QUARTERLY NEWSLETTER

ISSUE 1 > 2013

membership info > commentary > AM13 in Lund, Sweden ENJOY as part of

your ACUNS membership

FEATURE ONE: OBAMA’S SECOND TERM A Mandate for Multilateralism? | 3Jeffrey Laurenti Senior Fellow, The Century Foundation

FEATURE TWO:SUDAN’S YOUTH MOVEMENT A Force for Political Change | 7Nicholas Bishop Research Fellow with the Atlantic Council of Canada

PLUS:

AFTER DOHA: THE CLIMATE GOVERNANCE CRISIS | 5Simon Dalby CIGI Chair in the political economy of climate change, Balsillie School of International Affairs

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Q > CONTENTSQUARTERLY

AM13 details and updates

JUNE 17-19, 2013

LEADERSHIP IN GLOBAL GOVERNANCE

LUND UNIVERSITY | SWEDEN

A C U N S . O R GBooking information, schedules and more information can be found online at

THE JOHN W. HOLMES MEMORIAL LECTURE

John W. Holmes brought to the Academic Council a

lifetime of experience and reflection on international politics and the role of the United Nations. He also brought a marvelous mix of idealism and realism, a mix that showed up clearly in the report, “Looking Backwards and Forwards”. In the conclusion, he spoke of the need for reexamining the role of the UN in a way that captures the basic purposes of the Academic Council. It is an ideal time, he said, to launch in all our countries that renewed examination of past experience of the UN, to discover on what we can build and where not to venture, how we can use the growing threat to the globe itself to create the will for international self-discipline, which is what international institutions are all about.

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WELCOME TO ACUNS

STARTING POINT

up2date news & opinions

SECRETARIAT STAFFAlistair Edgar Executive Director, ACUNS Associate Professor, Wilfrid Laurier UniversityT > 226.772.3167 F > 226.772.3004 E > aedgar@wlu.ca

Brenda Burns CoordinatorT > 226.772.3142 F > 226.772.3004 E > bburns@wlu.ca

ACUNS SECRETARIATWilfrid Laurier University75 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON, Canada N2L 3C5

BOARD MEMBERS 2012-2013

Chair: Abiodun Williams, The Hague Institute for Global Justice

Past Chair: Christer Jönsson, Lund University

Vice Chairs: Roger Coate, Georgia College and State University Rama Mani, University of Oxford

M E M B E R S

Hugh Dugan, US Mission to the UN

Mary Farrell, University of Greenwich

Kirsten Haack, Northumbria University

Sukehiro Hasegawa, Hosei University

Lise Morjé Howard, Georgetown University

Melissa Labonte, Fordham University

Jan Wouters, University of Leuven

TO NOMINATE

> See our ad on page 9 to nominate members for positions available on the Board as of June 2013.

Great expectations for 2013Lots of events and ways to connect

Dr. Alistair Edgar, ACUNS

Welcome to our new newsletter – I am happy to say that we have had excellent responses to the magazine-style design format as well as the more contemporary look of our branding that was explained in this column in the previous newsletter. We continue, as well, to work on giving the best and most useful substantive content. We have three different informative pieces in this newsletter, and already have one more set aside for the next – all of them in one way or another addressing issues and themes that engage with the subject matter of our 2013 Annual Meeting, namely Leadership in Global Governance.

I am writing this short note in mid-December while in Beijing, where I have been invited to attend the meeting of the Chinese Academic Net for UN Studies (CANUNS), the Japan Association for UN Studies (JAUNS) and the Korean Academic Council on the UN System (KACUNS). At a time when there is heightened political tension of some kind between all three states, it is a welcome opportunity to be part of this constructive scholarly gathering. Congratulations to Jian Chen, as President of CANUNS, Yozo Yokota as President of JAUNS, and Heung-Soon Park as President of KACUNS, for their leadership of this example of regional good governance. Prior to traveling to Beijing, on 6 December I also was very pleased to be able to attend the NGO-DPI welcoming reception for UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson, held at the Church Center opposite the Secretariat in New York City. In a relatively small and informal environment, Mr. Eliasson spoke to some 150 NGO representatives and answered questions in a lively and personal way.

