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The Common Foreign and Security Policy
The Common Foreign and Security Policy
- Hylke DijkstraHylke DijkstraDepartment of Political Science, Maastricht University
- and Sophie VanhoonackerSophie VanhoonackerDepartment of Political Science, Maastricht University
The member states of the European Union (EU) coordinate, define, and implement foreign policy in the context of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). This policy area, often referred to as EU foreign policy, has a broad scope covering all areas of foreign policy and all questions relating to security and defense. The CFSP is supported by a unique institutional framework, in which member states diplomats and officials from the EU institutions jointly make policy. It is led by the High Representative, who is the "face and voice" of EU foreign policy, and supported by the substantial European External Action Service and 140 EU delegations in other countries and international organizations.
Because foreign policy is normally the business of sovereign states, the exceptional nature of the CFSP has long been a subject of inquiry. The CFSP has particularly puzzled advocates of the traditional theories of European integration and international relations, who have failed to appreciate what the EU does in the field of high politics. Given the absence of formal diplomatic recognition and a strong reliance on the resources of the member states, the EU is still not a full-fledged actor, yet it has a strong international presence nonetheless. Its presence and the gradual increase in "actorness" have also raised questions about whether the EU presents a different type of actor, a civilian or normative power, which derives its influence from nontraditional sources of power.
Under the assumption that the EU has some actorness, the Europeanization of foreign policy has become an area of interest. Member states can act through the EU structure to achieve more impact internationally, can adjust national foreign policy on the basis of EU positions, and are socialized into greater European coordination. The relationship between national and EU foreign policy is thus a significant topic of debate. Finally, governance perspectives increasingly provide insight into the organization of the CFSP. How the member states and the EU institutions collectively coordinate, define, and implement EU foreign policy is not only an important question in itself but also matters for policy outcomes.
- Policy, Administration, and Bureaucracy
- World Politics
The member states of the European Union (EU) coordinate, define, and implement foreign policy in the context of the Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP). This policy area—often referred to as EU foreign policy—has a broad scope. It covers all areas of foreign policy, including all questions relating to security and defense (see, on the Common Security and Defence Policy, Duke, 2016). Other EU external policies, such as trade, development cooperation, and humanitarian assistance, fall outside its scope. The CFSP was established by the Treaty of Maastricht in 1993. It succeeded European Political Cooperation (EPC), through which the member states had coordinated their foreign policies since the 1970s. The CFSP is supported by a distinctive institutional framework, in which national diplomats and EU officials jointly make policy on the basis of consensus. It is led by the High Representative, who is the "face and voice" of EU foreign policy,1 and supported by the Brussels-based European External Action Service (EEAS) and around 140 EU delegations in third countries and international organizations.
Because foreign policy is normally the business of sovereign states, the exceptional nature of the CFSP has long been a subject of inquiry (for introductions, see Jørgensen, Aarstad, Drieskens, Laatikainen, & Tonra, 2015; Hill & Smith, 2011; Keukeleire & Delreux, 2014; Smith, 2014). The CFSP has particularly puzzled advocates of the traditional theories of international relations and European integration, who have difficulty explaining what the EU does in foreign policy. The ambiguity in foreign diplomatic recognition and a reliance on the resources of its member states makes the EU an unconventional international actor. Yet the EU has developed a strong international presence nonetheless. This also raises questions about the EU's international identity. Does the EU present a different type of actor—a civilian or normative power—which derives its influence from non-traditional sources of power? Or is the EU, as sovereign states, driven by material interests?
The relations between EU and national foreign policy are critically important. The member states can act through the EU to achieve more impact internationally. At the same time, the CFSP puts pressure on the member states to adjust their national foreign policies. While EU foreign policy often complements national foreign policy, it can also replace and challenge national efforts. This raises questions of coherence. Finally, it is relevant to pay attention to the governance of EU foreign policy. The unique method of policymaking, through which member states and the EU institutions coordinate, define, and implement the CFSP, affects policy outcomes. As such, the machinery behind EU foreign policy is instrumental to understanding the role of the EU as an international actor and its relations with national foreign policy.
This article starts off by conceptualizing the EU as an actor in diplomatic and international affairs. It continues with the relations between EU and national foreign policy. It finally analyzes the governance of EU foreign policy. The conclusion reflects on the status of CFSP research. This article focuses on key academic debates and does not seek to summarize the numerous studies on EU foreign policy toward particular regions and countries.
The EU as an International Actor
The starting point when studying EU foreign policy is to conceptualize the EU as an international actor. The domain of international relations is normally reserved for sovereign states. As a nonstate actor, the EU is not automatically recognized by the other states, it cannot join all international organizations, and it has had difficulty participating in negotiations. A key question for scholars has thus been whether, in fact, the EU is an international actor. And if the EU can be considered an actor, what type of actor is it? What are its ends and means? Before going to these questions, it is important to provide some background on EU foreign policy.
EU foreign policy has a long history. After the European Defence Community (EDC) failed ratification in the French Parliament in 1954 and following the rejection of the Fouchet Plans in the early 1960s, the member states established EPC in 1970. It was a modest attempt at foreign policy coordination. EPC was initially kept separate from economic integration in the context of the European Community. Foreign ministers and national diplomats would occasionally meet to exchange information on issues of international politics and work toward a harmonization of views and joint action whenever feasible and desirable. The frequency of these meetings and the scope of the agenda increased over time. The process also became institutionalized (Nuttall, 1992; Smith, 2004). Yet EPC remained an informal intergovernmental debating club until the creation of the CFSP with the Treaty of Maastricht in 1993.
Explaining the relative absence of the EU in the area of foreign policy was not difficult. Hoffmann (1966), for example, distinguished between "low" and "high" politics when discussing the European project. Economic integration was perhaps achievable, but cooperation in foreign and security affairs was a different ball game. Waltz (1979, p. 152) pointed at the primacy of the member states. The member states rather than "Western Europe as any kind of a power," he noted, had responded to the Yom Kippur War in 1973, albeit "behaving at once like hens and ostriches." Also Bull (1982, p. 151) was skeptical about the prospects of European integration in foreign policy: "'Europe' is not an actor in international affairs, and does not seem likely to become one; the Europe with which I am concerned is the actual one of state governments."
While the theorists of international relations and European integration could thus account for the slow pace with which EPC developed, they were much less capable of making sense of what EU foreign policy was actually about. This resulted in a new approach. Rather than defining actors along the lines of the characteristics of states, several scholars tried to come up with innovative criteria of "actorness." Sjöstedt (1977, p. 66), for example, stated that "if [Europe] is capable of behaving as an actor it must be considered as such." To have actor capability would require Europe to stand out as a separate unit in the system from its member states (Sjöstedt, 1977). After defining such new criteria, scholars could assess to what extent Europe was an actor in international politics.
Based on these ideas, Jupille and Caporaso (1998) proposed a much-used operationalization of EU actorness. The EU requires recognition by being a member of international organizations or a party to international negotiations. It needs to have the authority to act internationally by having legal competences to represent the member states. Through distinctive and independent institutions, it acquires autonomy from its member states. It needs to have cohesion in terms of its goals, tactics, procedures, and output. Fulfilling these criteria presents a challenge for the EU, particularly in the area of the CFSP. Yet the point was to have a yardstick to measure the degree of EU actorness across policy areas, regions, and time.
When EPC was rebranded into the CFSP in 1993, it was widely accepted that while the EU was perhaps not a full-fledged actor, it had a considerable "presence" (Allen & Smith, 1990) in international affairs. Following the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the EU continued to increase its mark on foreign policy. While its response to the civil wars in former Yugoslavia was hardly impressive, the post–Cold War era was more conducive of the EU playing a role in world politics. EU foreign policy was also strengthened through the establishment of new institutions such as the High Representative in 1999. The debate was therefore temporarily settled and moved to the question what type of actor the EU actually is.
