bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
The Geopolitical Context of Cultural Heritage Destruction
Authors: Paludan-Müller Carsten
Published: September 2022

Intentional destruction of cultural heritage during conflict often happens because heritage constitutes a strong link between cultural groups and geography. Geopolitics offers a perspective for examining how values ascribed to cultural heritage relate to territory on a global to local scale through time. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, geopolitics became a way of understanding the implications of control over certain territories and seas. But after World War II it vanished out of focus. When the system controlled by the two hegemons USA and USSR collapsed around 1989, re-emerging narratives of conflict relating to history, culture, and identity substituted the economic, social, and ideological conflict narratives of the Cold War and added new interest in geopolitics. With a weakening international order and the collapse of a number of nation-states as primary organizers of identity and territorial belonging combined with the identity-focused narratives of contemporary conflicts, cultural heritage (re)emerges as crucial references for mooring collective identities to geography. Hence, cultural heritage has come into focus as symbolic rallying points for manifestation of identities and conflicts between them, since conflicts often follow or feed on historic themes. This is why heritage is often purposefully destroyed during conflict and why its eventual reconstruction may or may not help post-conflict reconciliation. To illustrate these theoretical points, this chapter uses examples from the Ottoman Empire and its collapse and transformations during the twentieth century—a process that still casts long shadows throughout the regions, Eurocentrically referred to as “Europe’s ring of fire.”
German Diction
Authors: Adams David
Published: September 2022

This chapter presents the sounds of German: vowels, consonants, diphthongs, and glides, along with the relevant phonetic symbols, and explains diacritical marks (umlaut), vowel length, basic word structure, and word stress. More detail about word structure is presented later in the chapter, specifically information about prefixes and suffixes and how they affect words stress and vowel quality. It presents and discusses words of non-Germanic origin, which function quite differently from words of Germanic origin, and presents monosyllabic words and polysyllabic words that are exceptions to usual patterns. There are extensive examples of words with translations and phonetic transcriptions, as well as musical examples. It discusses usage of glottal separation in German speech and singing. Problematic sequences of consonant sounds are presented and discussed, with practical suggestions for their execution. Resources for German and sample vocal texts with phonetic transcriptions and translations are provided. There are several exercises interspersed throughout the chapter.
Descartes in Context
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

This collection of essays focuses on some pivotal theses in Cartesian philosophy, examining them in light of the philosophical context and of essential reference authors for seventeenth-century intellectuals. These include Scholastic thinkers such as Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, and Suárez; classical writers such as Galen; authors contemporary to Descartes, such as Campanella and Silhon; and philosophers who referred to Cartesian philosophy, such as La Forge and Malebranche. By considering their influence and contributions, it is possible to clarify some basic theses of Cartesian philosophy and to answer some long-debated questions in Descartes scholarship pertaining to issues such as the intuitive character of the proof of God’s existence, the presence of the theory of the free creation of eternal truths in the hypothesis of divine deception, the limits of divine power, the theory of animals as machines, and the possible Cartesian origin of some central theses in Occasionalism.
Descartes’ Innatism as Anti-Augustinianism
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

Scholars have often spoken of “Augustinianism” in relation to Descartes’ theory of knowledge. Instead, this chapter intends to prove that Cartesian innatism involves a clear rejection of the Augustinian theory of knowledge. Augustine himself, searching for a suitable theory to explain knowledge of necessary and eternal truths, had rejected innatism, in the form of Platonic reminiscence, in favor of the participation of human mind in uncreated truth. Moreover, innatism had acquired a strong anti-Augustinian characterization with Aquinas. Although Aquinas rejects innatism for man, it is to this Platonic model of knowledge that he resorts when it comes to defining angels’ knowledge. Angel’s natural knowledge consists of innate ideas, independent of vision in the Word. Consequently, innatism becomes a kind of natural knowledge, as opposed to vision in God, which can be reached only via supernatural intervention. According to Descartes, the human mind, like the angel’s mind in Aquinas, knows by connatural ideas and attains the truth, even though it is separated from the divine understanding. For an attentive reader of Aquinas, innatism evokes not only angelic knowledge but also the refusal to base the search for truth on vision in God and Augustinian illumination. The proof a contrario is given by Malebranche, who regards innatism precisely as the enemy of Augustinian illumination.
Divine Deception in Descartes’Meditations
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

