Modi's Strategic Concerns and China's Belt & Road Imitative (BRI): A Realist Perspective

This article provides a conceptual and theoretical framework to analyze motivations of China in BRI, which is conceived as a project of the 21st century for the revival of erstwhile Asian values, this paper is not a critique on BRI, but it securitizes India's concern whose policymakers consider that it can harm the strategic interest of India. This paper investigates why Indian policymakers have demonstrated reluctance to join BRI. Moreover, the study also explores the major reasons behind India's belligerent policy against BRI because they conceive it as a danger for their national sovereignty. Besides, this research has applied realist theory as an investigative tool to prove Indian concerns. As a whole, the paper analyses that how far the rivalry between both states can harm regional peace if they fail to find any suitable solution considering the BRI project.

Pouring Salt into the Wound: The Crisis of International Election Observation and COVID-19 in Africa

International election observation in Africa is in crisis. This crisis manifests in various ways, including lowering of standards from democracy promotion to ‘peaceocracy’; strategic interest bias; progress bias; low-tech methodologies; dominance over citizen observer groups; and contradiction of verdicts of election observation missions with court judgments. The crisis characterizes the wound of international election observation. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic found a pre-existing unhealthy condition of international election observation, thereby pouring salt into the wound. It accentuated the existential crisis of international election observation. Observation has to be recalibrated during and after the pandemic. Existing challenges facing international election observation have to be redressed. International election observation has to adapt to the new condition marked by COVID-19. This adaptation should include development and implementation of guidelines on election observation during COVID-19. In the long run, sustainability of election observation rests in the institutional strengthening of citizen-based observer groups.

Retained Water in the Commune of Gogounou in Benin: Inventory, Characterization and Management Mode

The present work was carried out with the aim of knowing the characteristics and the management made of the agropastoral dams of the commune of Gogounou which are of a great utility for the local populations. To do this, twenty (20) dams were chosen according to the strategic interest that they present for the population, that is to say a polling rate of 87% on all the dams of the municipality. An inventory of the dams was made according to quantitative and qualitative indicators. The results showed the existence of (04) groups of dams according to the technical characteristics and some qualitative variables. The parameters that lead to the degradation of these dams are often related to the age and type of dam and the place of installation. Groups (2 and 4) are agropastoral dams (100%) and more than half of the dams are on flood sites. Results have also shown that there are management committees around all the dams in the commune of Gogounou, but which are mostly non-functional at almost 75%. Also, it has been found that the breeders are mostly transhumant and sedentary who use (100%) dams for watering animals. This cohabitation between farmers and pastoralists does not occur without major conflicts, in particular, that of land whose settlement is generally peaceful. In short, the management of the dams in the commune of Gogounou is a real challenge to be met for a better development, both economically and socially to guarantee the prosperity of the actors and prepare them to adapt to the vagaries of the climate future.

Keeping Friends Close, But Enemies Closer: Foreign Aid Responses to Natural Disasters

If foreign aid is provided primarily for strategic reasons, as much of the field finds, how can donor generosity following natural disasters be explained? This article addresses this puzzle by building on the literature in three ways. First, it differentiates between three major types of aid: humanitarian, civil society and development. Second, it demonstrates that natural disasters act as an exogenous shock to the strategic calculus that donor countries undertake when making foreign aid allocation decisions. Specifically, the authors argue that donor countries use natural disasters as opportunities to exert influence on strategic opponents through the allocation of humanitarian and civil society aid. However, donors still reserve development aid for strategic allies irrespective of the incidence of natural disasters. Third, the findings are substantiated using a new measure of strategic interest that accounts for the indirect ties states share and the multiple dimensions upon which they interact.

How Leader-Specific Reputations Form and Change across Repeated Interactions

This chapter examines how perceptions of a leader's resolve form and change across multiple hypothetical interactions. By using a survey experiment, it reveals that statements create expectations of future action, which then interact with a leader's subsequent behavior to influence participants' perceptions of that leader's resolve. The results further show that early perceptions of a leader's resolve are significantly correlated with participants' later assessments of that leader's resolve, indicating that early interactions and the perceptions that stem from those interactions are highly influential to leader-specific reputational assessments within the experiment. In other words, first impressions matter, as they influence later assessments. Moreover, only certain contextual factors—namely, a preexisting state reputation and state strategic interest in the issue under dispute—create expectations of leader resolve within the experiment. These expectations then interact with a leader's statements and behavior to influence participants' assessments of resolve.

Conclusion

This concluding chapter summarizes the findings of the experiments and case studies in the previous chapters, discussing their implications for the study of reputation for resolve and the debate between reputation supporters and skeptics. The evidence from across the experiments and case studies shows that leaders can indeed acquire individual reputations for resolve. While these reputations are rooted in a leader's statements and behavior, they can be influenced by certain contextual factors—primarily a preexisting state reputation for resolve and the state's strategic interest in an issue under dispute. Yet, these two contextual factors influence leader reputations by interacting with a leader's own statements and behavior. Moreover, these leader-specific reputational assessments can affect the negotiating and crisis bargaining strategies individual leaders pursue. Leaders, therefore, are not wrong to care about their personal reputations for resolve or to believe that their reputations for resolve influence international politics. The chapter then explains how policymakers can best communicate their resolve to make themselves and their states less vulnerable to international threats.

A Reputation for Irresolute Action

This chapter studies how Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev viewed the resolve of President John F. Kennedy, looking at Khrushchev's decision making surrounding the Berlin Crisis of 1961 and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. According to evidence made available from declassified and translated Soviet archives, as well as information drawn from additional sources, Kennedy quickly formed a reputation for irresolute action largely because of his repeated failure to back up his strong rhetoric with firm action and his wavering support of the Bay of Pigs invasion early during his tenure. While Kennedy rather quickly established a poor reputation for resolve, it was difficult for him to alter this reputation. Throughout the Berlin Crisis of 1961 and during the early stages of the Cuban Missile Crisis, Khrushchev continued to doubt Kennedy's firmness and determination, despite the president's repeated attempts to signal his resolve. Declassified Soviet documents further indicate that Kennedy was able to change this negative perception of his resolve during the Cuban Missile Crisis only by presenting a consistently resolute position and altering his signals of strategic interest. Thus, it was Kennedy's communication of high strategic interest in Cuba combined with his resolute behavior during the missile crisis that enabled him to alter his poor reputation.