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In order to describe the environment surrounding us, so complex in terms of relations resulting from using violence, we easily employ terms such as 'partisan' or 'militant', just in order to define the very same ones as terrorists a while later. Probably the benchmark of contemporary description, especially of political action is the lack of clear-cut attitudes. Terrorism is nothing new, and this statement in itself is not very revealing. However, for many contemporary researchers of this issue, there is never too much information. Terrorism has always accompanied the history of oppressive regimes as well as resistance movements and uprisings. All the same, within the anti-colonial insurrectionary movements of the mid-20th century which led to the fall of European colonial empires over a short period of time, terrorism achieved new quality. It should also be emphasized that it achieved considerable political successes compared to the social-revolutionary terrorism of the late 19th century. The attribute 'terrorist' serves as an excluding one in different relations. By employing such term, one that their cause is an unconventional one – leastways as long as specific ways of using violence are applied. On the other hand, groups classified as terrorist ones often describe themselves as partisans who are fighting for the liberation of certain social or ethnic groups and who have to employ “unconventional” methods of using force because of the military superiority of the oppressive regime. By describing certain actions as 'terrorist' one usually intends on bereaving it of every sort of political legitimation. Is there any aspect that terrorism and guerrilla actions have in common? In certain socio-revolutionary or ethno-separatist strategies of violence, the concept of terrorism consists in the idea of a 'starter' which is to create the conditions to commence the guerrilla war. There could also be groups acting as partisans on one front line, and as terrorists on the other. The example is Al-Qaeda: in Central Asia its network operated only temporarily, as a kind of guerrilla, while in the global scale it employed terrorist strategy.
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The article investigates Dobrudzha (in the political boundaries of Bulgaria and Romania) – a zone of interpenetration of identities and cultural practices among the population as a result of its long co-habitation within the Ottoman Empire on the Black sea shores and on the banks of the lower Danube River. The author uses a syncretic approach, including observation in situ allowing both for the pointing out of the “internal” multiplicity of practices connected to one or more denominations, as well as for the outlining of ‘trans-confessional’ and the ‘trans-ethnic’ similarities – healing practices, contacts with trees, stones and springs as the intermediaries of the divine. The aim is to investigate some details, as well as to reveal common places and diversity.
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The article draws attention to some aspects of the political culture of the Bulgarian Turks. On one hand, there is a pronounced nostalgia for socialism associated with the individual security and economic stability. On the other hand, the positive assessment of European integration is understood as free access to Western European labor markets. How does the “economic” factor influence the political culture of this population at the beginning of the XXI century?
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Nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons represent the biggest danger to humanity. During the Cold War, the US and USSR provided ‘umbrella protection’ to convince allies not to acquire nuclear weapons. Most ‘newly’ independent nations never had such security during the Cold War since they were not part of a power bloc. During the Iran-Iraq conflict (1980-1988), the Islamic Republic of Iran was attacked with chemical weapons. Since Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), an Iranian exile organization, exposed Iran's hidden nuclear program in 2002, the topic has gained worldwide attention. Iran's nuclear agenda has produced a worldwide catastrophe despite its NPT membership. Iran says its nuclear program is peaceful and respects Islamic values. Most US politicians and academics consider Iran a rough nation with political and strategic concerns, including regional hegemony, human rights, terrorism, WMD proliferation, and military operations beyond the border. This study examines Iran's nuclear policies to demonstrate its essence, goal, and strategy.
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This paper shows how governments are reluctant to take decisions to allow GMO products for human use and to change them. It also draws a comparison about the allowance and usage of GMO products between Russia and Egypt (with the United States of America representing the largest country around the world in using GMO products). The results of the study are supported by the data of a survey among certain age groups from the Russian and Egyptian populations, conducted by the authors of the paper. As a solution, the Egyptian and Russian governments should allow imports and cultivation of GMO crops under supervision by departments to guarantee their safety. The authors see that GMO products are the best solution to face the potential food shortage for most of the countries dependent on foods imported from Ukraine and Russia because of the Russia-Ukraine war.