The EU had traditionally been considered a "civilian power," which was "long on economic power and relatively short on armed force" (Duchêne, 1973, p. 19). Through its trade and development policies, it was able to transform its economic weight into political objectives. The use of sanctions, which have become a favorite foreign policy tool of the EU, is another example. Attaching strings to development assistance is a third one. A civilian power further prioritizes settling international disputes through diplomatic means and attaches importance to international law. The notion of civilian power neatly fitted the bill with Europe lacking real military might. It was, however, not uncontroversial. Bull (1982), for instance, called civilian power a "contradiction in terms." He pointed at the need for military power following the escalation of the Cold War in the early 1980s.
The idea of civilian power, nonetheless, served as a stepping stone for the "EU as a power" debate of the 2000s. Manners (2002, p. 239) influentially argues that we should analyze not only the EU's ability to make use of civilian and military instruments but also its ability to shape conceptions of what is considered "normal" in international relations. From fundamental human rights to stable institutions, the EU has been trying to portray its norms on the rest of the world. The Normative Power Europe thesis holds that it does so successfully. For Manners (2002, p. 253), the ability to get others to accept one's norms is "the greatest power of all." The work of Manners (2002) has resulted in a cottage industry of Normative Power Europe–related research. Scholars have developed the concept and studied it empirically across cases. Other scholars have proposed other adjectives, such as ethical power (Aggestam, 2008), structural power (Keukeleire, 2003), and market power (Damro, 2012). Several have contested the concept, arguing that the EU is a normal or realist power and behaves like any other state (Hyde-Price, 2006; see also Duke, 2016).
Given the prominence of the Normative Power Europe thesis, it is important to also mention different critiques. First, some argue that the EU is hardly alone as a normative power. The United States, after all, equally promotes democracy and human rights (Sjursen, 2006, p. 240; or consider Normative Power China; Kavalski, 2013). Manners (2002, p. 242) counters by noting how the EU is "different to pre-existing political forms" as a result of its historical context, hybrid forms of governance, and legal constitution. He argues that because the EU has helped former archenemies to "domesticate" their relations (p. 236), it promotes similar norms—such as peace, liberty, democracy, rule of law, and human rights—in the international arena. A second critique concerns the legitimacy of EU norms, which Manners (2002) seems to take for granted. Sjursen (2006, pp. 241–242) notes that the line between the EU acting as a "force for the good" and "Eurocentric imperialism" is, in fact, razor thin. Bickerton (2011) similarly points at the arbitrary nature of the EU's core values.
Perhaps the most potent critique is that Normative Power Europe can be seen as a product of its time (Bickerton, 2011, pp. 76–77). The debate coincided with the U.S. invasion in Iraq in 2003, which resulted in significant transatlantic tensions. It became fashionable in Brussels to portray the EU as advancing respectable norms with support for international law. This rhetoric was uncritically used by Normative Power Europe advocates as evidence of their thesis (Hyde-Price, 2006, p. 218; Sjursen, 2006, p. 235). Furthermore, the 1990s and 2000s were the golden age of European integration. Through enlargement, the EU promoted its norms in candidate countries. In global governance it had a prominent voice in discussions such as climate change. The litmus test of Normative Power Europe has, however, always been whether big powers, such as the United States and China, conform to EU norms. As we move further into the 21st century, this is becoming increasingly less likely. The Normative Power Europe thesis is thus losing some of its original appeal. Publications on realist and market power have provided balance (Damro, 2012; Hyde-Price, 2006).
The debate on what type of actor the EU represents continues to date. Scholars still discuss to what extent the EU is an actor and, if so, what its external identity is (e.g., da Conceição-Heldt & Meunier, 2014; Nicolaïdis & Whitman, 2013). The changing international order, in which the emerging powers increasingly compete for influence, presents furthermore a new challenge for EU as an international actor. It forces the EU to rethink the role of norms and interests in its foreign policy. The EU Global Strategy seems a step in this direction (European External Action Service, 2016, pp. 13–16). Many emerging powers also attach importance to sovereignty, which naturally complicates the life of the EU as an unconventional international actor. Research on the EU as an international actor will therefore remain important in the years to come.
The EU and National Foreign Policy
If the EU can be conceptualized to a certain degree as an international actor, this immediately triggers the question of how EU foreign policy relates to national foreign policy. After all, for the EU to be an actor requires a degree of autonomy from its member states. It should be considered a separate unit in the international system. Under the label of Europeanization theory, scholars have debated the interaction between EU-level foreign policy and national-level foreign policy. What also needs to be clarified is whether EU foreign policy complements, replaces, or competes with national foreign policy.
Scholars started to use the concept of Europeanization in the 1990s to examine the impact of European integration on the member states (authoritative volumes include Featherstone & Radaelli, 2003; Vink & Graziano, 2006). Many focused on traditional EU regulatory policies, such as the transport, cohesion, and environmental policies, which needed to be implemented nationally. One of the first scholars to apply the idea of Europeanization to the CFSP was Tonra (2001) in his study of the Dutch, Danish, and Irish foreign policy. Although the effects of Europeanization are considered to be weaker in foreign policy than in regulatory policy, the concept has proved useful in analyzing the relations between EU and national foreign policy. Interaction is typically considered a two-way street. Member states try to use EU foreign policy to pursue their own interests. Yet, at the same time, they are also subject to European demands.
One reason for the member states to participate in EU foreign policy is to reach "politics of scale" (Ginsberg, 1989). Most member states have limited capacities and difficulty achieving international impact. Rather than pursuing unilateral foreign policy, they may decide to act through the EU structures. The EU not only often gives the member states more leverage, it also protects them when dealing with the great powers. Rather than addressing Russia themselves, for example, the Baltic states much prefer to go through Brussels. Also, when it comes to discussing human rights with China, member states tend to voice their concerns through the EU rather than national channels of diplomacy. One way of looking at EU foreign policy is thus as a continuation of national foreign policy through different channels.
Scholars working in the Europeanization tradition analyze to what extent the member states are successful in projecting their national interests to the EU level (Wong, 2011). The use of the EU foreign policy as an "influence multiplier" (Wong, 2011, p. 158) plays out in different ways. For French President De Gaulle, for example, the very essence of Europe becoming a "third power" during the Cold War was about France continuing its influence in world affairs. On a more micro level, Belgium may seek to affect EU policies on the Democratic Republic of Congo. The idea of national projection is uncontroversial in the academic literature. It is well known that member states act through international institutions when it suits them. EU foreign policy is not different.
A more contested proposition is whether we also see a Europeanization of national foreign policy, that is, whether member states have adapted their national foreign policies as a result of EU membership and participation in EU foreign policy. When examining national adaptation processes, we can distinguish between changes in terms of norms and identity, procedures, and substance. It is worth discussing these separately. Through participating in the formulation and conduct of EU foreign policy, foreign ministers and national diplomats familiarize themselves with EU policies as well as the practices and interests of other member states. This is likely to affect their perceptions and foreign policy identities (Alecu de Flers & Müller, 2013; Manners & Whitman, 2000, pp. 249–252; Tonra, 2001; Wong & Hill, 2011, p. 210). Socialization between elites does not mean that they immediately discard national interests, but they may develop a better understanding of the other member states and internalize European norms of behavior and thinking.
Participation in the CFSP has also resulted in new institutional structures. Member states have whole teams of diplomats in Brussels and in the national capitals dealing with EU foreign policy (Cross, 2011; Juncos & Pomorska, 2011; Manners & Whitman, 2000, p. 257). This is significant. Pomorska (2007), for instance, shows that the participation in the CFSP has been a driver for modernization for the Polish foreign ministry since it joined the EU in 2004. Finally, we can identify a Europeanization of the substance of national foreign policy. In a comparative study of 10 different member states, Wong and Hill (2011, pp. 210–215) find that the foreign policies of all member states, even the most reluctant ones, have been affected by Europeanization. They refer, for example, to the neutral member states that had to rethink their foreign policies. Participation in the CFSP has furthermore increased the scope of national foreign policy. Spain, for instance, suddenly had to worry about the Western Balkans. At the same time, Wong and Hill (2011 p. 216) also show that countries set limits as to how far they want to go.
The picture that Europeanization scholars offer us is, at best, mixed. There is clear evidence that national foreign policy is affected by EU foreign policy. The impact of Europeanization varies, however, across member states and subject areas. It is clear that the Europeanization of national foreign policy is not a linear process of ever increasing convergence (Musu, 2003; Wong & Hill, 2011, p. 218). The direction of national foreign policy is shaped by European integration, but also by many other factors, which makes it difficult to come to definite conclusions.