The notion of divine deception evoked by Descartes in the First Meditation has frequently been interpreted in light of the Cartesian theory of the free creation of eternal truths. However, numerous elements disprove this hypothesis. First of all the very structure of the Meditations, which assumes that the path to the discovery of truth begins with established knowledge and common prejudices. Secondly, in accordance with the prejudices of common Aristotelian philosophy, the theory of mathematics present in the First Meditation views mathematical concepts as ideas abstracted from external bodies and not as eternal essences, as the free creation of eternal truths supposes. Furthermore, the theory of error developed by Suárez in the Disputationes metaphysicae helps to interpret the concept of divine deception without having to invoke God’s power to create the truth.
TheReplies to the Seventh Set of Objections, the Skeptic’s Duties, and the Circle
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

The Seventh Set of Objections with the Author’s Replies is a Cartesian text that has hardly ever been made the focus of in-depth analysis in discussions concerning the circular reasoning into which Descartes allegedly falls when trying to find a way out of the radical doubt laid out in the First Meditation. However, the distinction between the clarity and distinction of an idea and the appearance of clarity and distinction of the same idea—a distinction which Descartes invokes in order to respond to the objections raised by the author of the Sixth Objections—offers an interpretive key capable of disproving this accusation of circularity.
Descartes and False Ideas
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

In the Third Meditation Descartes introduces the notion of true and false ideas. The latter category has attracted considerable scholarly attention, especially because of the difficulty of reconciling the theory of misconceptions set out in the Third Meditation with the replies to the Objections that Arnauld addressed to Descartes on this subject. Indeed, Descartes made significant changes to the theory of the material falsity of ideas in his replies to Arnauld. These changes are particularly evident in light of what presumably served as Descartes’ source of inspiration, namely the theory developed by Suárez about the entities of reason. A hypothesis is put forward as to the reason for these changes.
Traces of the Atheist
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

Descartes was always careful to avoid conflict with ecclesiastical authorities and to emphasize his conformity with orthodoxy. Wherever possible, Descartes also sought to iron out any disagreements with the previous philosophical tradition. Sometimes he pursued this task through actual dissimulation techniques. The Discourse on the Method is a particularly striking example of this. To appreciate the prudent approach adopted by Descartes in this text, it is enough to recall the absence of the hypothesis of the deceiving God, which not only weakens the reasons for doubt, but ultimately makes the search for some divine guarantee implausible. Even a theory that essentially seems to favor Christian apologetics, such as that of machine animals, is concealed behind a very traditional analysis of animal behavior. This coexistence of audacity and dissimulation makes the Cartesian texts reminiscent of certain procedures that were widespread in the early modern age and that open up the possibility of approaching many philosophical texts by reading them ‘between the lines’, as theorized by Leo Strauss in his famous study Persecution and the Art of Writing. Reading “between the lines,” however, is tricky when dealing with early modern literature, as the arguments present in apologetic writings are often reproduced by libertine or even atheist authors. Descartes found himself confronted with the intertwining of apologetic texts and libertine-inspired texts when Mersenne, hidden behind the mask of unspecified “theologians,” raised objections which Descartes himself identified as part of the atheists’ repertoire. This episode shows that Descartes was wary of heterodox literature not only for reasons of prudence, but also—and on a deeper level—on account of his own distance from an intellectual universe linked to Renaissance naturalism. At the same time, this episode leads us to reflect on the risks of Strauss’ reading, based on which certain texts are traditionally and unhesitatingly included in atheist literature. Mersenne presented Descartes with a series of objections to the Meditations. A careful analysis of these objections can throw light on the theological context in which those criticisms were grounded. Mersenne’s objections reproduce theses already advanced in the Quaestiones celeberrimae in Genesim. In this work, in which he intended to refute Vanini, Mersenne used some proofs of the existence of God derived from the Jesuit Lessius, and already used by Vanini himself. These same proofs, together with others developed by Mersenne, were then taken up by the free thinker Pierre Petit. A reconstruction of the origin of the arguments used by Mersenne can provide important elements to evaluate the interweaving of apologetic and heterodox literature in the first half of the seventeenth century and to discuss Leo Strauss’s proposal to “read between the lines.”
Knowledge and Causality
Authors: Scribano Emanuela
Published: September 2022

In assessing the arguments in support of Occasionalism, Malebranche sides against the supporters of the autonomy of nature. Malebranche’s opponents are usually seen to fall within the Scholastic camp. Yet the deification of substantial forms, which is the main target of Malebranche’s criticism, is hardly detectable in the works of Scholastic philosophers. Malebranche repeatedly mentions “physicians” responsible for the deification of substantial forms. This chapter suggests that Malebranche’s main target is Jean Fernel’s work De abditis rerum causis. This reconstruction would explain why Malebranche chose to resort to the principle that an effect can be brought about only by an agent who knows how to produce it. Indeed, by recasting this principle as an argument for Occasionalism, Malebranche deprived Fernel of his main argument in support of the deification of nature.
The Insurgent's Dilemma
Authors: Ucko David H.
Published: September 2022

