Suzette R. Grillot

COCOM Is Dead, Long Live COCOM: Persistence and Change in Multilateral Security Institutions

Members of the Co-ordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls (COCOM) agreed to disband this ‘economic arm of NATO’ as of March 1994. Despite the demise of COCOM, member states agreed to continue applying their existing export control policies and, in December 1995, replaced COCOM with the Wassenaar Arrangement on Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies. Such actions are in contrast to conventional views about a likely decline in co-operation among COCOM members with the end of the Soviet threat. After providing a brief history of COCOM operations, we derive six categories of multilateral co-operative behaviours and assess evidence for COCOM in each category for two five-year periods, 1985–89 and 1990–94. We find that multilateral co-operation in this security institution not only increased in most categories in the last years of the Cold War, but increased in every category after 1989. We then review the possible explanations for the increase in co-operation, and find that the emergence of a liberal community identity among COCOM members explains this outcome better than more conventional theoretical approaches.

Ideas, beliefs, and nuclear policies: The cases of South Africa and Ukraine

Dr. William J. Long is Professor and Director of Graduate Programs at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He also serves as Co-Director of the European Union Center of the University System of Georgia and Research Director for Georgia Tech’s Center for International Business Education and Research. He is the author of US Export Control Policy (Columbia University Press, 1989) and Economic Incentives and Bilateral Cooperation (University of Michigan Press, 1996). Dr. Suzette R. Grillot is Assistant Professor in Political Science and International Academic Programs at the University of Oklahoma. She is coeditor of Arms on the Market: Reducing the Risk of Proliferation in the Former Soviet Union (Routledge, 1998) and Arms and the Environment: Preventing the Perils of Disarmament (forthcoming).

Assessing the Small Arms Movement: The trials and tribulations of a transnational network

For nearly ten years, nongovernmental actors have raised concerns about the increased accessibility of small arms and light weapons around the world. By the late 1990s, hundreds of these nongovernmental actors began to coalesce together in an effort to enhance awareness, conduct research and affect policy relevant to small arms issues. How did this NGO coalition emerge? How does it operate? How effective has it been? Where is it headed? To answer these questions we seek to assess the structure and activities of the SAM based on existing understandings of transnational social movements. We focus specifically on the emergence, structure and effectiveness of the SAM—a movement that has, according to many of its participants, founders and observers, struggled over its years of operation to achieve its objectives. Moreover, we offer a comparative analysis of the successful International Campaign to Ban Landmines in an effort to demonstrate similarities and differences in the two transnational organizations. Our findings lead to a number of recommendations we believe the SAM should heed to become more effective.

Policing Via Principles: Reforming the Use of Force in the Western Balkans

After a significant period of violent conflict in the Western Balkans, countries in the region, specifically Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia-Montenegro, and the United Nations (UN) protectorate of Kosovo, have embarked on a process of democratic reform. Part of the democratization effort involves reforming the police force. One important, yet not often studied, aspect of police reform is the appropriate use of force with firearms. This study explores the process of police reform in the Western Balkan region to assess the implementation of the UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials. Ultimately, this study offers a view of law enforcement activities in an attempt to assess how well these countries are incorporating international standards on the use of force with firearms into their national police practices. In so doing, this research enriches our understanding of weapons issues within the context of security sector, and specifically police reform.

The Determinants of Nonproliferation Export Controls: A Membership-Fee Explanation

Dr. Richard T. Cupitt is Associate Director and Washington Liaison for the Center for International Trade and Security of the University of Georgia. In 2000-2001 he also served as a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and assisted in studies on reforming U.S. and multilateral export controls. His most recent book is Reluctant Champions: U.S. Presidential Policy and Strategic Export Controls. Dr. Suzette R. Grillot is Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Academic Programs at the University of Oklahoma. She is co-editor of and contributor to the books Arms on the Market: Reducing the Risk of Proliferation in the Former Soviet Union and Arms Control and the Environment: Preventing the Perils of Disarmament (forthcoming 2001). Dr. Yuzo Murayama is Professor of Economic Security at Osaka University of Foreign Studies in Japan. He specializes in technology-related issues such as export controls, technology transfer, and missile defense. His most recent book on technology policy won the 2000 Fujita Future Management Prize.

Guns in the Balkans: controlling small arms and light weapons in seven Western Balkan countries

Violent conflict in the Western Balkans has been a significant problem for more than a decade. Addressing the problem of violence in the Western Balkans requires attention to the availability, circulation and control of weapons – particularly small arms and light weapons, which continue to cause the most significant problems. After a tremendous influx of armaments during the Balkan wars of the 1990s – as well as a significant proliferation of weapons made in Yugoslavia – a large amount of weaponry continues to exist in the region, and governments must struggle to develop and implement appropriate arms control measures in an effort to meet standards of western integration. This article analyses the extent to which the countries of the Western Balkans are addresssing their weapons issues and specifically to what extent they have successfully developed and implemented measures to control the movement of arms. The author finds that there is a significant gap between policy and practice as most countries have developed legal instruments on small arms control but struggle somewhat to implement them. Finally, the author argues that motivations for small arms control behaviour vary throughout the region, requiring individual country considerations in order to address each country’s specific behaviour.

