Crisis Management (Political Science)

In recent decades, Western democracies have witnessed substantial changes in the role played by political leaders. In particular, prime ministers have benefited from increasing decision-making autonomy in both the cabinet and the party, to the detriment of party organizations. In this context, Germany represents a deviant case, when compared to other West European democracies: if, on the one hand, the personalization of politics has provided the chancellor with further visibility in the media, on the other hand strong political parties and a complex system of institutional veto points have remained significant sources of limitation to monocratic government. Nevertheless, the policy autonomy of the head of government has increased in many fields: how has this been possible? This chapter investigates how German chancellors have used domestic and international crises as windows of opportunity to find new room for maneuver and promoting crucial policy turns, often in opposition to their parties. The analysis focuses on two chancellors: Gerard Schröder and Angela Merkel, whose governments are contextualized within the executive history of the Federal Republic of Germany since 1949. Particular attention is paid to Merkel’s management of the Covid-19 crisis and the institutional constraints on her action. Findings show that a relative informal strengthening process of the figure of the chancellor has not been paired by relevant changes in chancellor’s normative powers. From a comparative perspective, this result is interpreted as a signal of continuity in the ability of German political institutions to work as counterweights vis-à-vis more personal forms of leadership.

* Publication sponsored by the Federal Foreign Office of Germany (www.auswaertiges-amt.de)

The long-standing disagreements between NATO and Russia have been left unresolved for decades. In 2014 they finally escalated into an outright confrontation on the European continent, in which most European countries are now involved. Armed conflict in Eastern Ukraine, information warfare, along with a military buildup – these developments signalize clearly that European security is in danger today.

If the OSCE is to resolve this crisis, there needs to be more than a high-level dialogue among the OSCE participating States on the future of European security. It could be years before such a dialogue would bring results and a way out of the dangerous confrontation would be found. Until then, this dialogue should be complemented by the OSCE’s work on the ground, through its field operations, targeted at preventing new conflicts similar to that in Ukraine.

This work is particularly needed in the countries of Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus where the lines of geopolitical confrontation are drawn today. Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan – over the fate of these six states a particularly intense struggle has unfolded. While they have been developing closer relations with NATO and the EU, the example of Georgia in 2008 has shown that Russia will oppose the Western influence in its neighbourhood. The more recent example of Ukraine has further demonstrated that the increasing instability in Europe puts even the states without ‘frozen conflicts’ on their territories at risk of an armed conflict that could lead to civil war and partition.

The OSCE and its field operations have been slow to respond strategically to these new challenges. In contrast to the field operations in the Western Balkans, the OSCE operations in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus are much smaller and have lower budgets. Unlike the OSCE field operations in Central Asia, they do not have explicit conflict prevention mandates focusing instead on the resolution of already existing ‘frozen conflicts’. Moreover, in three of the six countries of Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus – Azerbaijan, Belarus and Georgia – there is no OSCE field operations at all.

This chapter will present the evidence of why the risk of new armed conflicts in Eastern Europe and the South Caucasus is real. It will then argue that the OSCE should respond to the challenge by, firstly, enlarging its field operations in Moldova and Armenia, secondly,  re-establishing  the  field operations in  Georgia, Azerbaijan and Belarus, and, thirdly, tasking all field operations in Eastern Europe  and the South Caucasus with conflict prevention.

Krizler, orgut yapisinin hantalligi ve yonetim yetersizligi gibi orgut ici sebeplerle ortaya ciktigi gibi, genel ekonomik belirsizlik ve dalgalanmalar, teknolojik gelismeler, siyasi, hukuki, sosyal ve kulturel degismeler, guclu rekabet sartlarindan dogan dezavantajlar ve uluslararasi cevreden gelen etkiler sonucu da ortaya cikmaktadir. Bir orgutun surekli bir degisimin yasandigi cevreye ayak uyduramamasi ve degimi idare edememesi sonucunda stratejik aciklik olusur. Krizin meydana gelmesi ve siddeti, orgut ile cevresi arasindaki bagimlilik derecesine, orgutun krizi algilama bicimine ve krize gosterdigi tepkiye baglidir. Ozel sektorde faaliyet gosteren isletmeler veya kamu sektorunde mal ve hizmet sunan, kamu yararini amaclayan kurum ve kuruluslar, yani kisaca orgutler ic ve dis cevrelerindeki degismelere ayak uyduramazlarsa ve planlari disinda gelisen beklenmedik durumlara hazirlikli olmazlarsa krizlerle karsi karsiya kalmaktadirlar. Kamu yonetimleri degismeye direnen ve mevzuatla si...

