This paper proposes to undertake a comprehensive investigation into the role, attitudes, and interrelationships of West Germany, France, Great Britain, and the United States within the framework of the North American Treaty Organization. This investigation will be limited to the involvement of these four members states in the proposed establishment, and eventual failure of a NATO controlled multilateral nuclear force (MLF). This limitation was imposed because it was discerned that these four major NATO members set the tempo and boundaries for the debate stemming from this proposal. The smaller member states seemed reluctant to take a definite stance on the issue until one of these four set forth its own convictions. Once this was done the smaller countries allied themselves with a major member's views. Thus, a study of the relationships and positions of France, Germany, Great Britain and the United States will lend itself to a full and precise investigation of the matter. The time span involved in the major portion of this research will be limited to the years 1960 through 1965, as these were the years in which the MLF proposal had its origin, was debated and died from a lack of action.

<p>This paper aims to tell out a “what next” question of the future scenarios that the European Union (EU), as a security community, is most likely to face in its development as a world power up to the year 2020. The EU is a rapidly evolving concept consolidating with comprehensive internal and external dimension and implication. Key concepts such as power, security, global governance and international order have been used as the underlying themes that will determine the course of the future. In this context Neo-realism, Constructivism and Security Community’s model have been used as the theoretical framework to examine how EU’s role in the international system can be analyzed in the conceptual framework of security. This is followed by a discussion on the concurrent ESDP instruments initiated by the new Constitution as a key momentum of security community buildup internally. To broaden understanding and to get a variety of perspectives, research reports and policy papers of some transatlantic think tanks were analyzed. While multi- perspectives of some prominent think tanks were reviewed, analyzed and discussed, the opinions of policy makers at the United Nations Head Quarters, New York, were also explored to reflect on how EU’s role in international affairs is being perceived in the corridors of power, both concurrently and futuristically. These views were consequently augmented by attending General Assembly and Security Council sessions during September 2004 to January 2005 to observe what sorts of power and influence EU exerts in the contemporary international system and what potential it has for the future. Based on these findings, the paper identified three scenarios that EU is most likely to face in its efforts to be an international power. The paper concluded with the understanding that EU has vision and potential to be a power in the international system futuristically, which can be further enhanced if EU enhances its military capabilities and improves its power perception in the eyes of various stakeholders. However since the international system is volatile, its future role cannot be predicted with accuracy, only alternative options can be identified. EU’s roles are dependent upon the degree of success of the integration process internally and the structural interaction with other major actors in the international system. Whereas EU may enhance its role up to the year 2020, it may not enter into a power conflict with other major powers. However it will play its role comparable with the magnitude of its size, power and influence to manage the international system, futuristically in an improvised way.</p>

This paper aims to tell out a “what next” question of the future scenarios that the European Union (EU), as a security community, is most likely to face in its development as a world power up to the year 2020. The EU is a rapidly evolving concept consolidating with comprehensive internal and external dimension and implication. Key concepts such as power, security, global governance and international order have been used as the underlying themes that will determine the course of the future. In this context Neo-realism, Constructivism and Security Community’s model have been used as the theoretical framework to examine how EU’s role in the international system can be analyzed in the conceptual framework of security. This is followed by a discussion on the concurrent ESDP instruments initiated by the new Constitution as a key momentum of security community buildup internally. To broaden understanding and to get a variety of perspectives, research reports and policy papers of some transatlantic think tanks were analyzed. While multi- perspectives of some prominent think tanks were reviewed, analyzed and discussed, the opinions of policy makers at the United Nations Head Quarters, New York, were also explored to reflect on how EU’s role in international affairs is being perceived in the corridors of power, both concurrently and futuristically. These views were consequently augmented by attending General Assembly and Security Council sessions during September 2004 to January 2005 to observe what sorts of power and influence EU exerts in the contemporary international system and what potential it has for the future. Based on these findings, the paper identified three scenarios that EU is most likely to face in its efforts to be an international power. The paper concluded with the understanding that EU has vision and potential to be a power in the international system futuristically, which can be further enhanced if EU enhances its military capabilities and improves its power perception in the eyes of various stakeholders. However since the international system is volatile, its future role cannot be predicted with accuracy, only alternative options can be identified. EU’s roles are dependent upon the degree of success of the integration process internally and the structural interaction with other major actors in the international system. Whereas EU may enhance its role up to the year 2020, it may not enter into a power conflict with other major powers. However it will play its role comparable with the magnitude of its size, power and influence to manage the international system, futuristically in an improvised way.