Despite attracting headlines and hype, insurgents rarely win. Even when they claim territory and threaten governmental writ, they typically face a military backlash too powerful to withstand. States struggle with addressing the political roots of such movements, and their military efforts mostly just "mow the grass"; yet, for the insurgent, the grass is nonetheless mowed--and the armed project must start over. This is the insurgent's dilemma: the difficulty of asserting oneself, of violently challenging authority, and of establishing sustainable power. In the face of this dilemma, some insurgents are learning new ways to ply their trade. With subversion, spin and disinformation claiming centre stage, insurgency is being reinvented, to exploit the vulnerabilities of our times and gain new strategic salience for tomorrow. As the most promising approaches are refined and repurposed, what we think of as counterinsurgency will also need to change. The Insurgent's Dilemma explores three particularly adaptive strategies and their implications for response. These emerging strategies target the state where it is weak and sap its power, sometimes without it noticing. There are options for response, but fresh thinking is urgently needed--about society, legitimacy and political violence itself.
Infiltrative Insurgency the Trojan Horse
Authors: Ucko David H.
Published: September 2022

Facing declining fortunes via military contestation, some insurgents are moving toward co-opting the state instead, using seemingly legal mechanisms yet also covert violence to clear the path. Termed infiltrative insurgency, this approach exploits the openness of party politics. Compared with traditional insurgency, it is a subtler method of seizing power--one that minimizes international censure and shields against armed repression. What distinguishes this approach from standard party politics and social movement mobilization is the continued use of violence, which is disguised, unattributed and therefore capable of achieving results without significant political costs. This chapter sets out the nature and functioning of infiltrative insurgency, blending its theory with case studies. Insight is drawn from historical precedents, including the Russian Revolution, the Nazi Party's overthrow of the Weimar Republic, and the blending of violence and party politics by the IRA, FARC and Golden Dawn in Greece. This approach is particularly responsive to today's strategic conditions, in which stark exercises in power work less well and less often. Given this context, the chapter discusses the dangers of infiltrative insurgency to political openness and state legitimacy--and therefore to democratic societies most of all.
In Defense of Democracy
Authors: Ucko David H.
Published: September 2022

Insurgents using the infiltrative approach present themselves as a legitimate political party, even as a social movement, yet retain the use of violence and terrorism to clear the path and implement their agenda. This veneer of respectability avoids the backlash that might result from starker expressions of power and make gains made more sustainable. The ambiguity also presents the state with severe ethical and strategic hazards. To respond to the Trojan horse of anti-democratic forces--those who seek to use the system only to destroy it--it must engage in the delicate task of unraveling a conspiracy located within the central institutions of state. This chapter sets out options for states confronting an infiltrative insurgency. It reviews the "inclusion-moderation thesis," which advocates integration of anti-democratic forces, as well as strategic of repression, which operate according to the observe logic. It also evaluates theories of proscription, including "militant democracy," which seek to ban specific parties from democratic competition. All options can have merit, depending on context. They also all present the state with an ethical and strategic minefield, where missteps cause grave and enduring harm to that which is being protected: the democratic functioning of society.
Conclusion
Authors: Ucko David H.
Published: September 2022

This concluding chapter summarizes the three adaptive insurgent approaches examined in previous chapters: localized, infiltrative and ideational. In all three, the theory of victory relies on staying below a particular threshold where a military counterattack becomes likely. In localized insurgencies, the group seeks survival by limiting its objectives to the local level. In infiltrative insurgencies, the group finds protection within the political system all the while using violence behind the scenes. In ideational insurgencies, movements are united by an idea rather than territory and, therefore, become difficult to locate and to repress. Counterinsurgency must therefore also change. Suppressive firepower may have helped states survive past struggles, but it will yield ever-diminishing returns if insurgents solve the dilemma that was thus imposed upon them. The conclusion proposes a new analytical model to map the innovations in insurgency strategy and summarizes its implications for countering the three types of insurgency reviewed in this book. Underlying the entire discussion of response, and regardless of the challenge at hand, the state must also focus on what it is fighting for, not just on the threats that it seeks to defeat.
Contextualizing Specificity
Authors: Brown Adam R.
Published: September 2022