The concept of Europeanization helps us to understand the interaction between national and EU foreign policy. Yet it is equally important to consider the positioning of EU foreign policy versus national foreign policy. Does it replace, complement, or compete with the national foreign policies of the member states? While this question is not often explicitly asked, it is implicit in much of the analysis and policy practice of EU foreign policy. It is furthermore significant when thinking about the coherence between what Brussels says and what national capitals do (Gebhard, 2011; Nuttall, 2000).
Few people would claim that EU foreign policy is completely replacing national foreign policy, but this should not prevent us from discussing it as a theoretical possibility. In federalist countries, for example, foreign policy and defense are often exclusively organized at the federal level. This provided a model for European federalists in the 1950s, who proposed the plans for the doomed EDC (Burgess, 2009, pp. 31–32). More recently, the European Constitution of 2004, which failed ratification, replaced the High Representative by no less than a EU foreign minister (Norman, 2003). This symbolic title along federalist lines would have given the officeholder some clout. Even after this ambitious title was scrapped in the Lisbon Treaty of 2007, some member states still felt the need to include a declaration stating that the CFSP "will not affect the existing legal basis, responsibilities, and powers of each Member State in relation to the formulation and conduct of its foreign policy" (TFEU: Declaration 14). They were worried about the possibility of EU foreign policy superseding national foreign policy.
When going beyond these abstract "constitutional" debates and looking at the daily practice, it is clear that EU foreign policy largely complements national foreign policy. EU foreign policy has given the member states a forum to exchange information and views and to coordinate their national positions to achieve a greater impact internationally. The High Representative, the EEAS, and the approximately 140 EU delegations also largely perform complementary functions (see also next section). Foreign ministers may not have the ambition to sit through a dozen mediation meetings between Serbia and Kosovo, which makes the involvement of the High Representative useful. The EU delegations across the world have also tried to avoid competing with national embassies and rather attempt to complement their work (Balfour & Raik, 2013, p. 33).
That having been said, it is not difficult to find examples in which EU institutions have competed with national actors for external representation, visibility, and access. The bureaucratic politics literature indeed underlines the need for the High Representative and the EEAS to justify themselves, which might result in term stepping on the "turf" of the member states (Adler-Nissen, 2014; Dijkstra, 2011). Equally important is the possibility that member states might ignore the objectives of EU foreign policy when they interact bilaterally with third states and international organizations. This raises the all-important question of coherence between EU and national foreign policy (Gebhard, 2011; Nuttall, 2000). Despite the efforts by Brussels and the national capitals to sing from the same hymn sheet, foreign counterparts still often must listen to contradictory voices. The CFSP is a policy area in which the member states are keen to remain in charge.
The Governance of EU Foreign Policy
A final topic concerns the governance of EU foreign policy: How have the member states and the EU institutions organized policymaking? The CFSP is often said to be an intergovernmental policy where consensus rules and the member states are omnipotent. Yet in reality the EU is multilayered, with a maze-like system of institutions. This also goes for the CFSP, where authority is dispersed across different levels and actors. Actions in the CFSP are also often linked to other policy areas, such as trade and development, which are subject to different decision-making procedures. The question of governance is closely related to the discussion of the EU as an international actor. After all, the actorness of the EU largely depends on how the internal machinery and external representation are organized. It also speaks to Europeanization and the interaction between EU and national foreign policy. Governance structures affect how national policies are projected and how adaptation and socialization take place.
The relevance of studying the governance of EU foreign policy mirrors a development in the study of the EU more widely. The process of European integration had long been analyzed through the perspective of international relations and international organization. Since the mid-1990s, however, scholars have started to borrow concepts and theories from comparative politics and public administration (e.g., Hix, 1994). The CFSP, albeit with a delay of about a decade, became an interesting laboratory for these kinds of theories as well. This development also brought about an interest in the EU's bureaucratic organization (Bauer & Trondal, 2015). Rather than focusing on the foreign ministers, who take the formal decisions in EU foreign policy, scholars increasingly pay attention to the civil servants (Duke & Vanhoonacker, 2006).
The organization of EU foreign policy is also a recurring theme on the day-to-day agenda of the member states. From the EPC arrangements, which relied heavily on the rotating presidency, to the negotiations over the organization of the EEAS, member states at times seem more concerned with their institutions than with producing actual output. When analyzing the governance of EU foreign policy, two issues can be studied. First is the coordination between the member states. As EU foreign policy has grown increasingly intensive and wider in scope, the member states have sought to improve the efficiency of their own coordination processes. Second is the delegation of functions to the EU institutions. To further increase coherence, efficiency, and impact, the member states have tasked the EU institutions with the formulation and implementation of EU foreign policy.
The first set of governance questions involves the coordination process between the member states themselves. As EPC started modestly in 1970, the member states established a light coordination mechanism. Each six-monthly rotating presidency would organize one ministerial meeting and two meetings of political directors in its own capital. The number of EPC meetings, however, increased quickly, and the member states established a system of information sharing to allow for continuous consultation. They also adopted rules of procedure and norms, started to coordinate in international organizations and third countries, and improved coordination between presidencies. Decisions were taken by consensus, and the European Commission was kept at arm's length. Its role was limited to coordinating between EPC and the other policies of the European Communities to achieve coherence. The rotating presidency was mandated to represent the member states internationally. As foreign policy cooperation became more prominent, the member states institutionalized their cooperation (Nuttall, 1992; Smith, 2004).
In a parallel development, the member states gradually moved foreign policy coordination from the national capitals to Brussels. This process of centralization, or "Brusselization," started when EPC was allocated some office space with the Single European Act of 1987 (Allen, 1998). Initially, only the working groups of the lower-level diplomats were based in Brussels. The foreign ministers continued to meet in the capital of the presidency in office. But as time passed by almost all formal meetings were moved to Brussels. With the establishment of the function of a High Representative for the CFSP in 1999, Brussels became the administrative center of EU foreign policy (Duke & Vanhoonacker, 2006).
The institutionalization and Brusselization of EU foreign policy are important as they raise questions as to whether the national capitals are losing their sovereign control over foreign policy. At minimum, it can be observed that EU foreign policy is no longer a purely intergovernmental policy area in which national leaders meet to discuss world affairs on an ad hoc basis without any commitment. The mode of governance can be better described as "intensive transgovernmentalism" (Wallace & Reh, 2015, pp. 109–111; see also "new intergovernmentalism" in Bickerton, Hodson, & Puetter, 2015). Much of the decision making remains in the hands of key national officials, but they meet on a continuously rather than ad hoc basis. The traditional EU institutions play a marginal role, but the member states have made special institutional arrangements, such as the establishment of the EEAS, to facilitate their work.
Various scholars have studied the effects of institutionalization and Brusselization on the attitudes and identities of national diplomats engaged in EU foreign policy. Already in 1973, the member states themselves talked about a "coordination reflex," in which diplomats first looked at their European partners before reacting to world events (also Nuttall, 1992). With the development of the CFSP, the socialization of European diplomats and their esprit de corps within the different committees became a topic of academic debate (Cross, 2011; Juncos & Pomorska, 2011). The argument is that since these diplomats meet so frequently, they start to adopt new role conceptions that affect their identity and loyalties. They identify with EU foreign policy and want to make the system work. Rather than pushing national interests until the very end, they try to solve problems and accommodate the other member states. It is important, however, not to overstate this argument. The diplomatic profession is about socialization and troubleshooting, but diplomats are aware of the red lines in their instructions.
The second set of governance questions is about why, and to what extent, the member states have delegated functions to the EU institutions (Dijkstra, 2013; Wagner, 2003). The member states relied for several decades on the services of the rotating presidency. This had the distinct advantage of keeping the sensitive foreign policy tasks in-house. By not involving the EU institutions in the foreign policy discussions, the member states felt they could keep more control. The EU institutions have nonetheless carved out a role for themselves. Linkages between the CFSP and other external relations policies have allowed the European Commission and even the European Parliament and the European Court of Justice some influence. Furthermore, since the Treaty of Amsterdam in 1999, the member states have delegated several tasks in the area of foreign policy to the de novo EU institutions, such as the Council and the EEAS. These EU institutions are permanent, whereas the rotating presidency had a temporary character. Continuation and the need for professionalism were considered critical when engaging in longer-term diplomatic relations or sending out soldiers on military operations.