The changes in the institutional structure of the EU brought about by the Lisbon treaty and recent developments in economic governance are offering scholars new fields of interest. In particular, the emergence of the European Council - and its President - as the institution driving integration further in times of crisis, the extension of co-decision and the continued quest for legitimacy through transparency are among the factors inviting scholars to cast new light on the role and functioning of the European Council and to re-assess the role and functioning of the Council of the European Union. The General Secretariat to both institutions has also increasingly been the object of scholarly enquiry.
The Library of the General Secretariat, a part of DG Communication and Document Management, wishes to contribute to and foster further research by offering scholars, libraries and civil society a structured bibliography of literature on the European Council, the Council of the European Union and their General Secretariat. The bibliography has been compiled by the Library on the basis of its own holdings and of targeted bibliographical research. It has greatly benefited from contributions by a variety of individual researchers and academic institutions throughout Europe and is constantly being updated with new contributions.
In its enhanced and updated January 2016 edition, the bibliography contains more than 1750 records: monographs, theses, academic articles and chapters of books. Records are indexed with EuroVoc descriptors http://eurovoc.europa.eu/ and classified by subject area. EuroVoc, the EU's multilingual thesaurus, is freely available via the EU Open Data Portal: http://open-data.europa.eu/en/data/dataset/eurovoc
In addition to the present printed release, the bibliography can be searched and browsed online at: http://ec.europa.eu/eclas/F?func=find-a-0&local_base=BIB
The Library invites research communities to use the bibliography and welcomes comments and suggestions on additional resources to be included. All materials referenced in the bibliography are held in full text in the Library and inter-library loans can be arranged. Researchers and students can access Library collections on site by appointment.

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The reification of humanitarian borders generates a politics of crisis that weakens the capacity to produce structural political changes and legitimizes exceptionalism and the reproduction of hierarchized borders. In this article, I argue that a critique of crisis implies the possibility of thinking about migration beyond the limits of humanitarian borders, therefore locating debates about political action and change within the realm of ordinary politics rather than that of emergency and exceptionalism. In contemporary Europe, a critique of crisis is a critique of power. It is thus a way to develop a political vision of borders and mobility beyond the humanitarian order of things.

In recent years, there has been a notable surge in the number of international organizations involved in military crisis management and capacity-building initiatives. Particularly in Africa, organizations such as the European Union, NATO, the United Nations, the African Union as well as lesser known organizations such as the Standby High Readiness Brigade for UN Operations (SHIRBRIG), have increasingly ventured into this field. This has created unprecedented opportunities, but also fundamental risks.

This special issue provides a critical analysis of cooperation and rivalry between core international organizations in the field of peacekeeping, peacebuilding and long-term capacity-building.

Senior scholars and practitioners provide new insights and practical recommendations on how to make more effective use of the growing phenomenon of inter-organizationalism in peace and security.