The world’s first written constitutions were adopted by American states in the 1770s, and experience under these charters informed deliberations at the 1787 federal convention. State constitutions then and now resemble typical national constitutions more than the familiar but unusual US Constitution. That is, state constitutions protect both positive and negative rights; they address education, labor, corporations, local governance, and diverse other issues; they tend toward detail; and they undergo frequent amendment. Most important, state constitutions confer plenary rather than enumerated power, starting from an assumption that the legislature may take any action unless the constitution expressly prohibits it. Plenary power leads to different interpretive challenges than for the US Constitution. It also means that state constitutions adopted during periods of distrust of centralized authority, like the late 19th century, are much more detailed than state constitutions adopted at other times.
Evaluating State Constitutions
Authors: Brown Adam R.
Published: September 2022

Americans know little about the US Constitution, but they know even less about their state constitutions. Around half are uncertain that their state constitution even exists. Despite this ignorance, Americans readily express veneration for the US Constitution, but they appear to value it more for its link to a vaunted past than for its unfamiliar substance. State constitutions benefit from no such founding mythos, so Americans evaluate them differently. Survey experiments reveal that Americans take a Jeffersonian view of state constitutions, offering more favorable evaluations of their state constitution when informed of its frequent amendment rate or recent replacement. Though Americans hesitate to amend the US Constitution, though show no such reticence about amending state constitutions.
The Death and Life of State Repression
Authors: Davenport Christian , Appel Benjamin
Published: September 2022

The Death and Life of State Repression provides insight into a problem that dates back at least 75 years, if not before. Since World War II, individuals and institutions from around the world have been concerned with state repression/human rights violation and since about 1990 a robust empirical literature has emerged to investigate what drives this behavior up or down (i.e., exploring variation). While useful, this work has generally ignored important aspects of the “Death/Life cycle” of state repression: i.e., its onset, escalation, termination and recurrence. Such an approach is important because different explanations and policies might be relevant for different parts of the cycle. Exploring a new database of repressive spells from 1976-2006 and new theory regarding spells, The Death and Life of State Repression breaks new ground in a variety of different ways. Within the book, it is argued that repression is a sticky process that is largely slow-moving and non-adaptive. Consequently, change in this behavior is rare unless the ruling cohort is perturbed in some manner. Now, what perturbs is somewhat surprising. The Death and Life of State Repression does not find support for the predominant variables/policies advanced by the international community (i.e., naming/shaming, international law, military intervention and economic sanctions). Rather, it finds that political democratization plays a crucial role in reducing and stopping most aspects of repressive spells and democratization itself is influenced by non-violent direction action. The book has major implications for those who wish to study state repression as well as those who have an interest in trying to reduce as well as stop it from occurring across the Death/Life cycle.
Introduction
Authors: Davenport Christian , Appel Benjamin J.
Published: September 2022

The Introduction provides a general overview of The Death and Life of State Repression. It identifies a new conception of repressive behavior/human rights violation: the spell. This involves the onset of large-scale and violent state activity above a particular threshold, its escalation, its termination, and its recurrence (i.e., return after having previously stopped). The chapter outlines the variety of policies/solutions that have been advanced from research, policymakers, and activists (e.g., military intervention, economic sanctions, international law, naming and shaming, democratization, and non-violent direct action). Chapter 1 then moves to outline what is limited about the predominant approach as well as what needs to be changed with regard to theory, data, and empirical analysis in order to address the topicof interest.
What We Can Do to Better Understand, Prevent, Reduce, and End Repressive Spells
Authors: Davenport Christian , Appel Benjamin J.
Published: September 2022

Chapter 8 of The Death and Life of State Repression provides an overview of the manuscript but also points forward to what the study of state repressive action should address moving forward (Repression 2.0). Specifically, the chapter raises the point that there are some explanatory factors that hold across distinct phases of the Death/Life cycle. If one was interested in developing a general approach to reducing and ending state repression/human rights violation, then this merits attention. The chapter also raises the point that there are some explanatory factors that only hold within the context of a specific phase of the Death/Life cycle. If one was interested in developing a specific approach to reducing or ending a particular phase of the Death/Life cycle, then this merits attention. The chapter concludes with a listing of insights and challenges moving forward across theory, data, investigation, and policy implementation.
Offensive Cyber Operations
Authors: Moore Daniel
Published: September 2022

Cyber-warfare is often discussed, but rarely truly seen. When does an intrusion turn into an attack, and what does that entail? How do nations fold offensive cyber operations into their strategies? Operations against networks mostly occur to collect intelligence, in peacetime. Understanding the lifecycle and complexity of targeting adversary networks is key to doing so effectively in conflict. Rather than discussing the spectre of cyber war, Daniel Moore seeks to observe the spectrum of cyber operations. By piecing together operational case studies, military strategy and technical analysis, he shows that modern cyber operations are neither altogether unique, nor entirely novel. Offensive cyber operations are the latest incarnation of intangible warfare--conflict waged through non-physical means, such as the information space or the electromagnetic spectrum. Not all offensive operations are created equal. Some are slow-paced, clandestine infiltrations requiring discipline and patience for a big payoff; others are short-lived attacks meant to create temporary tactical disruptions. This book first seeks to understand the possibilities, before turning to look at some of the most prolific actors: the United States, Russia, China and Iran. Each has their own unique take, advantages and challenges when attacking networks for effect.
Targeting Networks1
Authors: Moore Daniel
Published: September 2022