National and Global Efforts to Enhance Containerized Freight Security

In recent years it has become apparent that seaports have the potential to be a prime terrorist target, as the volume of trade that passes through ports is essential to a functioning, healthy and growing economy. Therefore, our research provides an overview of the policies, programs and procedures used to manage the security of containerized freight at U.S. seaports. This analysis is guided by the following questions: How consistent and compatible are efforts to secure the transport of international containerized freight? How systematic are these efforts? What and where are the gaps in security implementation, and how might these gaps be filled? Based on over two years of extensive fieldwork and literary analysis, our article identifies the strengths and weaknesses of existing policies on containerized freight security so as to inform the evolution of such policies. From this, we develop a list of elements relevant for a comprehensive containerized freight security system. These elements serve as an assessment tool for gauging the degree of security at domestic and international seaports. Our findings suggest that the supply chain is much safer today than it was ten years ago. Security measures in the form of advance manifest requirements, threat assessments, and verification protocols have achieved a certain amount of success with freight security and continuing operability. Areas in need of improvement depend on government ability to engage private industries in relevant security policy formulation, and on governmental success in utilizing past cooperative experiences when framing policy implementation internationally.

Building trust and a sense of community in the Western Balkans: they shall overcome (their violent pasts)?

This study examines the extent to which Albania, Croatia and Macedonia, brought together by partnership in the Adriatic Charter in 2003, have made progress toward the development of trust and belonging (a security community) that will facilitate wider Euro–Atlantic integration. We assess identity and belonging with partners and neighbours, as well as within individual states. Moreover, we examine whether notions of security community ‘trickle down’ to the public. Based on extensive fieldwork, we conclude that there has been an increase in interactions among these countries at the elite level, but the general public in each country appears to exhibit less trust and sense of community.

Guns, Violence, and Fragile Stability: Policing in the Balkans

On November 7, 2009, South African police officer Shadrack Malaka approached the car where three-year-old Atlegang Aphane was sitting with his uncle in Midrand, Johannesburg. After allegedly mistaking a metal pipe the child was holding for a gun, the officer shot and instantly killed the boy through the car window and ordered Atlegang’s uncle out of the car and onto the ground. The officer has since been arrested for murder and is awaiting an upcoming trial.1 This example of police misconduct is only 1 of 612 deaths attributed to police wrongdoing, and 1 of 29 cases of firearm-related death associated with South African police last year—leading many to criticize the use of lethal force by the South African Police Service and the “shoot to kill” policy that has been advocated by both President Jacob Zuma and national police commissioner Bheki Cele.2 This incidence of police brutality is, unfortunately, symptomatic of the greater issue of police misconduct plaguing the African continent. Instances of the improper use of lethal force occur daily in countries such as Angola, Burundi, and Rwanda and foster feelings of mistrust between African communities and the police. In post-conflict nations the formation of an efficient, transparent, and democratic security sector is essential to the creation of a sustainable peace.3 For this

Preventing deadly conflict: Learning from the UN experience in Macedonia

In 1992, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 795, establishing a preventive diplomatic mission and troop deployment in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the UN secretary-general at that time, tasked Henryk Sokalski, a Polish diplomat stationed at the United Nations in Vienna, to head this new UN effort. An Ounce of Prevention is a memoir of sorts of his experience in the newly independent Balkan state. But more than that, Sokalski extols the virtues of preventive diplomacy, highlighting its theoretical and practical significance. This mission, known first as the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) and later as the United Nations Preventive Deployment Force (UNPREDEP) was the first, and thus far the only, effort of its kind. And in Macedonia, it worked – until its premature withdrawal and the subsequent outbreak of violent conflict. For UNPREDEP’s six years of work in Macedonia, however, there is much to hail and many lessons to learn. The 240 pages presented in this book outline those successes, weaknesses and struggles that the UN preventive mission faced during its time in Macedonia. In doing so, the book enhances our general understanding of conflict prevention. The first chapter of An Ounce of Prevention provides a concise yet rather comprehensive and useful discussion of preventive action as a tool of modern diplomacy. Understanding that it is difficult to define preventive diplomacy (is it the mere avoidance of violence, or is it capacity and peace building, or is it an attempt to address root causes of violence?), Sokalski provides a nice overview of the various approaches. Along the way he emphasizes that an effective preventive action is one that is comprehensive in nature – one that