Krizler, örgüt yapısının hantallığı ve yönetim yetersizliği gibi örgüt içi sebeplerle ortaya çıktığı gibi, genel ekonomik belirsizlik ve dalgalanmalar, teknolojik gelişmeler, siyasî, hukukî, sosyal ve kültürel değişmeler, güçlü rekabet şartlarından doğan dezavantajlar ve uluslararası çevreden gelen etkiler sonucu da ortaya çıkmaktadır. Bir örgütün sürekli bir değişimin yaşandığı çevreye ayak uyduramaması ve değişimi idare edememesi sonucunda stratejik açıklık oluşur. Krizin meydana gelmesi ve şiddeti, örgüt ile çevresi arasındaki bağımlılık derecesine, örgütün krizi algılama biçimine ve krize gösterdiği tepkiye bağlıdır. Özel sektörde faaliyet gösteren işletmeler veya kamu sektöründe mal ve hizmet sunan, kamu yararını amaçlayan kurum ve kuruluşlar, yani kısaca örgütler iç ve dış çevrelerindeki değişmelere ayak uyduramazlarsa ve planları dışında gelişen beklenmedik durumlara hazırlıklı olmazlarsa krizlerle karşı karşıya kalmaktadırlar. Kamu yönetimleri değişmeye direnen ve mevzuatla sınırlı yapıları gereği kriz durumlarında esnek ve hızlı yönetimi gerektiren karar ve uygulamaları yerine getirmekte zorlanmaktadırlar. Personel ve örgüt yapılarından kaynaklanan iç sebepler ve sosyal, siyasî, idarî, malî ve ekonomik sebeplerden doğabilecek dış sebepler kamusal örgütlerin krize girmelerine yol açmaktadır. Ancak genelde kamu yönetiminde kriz yönetimi uygulamaları denilince afet yönetimi konusundaki çalışmalar ön plana çıkmaktadır. Bu çalışmada, kriz kavramı, özellikleri ve kriz yönetiminin teorik çerçevesi sunulduktan sonra, afet yönetiminden daha geniş bir model olan kriz yönetiminin kamu yönetimi için önemi üzerinde durulmaktadır. Türk kamu yönetiminde kriz yönetimi uygulamalarının son yıllardaki durumu ve yapılması gerekli düzenlemeler incelenmektedir. - Crises can emerge due to; not only organizational structure clumsiness and
insufficient management, but also general economic uncertainty and volatility,
technological developments, political, legal, social and cultural changes, strong
competition arising from the disadvantages and effects from international
environment. A strategic gap emerges, if organization experiencing constant
change of environment cannot keep up and handle with that. The occurrence and
severity of the crisis, depends on the degree of dependence between the
organization and its environment, crisis perception level of the organization, and
the response of the organization to the crisis.
If enterprises operating in the private sector and the agencies, and public interest
aimed institutions providing public sector goods and services lag behind the
internal and external environment changes and are not prepared for the
unexpected situations, which emerge out of their plans, they face crises.
Public administrations have difficulty in making the flexible and speed requiring
decisions and fulfilling the needed actions in crisis situations due to their
structure, which resist change and is limited with legal regulations. Internal
causes resulting from staff and organizational structure; and the external causes
arising from social, political, administrative, financial, and economic reasons,
lead public organizations into crisis. However, when crisis management in public
administration is the subject; generally the practices in the field of disaster
management come forward.
In this study, after stating the concept of crisis, its features, the theoretical
framework of crisis management, importance crisis management, which is a
more complex model than disaster management, in public administration will be
focused. The situation about crisis management implementations in Turkish
public administration practice and the necessary practices and regulations will
be examined.

International migration represent a multifaceted phenomenon, composed and powered by environmental, social, economic and political factors, all intertwined. This complexity results in an increased categorization of migrants for employment, seasonal, skilled, political and environmental issues, all intended to increase in number and inten- sity. Although many of nowadays migrants are driven by several factors, in this article the author intends to deepen the latest categories of environmental migrants, concerning those people forced to flee from food crises. In this regard, the paper will attempt to shed a light on the relationship between food crises – especially those in which one of contributory causes have been fluctuations in food prices – and migration, both internal- ly and internationally. In addition, the author intends to examine the role played by migration in alleviating and supporting the difficulties of people affected by the food cri- sis. Indeed, it will be highlighted how transnational migration can represent a coping strategy against environmental and food crisis prevailing in a country and, at the same time, it will be analysed how migrants can help and sustain their families, and more generally food security, in specific geographical area, for example through remittances sent by migrant workers. To this end, two case studies concerning the Djibouti and Kyrgyzstan will be taken into exam, the first one as is affected by internally displaced people, the second due to international migrations occurring in the country.

In the context of democratization and democratic consolidation, internal political crises, caused by either external shocks or dynamics in the domestic arena, pose a significant challenge to the stability of the Georgian political system. Such crises can jeopardize not only internal order but also Georgia’s relations with external actors. Consequently, analyzing the government strategies of crisis management and identifying lessons from failures or successes is key to improving the level of national resilience. This paper aims at evaluating the Georgian government’s responses to domestic political crises. It also provides insights, based on the Lithuanian experience, on how such responses can be improved in order to strengthen national resilience.

¿Serán parte de la solución, o del problema?

A los detractores, para que consideren las causas
que influyeron en el nacimiento de Podemos.

A los seguidores, para que eviten
confundir sus deseos con la realidad.

A unos y otros, que enfrentan conflictos similares
para combatir ‘la nueva normalidad’.

Until the late 15th century, the term “crisis” – from Greek krinein “to decide” – denoted the turning point of a grave illness, a change that leads either to patient’s recovery or death. Today, an international crisis, if not averted, can result in the death of millions of people.

Since the end of World War II, the UN has played a major role in preventing political disagreements, military accidents, ethnic and religious tensions from turning into large-scale armed conflicts. The OSCE has been one of the key organizations to share this responsibility with the UN, focusing primarily on the European continent. The OSCE’s crisis management capabilities began to grow in the early 1990s. During this process, the dissolution of Yugoslavia and of the Soviet Union triggered an ad hoc creation of OSCE field operations, now a key instrument in the OSCE’s crisis management toolkit. The first long-term OSCE operation – the Observation Mission of Long Duration in Kosovo, Sandjak and Vojvodina – commenced in 1992. Soon after, further field operations were established in the Western Balkans, Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus and Central Asia.