The large amount of produced oil and gas come from conventional resources all over the world and these resources are being depleted rapidly. This fact and the increasing oil and gas prices force the producing countries to find and search for new methods to recover more oil and gas. In order to meet the demand, the oil and gas industry has been turning towards to unconventional oil and gas reservoirs which become more popular every passing day. In recent years, they are seriously considered as supplementary to the conventional resources although these reservoirs cannot be produced at an economic rate or cannot produce economic volumes of oil and gas without assistance from massive stimulation treatments, special recovery processes or advanced technologies. The vast increase in demand for petroleum and gas has encouraged the new technological development and implementation. A wide range of technologies have been developed and deployed since 1980. With the wellbore technology, it is possible to make use of highly deviated wellbores, extended reach drilling, horizontal wells, multilateral wells and so on. All of the new technologies and a large number of new innovations have allowed development of increasingly complex economically marginal fields where shale gas and coal bed methane are found. In this study, primary target is to compare different production methods in order to obtain better well performance and improved production from different types of reservoirs. It is also be given some technical information regarding the challenges such as hydraulic fracturing and multilateral well configuration of the unconventional gas reservoir modeling and simulation. With the help of advances in algorithms, computer power, and integrated software, it is possible to apply and analyze the effect of the different well trajectories such as vertical, horizontal, and multilateral well on the future production performance of coal bed methane, shale gas, and tight gas reservoirs. A commercial simulator will be used to run the simulations and achieve the best-case scenarios. The study will lead the determination of optimum production methods for three different reservoirs that are explained above under the various circumstances and the understanding the production characteristic and profile of unconventional gas systems.

Condensate blockage negatively impacts large natural gas condensate reservoirs all over the world; examples include Arun Field in Indonesia, Karachaganak Field in Kazakhstan, Cupiagua Field in Colombia,Shtokmanovskoye Field in Russian Barents Sea, and North Field in Qatar. The main focus of this thesis is to evaluate condensate blockage problems in the North Field, Qatar, and then propose solutions to increase well productivity in these gas condensate wells. The first step of the study involved gathering North Field reservoir data from previously published papers. A commercial simulator was then used to carry out numerical reservoir simulation of fluid flow in the North Field. Once an accurate model was obtained, the following three solutions to increasing productivity in the North Field are presented; namely wettability alteration, horizontal wells, and reduced Non Darcy flow. Results of this study show that wettability alteration can increase well productivity in the North Field by adding significant value to a single well. Horizontal wells can successfully increase well productivity in the North Field because they have a smaller pressure drawdown (compared to vertical wells). Horizontal wells delay condensate formation, and increase the well productivity index by reducing condensate blockage in the near wellbore region. Non Darcy flow effects were found to be negligible in multilateral wells due to a decrease in fluid velocity. Therefore, drilling multilateral wells decreases gas velocity around the wellbore, decreases Non Darcy flow effects to a negligible level, and increases well productivity in the North Field.