While the member states have long tried to keep the European Commission out of the CFSP, it was clear from the beginning that foreign policy could not be kept entirely separate from the other fields of external relations, such as trade, development, and enlargement policy. To guarantee the coherence of EU external relations, the Commission was allowed a way in (Nuttall, 1992, 2000; Smith, 2004). The case of sanctions provides an example. While sanctions are part of foreign policy, they must be implemented through trade policy, where the Commission traditionally has a strong role. From the establishment of EPC to the Treaty of Lisbon, the Commission has tried to get more involved in the CFSP using the argument of coherence (Dijkstra, 2014; Spence, 2016). Similarly, the European Parliament has increased its profile. Using some of its powers, such as its say over the budget, its right to elect EU commissioners, or its job to ask questions, it has forced the member states to take it more seriously. Finally, while it does not have a formal role in the CFSP, the European Court of Justice has made rulings on several issues that touch upon foreign policy.
More important than the role of the traditional EU institutions has been the delegation of tasks to so-called de novo EU institutions (Bickerton, Hodson, & Puetter, 2015). The establishment of the post of High Representative for the CFSP in the Amsterdam Treaty in particular proved a sea change for the governance of EU foreign policy. While the High Representative formally assisted the rotating presidency, the first officeholder, Javier Solana, was an experienced politician, who quickly put many national foreign ministers in the shadows (Müller-Brandeck-Bocquet & Rüger, 2011). He was also given a policy staff, which grew during his 10-year tenure. With the Lisbon Treaty of 2009, the post of High Representative was significantly upgraded. It incorporated all the foreign policy functions of the rotating presidency. For example, the High Representative is now the permanent chair of the Foreign Affairs Council. In addition, the High Representative became part of the European Commission and serves as a vice president in the College of Commissioners. This gives the High Representative the possibility to work more closely together with the commissioners responsible for the other external relations policies. The member states furthermore created the EEAS in 2011 by merging all the EU offices dealing with foreign policy and complementing them with national diplomats. As a result, the EU has now a serious diplomatic service, which also includes some 140 EU delegations around the world (Balfour & Raik, 2013; Batora & Spence, 2015; Smith, Keukeleire, & Vanhoonacker, 2016).
Even more than the institutionalization and Brusselization of coordination, the delegation of foreign policy tasks to the EU institutions raises questions about the erosion of sovereignty. Do the member states still control EU foreign policy? The academic answer is a qualified yes (Dijkstra, 2013). While the EU institutions have influenced several specific instances of foreign policy and have some organizational autonomy (Henökl & Trondal, 2015), it is worth pointing out that the High Representative and the EEAS remain relatively weak actors. They play a role in the formulation and implementation of EU foreign policy, but the final decisions are still taken by the member states. The member states have also gone out of their way to establish control over the EEAS. Indeed, the whole point of de novo bodies, such as the EEAS, is to keep foreign policy out of the powerful European Commission. In addition, it is also worth pointing out that while the EEAS resources are impressive, the total staff is similar only to that of a medium-sized national diplomatic service.
Weak leadership is also part of the reason why the EEAS has not exploited its full potential (Vanhoonacker & Pomorska, 2013). Although she had more powers and resources, former High Representative Catherine Ashton has been less entrepreneurial than her predecessor Solana. When she did get personally involved, it was often not controversial. Ashton did useful work rather than challenging the member states. It appears that current High Representative Federica Mogherini, who assumed office in November 2014, exerts more leadership than Ashton. She has higher visibility and has been praised for concluding the negotiations with Iran concerning nuclear nonproliferation. She has furthermore been the driving force behind the EU Global Strategy. Yet Mogherini has also been careful to complement the member states rather than to undermine them.
The governance of EU foreign policy has been extensively researched. While the parallel processes of institutionalization, Brusselization, and delegation have given EU foreign policy some autonomy from its member states, it is not fully autonomous. Rather, EU foreign policy is uniquely organized as a machinery in which the member states and the EU institutions jointly make policy. It is no longer an ad hoc circus that travels across Europe every six months as a result of the changing presidency. It is continuous and permanent—and transgovernmental rather than intergovernmental. The strength of EU foreign policy, nevertheless, still depends largely on the input of the member states.
The Maastricht Treaty, which entered into force in 1993, established the CFSP. This policy area has been further developed by the member states ever since. The CFSP has also received widespread attention from the scholarly community. It has sparked a range of new questions and puzzles for students of European integration. It has encouraged academics to experiment with different approaches ranging from international relations to comparative politics, foreign policy analysis, and public administration.
The EU's actorness and its identity have been a topic of debate. It is far from evident that the EU, like sovereign states, has the "capacity to behave actively and deliberately in relation to other actors in the international system" (Sjöstedt, 1977, p. 16). In addition, it is debatable whether the EU pursues similar ends and means as sovereign states. An influential conceptualization has been that of the EU as a normative power (Manners, 2002)—the argument goes that the EU is seeking to transform the norms and standards of world politics. While the concept has been criticized, it nicely illustrates how scholars struggle to make sense of an active unconventional international player.
A second key debate concerns the relations between EU and national foreign policy. If the EU has indeed some actorness, it is important to know where it stands in comparison to the foreign policies of the member states. The Europeanization debate, which started in the early 2000s, has been most helpful. It has clarified the interaction between EU and national foreign policy. It has also resulted in many country studies exploring the impact of Europeanization. Although it is clear that member states continue to jealously guard their control over foreign policy, all of them, including the larger member states, accept the EU as a frame of reference. EU foreign policy constrains national foreign policy choices. Equally important is that EU foreign policy increasingly not only complements national foreign policy but also sometimes replaces and competes with it.
The third debate is about the governance of the CFSP. With the emergence of multiple Brussels-based actors, the increasingly relevant question is whether centralization and delegation affect the outcomes of EU foreign policy. Intensive transgovernmentalism (Wallace & Reh, 2015, pp. 109–111) seems a particularly suitable description of the mode of governance in the CFSP. Decisions remain in the hand of the member states, but their continuous interactions affect the attitudes and identities of national diplomats. The EU institutions also increasingly have some autonomy in the formulation and implementation of foreign policy.
This article is far from exhaustive, but it raises a couple of reflections on the state of the art of CFSP research. First, it is impossible to analyze the CFSP through one overall concept or approach. The three themes identified in this article all have their own subquestions and research agendas. CFSP research is very rich, and the pluralism in the research agenda should be seen mostly as a strength rather than as a weakness. The drawback is that for students of EU foreign policy, it is becoming nearly impossible to follow all the debates in their entirety. This has resulted in a certain degree of fragmentation.
Second, CFSP scholars make extensive use of concepts and perspectives originating outside their discipline: the research agendas on Europeanization and CFSP governance are two examples. The fact that scholars are open to insights from not only EU studies and international relations but also comparative politics, public administration, economics, and sociology is a healthy sign. Having said that, it remains difficult to find the right balance between uniqueness of EU foreign policy, on the one hand, and using concepts and insights of other disciplines, on the other hand. When it works out, it undeniably adds to our understanding of the CFSP. But in some cases, transferring concepts across disciplines causes more problems than it solves.
Third, we see a scholarly debate that has been very responsive to developments triggered by the changing European and international context. The historiography of the CFSP is almost a function of world politics. From Civilian Power Europe during detente in the 1970s to Normative Power Europe in the midst of transatlantic conflict over Iraq in 2002–2003, it is difficult to deny a certain tide in the CFSP scholarship. This trend continues to date. As a result of the prominence of the emerging powers, various scholars are now interested in EU–Asia relations. The withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the EU will undoubtedly affect the scholarship on the CFSP. The three research topics identified in this article—actorness, the relation with national foreign policy, and governance—are, however, likely anchors for CFSP research in the years to come.
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1. The High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy is also a vice president of the European Commission. While HR/VP is regularly used, this article refrains from using too many acronyms.