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The subject of the research, the results of which are presented in this article, was the ongoing armed conflict in Ukraine, which began on February 24, 2022. The aim of the research was to analyze the course of hostilities and identify the causes and consequences of Russian failures. The article tries to answer the following questions: How do Russian actions present themselves in the context of the concept of new generation war? What mistakes did Russia make, and What were their consequences? What factors determined the failure of the first phase of the Russian operation? In the course of the conducted research, it was established that the Russians did not fully exploit the potential of the concept of new generation warfare. It was proved that the Russian operation in Ukraine was conducted inconsistently with the canons of the art of war. It was assessed that there was a set of key factors that had a decisive impact on the failure of the first phase of the Russian operation in relation to its strategic objectives, as outlined in February 2024. It was shown that the first of these was a critical error of misjudging the enemy's potential while overestimating the potential of their own troops. It was established that the Russians prepared and executed the invasion of Ukraine contrary to the canons of the art of war. It was shown that financial resources were misallocated during the implementation of the State Armament Program in 2020. Moreover, it was proved that corruption and wastefulness, underlying the de facto autocratic system of power existing in Russia, are responsible for the actual, different from propaganda, general state of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. In the article, the method of critical analysis, to which the available source material (articles, reports, monographs) was subjected, and the method of historical analysis made it possible to analyze the evolution of the Russian concept of a new generation of war were used. Also, the method of induction was used to draw general conclusions from a number of specific observations, the method of deduction was used in the process of moving from general rationales to specifics, and the method of synthesis helped to examine cause-and-effect relationships concerning the subject matter addressed and made it possible to formulate the conclusions. A significant difficulty in the research process was the issue of using Russian sources in a situation where articles with a clear propaganda character are posted in trade journals and other available sources, making their substantive value low. Therefore, the article refrains from citing Russian sources.
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The increase in the amount of data today has led to the use of computer applications in order to manage processes precisely. Robotic process automation (RPA), also known as software robotics, uses automation technologies to mimic back-office tasks of human workers, such as extracting data, filling in forms, moving files, et cetera. Optical character recognition (OCR) is sometimes referred to as text recognition. An OCR program extracts and repurposes data from scanned documents, camera images and image-only pdfs. OCR systems use a combination of hardware and software to convert physical, printed documents into machine-readable text. Hardware such as an optical scanner or specialized circuit board copies or reads text then, software typically handles the advanced processing. Process Automation in Azure Automation allows you to automate frequent, time-consuming, and error-prone management tasks. This service helps you focus on work that adds business value. In this paper, I will use the above-mentioned technologies to realize the automatic data generation process for the construction of an online library. In addition, the level of data accuracy will be studied in the automation of data generation from pdf files to mySql. The application will be built in front end html and back end php programming language and mySql database. These tests will be done by inserting more than 17000 books in pdf format.
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The paper “Geopolitical assessment of cultural diffusion in Moscopole of the XVIII century” is a professional effort to convey to scholars, teachers, specialists of local and central government, tourism and entrepreneurship, findings and interesting facts about Moscopole, a mountainous resort village, in the southeastern Albania. This paper deals with the concept of cultural diffusion of the medieval city of Moscopole (XVIII century). The paper analyzes the indicators that highlight the flourishing of the city of Moscopole in the years 1750–1769 and the cultural richness that this nucleus of civilization conveyed to Albanian territories and further in the Balkans. The methodology followed is based on the research method, intertwined with information processing, comparison, and data synthesis analysis. This cultural diffusion and rich historical heritage have turned Moscopole into a model for the development of mountain tourism.