Offensive cyber operations (OCOs) are often lumped together as a single mass of capabilities, as if they were missiles, warplanes or tanks. This chapter divides the full scale of OCOs to two principal categories: presence-based and event-based operations. Presence-based operations are protracted clandestine intelligence operations which at their tail end culminate in the activation of an offensive payload. Event-based operations are robust, deployable, near-instantaneous capabilities which are meant to be reusable. The former are often strategic sensitive capabilities that are saved for high-value targets. The latter may even be used by non-technical forces engaged in active combat as part of tactical maneuvers to degrade the capacity of the enemy to rely on their networked resources. The distinction matters as presence-based capabilities may be held in reserve by specialist units, while event-based capabilities can more safely be disseminated. Similarly, this chapter dissects the full complexity of planning and executing OCOs by observing the unique circumstances around their four key stages: preparation, engagement, presence and effect. Each requires different types of expertise and investment and demonstrates why some countries are uniquely positioned to succeed over others.
American Cyber Superiority
Authors: Moore Daniel
Published: September 2022

The United States of America is one of the oldest and most advanced employers of offensive cyber operations (OCOs). This chapter fuses analysis from official declared doctrine, publicized incidents, leaked materials and additional available documentation to portray a bureaucracy-heavy behemoth capable of immense tactical, operational, and even strategic successes. A highly capable signals intelligence (SIGINT) apparatus in the National Security Agency (NSA) eventually gave birth to US Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM), an entity now uniquely dedicated to the integration and deployment of cyber capabilities into military conflict. As such, the US is uniquely positioned to be one of the most successful users of cyber-warfare and has provided glimpses of its capacity to do so--albeit in limited form. However, it still suffers from significant limitation on its ability to capitalize on its strengths due to the US insistence on viewing cyber as a distinct warfighting domain rather than a crucial aspect of all others. The need to put cyber in a separate box, along with US predilection to layer legal and bureaucratic hurdles on its use of cyber capabilities may hold the country back from fully realizing its strengths.
Approximating the Iranian Threat
Authors: Moore Daniel
Published: September 2022

The Iranian government has exhibited significant creativity in achieving its regional security objectives. Hampered by crippling sanctions and faced with technologically superior adversaries, Iran continuously seeks to rebalance asymmetries through unconventional means of warfare. Iranian strategy includes high volumes of light, effective munitions, terrorism and a significant investment in compatible proxy forces. Considering the deep reliance of Iran's enemies on information networks and technological superiority, it is no surprise that Iran attempts to achieve its objectives through the targeting of these elements. This chapter reviews how Iran uses commercial, academic and individual proxies alongside national forces such as the IRGC to carry out Offensive Cyber Operations (OCOs) against its enemies, to some degree of success. While Iranian operations are riddled with errors and of limited technical sophistication, they are often good enough to create the desired effect. From Denial of Service attacks to Shamoon variants, this chapter explores a variety of Iranian attacks and capabilities and how they were employed as part of a broader strategy.
Conclusions
Authors: Moore Daniel
Published: September 2022

Cyber security is neither an offensive panacea nor the Pearl-Harbor-like vulnerability it is imagined to be. The conclusions review how it is uniquely difficult to create effects successfully, continuously and meaningfully through offensive cyber operations (OCOs) in a military context. They require immense investment, operational discipline, and access to immense amounts of accurate targeting intelligence. While many countries actively use--or plan to--OCOs, few do so very well. The United States is uniquely positioned to deliver both tactical and strategic effects alongside combat operations and beyond them, but is often hampered by the limitations of its own bureaucracy and shackling "cyber" within a domain of warfare. Russia is a prolific, aggressive and technically capable user of OCOs, but frequently makes operational errors which are costly in a high-accuracy medium such as OCOs. The Chinese People's Liberation Army invests significantly in creating capabilities suitable to its military aims but is as-of-yet untested in campaign-wide joint operations. Iran frequently punches above its weight in effects by creating low-complexity, noisy, but noticeable effects delivered through proxies and conventional forces.
Religion and Politics in Sub-Saharan Africa
Authors: Ellis Stephen , Randrianja Solofo , Bayart Jean-François
Published: September 2022