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6 Point SIEM Solution Evaluation Checklist
Security information and event management (SIEM) systems have become a crucial component of modern security strategies. Yet given the cost and range of solutions, it is not a purchase to be made hastily.
This E-Guide from SearchSecurity.com explores the top six evaluation criteria you should keep in mind when investing in an SIEM solution. View now to learn more!

subset: commoncrawl


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They were wrong.
With James struggling again to impose his will, the defending champion Heat lost Game 3 to the San Antonio Spurs 113-77 at AT&T Center Tuesday night and now trail 2-1 in the NBA Finals. They did it with three-pointers, setting an NBA Finals record with 16 in the game. And they did it with an extended run, finishing the game on a 69-33 tear after a tie at 44.
As such, the odds of the Spurs winning the fifth title they so desire turned in their favor yet again: In Finals in which the first two games are split, the Game 3 winner has gone on to win it all 12 out of 13 times. Game 4 is in San Antonio on Thursday.
James, who had two points at the half when the Spurs led 50-44, missed 11 of his first 13 shots and finished with less than 20 points for the third consecutive game for the first time since the Finals loss to the Dallas Mavericks in 2011 that haunted him so. The Spurs are the ones haunting him now — again.
"We didn't do anything right tonight," James said. "We can't play like that on either side of the floor if we want to win."
The Spurs broke open a close game, tied at 44, with a 69-33 run. And it wasn't Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, or Manu Ginobili at center stage, but role players like Gary Neal, Kawhi Leonard, and Danny Green. Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, or Manu Ginobili at center stage but role players Gary Neal, Kawhi Leonard, and Danny Green.
Neal, who had scored in double-digits four times in 16 playoff games, finished with 24 points and hit six three-pointers.
"All of my teammates and Pop, they do a great job of encouraging me to continue to shoot the ball," Green said.
Leonard was spectacular in defending James and added 14 points. Green had 27 points and hit seven of nine three-pointers.
"When I'm aggressive defensively it helps me get into a rhythm offensively," Green said.
Just once all season had he scored less than 20 points in consecutive games, and it didn't happen in the playoffs until the Finals. It happened just five times in the regular season and twice in 16 playoff games before they faced the Spurs. He was 14-for-33 coming in and shot 7-for-21 in Game 3.
For all the talk about how the Heat haven't lost consecutive games since Jan. 10, it wasn't as if the Spurs weren't a resilient bunch too. Barring a three-game losing streak to end the regular season that had everything to do with their lack of health, they had lost consecutive games once since Dec. 18. They were 35-6 at home during the regular season.
Duncan wasted no time in setting the Spurs' tone at the start, attacking Udonis Haslem in the lane for the sort of bucket that had been so tough to come by in Game 2. He kept it going nearly six minutes later, roaring past James in the lane for a dunk that came off of a Parker penetration pass and put them up 11-4. In between, they kept the Heat to just two of nine shooting while Bosh's latest futile stretch came in the form of his one of five start from the field.
The Heat eventually responded, and early aggressiveness from Wade going to the rim sparked his eight-point first quarter as the Spurs led 24-20 entering the second. It was a good sign for the home team, as they had won one of the previous eight quarters in these Finals coming in (the Heat won five, and the teams tied twice).
"I didn't recognize our team tonight," Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. "We got what we deserved out there."
But it wouldn't have lasted until halftime if not for Neal, whose 14 points before the break were about as unexpected as the notion that James would have just two on 2-for-8 shooting in that same span. The Spurs' first double-digit lead of the Finals had become a 44-44 tie after a 14-4 Heat run, but a Parker three from the right corner stemmed that tide and Neal capped the half with a three-pointer at the buzzer that put San Antonio up 50-44.
Duncan played quarterback yet again, starting the break with a quick outlet pass to Parker and another to Neal on the left wing for his shot. But there had been missed opportunities — two consecutive wide open threes that were missed by Matt Bonner midway through the second and eight turnovers that led to 10 Heat points.
The Spurs pulled away yet again midway through the third quarter, and it had everything to do with Duncan's desire. After his jumper and a Green three put the Spurs up 11, Duncan blocked an out-of-control layup from Mario Chalmers and lunged toward the baseline to keep the ball in bounds and start the fastbreak. With Duncan falling into the front row and Green attacking the rim on the other end en route to getting (and making) two free throws, their run that began late in the second quarter stretched to 15-2 and they led 59-46.


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The TFN reports today that angry responses from educators as well as the general public have persuaded them to hold off, at least temporarily, the adoption of an "alternative" language arts curriculum put together by a former teacher and current Christian-right homophobe and ideologue named Donna Garner. Creationist Dan McLeroy, who heads up the SBOE, favored Garner's curriculum, which had already been rejected as too rigid and outdated (in the TFN's words) ten years ago when the governor of Texas was none other than the clod who's been stinking up the White House since January 2001. Had the SBOE adopted it now, it would have utterly derailed a very intensive revision of language arts standards that has been underway for a couple of years, and which has the blessing of educators.
However, this is only a temporary setback for the fundies. The SBOE has put together a subcommittee (with McLeroy on it, surprise surprise!) to further study the matter. Expect the fight to protect students from these troglodytes to continue.


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The value of big data in security
Content Copyright © 2012 Bloor. All Rights Reserved.
Also posted on: Security Blog
One of today's buzzwords is big data. Volumes of information generated are increasing rapidly, driven in part by increased take up of mobile technologies and the growing number and range of machine-to-machine communications as ever more equipment, such as industrial sensors, is connected to networks. Increasingly, organisations are looking to understand how information, events and behaviours impact the overall goals and objectives of the business. Making use of that information is critical as it provides valuable insights that can be used for improving operational performance and business decision making.
The ability to harness big security data generated by feeds from throughout the network stack, incorporating network systems, host, applications and users, combined with internal and external security intelligence information, similarly has enormous potential benefits for organisations. These feeds provide essential information and should be continuously monitored in real time to uncover and understand deviations from what is considered to be normal behaviour to uncover threats that more reactive security controls can miss.
To answer these needs, vendors with their roots in the security information and event management technology and log management systems space have been building out their capabilities, developing security intelligence platforms that incorporate such advanced capabilities as big data analytics and event correlation, integrity and change management, archiving and incident response.
A new report from Bloor Research discusses these developments and provides pointers as to what organisations should look for in such a security intelligence platform. This link will take you to the report: The value of big data in security.


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DaWanda Designmarkt Amsterdam
{above: journal by froschkind and necklace by gudbling}
This weekend I am trying to visit the first Dutch handmade market in Amsterdam organised by DaWanda to celebrate the opening of their Dutch website. The market is at Meininger hotel and more then 100 designers will exhibit their work in the different rooms of the hotel.
What are your plans for the weekend? Perhaps we can meet each other on Sunday otherwise I hope to see you back next week ~ irene xoxo
In the images above t-shirt and teatowel by detailF, paper products by froschkind and a chrochet lamp by Made by Mo.


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Click image to enlarge |
Just your basic Friday chest x-ray on an asymptomatic patient with hypertension and atrial flutter.
Any thoughts?
Send them to the ER!
I think it is aortic aneurysm or mediastinal mass. It also shows hyperaeration which reflect chronic lung disease and possible smoking history which increase the risk of aneurysm or lung cancer. I also concern about right lower lobe patchy infiltrate, blunting of left costophrenic angle and haziness in right upper lung field close to mediastinum.
I'm amazed to see "an asymptomatic patient" was hooked with telemetry and got portable CXR rather than regular PA and lateral which would yield much more information.
More history and physical exam, previous CXR and obtaining CXR PA and lateral should help.
Is that the apex of the heart sticking up to the left? It looks like the cardiac shadow is sideways. I don't read xrays but is the diaphragm in the right place? Is "something" pushing the heart up and to the left?
Do a needle biopsy in the office.
It's not every day you see a descending aortic aneurism that exceeds 8 cm in diameter (confirmed by CT).
Needless to say, we didn't do an atrial flutter ablation until the aneurism was addressed and no office-based needle biopsy was performed.


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Scotland Pushes for Gay Marriage; Church Warns Against Infringing on Rights
Scotland is pushing to become the first U.K. nation to introduce legislature approving same-sex marriage, though their plans are being opposed both by the Catholic Church and the Church of Scotland.
Currently, Scotland allows for same-sex civil partnerships, but an entire "rainbow coalition" of organizations, which includes The Equality Network, Amnesty International, Unison and the Humanist Society of Scotland, wants fully recognized marriage for gay couples, BBC reported.
The U.K. government is, in the meantime, considering whole-scale changes to the definition of marriage and is proposing to legalize gay marriage by 2015.
Much like the U.K. government proposals, the Scottish bill is supposed to provide a provision for religious institutions opposed to same-sex marriage, allowing them to refuse to perform such ceremonies. But the mainstream Scottish Christian communities are concerned that changing the traditional definition of marriage to include same-sex couples will force churches to accept something that goes against their beliefs nonetheless.
Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the most senior Catholic cleric, has even called the plan a "grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right," and has called for more discussion to be held on the issue. The cardinal has also pushed for the Scotland for Marriage campaign in opposition to same-sex marriage
"The Church of Scotland cannot agree that the law in Scotland should be changed to allow same-sex marriage. The Government's proposal fundamentally changes marriage as it is understood in our country and our culture – that it is a relationship between one man and one woman. In common with the historic position of the Christian Church, the Church of Scotland has always viewed marriage as being between one man and one woman," a previous statement issued by the church body read.
"Scriptural references to marriage, whether literal or metaphorical, all operate under this understanding. To redefine marriage to include same-sex marriage may have significant and, as yet, inadequately considered repercussions for our country, for the well-being of families, communities and individuals," the body added.
The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in May 2011 affirmed that while it supports the traditional definition of marriage, it still views homophobia as sinful and urges ministries to defend all members of the church, regardless of their sexual orientation.