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Through a critical analysis of J. Morawiecki’s Szuga. Krajobraz po imperium [Szuga. Landscape after the Empire], Paweł Rogalski ponders a number of questions: Does Russia still exist in the 21st century in the imperial discourse? Has the superpower paradigm, as a certain manifestation of anarchy and a fallen myth, not already been ruined or exhausted? Is the empire an episode necessary historically to balance forces in a global crisis? Is the war in Ukraine (2014 and 2022) perhaps the “new-old” founding murder of the Eastern civilization, incorporating the model of the Russian empire? Does ideology as a glue, instead of positively constructing the subjectivity of the community, contribute to building a new, dangerous phantasm of the empire? In this context, the travel narrative authenticates the message by reaching abandoned and blurry places, where the encountered human subject generates not only events and adventures, but is a record of ideological traces left on the body and the psyche. As Czesław Niedzielski wrote: “In all varieties of reportage prose, the identity of the speaking subject and the author (regardless of the form of the reporting) is one of the basic premises determining the documentary and, most of all, the authentic qualities of the genre”.
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This article focused on two distinct areas: diplomacy for AI and AI for diplomacy. The first point investigated challenges faced by diplomats associated with creating stability in cyberspace and diversifying objects of cooperation. The second point sought to identify the threats and opportunities associated with AI in diplomacy; to explore the impact of digital tools on diplomatic capacity, technological limitations through digital diplomacy, and uncertain future demand for the diplomatic profession; to investigate the necessary competencies of civil servants in managing alternative reality and collaborating with technical specialists. The research utilized a qualitative approach, employing analysis of existing literature and diplomatic practices related to AI and its effects on diplomacy. The research underscored the importance of diplomats’ readiness for change and their understanding and utilization of new technologies. It highlighted the need for interdisciplinary training programs incorporating innovative thinking, big data management, and machine learning to foster effective collaboration between diplomats and technical specialists. We concluded that embracing AI and digital capabilities can empower diplomats and enhance the effectiveness of diplomatic instruments in achieving national goals in times of peace and hybrid war in the real world and the metauniverse.
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Kinga Wyskiel’s article concerns the issue of gender in science fiction stories by Julia Nidecka. The following stories have been analysed and interpreted: “Wilki na wyspie” [Wolves on the Island], “Taśmy prawdy” [Tapes of Truth], “Kwiaty w bukiecie” [Flowers in a Bouquet] and “Goniący za słońcem” [Chasing the Sun]. Wyskiel considers two dominant strategies for the representation of femininity in these stories and focuses on Nidecka’s images of the woman scientist and the mutant woman present in them. Wyskiel also points out that gender is an a priori category in Nidecka’s future worlds and that, consequently, the construction of those worlds has been based on the gender matrix.
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In this article, Jerzy Stachowicz examines selected literary works the represent the science fiction genre of the interwar period. He focuses on pacifist visions of the future in those works and argues that these scientistic, military, and superpower fantasies have an anti-war potential, and that fantasy literature itself can, to some extent, be regarded as a „pacifist practice”.
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Research on health diplomacy not only deepens global health governance but also enhances the sharing of information and resources in the field of public health. A bibliometric study was conducted on health diplomacy works published between 1993 and 2023 with “health diplomacy”, “medicine diplomacy”, “health and foreign policy”, or “vaccine diplomacy” as the keywords. VOSviewer and CiteSpace were used to perform the bibliometric analysis. A total of 2,216 articles from the Web of Science database were analyzed. Results found that the United States held a prominent and influential position in health diplomacy studies, followed by China, the United Kingdom, and Australia. The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, the University of Toronto, and Harvard University were the top three research institutes for health diplomacy. The article from Feldbaum et al. (2010) served as the representative and symbolic reference. These findings showed that topics including power, Covid-19, security, soft power, WHO, vaccine diplomacy, and governance, though with shorter spans, were the focal points in recent years. In addition, health diplomacy research exhibited interdisciplinary, cross-cutting, and temporal characteristics closely related to factors such as politics, economics, environment, and public goods.
