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This paper takes as a point of departure a notion of reorganization as a way of managing risk. It examines the reorganization process in the Norwegian central administration for homeland security. As a central theme the paper explores why the proposal to radically reorganize the administration by replacing a network model with a hierarchical model resulted in a much more modest change to a hybrid agency model. The descriptive part of the paper traces the reorganization process, starting with the initiative taken by the Ministry of Justice in 1999 to establish a public commission and ending with the final parliamentary resolution in 2002. Despite the 9/11 terrorist attack that occurred in the middle of the process and its implications for security, only minor changes were made to existing arrangements. A striking feature of the process was negative coordination, indicating that the wish to coordinate was greater than the willingness to be coordinated. To understand why this was so, we look at bureaucratic politics and bargaining between different interests, at institutional identities and strong cultures and traditions within different governmental bodies. We focus especially on framing processes within and between organizational fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the foundations and rationale for Australian reliance on US assurances of extended nuclear deterrence. The Australian model of extended nuclear deterrence is marked by its lack of public presence, a lack of certainty about its standing and character in US eyes, its lack of a direct nuclear threat, and its resurgence at a time when nuclear abolition possibilities are being embraced by the leader of the deterrence provider. Australian policy amounts to a claim that the nuclear guarantee is necessary 'just in case'- though without any plausible specifics. The fundamental questions remain - for Australia as for other recipients of extended nuclear deterrence assurances - what threats, what probabilities, what alternatives? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decade, the EU has developed into a regional institution whose military ambitions extend well beyond Europe. This development counteracts the assumptions of realist and intergovernmental theories, raising the question of what concepts are appropriate for understanding security and defence policy in the EU. It has been argued that governance approaches are particularly well-suited to describe the functioning of the EU. Yet analyses of the EU's common security and defence policy (CSDP) have to date not been granted the benefits of this insight. This article seeks to remedy this by venturing down the yet unfulfilled EU trail of a burgeoning literature on security governance. Exploring five features of security governance, the article identifies the most promising questions and approaches of the so-called governance turn in IR theory, ending up with a putative EU security governance research agenda that will lead to a deeper understanding of the kind of security actor that the EU has evolved into. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Is Europe about to rise as a full political actor on the world stage? Conventional wisdom had it that European integration in foreign policy, security and defence was unlikely to amount to much very quickly. More recently, however, a diverse group of scholars has argued that pan-European political actorhood had gained considerable substance. Surveying the recent literature, pertinent related writings and relevant primary materials on the matter, this article identifies and systematizes the many different factors affecting European high-politics actorhood in the early 21st century. A fully grown international actor Europe, it finds, remains a longer-term project rather than an imminent prospect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the U.S. President George W. Bush's foreign policy. The U.S. foreign policy today is neither the engaged multilateralism of the second half of the twentieth century nor the isolationism of previous decades. It might be called aggressive unilateralism. The administration is determinedly pursuing what it perceives as the U.S. advantage through aggressive treatment of presumed enemies and presumed allies alike, rejecting the tradition of bargaining and mutual respect among allies and of a stable balance of deterrence with enemies. The new National Security Strategy asserts the right of the United States to attack anywhere at any time that its leaders perceive, or claim to perceive, a threat.

The article offers the author's perspective regarding the concerns involving the civilian power in Europe. The author provides an overview the shift in the power system from traditional military and political power to civilian power, and especially to economic power. He also tackles various topics including the balance of power in international relations, the need for military power in Europe, and the foreign relations between the United States and European countries. He also explores the problems of national security posed by the Soviet Union to Europe and the foreign policy of European states.

The changing international environment for U.S. strategic policy formation is causing progressive uncertainty about the adequacy of threat assessment concepts and procedures. The concept of "strategic value," which plays a central role in decisions to use and control military force, is defined and elaborated in terms of three key elements-territory, worth and access. This classification allows for a more coherent analysis of the nature of "strategic threat" in the changing international environment. It also provides a more realistic approach for making choices among available policy options and available means of implementing security policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on some considerations relevant to national policy. There are social situations which do not allow the possibility of "rational" behavior so long as the conditions for mutual trust do not exist. A characteristic symptom of such non-rational situations is that any attempt on the part of any individual or nation to increase its own welfare or security (without regard to the security or welfare of others) is self-defeating. Thus, for example, if the Soviet Union attempts to increase its security by taking over Berlin, it will decrease its real security by increasing the likelihood of nuclear war. In such situations the only way that an individual or nation can avoid being trapped in a mutually reinforcing, self-defeating cycle is to attempt to change the situation so that a basis of mutual trust can develop. To induce a mutual welfare orientation in another, one has to demonstrate toward the other that its own behavior is based upon such a premise and that one cannot improve its welfare by violation of it.