Closer to home, the ACUNS Secretariat has continued to work on its major programs. The behind-the-scenes organization for the AM13 at Lund University, Sweden is moving forward well and the draft program is taking shape: please refer to the AM13 section of our web site for details. By the time you read this newsletter, our Vienna Liaison team will have held its 3rd Vienna UN Conference in mid-January 2013, with a full slate of panels featuring leading UN and other speakers. Also in January, following a vigorous and competitive search process the new editorial team for Global Governance will have taken over the administrative reins under the leadership of editor-in-chief Ramesh Thakur. In Waterloo, the Secretariat supported a one-day workshop, bringing together a dozen scholars and practitioners to discuss Instability in the Horn of Africa, and now is working on a follow-on event it hopes to hold in Kenya.

I hope as well, that you all have read the notices about the new book reviews section of our website – which has been a runaway success in terms of members volunteering to review available books – and the UNSC annotated bibliography project for which we will continue to seek your contributions. Speaking of the website and our linked e-updates, our podcast series has been exciting to develop and we have been able to make more direct connections to speakers at the UN and in international diplomatic circles; still, we always are interested to hear from scholars who have research programs they would like to share, and also new books about which they would like to talk, so please do let us know!

There is much more to tell, as we plan our events and programs through as far ahead as 2015; but space limitations mean that will have to wait to be rolled out as we have more firm details to give you.

A MANDATE FOR MULTILAT- ERALISM?

FEATURE STORY

> J E F F R E Y L A U R E N T ISENIOR FELLOW

THE CENTURY FOUNDATION

OBAMA’S SECOND TERM

IT IS A TRUISM

American politics that foreign policy does not matter in winning presidential elections, save perhaps in wartime— and even then, its impact is more intensely felt in the restricted electorates of party primaries than in the general election campaign. In 1968, with half a million troops in Vietnam, the war burned bright in the early primary votes, but the general election was decided on the realigning domestic issue of race.

In 2012, a raging war in Afghanistan was all but invisible in the American campaign debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. Syria’s civil war flickered briefly—most notably as the challenger’s evidence that “President Obama has abdicated leadership and subcontracted U.S. policy to Kofi Annan and the United Nations.”

But embedded in that critique was the fundamental choice between unilateral and multilateral approaches to America’s international engagement.

The former Massachusetts governor did not enlist in congressional Republicans’ revivalist crusade against the United Nations, promising instead that he would “exercise leadership” there. He vowed to focus multilateral institutions “on achieving the substantive goals of democracy and human rights,” but throughout the campaign made no reference to the U.N.’s signature role in keeping and building peace.

Though the candidates certainly did not spotlight them, the United Nations and the American commitment to

OF

multilateralism lurked very much in the shadows and penumbras of the campaign debate. And Obama’s election victory seemed to vindicate his commitment to pursue America’s international goals through the world’s sometimes creaky multilateral machinery.

Perhaps he can end his second term with the kind of landmark accomplishment on the international stage that gives concrete reality to his Nobel Peace Prize— awarded to him in 2009 simply for abandoning the militarized unilateralism of America’s prior conservative regime.

In his victory address on election night, Barack Obama broke a year-long silence on climate change to warn of “the destructive power of a warming planet.” The United States thus headed back to the climate negotiating table, with new evidence in 2012 from Nebraska to New Jersey of ever more extreme weather.

Whether Obama will re-engage personally in achieving a global climate accord, as he had dramatically sought to do by flying to Copenhagen in December 2009, to crown his second term remains to be seen. Given the vast network of domestic constituencies and economic as well as environmental issues it raises, climate change is the most complicated but surely the most consequential of issues on the president’s multilateral agenda.

The day after his re-election, the president’s delegates in the U.N.’s disarmament committee voted to launch a new round of negotiations on a proposed global arms trade treaty. Washington had sidelined those talks in July, for fear the treaty’s provisions might become an issue in the presidential campaign. And the awkward reality about agreeing on multilateral obligations that bind other states is that they insist on reciprocity—and your national legislature has to approve whatever reciprocal obligations you put into treaty law.

The U.S. constitutional requirement for Senate approval of treaties by a two-thirds majority sets the bar particularly high in the case of the United States, a reality that constrained Obama in Copenhagen and makes the arms trade treaty negotiations politically sensitive. The track record in recent years on Senate consent to complex multilateral treaties is not encouraging.