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This article discusses a new model of the threat of Indonesian terrorism, especially in the East Java region. Indonesian terrorism continues to grow even more dangerous than before because terrorism has a dynamic nature following the times. The research method for this article was a literature study, with data collection techniques using the Harzing PoP 8 application and some data from Google Scholar. The relevant references collected were converted into RIS data types using the Mendeley application. The RIS data was then processed using VOSviewer software to visualize data about previous research related to a new model of the Indonesian terrorism threat. The authors found that terrorism has survived to this day because it found new ways of recruiting and carrying out its acts of terror. Terrorism no longer focuses on a man as the perpetrator but involves women and even children in their actions. Terrorism can also utilize technological sophistication to support group movements and their acts of terror. This is evidenced by the blocking of 600 social media accounts by BNPT, which often uploads radical content in Indonesia.
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The role of the geopolitical location of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan towards United States (US) foreign policy from 1990 to 2017 is the focus of this study, which addressed the impact of important regional and international political events, positively or negatively, on the development of relations between the two countries in terms of political and security aspects. The study adopted a qualitative approach, and primary data was collected through interviews with 16 participants from political, economic, and security experts in Jordan and the US. Thematic analysis was used to analyze the data obtained. The study concluded that US foreign policy recognizes Jordan as a close ally and considers its stability extremely important; Jordan has a suitable location to defend Israel because critical Arab countries surround it, and Jordan enjoys a unique geographical location in the Middle East. Some political events play an essential role in US foreign policy concerning security aid to Jordan, as the US links its aid to Jordan to political events.
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During 2023 NATO Vilnius Summit Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that “no other partner is closer to NATO than Japan”. Indeed, Japan and NATO have a long history of interaction. The war in Ukraine significantly changed global security environment. This new challenge had an impact on the relationship between NATO and its Indo-Pacific partners, including Japan. NATO last two summits in Madrid and Vilnius were important not only for the European security, but for Indo-Pacific as well. This study aims to analyze how the war in Ukraine affects Japan-NATO relations, and what is the future of their cooperation and NATO‘s role in the Indo-Pacific region.
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This article analyses the maritime security pillar of India’s Indo-Pacific Outlook Initiative (IPOI) in Southeast Asia and its far-reaching impact on Vietnam. The study utilizes the analytical framework of neorealism, liberalism, and constructivism to examine the objectives and intentions of India’s IPOI and ASEAN’s AOIP in the context of strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific. The author’s findings reveal a significant convergence of strategic interests between IPOI and AOIP, which brings numerous and tremendous benefits to Vietnam, such as fostering the Vietnam-India comprehensive strategic partnership and equipping Vietnam to tackle challenges from the rise of China. The rise of China, strategic competition among major powers, and the increasing significance of the Indo-Pacific have spurred India and ASEAN to develop their visions to adapt to the Indo-Pacific concept. However, the implementation of IPOI in Southeast Asia still faces several limitations, primarily due to the divergent understanding and goals of IPOI, which places a premium on maritime security, and AOIP, which is more focused on naval cooperation. Furthermore, differences in the perceptions of India and ASEAN on maritime security also contribute to these limitations, highlighting the need for further research and development.
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The main goal of this paper is to present and compare the main developments in the Russian wars in Ukraine and Syria by considering the main patterns, parallels, and changing trajectories that could shed more light onto both of these war zones, which are highly interlinked due to Russia’s leading role in both. It analytically, comparatively, and contemplatively approaches those developments by highlighting multiple similarities and the main differences in global responses to these conflicts. Both conflicts should be seen as highly unpredictable, dynamic, and unnecessarily extended asymmetric proxy wars in which global powers test their new military doctrines and their competitors' responses to their unconventional actions and other unsolicited and indirect interferences in the local dynamism of both wars. Unlike in Syria, the Ukrainian war zone is wholly transformative and ready for the adoption of partial hybridization and the utilization of the new software-defined warfare in combination with conventional weapons.
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