This chapter argues that religion and politics are both systems of ordering the power inherent in human society, in the process of which elements of authority and hierarchy tend to emerge. As such, religion and politics are closely related. In the modern Western tradition these two systems of harnessing or manipulating power have been subject to sharp organizational and intellectual distinctions which conform to the separation of politics and religion or church and state. However, it is clear that a large number of the world's people, including in Africa, continue to regard these two spheres of power as impinging upon one another or even, in some circumstances, of being virtually indistinct. The chapter provides some examples from African popular texts and discusses the implications for understanding politics on the continent.
This Present Darkness
Authors: Ellis Stephen , Randrianja Solofo , Bayart Jean-François
Published: September 2022

This chapter analyzes how Nigeria acquired its unfortunate reputation as an epicenter of global illicit trade and organized crime. It discusses how precolonial culture and indigenous religion shaped "the psychology of Nigerian organized crime," while the theory and practice of early colonialism, especially in Southern Nigeria, provided an early contribution to "a culture of corruption."
West Africa’s International Drug Trade
Authors: Ellis Stephen , Randrianja Solofo , Bayart Jean-François
Published: September 2022

Since the publication in 2007 of a report on West Africa's role in the illegal cocaine trade from Latin America to Europe, considerable media attention has focused on Guinea-Bissau in particular, as a country infiltrated by drug interests. However, West Africa has a long history of involvement in the international drug trade, that has been dominated by Nigerian interests especially. Consideration of this history may help stimulate a debate in historical sociology that will illuminate both the nature of involvement in the drug trade itself, and also larger questions about the long-term formation of the state.
The Roots of African Corruption
Authors: Ellis Stephen , Randrianja Solofo , Bayart Jean-François
Published: September 2022

This chapter argues that in broad swaths of Africa, many types of corrupt practice are not the deviant behavior of a small minority--they are a standard mode of transacting political and financial business. The article traces the historical roots of this phenomenon, explaining how hollowed out institutions of the postcolonial state have been used by secret services, money launderers, offshore bankers, corporate lawyers, sanctions busters, drug traffickers, arms smugglers, political elites and others for personal gain. Underlying this is the imposition of legal-rational institutions by colonial powers on indigenous societies, the economic decline that has beset the continent since the 1970s, and a perception on the part of African leaders that the international system is rigged against them. As long as this mood prevails, corruption in Africa will continue.
No Shortcuts
Authors: Smeets Max
Published: September 2022

Over the past decade, numerous states have declared cyberspace as a new domain of warfare, sought to develop a military cyber strategy and establish a cyber command. These developments have led to much policy talk and concern about the future of warfare as well as the digital vulnerability of society. No Shortcuts provides a level-headed view of where we are in the militarization of cyberspace. In this book, Max Smeets bridges the divide between technology and policy to assess the necessary building blocks for states to develop a military cyber capacity. Smeets argues that for many states, the barriers to entry into conflict in cyberspace are currently too high. Accompanied by a wide range of empirical examples, Smeets shows why governments abilities to develop military cyber capabilities might change over time and explains the limits of capability transfer by states and private actors.
TouchIT
Authors: Dix Alan , Gill Steve , Ramduny-Ellis Devina , Hare Jo
Published: September 2022

The physical world is increasingly filled with digital products to the extent that the boundaries of digital and physical reality become blurred. From mundane devices such as mobile phones and washing machines, to esoteric research including tangible computation and body implants, we continually bridge two worlds, literally touching buttons and dials and metaphorically touching the bits beyond. The connection between pure thought and abstract information is through solid keyboard and mouse, but likewise the material world of buildings, cars, and running shoes is suffused with computation through sensors, displays, and flashing LEDs. How do people understand this world and how can designers create usable hybrid physical–digital products? This book brings together experience from human–computer interaction and industrial design, exploring these themes under four main headings: human body and mind; objects and things; space; and computation and information. In considering each it looks at the underlying physical processes, our human understanding of them, and then the way these inform and are informed by digital design. The final part of the book draws together the theoretical and practical implications of this for design. This includes practical advice, potential tools, and philosophical underpinnings. Digital technology is fundamentally altering the world we live in but can only be truly understood in relation to the physical world we all inhabit. The most successful future products and policies will be those that take this rich digital/physical ecology seriously.
Body
Authors: Dix Alan , Gill Steve , Hare Jo , Ramduny-Ellis Devina
Published: September 2022

