Whither State? The Institutional Politics of American Nation-building Policy
This article discusses the difficulties associated with military-led stability and nationbuilding operations and argues that the United States’ current policy negatively affects defence capabilities, unduly influences how stability operations are prioritized and conducted, limits State Department capacities, and allows the military to be seen as the ‘face’ of American foreign policy. Several options exist for the United States to adequately address this issue to include the working within the established system, a reassignment of leadership responsibilities, or restraining the American tendency to intervene. The United States’ military has proven that it is capable of conducting nation-building operations, but at the cost of global misperception, painful inefficiency, significant risks to United States’ overall defence capabilities, and the issues of civilian control that follow from reliance on warriors in the role of diplomats.
Global Violence Against Women as a National Security "Emergency"
This article analyzes the way that global violence against women is presented as a national security emergency in the United States. In the post-9/11 era, women's issues, including violence against women, have become central in American foreign aid and policy objectives. In particular, American national security, including the threat of terrorism, is now casually connected to gender inequalities abroad. This article investigates the implications of state-based strategies to end violence against women as a means to eradicate national security threats. Using the concept of a "development and in/security nexus," the article explores what has been branded "The Hillary Doctrine" to denote Hillary Clinton's promotion of women's rights during her tenure as Secretary of State alongside the proposed US International Violence Against Women Act in order to assess the impact of "doing" security and "doing" development within anti-violence strategies. The current US foreign policy focus on global violence against women functions to "genderwash" American foreign interests and facilitates the securitization and militarization of programs designed to end violence at the expense of women's well-being.
Cambodian refugee health care beliefs and practices.
Since 1975, when refugees from Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia first began coming to the United States, many articles have been written about Southeast Asian or Indochinese refugees and health care. A careful review of the literature shows that most of these articles have one thing in common: they are written primarily about Vietnamese and do not address the unique health care beliefs and practices of Lao or Cambodian refugees.1 Although some beliefs and practices are common to most Southeast Asians, many are not. Understanding at least that differences exist, and hopefully what some specific differences are, will allow nurses and others to give better care to the various people commonly grouped together as Southeast Asians. This article will introduce readers to some Cambodian beliefs and practices related to health care. Of the principle refugee groups admitted to the U.S. since 1975, the Cambodians are presenting the greatest challenges to health care providers. Cambodians are usually poorly understood by Americans, their health status statistics are hidden among the broad category of "Asian-Pacific Islanders" or "Indochinese Refugees," and cultural and institutional barriers combine to make access to care an overwhelming problem. The end results, of course, are more problems and more expense for the Cambodians, increased stress placed on an already terribly overstressed people, and ultimately greater demands and expense placed on the health care system. One of the most common misunderstandings about Cambodians is that they (and Lao) are basically the same as the Vietnamese. "They speak the same dialect don't they?" There are some similarities, but there are also very significant differences.