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Great Basin bristlecone pines, Pinus longaeva, are the Methuselahs of the living world. Many live trees are several thousand years old, and the record holder clocks in at around 4,840 years. The pines, which subsist high on the mountain slopes of the western United States, grow very slowly. But, old age be hanged, those at the highest elevations are now having the time of their lives, thanks to global warming.
Trees leave a record of their growth in their annual rings—the wider the ring, the greater the growth that year. A team of dendrochronologists four strong, headed by Matthew W. Salzer of the University of Arizona in Tucson, reports that pines high up near the tree line in California and Nevada developed wider rings during the second half of the twentieth century than during any other fifty-year period of the past 3,700 years.
That's probably a consequence of milder temperatures, because only pines close to the tree line—those most limited by cold—exhibit the effect. If the growth spurt were caused by more-abundant carbon dioxide boosting photosynthesis, or by a wetter climate, then lower-elevation trees should have wider rings too. They don't.
In fact, over the past century (for which good weather records exist), there is a significant correlation between tree-ring width at the tree line and mean air temperature—further support for the notion that the venerable trees are long-lived indicators of warming in western mountains. (PNAS)
Related links:
Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research
NSF audio slideshow
Higher Temperatures May Be Behind Pine Growth - NPR interview


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CIA Director Pledges to Make Benghazi Survivors Available to Talk
One year after the terrorist attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, the survivors may finally begin to talk.
Sep 11, 2013
The Weekly Standard
In a three-page letter to the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Mike Rogers, CIA director John Brennan says that his agency will provide the "relevant information" to Rogers in order to facilitate meetings between CIA-affiliated personnel in Benghazi and congressional oversight committees. The offer of cooperation, dated September 3, 2013, comes as four committees of jurisdiction in the House of Representatives prepare to reinvigorate separate inquiries into the events of September 11, 2012, and their aftermath. In the next two weeks, the House Foreign Affairs, Armed Services, Government Oversight and Reform, and Intelligence Committees will all hold hearings looking into different aspects of the Benghazi attacks – beginning with an Intelligence Committee hearing later this week on the lack of progress in the investigation and apprehension of the perpetrators of those attacks. 60 Minutes is planning to air its investigation into the Benghazi attacks later this fall.
In his letter to Rogers, Brennan responded to several specific questions the Intelligence Committee chairman had posed in a letter dated August 2, 2013, denying that CIA officers on the ground during the attacks had been subjected to polygraphs or required to sign non-disclosure agreements. He also denied that any CIA officers – "either staff or contractor" – had been told not to speak to Congress about the attacks or threatened with consequences for any such cooperation. "To the best of my knowledge after inquiry, I am unaware of any officer who has been threatened with reprisals," Brennan wrote. "Nor would I tolerate such behavior. To retaliate or threaten retaliation would be a violation of law."
But the most important part of Brennan's letter was the brief section on the possibility of meetings with Benghazi survivors. "Finally, you asked that CIA provide a list of all officers in Libya on 11 September 2012 and arrange for the committee to speak to any of those officers regardless of their current location," he wrote. "Information identifying those officers is classified. We will work with the Committee to provide the relevant information via classified channels."
The request from Rogers for access to survivors came after considerable debate among Republicans in the House. One group of lawmakers expressed concerns about demanding access to the Benghazi survivors. Doing so, they argued, would set a bad precedent for intelligence officials in the field. CIA officers have to be risk takers to do their jobs effectively, this group maintained, and calling them back to Washington after a debacle like Benghazi could well make them more risk-averse.
But others argued that any CIA officials in Benghazi that night who wanted to talk were unlikely to do so without the protection that a congressional demand – or, more formally, a subpoena – would provide. CIA officers, they reasoned, wouldn't volunteer to share details about the events of that night that could damage the Obama administration, particularly since the CIA director had been a close adviser to Barack Obama since his 2008 campaign. The only way these officials would talk is after a demand from Congress that they do so.
The request from Rogers to Brennan comes after months of persistent reports and rumors that Benghazi survivors had been threatened into silence. Sources claiming to speak for some of the survivors have claimed that these officers were forced to sign additional non-disclosure agreements and, in some cases, take additional polygraph tests as part of campaign to keep them from sharing their stories. "While we may never be able to stop the rumors and misstatements regarding the events of that night," Brennan wrote, "I appreciate the opportunity to refute some of them directly."
The meetings between survivors and the intelligence oversight committees have already started. Two survivors met with staffers from the Senate Intelligence Committee earlier this summer. Those individuals will meet with the House committee in the coming weeks.
The lack of information from U.S. government officials on the ground in Benghazi that night is the largest hole in the narrative surrounding the attacks. Until now, members of Congress have had to rely largely on the accounts of people who were in touch with individuals in Benghazi – reports that were, by definition, secondhand. But with the apparent commitment of Brennan to help make available CIA personnel who survived the attacks, the public may begin to learn firsthand—after a full year—some of many of the outstanding details of what actually happened in Libya that night