Our bodies are obviously physical. In the case of assistive technology, this may be to ameliorate gaps in our abilities, in other cases it may be to work alongside or extend our bodily functions. Our physical size influences the technology we are able to use and may be used as a positive part of design, including for child safety. We also have temporal limits: nerve impulses taking as long to propagate through our body as the fastest Internet signals take to pass around the world. This chapter explores how the design of digital devices and environments need to take into account the physical constraints of the human body. It also discusses how the technology we carry with us, wear on our bodies, or have embedded within us means that we are all, to some extent, cyborgs.
Body and Mind
Authors: Dix Alan , Gill Steve , Hare Jo , Ramduny-Ellis Devina
Published: September 2022

In the past, mind and body were seen as separate: the brain like a distant general sending orders to corporeal troops. However, it is virtually impossible to describe one without the other. This chapter considers how we sense ourselves as well as the outside world, so that posture and facial expression affect feelings as well as being caused by them. It shows that simple activities, such as lifting a cup, are the result of a closed-loop control cycle of action and sensing. Fitts’ Law is well known in HCI as a ‘law’ of the human motor system, but it is in fact a cybernetic law of the extended human body – indeed, from the first stone tools to the modern computer, humans have always been cyborgs. Apparently internal plans and intentions turn out to be intermixed with physical sensing and action, so that some regard our very mind as embodied in the world.
Social, Organizational, and Cultural
Authors: Dix Alan , Gill Steve , Hare Jo , Ramduny-Ellis Devina
Published: September 2022

This chapter looks at humans as social beings, and as a species how our social identity and interactions have been forged in the physical world. However, increasingly our communication, community, and identity is mediated digitally. The chapter shows that in some ways digital technology is merely an extension of previous forms of remote communication. However, digitally enabled physical artefacts are also enabling new ways of meeting and even achieving intimacy at a distance. Physical objects mediate many human activities; understanding this helps us to digitally augment existing artefacts or design new ones; and by recognizing that organizations perform computational functions we can see the ways the physical objects encode memory and processing. Culture itself is often seen through the lens of the artefacts it creates, and social identity in terms of geographic location or physical similarities. Increasingly both are becoming redefined digitally.
Reproducibility
Authors: Dix Alan , Gill Steve , Hare Jo , Ramduny-Ellis Devina
Published: September 2022

An idea externalized once is transient or maybe cabalistic, but once reproduced it becomes the driver of culture whether through print in books, or industrial processes in plastic toys. This chapter discusses how the need to reproduce in symbols and language naturally leads to discretization: each ‘A’, whilst written differently is the same letter, each LEGO brick needs to be the same to connect to the next. Reproducibility led to the emergence of industrial and consumer culture, and was essential for the growth of Amazon, and yet in an age of reproduction, scarcity is often the core of value and we seek singularity and irreproducible experiences. Oddly, we then capture the transient in recordings from cave paintings to Flickr. In an age of unremitted recording, the ‘infinite archive’, it seems we ‘capture’ everything, and yet the recording is decontextualized, potentially devaluing or dehumanizing the experience, challenging our notions of privacy, and enabling fake news.
Underground Penality
Authors: Dudai Ron
Published: September 2022

How should we approach the pursuit of informers by armed groups? While most accounts treat it as terrorism, this chapter argues that it should be conceptualised as a penal phenomenon, and that the perspective of punishment and society provides the most productive lens for the understanding and analysis of the issue. The chapter begins with a review of the ways in which some scholars of punishment and society have begun examining issues beyond the traditional focus on the state criminal justice system, demonstrating the increasing interest in non-state actors in the field. It then introduces armed groups and explores how many of them engage not only in violence against their adversaries, but also in governance and control of the population they seek to represent. The third section defines and explores informing, explains its particular prominence and significance in violent political conflicts and offers a review of armed groups’ norms and practices against informers—while noting that punishment and society scholars have thus far not engaged with this practice. The final section pulls these threads together and defines the rebel pursuit of informers as ‘underground penality’: a distinct form of punishment and social control by non-state actors. It distinguishes this case from other forms of non-state punishment such as vigilantism and lynching, being an organised form of penalty that seeks to usurp rather than complement the state’s penal system.
European Integration and Media Personalization
Authors: Gattermann Katjana
Published: September 2022

Chapter 3 focuses on the relationship between institutional personalization and media personalization at the supranational level and studies the EU news coverage by the Financial Times between 1982 and 2019. It distinguishes two types of media personalization to compare the visibility of politicians with that of institutions, namely centralized personalization, that is, an increased focus on the President, and decentralized personalization, i.e., the dispersion of personalization away from leaders. It finds a moderate increase in both centralized and decentralized personalization in the news coverage involving the European Commission. These trends appear to be driven by the different Presidents rather than by formal treaty changes. Institutional changes nevertheless led to an increased focus on the Presidents of the Eurogroup and the European Council right after the offices had been created. These and additional findings are discussed against the backdrop of the media’s responsibilities to hold European politicians publicly accountable.
Personalization of Politics Inside the European Parliament
Authors: Gattermann Katjana
Published: September 2022