The Law of the Sea in particular is widely acknowledged to be a no-brainer, backed by such conservative favorites as the Navy and

the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The continued inability to get a Senate vote on ratification is especially anomalous given America’s interests in Arctic oil exploration and peaceful resolution of South China Sea territorial disputes. Perhaps Democrats’ surprising victories in Senate elections may embolden Republican colleagues to face down the noisy “black-helicopter” isolationists whose paranoia has paralyzed the ratification process.

By contrast, the comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty presents a substantive and debatable choice on defense policy. Its entry into force would constitute a major step toward phasing nuclear weapons out of arsenals and strategic doctrine – a goal to which Obama recommitted the United States after thirty years of presidential silence – and the prospect of its approval understandably agitates supporters of nuclear weaponry. The Senate’s most passionate advocate of the nuclear arsenal, Arizona’s Jon Kyl, succeeded in defeating the treaty when President Clinton first presented it in 1999, but he did not seek re-election in 2012. Winning Senate consent to the test ban should be a second-term priority for the president.

Obama seems to have an easier time winning votes in the United Nations than in the U.S. Senate. In a five-way vote in the General Assembly in November for three Western seats on the U.N. Human Rights Council, the United States was top vote-getter, comfortably ahead of Germany and Ireland and far outpacing the losing candidates, Greece and Sweden. In President George W. Bush’s first term, Sweden defeated the United States for the human rights commission; in his second term, Bush did not even dare to seek a seat on the council.

The Security Council is an even easier arena for the United States than the General Assembly, though of course it remains prone to paralysis when a powerful permanent member is odds with the rest; think Russia on Syria, or the United States on Israel. Palestinians embracing a two-state solution with Israel finally circumvented Washington’s veto of their statehood claims in New York by winning Vatican-like Observer State status after the U.S. election. On Syria, Obama has wisely refused American military support for the rebels, but his administration has pushed the rebel elements to try again to coalesce in a single political front.

Whether the new council agreed in Qatar to unite the Syrian opposition can hold together is uncertain. The crucial test will be

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FEATURE ONE

Continued on next page >

Obama’s election victory seemed to vindicate his commitment to pursue America’s international goals through the world’s sometimes creaky multilateral machinery.

The delegates have come and gone from yet another climate change conference of the parties, and twenty years after the Earth Summit first put climate change on the international agenda as a matter of major concern, the trends in the emissions of greenhouse gases have not slowed much if at all. While the Doha meetings have extended the Kyoto protocol, worked out some details of the next steps in the process for eventually negotiating a binding agreement, and interestingly albeit tentatively accepted that some states may need to be compensated for damage caused by climate change, there is little from Doha that suggests that urgent steps will be taken, or even that political rulers of many of the larger states of the United Nations take the predicament of some of the lower lying states very seriously.

After a temporary blip due to the global financial crisis in 2008-09, emissions of carbon dioxide have resumed their upward trend. In early 2012, some instruments apparently measured carbon dioxide at 400 parts per million over Greenland. Predictions from the early work of the Intergovern-mental Panel on Climate Change concerning temperature rises have, despite unforeseen events such as the collapse of much of the Soviet Union’s industry, eruptions from Mount Pinatubo, and the rapid rise of Asian economies, proven accurate. The trend line is inexorably upwards, and numerous attempts to generate a comprehensive agreement to limit emissions have obviously failed to change matters much. The much criticized Kyoto protocol was only ever a first step, and while its extension, agreed at Doha is to be welcomed, it deals with less than a fifth of global emissions.

Despite widespread agreement under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, that dangerous anthropogenic interference with the earth’s climate system had to be avoided, most serious projections into coming decades suggest that dangerous warming of the climate is being set in motion. Indeed one study under the auspices of the World Bank, not an agency noted for being alarmist about environmental change, recently suggested that we are on our way to a world 4 degrees Celsius warmer than pre-industrial times. This figure is double the widely agreed consensus that 2 degrees is the maximum that should be contemplated to avoid dangerous changes. The 2 degree figure is itself more diplomatic compromise than hard science. If we get to 4 degrees then we are in a period of what some scientists have simply termed very dangerous warming, well beyond the merely dangerous consequences of a 2 degree change.

Clearly the “emissions gap” to use the United Nations Environment Program term for the difference between scientific projections of what is needed to deal with greenhouse gas emissions, and the political agreements to constrain them, is growing rather than shrinking. The alarm expressed by repre-sentatives of the small island states at Doha over the failure of the international community to deal effectively with rising greenhouse gas levels is entirely appropriate. If sea levels continue to rise, as they will if temperatures increase, then residents of island states are faced with inundation. Already some Islands off New Guinea have been evacuated; Pacific Island states are negotiating with higher neighbors about land purchases and relocations.