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Published 11-01-12
Submitted by Amazon Defense Coalition
Indigenous groups and villagers from Ecuador are filing suit today to freeze an estimated $2 billion of Chevron assets in Argentina to help pay for a remediation of the extensive toxic pollution left by the oil giant on their ancestral lands in the Amazon rainforest, representatives of the communities announced.
The move is the fourth legal action filed to enforce a $19 billion judgment in Ecuador against Chevron for creating what experts believe is the world's worst oil-related contamination, dubbed the "Rainforest Chernobyl" by local communities. Earlier legal actions were filed this year against Chevron assets in Canada, Brazil, and Ecuador.
Brought by the prominent lawyer Enrique Bruchou, the action in Argentina differs from the earlier seizure actions in that it derives its authority in part from an international treaty in Latin America called the Inter-American Convention on the Execution of Preventive Measures. The treaty, which dates from the late 1970s, allows for the automatic freezing of assets of a defendant that fails to abide by the law and refuses to pay a final foreign judgment.
The Preventive Measures treaty has been ratified by Argentina, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Paraguay, Guatemala, and Uruguay. Venezuela and Chile have signed the treaty, but have not ratified it.
Chevron maintains oil operations and bank accounts in Argentina worth about $2 billion, said Bruchou and Pablo Fajardo, the lawyer representing dozens of indigenous and farmer communities in Ecuador. Chevron's operations in Argentina produce about 26,000 barrels of crude and 4 million cubic feet of natural gas daily.
In all, the amount of Chevron assets in the four countries are worth at least an estimated $8 billion, said Fajardo. Because the judgment in Ecuador against Chevron is for $19.04 billion, seizure actions will continue to be filed against Chevron assets in more countries to make sure the full amount of the judgment is collected, he added.
Bruchou, a native of Buenos Aries, founded his firm in 1990 after working for several years at the U.S. law firm Shearman & Sterling. He has represented several international corporations, including Citibank, BNP Paribas, Merrill Lynch and Barclays. International Financial Law Review named his law firm, Bruchou Fernandez Madero & Lombardi the best in Argentina for five consecutive years. Bruchou himself was named "Law Firm Leader of the Year" in 2011 by the prestigious Latin Lawyer magazine.
In a press conference in Buenos Aires on Wednesday, Bruchou said that enforcement of the Ecuador judgment in Argentina and other Latin American countries will signal to foreign investors that they should apply the same environmental standards they use at home to areas where vulnerable indigenous and farmer communities are located. "We ask for no more than that and no less than that," he said. "We call it responsible foreign investment."
Just recently, a court in Ecuador ordered the seizure of an estimated $200 million in Chevron's assets in that country, which include bank accounts and a $96.3 million debt owed the oil giant by Ecuador's government. Any further investments that Chevron tries to make in the four countries would be subject to seizure and auction, said Fajardo.
The case originally was filed in the U.S. in 1993, but shifted to Ecuador in 2002 at Chevron's request after the oil company praised the courts there as fair and transparent.
After an eight-year trial, the court in Ecuador found in 2011 that Chevron admitted to deliberately dumping billions of gallons of toxic waste into Amazon waterways, decimating indigenous groups and creating an epidemic of cancer that has killed or threatens to kill thousands of people. A video on the case can be seen here; a written summary of the evidence can be read here; and a segment from the U.S. news show 60 Minutes on the case can be viewed here.
The area affected by Chevron's toxic dumping was once one of the most bio-diverse ecosystems on the planet.
Luis Yanza, a representative of the dozens of rainforest communities that brought the lawsuit, praised the filing of the action in Argentina. "The time has come to use the force of law to obligate Chevron to correct its atrocious behavior in our country," Yanza said.
"We have fought now for almost two decades to correct the injustice created by Chevron in Ecuador," said Fajardo, who grew up in Ecuador's oil fields and is the recipient of a CNN Hero Award. "While Chevron might think it can ignore court orders in Ecuador, it will be impossible for Chevron to ignore court orders in countries where it maintains substantial assets," he added.
The action in Argentina comes just weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court denied Chevron's attempt to block enforcement of the judgment, while numerous other U.S. courts have flatly rejected the oil giant's claim that the judgment was the product of "fraud". In May, Chevron CEO John Watson suffered a stunning reprimand when investors holding 38% of the company's shares voted for a resolution that found he mishandled the Ecuador case.
The Amazon Defense Coalition is a part of a regional, national and global struggle for environmental and collective rights in the Ecuadorian Amazon
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I am a forest officer from India. I want to narrate a story. No, my story is not about elephants or tigers or snakes. Those stories about India are commonplace. I wish to narrate a simple story about people, the least-known part of the marathon Indian fable.
Humans are said to have arrived in India very early in world civilization. Some were raised here from the seed of their ancestors; others migrated here from all over the world. Over the centuries these people occupied every inch of soil that could support life. The population of India today is 1.2 billion. Each year, India's population increases by a number nearly equal to the complete population of Australia. Such a prolific growth of numbers is easy to explain; the fertile soil, ample water and tropical warmth of India support the growth of all life forms.
Not all numbers are great, however, and big numbers sometimes exact the price from the wrong persons.
This is my story.
I went to work in the state of Meghalaya in north-eastern India. Pestilence, floods and dense vegetation have made north-eastern India a most inhospitable place. Population is scanty by Indian standards. Life does not extend much beyond the basic chores of finding food and hearth. In the hills, far away from the bustle of modern civilisation, primitive tribal families practice agriculture in its most basic form. Fertilisers are unknown to them, so they cultivate a parcel of land until it loses its fertility, ultimately abandoning it to find other arable land. When the original parcel has finally recovered its fertility after a few years, they move back. It is a ceaseless cycle of migrating back and forth – the so-called practice known as 'shifting cultivation'. Ginger, peas, pumpkin, brinjal and sweet potato can be seen growing on numerous slopes in the Garo Hills of Meghalaya beside the huts of the farmers built on stilts, with chickens roosting below.
Photo credit: http://tarumitra.wordpress.com/
When I reached Meghalaya and looked about at the kind of world I had never seen before, I admit that I found the tribal folk a little strange. They lived in a way that would have appeared bizarre to a modern community. The people did not seem to know how many centuries had passed them by. For me as a forest officer, what looked worst was that that these people appeared to have no comprehension of the value of forests for the planet. They built their huts with wood. They cooked on firewood. Most of their implements were made of wood. A whole tree would be cut and thrown across the banks to make a bridge over a stream. Above all, their crazy practice of shifting cultivation would ultimately remove all the remaining forest.
I decided my main job in this place was to save the forest from its own people, and we enforced Indian laws to preserve the forests.
On one occasion my staff saw a young local man running with an illegally obtained log of wood and started to chase him, waving their guns in the air to scare him. He ran barefoot amid dense bushes a long distance before we managed to apprehend him. I had bruises on my arms and a leech hanging from my armpit drinking my blood by the time the race was over. I admit that in my anger at the time, I wanted to impale the man to the earth at the spot where he had cut down the tree. It was not the leeches and the bruises that angered me. The tree he was carrying was (until quite recently) in perfect condition.
But Meghalaya isn't populated solely by subsistence-farming villagers – there are also a few successful traders originally from big cities who have settled in this economically depressed region. They dress smartly and speak impeccable English. At the time, I remembered wondering how these more sophisticated types could be maintaining their relatively lavish lifestyles among the poor villagers who walked barefoot in the dense forests. On a couple of occasions I dropped in at the home of a prominent trader. He hosted me graciously in his beautiful home. I admit that I enjoyed these visits because they were my only link to the civilization I had become used to prior to moving to Meghalaya. But I never visited the home of any tribal villager, for what could I talk to them about anyway?
Part of my role as forest officer was to organize the collection of logs found cut in the forest – apparently by tribal youths. These my staff and I gathered and stacked neatly into lots for auction. My staff were particularly proud that cars would line up outside our office every time we held an auction – it was something of a local event.
At my first auction I carefully checked the rules. One rule in particular stipulated that a local tribal bidder was allowed a concession of 7.5 %. This means that if he made a bid within 7.5 % less than the highest 'non-tribal' bid, then the tribal bidder would be awarded the timber lot. Still sore from my chase, I thought this rule was crazy. Tribal people were cutting all the trees and then they were getting the lots at a discount! Wouldn't this rule only encourage them to cut down more trees?
Seized wood stacked at a forest beat office in the Garo Hills of Meghalaya awaiting auction. Photo credit: R. Singh Gill
I was ready to conduct my first auction.
Nearly every lot was bought by one particular tribal bidder. I looked at him closely – he seemed an unlikely businessman. He was dressed in crumpled shorts and a button-less shirt closed in the front with a safety pin. I calculated the money he was required to deposit for all the lots he had purchased, and it was a fancy sum. When the last lot was settled, he rose from his seat and left the room. I waited with a mixture of amusement and curiosity.
The man returned in a few minutes with a gunny bag in his hands. He swung the bag menacingly over my table in the way Dennis Lillee would have bowled to Desmond Haynes. Holding it up, he opened the bag and several thick wads of banknotes dropped onto the table. While the accountant nonchalantly counted the money, I stared speechlessly at the man in front of me. How could a person unable to purchase a decent shirt have enough money to buy a load of confiscated timber lots at auction? What sort of a place was this?
"He has done it again, sir." said the accountant after counting the money. "Every lot is his. Sometimes he does not even bother to change the proxy".
"What do you mean by that?" I exclaimed.
The accountant was referring to the wealthy non-tribal trader whose hospitality I had enjoyed. Without appearing at the scene of auction, using the poor tribal bidder as a front man, he had purchased nearly every lot. The government's '7.5 % concession' rule designed to help local tribal communities had been hijacked in full view of the government's officers.
The accountant explained why the trader had to do this. "They sell the woods in big markets like Delhi and Mumbai. If they cut down a tree and run with it, the police will catch them on the way. So they leave the logs for us to seize and buy them in auctions. Now they have the legal right (and documentation) to carry the logs to any place in the country."
I had presided over a charade.
It was the suave traders, not the gauche tribesmen, who were gaining from the destruction of forests in the north-east. The phony bidder who had stood in the auction would only get a few pennies – not enough even to buy him a new shirt.
The problem with forest conservation in India is that those with a symbiotic relationship with forests matter the least. A tribal family only has modest needs for a home and hoe. The drivers of destruction are far away from the forests. They create such incentives that any ploy to steal from the forests can be funded to succeed. I came to realize that it is not 'shifting cultivation' that is destroying the forests in India's north-east, but the economic development in other places fueling an inexhaustible demand for wood. The government, for all its claims to the contrary, is an institution of the elite. It will allow traders to buy wood in stage-managed auctions – and blame the loss of forests on poor, uneducated farmers.
Ranjit Singh GillJoint Director, Forest Survey of IndiaKaulagarh Road, Dehradun – 248195Uttarakhand, India -34.917731 138.603034