The 8-inch wafer Fab. landing China or not evoked highly concerned in the worldwide, and even evoked the misdoubt if Taiwan clash with Wassenar Agreements . On New Year¡¦s Day, President Chen Shei-Ben reiterated the Policy of Economy and Trade across the Taiwan Straits, ¡§Proactive liberalization with effective management¡¨, which also evoked controversy in the worldwide. While UMC (United Microelectronic Corporation) ¡¥s He-Jan investment was been debating hotly, we considered if it also had great effect of production race between Taiwan and China, besides business benefits. Moreover, we considered if it resulted in the technology illegal landing, and conflicted with Wassenar Agreements, by avoiding to threaten the national security. If Taiwan was a launching pad of America high tech to China, it would cause other high techs importing forbiddance from America. Because of that, Taiwan gets more a loss than gains. Suppose ¡§Economic globalization¡¨ is the lifeblood of Taiwan; The semiconductor industry is not only holding on the advantages of past , but also trying to approach to the market. Furthermore, it should create production competitiveness. The government should follow the market rules, develop the reciprocal relationship with business and reach the goal of looking after both sides, economic developing and national security. In this study, it expects to discuss the influence of The Sensitive Scientific Technology Draft Bill legislation of funding, technology, equipment, brain-import abridged in semiconductor production in Taiwan to the competitive advantage of production; (1) Understanding the status and meaning of The Sensitive Scientific Technology Draft Bill in Taiwan. (2) Does tech-import controlling of The Sensitive Scientific Technology Draft Bill in Taiwan has connecting to international relative laws? (3) Analyzing the impact of the protect mechanism of The Sensitive Scientific Technology Draft Bill to competitive advantage of semiconductor industry. The first study step is to comparing analyze the aims, effects, targets of international relative laws by documents study, especially according to the international relative laws of high-tech import controlling, for example, the administration rules and complement actions of COCOM and Wassenar Agreements, for understanding the reasonable and objective of The Scientific Technology Draft Bill (The Sensitive Scientific Technology Draft Bill). Moreover, base on profound interview with business to processing the situational analysis of business, production, people, society, government and the national security. This study conclusion and the suggestions from business experience can offer the reference resources for lawmaking and revising.

The &ldquo / German Question&rdquo / was on the agenda of the international community from the last quarter of the nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth century. Following the end of the World War II, due to the existence of a Soviet threat, the incorporation of West Germany into the liberal-democratic institutions of the western world was the principal issue to be dealt with. Following the reunification of Germany and the end of the bipolar international structure, the &ldquo / German Question&rdquo / was revisited. The German insistence on the early recognition of Croatia and Slovenia and German participation in the Kosovo War brought questions whether Germany has become more assertive and on the way to return to the power politics. This dissertation will analyze German foreign and security policy in the post-Cold War era in order to understand whether Germany has shifted from its civilian and multilateral orientation or has made small adjustments in its policies to adapt to the new international structure. In approaching the issue, the study attempts to link the theoretical and practical aspects under the guidance of a conceptual framework provided by realist, neorealist and constructivist approaches. Through contextualizing the coexistence of realist, neorealist and constructivist factors in German foreign and security policy, the dissertation argues that although Germany has made some small policy adjustments to adapt to the new international structure, German foreign and security policy has not shifted from its civilian and multilateral orientation.

<p>Since their creation, the multilateral development banks have accumulated performance records that include both substantial successes and stunning failures. Nowhere have their performance records been more mixed and controversial than with respect to environmental management issues. The multilateral development banks have financed projects that are widely considered to be environmental disasters, but have also financed projects that successfully included best practice environmental mitigation measures. They have wasted hundreds of millions of dollars financing unsuccessful environmental protection programs, while at the same time they have supported programs that contributed to the rapid development of environmental management capacity in less-developed countries. The purpose of this dissertation is to explore when and why monitoring and evaluation can prompt the multilateral development banks to move away from poor performing projects and towards high performing projects.</p><p>This type of performance-based allocation has been repeatedly highlighted as a key element in the successful delivery of development assistance. To test when the multilateral development banks practice performance-based allocation, I assembled a team that coded environmental performance information from 960 project evaluations, 174 program evaluations, and 74 civil society complaints. I use the resulting data to model when four multilateral development banks - the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, and African Development Bank - make performance-based allocation decisions about environmentally-risky and environment-improving operations. In addition, I visited the headquarters of each of these organizations and conducted interviews with 54 staff members about the processes that are in place to use monitoring and evaluation information as part of decision-making.</p><p>I find that the establishment of monitoring and evaluation systems at the MDBs has not created incentives for staff to practice performance-based allocation. Instead, performance information influences allocation decisions when it helps MDB staff approve future projects more quickly. It does so by helping staff identify development projects that are likely to face significant delays due to the inability of the borrowing country to manage negative environmental impacts and to identify the borrowing countries that are likely to successfully implement environment-improving operations.</p> / Dissertation