But where all of a state is low-lying then nothing less than the obliteration of a member state of the United Nations is in prospect. This is not a matter of accident, and act of a displeased deity, or an inevitable part of the natural order of things; it is directly attributable to the actions of other members of the international community. This raises numerous issues of whether states are actually guaranteed survival by the United Nations system. If not it also poses the questions of who has responsibilities for the populations that are displaced, and indeed whether one can effectively be a citizen of a state that has been obliterated by the consequences of climate change.

Given that industrial infrastructures are built for long-term service, decisions that are made in the next few years “lock in” the emissions from such things as coal powered electricity generation stations for decades to come. Climate change activ-ists were expressing alarm that there are currently plans afoot around the world to construct at least a thousand new coal power plants. If such things are built the prognosis for global warming is indeed that it will become very dangerous.

In these circumstances, numerous decision makers are now trying to think through what kind of adaptations will have to be made. Building on higher ground is an obvious start, especially from such critical infrastructures as sewage plants, which if built close to shore as they frequently are, can be especially vulnerable to flooding by storm surges. Increasing the height of sea walls, or building much more elaborate flood defences, as Venice very badly needed in late 2012, but doesn’t yet have, are part of the answer to immediate difficulties. But if climate continues to change or flips into a new global configuration these engineering adaptations are but temporary expedients. They are not a solution to the problem.

All of which means that, given the inadequate response to the climbing greenhouse gas levels at Doha and throughout the UNFCCC process, geoengineering is now being discussed seriously. Artificially adjusting the amount of solar radiation reaching the surface of the earth by injecting such things as sulfur aerosols into the upper atmosphere, effectively mimicking the action of volcanoes such as Mount Pinatubo, is a highly risky endeavor, and one that, if done unilaterally, will merely heighten the disagreements over climate change.

In the face of such obviously unpalatable options the ques-tion now facing all those of us who look to the United Nations for good governance is how to facilitate both a change of mind on the part of recalcitrant political leaders, and provide innovative options that can grapple with the global crisis without falling prey to the negotiation logjams that have stymied progress at Doha and previous COP meetings.

* Simon Dalby is the CIGI chair in the political economy of climate change at the Balsillie School of International Affairs and professor of geography and environmental studies at Wilfrid Laurier University. His published research deals with climate change, political ecology, geopolitics, global security, environmental change, militarization and the spatial dimensions of governance.

Educated at Trinity College, Dublin and the University of Victoria, he holds a Ph.D. from Simon Fraser University.

its ability to honor commitments to Washington and the U.N.-Arab League envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, in their efforts to end the warfare and put Syria’s transi-tion on a political track, underpinned by Security Council unanimity.

The first few months of Obama’s second term also provide the opportunity for him to initiate a new front in the effort to wind down Afghanistan’s 33-year war. Last year, Washington did open America’s first direct negotiating channel with the Taliban insurgency since 2001, but mutual suspicion and Washington’s hesitancy have aborted those talks.

Now is the time to acknowledge that a facilitator appointed by the United Nations may be the last opportunity to bring all the parties to a settlement before the scheduled Western troop withdrawal leaves the Kabul coalition and the insurgency to fight it out on their own. The prospects for harmonizing the interests of Afghanistan’s clashing political forces, its neighbors, and the more distant powers that have supported Afghan reconstruction are uncertain, but trusting simply in a military “solution” after 2014 would truly be a feckless gamble.

Obama’s conservative foes had sought to portray his commitment to multilateral problem-solving as “weakness,” redolent of the supposed failure of Jimmy Carter. With his second term secured, Obama can easily rebut them: How else but multilaterally can Americans succeed in addressing crises of such global scale as climate, economy, the Middle East, nuclear weaponry, Afghanistan, human rights, and peace?

* Jeffrey Laurenti is senior fellow at The Century Foundation and works on issues relating to international law and institutions, the United Nations and related agencies, the maintenance of international peace and security, and the politics of American foreign policy. He has served as director for TCF’s international task force on Afghanistan in its regional and multilateral dimensions and as co-director of TCF’s peace and security initiative with the Center for American Progress. He is the author of numerous monographs on subjects such as international peace and security, terrorism, U.N. reform, international law and justice, and other issues dealt with by the multilateral system.

