Article I co-wrote with Joe Curtin, a colleague at the IIEA, in openDemocracy Read the rest of this entry »
Making better presentations
19 May 2008
In 2003, I delivered my worst presentation ever at the podium of the Royal Irish Academy. I stood and read an irrelevant academic paper, to a disinterested audience, and had planned my delivery so poorly that it was necessary to skip paragraphs at random to keep within time. Since then I’ve looked at how Hardt, Lessig, Kawaneski, and Zittrain present complicated issues in engaging ways. I’ve learnt four rules from their example. Read the rest of this entry »
The Talk of The Year
2 May 2008
Interview with head of Frontex
3 April 2008
I interviewed Ilkka Laitinen, Director of Frontex, the EU border security agency, for the European Biometrics Forum yesterday.
Short interview on the future of Biometrics
29 March 2008
I interviewed Frank Paul, Head of Large-Scale Information Systems, at the European Commission DG FSJ, about the future of biometrics in the European Union…
Irish Independent - coverage of O’Reilly Foundation Scholarship
25 January 2008
I was profiled in the Irish Independent in an article about the O’Reilly Scholarship:
“…his first book, ‘Countering Militant Islamist Radicalisation on the Internet’, which was launched last year by the former chair of the UK Joint Intelligence Committee, Dame Pauline Neville-Jones. The book argued against the European Commission’s suggestion of using internet censorship to combat terror, and was heavily cited in the Commission’s official impact report that decided to abandon the idea of an EU-wide internet censorship system.”
I’m not too sure about the reference to “MI5 Spies!!”, but it was nice to publicise the O’Reilly Foundation and the support it has given to Irish researchers. See more below… Read the rest of this entry »
My review of Paul Rogers’ Towards sustainable security
5 December 2007
My review of Rogers’ Towards sustainable security is online on Nthposition. [link]
UPDATED THIS PROJECT HAS CONCLUDED. Most of the resulting materials have been made openly available. See My 2007 book [buy it on Amazon] or [read it free at Google Books] and my related articles which are more up to date. Also, I have now initiated a new phase in this research, finally returning to Cambridge to continue PhD work on this area - see details of research here. Read the rest of this entry »
Published as Institute of European Affairs Justice & Home Affairs Update, April 2006 [To see the original JHA UPDATE for April 2006, browse to http://www.iiea.com/newsletter/april2006/jhaapril06full.html]
Welcome to the first JHA update of 2006. This service from the Institute of European Affairs will regularly update you about developments in Justice & Home Affairs (JHA). JHA is the fastest developing policy area in the EU and now includes immigration, trafficking, counter terrorism, fraud, fundamental rights, citizenship, increasingly close police-, security- and judicial cooperation, and action in non-EU countries. This update focuses on the integration of immigrants in the EU and illustrates how JHA issues play an increasingly large and direct role in the lives of EU citizens and in the EU’s relations with other nations. Read the rest of this entry »
Complexity in the war on terror
20 March 2005
Published in Magill, March 2005. Note: This article was a rebuttal of Dr Millar’s piece, ‘No surrender to holy terrorists’, which appeared in the same pages.
In the previous article, Rory Miller of King’s College London writes that we in the West must not compromise with what he calls ‘Holy Terror’. He suggests that all Islamic militants across a very broad spectrum fully identify with al-Qaeda and are engaged in a civilizational struggle against the West. Those in the West who do not respond to this challenge are soft and dithering. In this conflict Dr Miller tells us that to compromise is to surrender. Yet his discussion of so-called ‘holy terror’ offers an oversimplified catch-all view of political Islam and Islamic militancy.
Assessing the recommendations of the coalition for a realistic foreign policy in their January 2005 statement in the Economist.
15 February 2005
“Americans should be deeply concerned that we are so unpopular in the region inasmuch as it makes it harder, rather than easier, for us to achieve our major national security objectives in the Middle East”.[1]
In The Economist’s first edition of 2005, the coalition for a realistic foreign policy (‘the coalition’ hereafter) published a statement criticizing the Bush administration’s Middle East policy.[2] According to the signatories, the continued Israeli-Palestinian stalemate jeopardizes America’s two key regional objectives: defeating Al Qaeda and preserving access to oil. They criticize President George Bush Jr’s unreserved support for Israeli expansion and occupation. The support Read the rest of this entry »
Unipolar moment or unipolar era?
5 February 2005
UNIPOLAR MOMENT OR UNIPOLAR ERA: THE FUTURE OF AMERICA’S ASSERTIVE GRAND STRATEGY
February 2005.
In the run up to the 2000 election, Condoleezza Rice laid out the central tenet of candidate Bush’s foreign policy manifesto: ‘Foreign policy in a Republican administration will … proceed from the firm ground of the national interest, not from the interests of an illusory international community’.[1] Five years later, one European newspaper marked President Bush’s second inauguration by announcing ‘world fears new Bush era’ on its front page.[2] In the interim, an
Principled failure: British policy toward Rhodesia, 1971-72
20 February 2004
The History Review 2004. Copyright Johnny Ryan 2004.
INTRODUCTION
The choice lies starkly between a compromise settlement, which by definition will not satisfy anyone but which will gain for the Africans substantial new opportunities for advancement, and a rapid and complete polarisation of the races and the prospect of conflict.[1]
In May 1972 the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary told the British Parliament that the peoples of Rhodesia stood at the crossroads between two destinies: they could accept a compromise settlement or suffer total racial polarisation and civil war. By then, the choice was already made. Despite attempts to initiate dialogue between the European and African parties in Rhodesia, British diplomacy failed to avert slaughter.
