferred in the past. The implication is that with cgNEAT it is now possible to create applications that generate their own content to satisfy users, potentially significantly reducing the cost of content creation and considerably increasing entertainment value with a constant stream of evolving content.

At a time when the majority of conflicts are non-international, providing arms to the legitimate government or to the opposition forces may influence and even determine the outcome of a civil war. It is, therefore, not surprising that such a provision is subject to a web of rules. This dissertation focuses on those applicable to the EU Member States, which arise from international, European, and domestic law. Sanctions regimes are an integral part of this legal framework. Of primary importance are, naturally, sanctions adopted by the Security Council under Chapter VII, but also the more controversial EU restrictive measures are accounted for. The dissertation aims to clarify to whom EU Member States can legally provide arms and weapons during a civil war. This investigation is justified also in light of the positions adopted by individual EU Member States vis-a-vis the conflicts in Libya, Syria, and Yemen, three conflicts particularly relevant in political and economic terms for the EU and its Member States. By analysing these three case studies and putting the whole legal framework to the test the dissertation sheds light on how EU Member States justify their intervention. The adoption of these specific case studies allows for the assessment of their positions both when they provide arms to parties that intervene on request of the legitimate government and when they provide support to opposition forces. Despite being EU Member States subject to common European rules on arms exports and being all party to the Arms Trade Treaty, their practice is far from uniform. The result of these differences is far-reaching and has an impact not only on the civil war where the arms are provided but also on the EU.

In this essential guide to the past, present and future of bio-warfare, international security expert Malcolm Dando draws a wealth of ecperience and research to uncover the truth about the alarming failure of international community to place effective curbs on the use of this deadly weapon.

L’objectif de cette thèse consiste à déterminer si le Traité sur le commerce des armes (TCA) est effectif en ce qui concerne les dispositions relatives au transfert (art. 6) et à l’exportation (art. 7) dans leurs applications aux ventes d’armes à l’Arabie saoudite. Cette effectivité est appréciée en mesurant l’applicabilité du TCA dans les ordres juridiques des principaux fournisseurs d’armes à l’Arabie saoudite, à savoir, la Belgique, le Canada, la France et le Royaume-Uni. L’applicabilité du TCA comprend deux volets : l’examen de la justiciabilité du TCA, à savoir, comment le juge national lui donne-t-il concrètement effet; et l’examen de son opposabilité, à savoir, comment déterminer si les individus peuvent se prévaloir de ses dispositions devant un juge national. Notre thèse vise à démontrer que le TCA en ce qui concerne les obligations relatives au transfert (art. 6) et à l’exportation (art. 7) n’est effectif que partiellement. Cette ineffectivité s’explique par le fait qu’il ne soit pas applicable dans les ordres juridiques des principaux fournisseurs d’armes à l’Arabie saoudite, notamment, ceux de Belgique et de France. Dans l’ensemble, la situation ne tend pas à s’améliorer vu l’inefficacité même du TCA et les multiples obstacles placés par les autorités administratives. Cela n’empêche cependant pas le déclenchement d’un processus de renforcement de cette effectivité portant principalement sur la suppression des obstacles artificiels placés sur la voie de son applicabilité. Ainsi, l’applicabilité directe du TCA, dans les ordres juridiques belge et français, ne doit pas être interprétée de façon à ce qu’elle l’empêche de déployer pleinement ses effets en droit interne. Le renforcement peut également se faire, dans les ordres juridiques britannique et canadien, par une incorporation intégrale des dispositions de ce traité en droit interne et par une attitude des juges qui soit favorable à l’utilisation de celui. / The objective of this thesis is to determine whether the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) is effective with respect to the transfer (Art. 6) and export (Art. 7) provisions as they apply to arms sales to Saudi Arabia. This effectiveness is assessed by measuring the applicability of the ATT in the legal orders of the main arms suppliers to Saudi Arabia, namely Belgium, Canada, France and the United Kingdom. The applicability of the ATT is twofold: the examination of its justiciability, namely, how does the national judge give practical effect to it; and the examination of its enforceability, namely, how to determine whether individuals can rely on its provisions before a national judge. Our thesis aims to demonstrate that the ATT with regard to the obligations on transfer (Art. 6) and export (Art. 7) is only partially effective. This ineffectiveness is explained by the fact that it is not applicable in the legal orders of the main arms suppliers to Saudi Arabia, namely those of Belgium and France. Overall, the situation does not tend to improve given the very ineffectiveness of the ATT and the multiple obstacles placed by the administrative authorities. This does not, however, prevent the initiation of a process of reinforcing its effectiveness, mainly by removing the artificial obstacles placed in the way of its applicability. Thus, the direct applicability of the ATT in the Belgian and French legal orders must not be interpreted in such a way as to prevent it from having full effect in domestic law. In the British and Canadian legal orders, reinforcement can also be achieved by a full incorporation of the provisions of this treaty into domestic law and by an attitude of the judges that is favorable to the use of the treaty.

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