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AFTER DOHA: THE CLIMATE GOVERNANCE CRISISSimon Dalby, CIGI chair in the political economy of climate change, BSIA

Continued from page 4 >

The difference between scientific projections of what is needed to deal with greenhouse gas emissions, and the political agreements to constrain them, is growing rather than shrinking.

GEOENGINEERING?

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MEMBER PUBLICATIONS

MPub member publications

Climate, Development and EquityDevelopment Dialogue no. 61, September 2012

Climate change already affects all of us, but those most vulnerable to its impacts have done the least to cause the problem. Unless radical cuts in emissions take place soon, the world is set for dangerous climate change, with all of humanity at peril.

This volume presents voices from across the North and South, addressing the combined challenges of climate, development and equity. It highlights the urgency of taking action, but also shows why any attempt to tackle climate change must be grounded in equity. How will humanity fairly divide the rapidly diminishing global carbon budget, while allowing billions of people in the global South (and North) the means for economic, social and environmental well-being? How can United Nations negotiations move forward, and what are the real and false solutions?

Disabilities, Human Rights and International Cooperation: Human Rights-Based Approach and Lived Experiences of Ugandan Women with DisabilitiesHisayo Katsui

The study investigates human rights-based approaches of international cooperation towards the equality of persons with disabilities in Uganda. It applies a participatory research approach by which persons with disabilities played meaningful roles throughout the research process. The focus of the study lies on the lived experiences of Ugandan women with disabilities, in particular those of deaf women on the grassroots level. Among the questions studied are the various perceptions of ‘human rights’ among the actors in development cooperation activities as well as the possibilities of persons with disabilities to be involved in the building of their society, based on non-discrimination, in conjunction with international and development cooperation. On the basis of case study findings, an empirical theory of a human rights-based approach to disabilities and international cooperation was established.

Exploring the Role and Transformative Potential of Human Rights in Development Practice and Food Security: A Case Study from MalawiAlessandra Sarelin

This doctoral dissertation investigates the interplay between human rights and development. It explores the role of human rights (as standards, as principles, as rhetoric) and their transformative potential in terms of challenging the status quo in favour of marginalized rights-holders. The study contains an analysis of the role of human rights in three food-related interventions in Malawi representing different approaches to development and food security: a charity-based approach; a rights-based approach; and a legal human rights approach.

International Protection of Human Rights: A TextbookSecond and revised edition

Catarina Krause and Martin Scheinin (Eds.)

This textbook presents the main universal and regional systems and standards for the international protection of human rights, also taking note of recent changes in procedure together with substantive developments in the field of human rights law. In addition to the United Nations at the universal level, it outlines the existing regional protection systems in Europe, Africa and the Americas as well as bringing forth the discussion pertaining to human rights law in Asia and the Arab countries. Moreover, the various means for domestic implementation of human rights law are covered, and attention is drawn to the role of non-governmental organizations in the protection of human rights. The volume is not limited to human rights law in the strict sense, but rather places human rights within a wider context of public international law as well as philosophy. The primary target group for this textbook is Master’s level students in law schools and specialized Master’s programmes in international law or human rights law, but the book may also appeal to more advanced human rights researchers and professors teaching human rights topics.

Liberal Internationalism The Interwar Movement for Peace in BritainMichael Pugh

Concepts and policies deriving from political and social movements in support of liberal nationalism are hotly debated today. Civil society has actively engaged in controversies over intervention in Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Lebanon. Pugh investigates the role of popular liberal internationalism as a social movement in Britain, addressing the use of force for peace through an examination of the impact of civil society actors in between wars. The interwar social movements had a massive and lasting influence on British approaches to international politics and influenced the UN’s approach to peacekeeping, use of force and peace-building.

This book considers social movements for peace and security which probe below the level of state policies. Using Gramscian and Foucauldian ideas of civil society and society, it critically examines the factions and fluidities of a movement that was suffused with values at once humane and superior, tolerant and dogmatic, universalistic and imperial. Pugh explores one of the most powerful social movements for collective security in modern history, a movement which trespassed conventional political boundaries and provided innovative ideas for constructing peace through collective security.