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Tired of speculative blog posts about Windows "Blue," the upcoming interim update that will allegedly fix all the problems in Windows 8 and put Microsoft back on course? Speculate no more: Blue has leaked, and now we have a much better idea of what this release really contains.
Spoiler alert: It's exactly what you should have expected, a spit polish update to what's already available in Windows 8, not a mulligan re-do.
According to the Polish tech blog WinForum, a leak of an "alpha" version of Blue—not what Microsoft would call it, but whatever—or build 9364 has appeared online. By comparison, Windows 8 is build 9200.
So. What can we see in the leaked build you ask? Here's what I see in the leaked screenshots. (I have not yet downloaded nor personally evaluated the build.)
More customizable tiles
Like Windows Phone 8, Windows 8 "Blue" sports more tile sizes now, but Blue ups the ante by adding both new smaller and larger tile sizes. The smaller size is obvious, it's just a tiny square, a la Windows Phone, but the bigger one is surprising: It's a double-tall (square) version of the currently-largest tile.
As important—and this is something I expect to see added to Windows Phone "Blue" as well—you can now customize the colors of individual tiles. It's about time. Update: This appears not to be the case in the leaked build, sorry. --Paul
Simpler Start screen personalization
You can now personalize the desktop directly from the desktop, instead of figuring out how to get into PC settings. Smart. And you can now choose between a basically infinite range of background and accent colors, instead of being stuck with a select few of each. Also, it's possible to name Start screen groups without going into semantic zoom mode.
New Snap view
The current Snap mode, which is hard-coded to a particular pixel width, is almost useless, so you'll be happy to hear that Blue adds a new Snap view, in which two apps can be snapped side-by-side with each taking up 50 percent of the screen. (This is one Blue feature I had heard about, so I can at least confirm the veracity of this bit.)
More PC Settings
And here is the second Blue feature I had heard about previously: More, but not all, of the settings in Control Panel have been ported to the Metro-based PC settings, yet another indication that the desktop environment is on the way out. I was told that the Display settings are available in PC settings now, for example. But there's a lot more in the screenshots: New Home and Lock Screen settings groups (that may replace Personalize), Screen (as I had heard about), Accounts (replacing Users), SkyDrive, Privacy, Network, Apps (which includes sub-groups, new to Blue, for Notifications, App sizes, Search, Share, Defaults, and Switching), Time & Language, Update & Recovery (previously part of General), and so on.
Settings pane
The grid of icons in the lower-right of the Settings pane has gotten a small visual update.
Devices pane
The Devices pane has been updated with new icon treatments.
Share pane
You can now share screenshots directly from the Share pane.
Internet Explorer 11
Yes, there's a new version of IE coming, and it will be part of Blue.
New apps?
I could be wrong but it looks like there are now Metro-style Alarms (as during the Windows 8 Beta and in Windows Phone) and Sound Recorder apps. They could be third-party apps, however.
What hasn't changed
Setup appears to be largely unchanged from Windows 8, though the theme color picker is styled a bit differently. The desktop looks the same, complete with ominous pre-release warnings.


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Anyone that has spent time in bear country learns to be on the lookout for momma bears and their cubs and most importantly to never get between the two of them. Often it is a good idea to make a lot of noise when going through these areas to let them know you are nearby, this can avoid very unpleasant confrontations. I used to put a bell on my walking stick so they could hear me. But even with my bell, in the Alaskan bush I would carry a heavy caliber firearm.
Many Native American Peoples legends center around bears and how they are reincarnated spirits from ancient tribes. One in particular I encountered years past was known throughout the land as the "Phantom of the Hoback", a silver backed old bear who bedeviled many who crossed paths with it. Like many ancient tales and lore passed down from our past generations, most can be found to have some fact attached to them.
When Sarah Palin used the Mamma Grizzly metaphor to describe herself and her fellow female candidates in the political arena, I thought it was a beautiful and powerful graphic reality. I have seen more and more powerful women on the right standing up to protect and defend what they believe is their family, our country the U.S.A..
The main stream media descends and savages any right of center female candidate who dares enter the political arena. They are attacked for their looks, for their religious beliefs, for their educational backgrounds, for any imperfections in their family. The press will focus on their pasts with the enthusiasm of a pack of jackals, looking for ANY past indiscretion going back to their elementary school years and even earlier. If that same press would have used its resources and zeal to delve into the background of our current President, I wonder if he would have stood up to the scrutiny, would he have even made it to the nomination stage?
Any right wing female candidate will have to be tougher than her male counterpart in order to survive the slings and arrows tossed at her. Sarah Palin has survived unprecedented attacks on her character over the past 2 1/2 years, that no one running for public office should be subjected to. Our editor, Niall O'Dowd wrote a great piece on that very subject a while back noting the savagery of the attacks on Sarah.
But the reality of the Mamma Grizzly shined last night when I saw Michelle Bachman deliver the Tea Partys rebuttal to President Obamas state of the Union speech. She has taken a stand and is going to fight to protect and defend what she believes in. She is not only a Momma Grizzly, but she has put her Celtic Warrior princess armor on. She is in this fight to the finish. No matter what your political beliefs, you have to respect that kind of strength and determination.


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Posted 11 years ago
(96 items)
Would anyone know more about these boots. I think they are from the 1970's I found a brochure in the box.
The tag only has numbers on it and don't know if they are custom made or something. They are about 20" tall.
Thank you for any help.


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Talented Lil Kesh undoubtedly is one of the youngest talents in the Nigerian music industry and being young doesn't becloud his creativity as he begins 2018 with this new record titled Apa Mi.
The new record is produced by Princeton and from all indications this is one record that has the potentials of becoming a hit. Though the singer doesn't go all lyrical, but the instrumentals have some feel good melodies which will certainly set the dance floors on fire.
Take a breath and listen as Lil Kesh takes us on a journey of fantasies. Don't forget to share your thoughts.
Is this a hit or miss?


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A founding member of Freestyle Fellowship, Aceyalone played an important role in the evolution of left-field hip-hop on the West Coast during an era when hardcore gangsta rap reigned. Following the dissolution of Freestyle Fellowship, Aceyalone embarked on a solo career that never resulted in enormous success but did allow him to maintain his revered status within the West Coast underground hip-hop scene. He debuted solo on All Balls Don't Bounce (1995) and followed-up with A Book of Human Language (1998). After a three-year absence from the hip-hop scene, he returned in 2001 with Accepted Eclectic, an album released by the Ground Control label, which also re-released his debut album. A new label, Project Blowed, issued Hip Hop and the World We Live In (2002) and Love & Hate (2003), the latter featuring collaborations with El-P and Antipop Consortium. In 2004 Project Blowed secured the rights to All Balls Don't Bounce from Capitol and reissued it with a bonus disc, bringing not only extra music but reviving the album after many years out of print. In 2006, Aceyalone released Magnificent City, a collaboration with underground producer RJD2, as well as Grand Imperial, a limited-edition collection of remixes and other exclusive tracks. His 2007 album, Lightning Strikes, was inspired by reggae and dancehall music. It was produced by Bionik, who was also behind the boards for 2009's The Lonely Ones, an album influenced by Motown, soul, and doo wop. Bionik returned for 2013's Leanin' on Slick, another retro-minded album with Cee Lo Green as special guest.
Jason BirchmeierAllMusic.com
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Accepted Eclectic
A Book Of Human Language (Accompanied By Mumbles)
All Balls Don't Bounce Revisited


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Welcome to the Como Pediatric Communication Center. It is our hope that this website will provide you with information that is specific to your child's needs. We offer speech and language therapy, occupational and physical therapy in a family centered environment. Our staff of therapists are amongst the professions best, and they all share a caring heart when it comes to your child and family. Our office offers a warm and inviting atmosphere which will allow your child to feel comfortable upon their arrival and throughout treatment. We have established an excellent rapport with past and present clients, the local school districts and area pediatricians who may choose or have already referred you to us. Their confidence in our ability to serve your family is what has made our center a place where you can count on a focused approach to obtaining results. We look forward to an opportunity to share an experience with your child that helps him/her reach his/her full potential.
The Como Pediatric Communication Center has been open since February, 2003. The center is owned and operated by Craig and Laurie Como.


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WASHINGTON – Mitt Romney's wife is reinforcing her husband's refusal to make public more of his of tax returns, saying "we've given all you people need to know" about the family's finances.
Ann Romney tells ABC News she thinks the Obama campaign's attacks on her husband have been "beneath the dignity of the presidency." And she says people will decide whom to vote for based on whether their lives would be better under Mitt Romney than President Barack Obama.
She says she believes voters are "going to fire the coach."
Ann Romney says the family gives 10 percent of its income to the Mormon church and he took no salary during his four years as Massachusetts governor. She says that should be enough to put aside people's concerns about his finances.