Since their creation, OSCE field operations have demonstrated mixed results in their crisis management work. The OSCE Centre in Bishkek was unable to avert the 2010 crisis in Kyrgyzstan. Not only did it turn violent, but also its death toll was higher than in the previous 1990 Kyrgyzstan’s inter-ethnic clashes. Tajikistan, Moldova and FYROM, despite their earlier history of civil and separatist wars, have only experienced minor conflicts in recent years. And many crises were averted from turning violent, not without the contribution made by the OSCE field operations in these three countries. Finally, Ukraine, which had not gone through even a minor armed conflict during its late Soviet and post-independence history, since 2014 has been coping with a crisis that has already taken almost 10,000 lives, and which the OSCE was not able to prevent.

The central research question of this study is: Why have some OSCE field operations been more effective in crisis management than others?

This study aims at providing academic advice that could inform policy and aid in improving the OSCE’s operation and strategy. It, therefore, analyzes the factors that lie firmly in the hands of the OSCE and of its participating States: the mandates of OSCE field operations and the resources at their disposal.

The study is based on document and secondary literature analysis. Where necessary, we requested information from respective OSCE field operations.

The paper is organized as follows. The next chapter provides a brief overview of the current policies and the state of the art in international crisis management in general and the role of OSCE field operations therein in particular. In the second chapter, we present our theoretical model of crisis management success. The third chapter lays out the case selection, research method and design. The fourth chapter is a case study that offers empirical evidence to assess our hypothesis. The final results and the main findings of the study are summarized in the conclusions.

The article considers the conceptual framework of EU security law and its realization in crisis management strategy, approaches to Eastern Europe and Ukrainian security issues, sanctions against Russia, EU missions to Ukraine. The object of the study is to distinguish and reconstruct the most important concepts underlying the security law of the EU, the legal ideology thereof and its implementation in the situation of Russian-Ukrainian armed conflict. The same way, the study provides a new key to understand the principal conceptual transformations of the international security law. The study shows that EU has implemented a wide range of non-military peacekeeping / anti-crisis instruments of its foreign policy in response to Russia's armed aggression against Ukraine, in particular, political, diplomatic, economic, trade, civilian operational. And they should not be derogated. But, given the general features of the development of the Union's foreign and security law and policy, there is no reason to expect that the Union will play a crucial role in restoring Ukraine's territorial integrity. Instead, as the authors propose, the intentions, potential and tools of the EU's "soft power", including the potential of two functioning EU missions, should be fully exploited to de-escalate the crisis, enhance the resilience and economic development of the Ukrainian state, and manage conflicts in Ukrainian society. That could be the proper way to implement positively the new international security law paradigm potential.

This article examines how cognitive and normative ideas influence the ability of the European Union (EU) to formulate common policies in response to international crises such as the 2002–2003 Iraq crisis and the Iranian nuclear crisis (since 2002). It argues that in crisis situations, i.e. in highly uncertain circumstances, ideas often become the principal guide for policy-makers. More specifically, ideas foster interpretations of a crisis along several core themes: above all, how the crisis issue is perceived, which means are deemed to be legitimate and/or effective and, depending on the particular crisis, how other relevant themes are seen, e.g. the appropriate relationship with the United States. Thus, the formulation of common EU crisis response depends on the convergence of these interpretations in Member States – as in the Iran crisis. On the contrary, if Member States’ interpretations diverge beyond a common ‘ideational space’ – as in the case of Iraq – dissonance will be the probable outcome.

"Il breve contributo discute il rapporto che nell'attuale fase di crisi economico-politica globale si instaura tra sovranità, stato e democrazia. In primo luogo, si discutono quell’insieme di trasformazioni e mutamenti nelle forme dell’organizzazione sociale e politica che non sono più rappresentabili e mediabili nello spazio giuridico e politico della sovranità: intesa come una certa modalità di comporre un potere pubblico razionale cui superiorem non recognoscens, quanto come una specifica forma di legittimazione politica. Diverso è il tema della persistenza dell’oggetto “stato”; una complessa architettura istituzionale e politica – anch’essa difficilmente definibile in maniera univoca – di cui si vuole vagliare il ruolo, le funzioni, insomma la tenuta dell’insieme dei poteri e degli attori che operano sul piano globale. Distinguere sovranità e
stato è un esercizio teorico decisivo. Infine, un terzo elemento problematico è dato dalle mutazioni interne alle forme del governo rappresentativo e della democrazia pluralista che sembrano
svuotarne i percorsi di legittimazione e che segnalano, per contro, un eccesso di autorizzazione politica. L’indebolimento delle procedure di legittimazione democratico rappresentativa e quindi dei luoghi in cui questa legittimazione si esprime – in primo luogo i parlamenti – a fronte di esecutivi sempre più forti, le trasformazioni
nei dispositivi di divisione e bilanciamento dei poteri, l’allentarsi delle forme della partecipazione civica anche in ragione di un sistema dei partiti in profonda trasformazione: sono tutti fattori – se ne potrebbero indicare molti altri – che spingono verso forme di democrazia dell’emergenza o di modelli di democrazia dell’efficacia o di governance."