In recent years, the use of the mode of regional trade liberalisation has proliferated, while the multilateral talks through the WTO have proceeded slowly, resulting in a debate on the role of bilateral and multilateral trade liberalisation. This thesis aims to provide new insights to this debate by studying the welfare effects of different types of trade agreements and the equilibrium outcome(s) of trade negotiation. We apply the three-country and three-good “competing-exporters model" developed by Bagwell and Staiger (1999) as our basic trade framework. By comparing the equilibrium welfare of each country under different structures of trading blocs, we clarify the welfare impacts of each trade agreement. Then we model the process of trade negotiation as a trade negotiation game, in which each country endogenously decides whether to negotiate through multilateral or bilateral trade liberalisation. By solving the equilibrium of the game, the stable structure of trading blocs and the path(s) to reach it can be found. We start with a framework in which all countries are welfare maximising. We find that at the early stage of trade negotiation, a free trade agreement (FTA) is Pareto welfare improving, despite the fact that member countries benefit more than any non-member. Although being the hub is the best position, a spoke is in a worse position than being outside a single FTA. Thus, a “hub-and-spoke" structure cannot be achieved and the unique equilibrium outcome of trade negotiation is given by multilateral free trade (MFT) through a multilateral trade agreement (MTA). The welfare-maximising analysis is followed by the examination of cases in which each government is politically motivated. The political structure we use is similar to Ornelas (2005), which follows the basic framework developed by Grossman and Helpman (1995), emphasising the interaction between lobby groups representing the special interest of one industry and the government in their home country. We first consider a circumstance where the political pressures are only from the import- competing sector. It is then generalised to a case in which all sectors are allowed to lobby the local government. Furthermore, the analysis is extended into an asymmetric world that includes two big countries and one small country. Our results show that political economy forces usually reduce the likelihood of forming trade agreements and that when the political concerns are sufficiently large, all trade agreements can be prevented by political pressures. Also, our findings suggest that the option of bilateral FTAs does not cause an initially infeasible MFT to become feasible, while a previously feasible MFT is likely to be blocked by the option of FTAs. Thus, our thesis provides some evidence to support the argument that the formation of FTAs can be a “stumbling block" for global trade liberalisation. / Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Adelaide, School of Economics, 2009

In recent years, the use of the mode of regional trade liberalisation has proliferated, while the multilateral talks through the WTO have proceeded slowly, resulting in a debate on the role of bilateral and multilateral trade liberalisation. This thesis aims to provide new insights to this debate by studying the welfare effects of different types of trade agreements and the equilibrium outcome(s) of trade negotiation. We apply the three-country and three-good “competing-exporters model" developed by Bagwell and Staiger (1999) as our basic trade framework. By comparing the equilibrium welfare of each country under different structures of trading blocs, we clarify the welfare impacts of each trade agreement. Then we model the process of trade negotiation as a trade negotiation game, in which each country endogenously decides whether to negotiate through multilateral or bilateral trade liberalisation. By solving the equilibrium of the game, the stable structure of trading blocs and the path(s) to reach it can be found. We start with a framework in which all countries are welfare maximising. We find that at the early stage of trade negotiation, a free trade agreement (FTA) is Pareto welfare improving, despite the fact that member countries benefit more than any non-member. Although being the hub is the best position, a spoke is in a worse position than being outside a single FTA. Thus, a “hub-and-spoke" structure cannot be achieved and the unique equilibrium outcome of trade negotiation is given by multilateral free trade (MFT) through a multilateral trade agreement (MTA). The welfare-maximising analysis is followed by the examination of cases in which each government is politically motivated. The political structure we use is similar to Ornelas (2005), which follows the basic framework developed by Grossman and Helpman (1995), emphasising the interaction between lobby groups representing the special interest of one industry and the government in their home country. We first consider a circumstance where the political pressures are only from the import- competing sector. It is then generalised to a case in which all sectors are allowed to lobby the local government. Furthermore, the analysis is extended into an asymmetric world that includes two big countries and one small country. Our results show that political economy forces usually reduce the likelihood of forming trade agreements and that when the political concerns are sufficiently large, all trade agreements can be prevented by political pressures. Also, our findings suggest that the option of bilateral FTAs does not cause an initially infeasible MFT to become feasible, while a previously feasible MFT is likely to be blocked by the option of FTAs. Thus, our thesis provides some evidence to support the argument that the formation of FTAs can be a “stumbling block" for global trade liberalisation. / Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Adelaide, School of Economics, 2009