Chapter 5 analyses the extent to which the legislative behaviour of MEPs has become more personalized between 1999 and 2019. First, it shows that the relative number of individual questions versus questions put forward by several MEPs is high throughout all terms, but decreases slightly during the eighth Parliament. This development is related to new rules of procedure, which capped the number of questions per MEP in the eighth term, underlining that institutional depersonalization has halted further personalization in MEPs’ legislative behaviour. Second, the findings nonetheless suggest that more MEPs tend to ask more questions over time. Third, an individual-level analysis shows that personalized behaviour is conditional upon domestic media contexts and electoral systems. After a brief discussion of the implications of the findings for party representation in EU politics, the chapter concludes that personalized legislative behaviour provides positive conditions for media coverage of European representatives.
Members of the European Parliament and Political Communication
Authors: Gattermann Katjana
Published: September 2022

Chapter 6 is interested in the extent to which the legislative and communicative behaviour of MEPs become increasingly intertwined, and whether this has any consequences for their visibility in traditional and on social media. The chapter begins by providing an overview of Twitter adoption among MEPs, which demonstrates that, by the eighth term, Twitter has become a standard tool of communication for MEPs, regardless of where and how they are elected. Next, the chapter analyses the interplay of Twitter activity and legislative behaviour of Dutch MEPs during the seventh and eighth parliamentary terms, showing that their legislative and communicative behaviour have become more intertwined in the eighth Parliament compared to before. MEPs have also become more effective in influencing the agenda of traditional and social media with their legislative activities. The chapter ends with the question whether these developments would make a difference for European citizens.
A New Profession
Authors: McCann Leo
Published: September 2022

This chapter provides an introductory overview of the purpose, content, and themes of the book. It opens by recalling the 1989–1990 ambulance service industrial relations dispute, showing how the resolution to that crisis laid the basis for the development of a clinically trained and ‘professional’ paramedic role. The remainder of the chapter provides an introductory description of the basics of how the NHS ambulance service in England operates today, taking the reader on a tour of the inside of ambulance response vehicles, and explaining the dynamics of the 999 ambulance service operating model, paramedic scope of practice, and ambulance service culture. It concludes by introducing the rest of the contents of the book to come.
Out on the Road
Authors: McCann Leo
Published: September 2022

This first empirical chapter of the book takes the reader out into the complex field where paramedics work; a place where emergencies happen, where patients are cared for, where vehicles are mobilized and ‘where the rubber hits the road’. Chapter 3 above all demonstrates the sheer broadness of the emergency ambulance working experience. It begins by describing the location where paramedic working shifts begin and end—the ambulance station. Ethnographic vignettes then illuminate the experience of receiving calls and driving on blue lights, and how ‘the ambulance journey’ has changed in an environment shaped by huge patient demand andsaturated by digital technologies. Interview excerpts describe how crews interact with one another, and what ‘a good shift’ looks like, focusing on the importance of crews developing effective working relations with each other and with ‘Control’, and on how the occupation accounts for and values appropriate interaction with the patients and the public.
Street-Level Professionals
Authors: McCann Leo
Published: September 2022

This chapter will explore paramedics’ understanding of professionalism at both the abstract, structural level of the occupation, and also at the more tangible, more personal levels of the individual self and at the operating context where paramedic work takes place—at Lipsky’s legendary ‘street-level’. Building on several themes already explored in the book, this chapter aims to identify the essence of paramedic professionalism at work. With ambulance work being so varied, it is difficult to isolate a specific ‘unique selling point’ of this profession. With this in mind, the chapter’s overall aim is to bring into sharper focus the idea of paramedics as ‘street-level professionals’, a notion drawing inspiration from both Michael Lipsky’s ‘street-level bureaucracy’ and from a much less well-known idea—Donald Metz’s characterization of ambulance workers as ‘blue-collar professionals’.
Say What you Mean
Authors: Stahlke Samantha , Mirza-Babaei Pejman
Published: September 2022

Feedback—the way a game communicates through visuals, sound, and any other means—is half of the game interaction equation. This half of game interaction is the focus of this chapter, discussing the many different ways that information can be represented. Both HUD design and the creation of responsive feedback through things like sound and animation are discussed throughout. Starting with an exploration of the different sensory channels available to designers, the chapter moves on to explain different ways to tackle common challenges, like representing numeric information intuitively at-a-glance. It also examines what determines the success of feedback design in terms of accessibility and artistic value.