The concept of crisis is getting more and more popular nowadays. We use it in our daily lives, denoting different problems in wide-range areas of knowledge. Although, the rise of the popularity of this concept doesn’t help us in the process of understanding the nature of the crisis. Moreover, popularity has become a kind of obstacle to the operationalization of the concept of crisis. A significant part of studying the crises should be focused on political crises. Probably, they are the most important point of this wide scientific area, because they refer to the political system, which is the focal point of the societies. We must understand the nature and the specific characteristics of the political crises in order to overcome them in the best way.

The political response to the pandemic has ranged from the extraordinary domestic measures of national governments to the exceptionalism of supranational authorities and of governments in concert.  While moves of the first kind recall the Hobbesian sovereign state, the latter mark a distinctively transnational and diffuse form of emergency politics, most visible in the European Union.  This piece examines this relatively new mode of emergency rule, which extends patterns emerging over more than a decade.  It shows how these produce new variations on familiar democratic problems of informal and concentrated power, how they can incite a reactionary response, and what these observations imply for the EU’s future.

In the context of democratization and democratic consolidation, internal political crises, caused by either external shocks or dynamics in the domestic arena, pose a significant challenge to the stability of the Georgian political system. Such crises can jeopardize not only internal order but also Georgia’s relations with external actors. Consequently, analyzing the government strategies of crisis management and identifying lessons from failures or successes is key to improving the level of national resilience. This paper aims at evaluating the Georgian government’s responses to domestic political crises. It also provides insights, based on the Lithuanian experience, on how such responses can be improved in order to strengthen national resilience.

Suudi Arabistan’ın “Aramco” petrol tesislerine son zamanlarda yapılan İHA saldırısı, bir yandan İran ile Suudi Arabistan arasındaki ve diğer yandan İran ve ABD arasındaki politik gerilimi artırdı. Saldırıların sebebi ve Yemenli Husiler veya başkası tarafından yapılması ne olursa olsun, saldırının koşulları ve saldırının zamanlaması, çok önemlidir. Çünkü Fransa cumhurbaşkanı Macron’un İran- ABD arasında olan krizin azaltması için arabuluculuk dönemine denk gelmekte ayrıca, BM 74. Olağan toplantısının arefesinde müzakere havasının başlaması ve olası Ruhani- Trump görüşme ümidi yaşanırken işte bu olay çok büyük yankılar yaratarak İran’ı itham ve zan altına bırakmıştır. Nitekim Suudi Arabistan'ın en büyük müttefiki olan ABD, İran’a işaret etti. Her ne kadar Yemen'de Suudi güçleriyle savaşmakta olan Şii Husi isyancı güçleri saldırıyı üstenmiş olsalar da ABD İran'ı suçlamaya başlayınca, son derecede tehlikeli ekonomik, siyasi dinamikler harekete geçti.

Mesmo com índices recordes de impopularidade e alvo de denúncias de corrupção, Temer mantém controle sobre mais da metade da Câmara. Seu impeachment foi impedido, mas com alto custo. Seu governo perdeu a capacidade de aprovar mudanças constitucionais.

Nessa vitória inconclusiva, com a economia em passos de jabuti, Temer se contentará em preservar a própria pele.

ABSTRACT Bringing together contributions from a multi-disciplinary and international group of experts, this volume explores the effects and legacies of Argentina's 2001-2002 social, economic, and political implosion. Interrogating the nature and effects of the crisis, the contributors reject the dichotomy of 'old' and 'new'; instead, they argue that responses to the crisis and the factors that precipitated the crisis are a combination of pre-existing and emerging problems, many of them ones that were perceptible in the 1990s and earlier. The multi-disciplinary analysis has implications beyond Argentina. This volume is essential reading for researchers, students, and policymakers interested in crisis, responses to it, and subsequent processes of recovery. http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/?sf1=id_product&st1=758971