International Law Beyond the State: Essays on Sovereignty, Non-State Actors and Human RightsRobert McCorquodale

International Law Beyond The State draws together a collection of thought-provoking essays by a leading Professor of International Law and Human Rights, Robert McCorquodale. These deal with some of the key issues necessary to understand the changing international legal system, such as the role of non-state actors, how human rights are applied and the developing ideas of sovereignty in the contemporary international community. He shows how international law is no longer the preserve of states alone.

The first part of this collection considers the development of international human rights law. It examines some of the broad impacts on international human rights law, such as self-determina-tion, globalisation, and the actions of non-state actors. These have each created significant impacts on the protection of human rights, the understanding of international human rights law and on the daily lives of many people. They also indicate aspects of a range of human rights, from economic, social and cultural rights, to civil and political rights, and to collective rights.

The second part of this collection explores the broader aspects of the international legal system and how it has been challenged and affected by international human rights law. This effect is due to the confrontation that international human rights law makes to the traditional or dominant view of the international legal system as solely a state-consent based system. While international human rights law is itself constrained within a state-based structure, being largely based on treaties between states and as it places direct legal obligations only on states – its focus on the relationship between an individual (or a group) and the state is in direct contrast with the traditional international law state-to-state relationship based on reciprocity of obligations.

FEATURE STORY

SUDAN’S YOUTH MOVEMENT

> N I C H O L A S B I S H O PRESEARCH FELLOW WITH THE ATLANTIC COUNCIL

OF CANADA

A re Sudan’s youth social movement organizations (harakat shababiyya) an emerging force for political change in the country? The answer is an unequivocal ‘yes’. However the speed of that change will be much slower than the Egyptian Spring movement which unseated long-time dictator Hosni Mubarak in just 18 days. As with countries across the region high levels of youth unemployment (25.4% according to UNDP in 20121) are a major contributing factor to the protest movement and growing dissatisfaction with the government.

South Sudan’s secession last year meant that the north lost access to three fourths of its oil revenues, triggering an economic crisis from which it will struggle to recover. Austerity measures and a deep cut to fuel subsidies have led to increasingly large protests against Omar al Bashir’s governing National Congress Party (NCP), in power since 1989.

Presently, protests remain small and quickly dissipate in the face of brutal repression and mass arrests – as many as 2000 – by government security forces. Initial protests on January 30, 2011 met with a similar end. Yet claims of torture and other human rights abuses by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have met with stringent denials by the government representatives who have attempted to marginalise and limit the popularity of the protest movement.

In the face of the crackdown, however, protests continue to gain momentum, spurred on by the successes of Arab Spring movements in neighbouring North African countries like Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya and the wider Middle East. The weakening social fabric has encouraged many who had been unwilling to risk joining the protests as ‘deprivation, shared grievances and generalised beliefs [have become] determinants of participation.’2

Opposition political parties by contrast, have remained on the sidelines, lukewarm about the protesters’ ability to usher in regime change or even minimal political reforms. Without this visible, organised leadership many older Sudanese are equally reluctant to back the youth’s street protests despite a desire for greater governmental accountability.

Youth activists disproportionately come from more educated, upper middle class backgrounds in the Khartoum area, something that is accounted for by the city’s position as a cultural and political hub. The metropolitan area is home to over 5 million people or one sixth of Sudan’s total population and is a base for many refugees fleeing conflict in Darfur and prior to its succession, South Sudan. This means activists are well informed on developments in other countries and continuing domestic exigencies.

Activists from the two major Sudanese social movement organizations (SMOs) - Girifna (We’re Fed Up) and Sharara, the only groups which have more than several dozen active members – have derided the government. They allege widespread mismanagement and seek ‘guarantees of freedom, cultural expression and human dignity.’ Both organisations are actively pursuing fundraising and awareness-building operations outside of Sudan. The financial clout of these larger SMOs allows them to agitate against the government in a more public manner as they can afford to support injured or detained members and make frequent use of likeminded networks of lawyers. The financial contribu-tion of Girifna members has even allowed the group to open up a Washington, DC office giving it greater access to Western media sources.

Similar to and modelled on the tactics employed in other Arab states, Sudanese activists are making full use of ‘liberation technology’3 like social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter to spread their message. Typically, Friday – the Muslim holy day – is employed as a day of protest as large crowds going to pray in mosques can quickly be mobilised.

After the failed January 30, 2011 protests, Girifna member Safia Ishag was arrested and reports that she then was raped by security forces. She went on to create a YouTube video publicly detailing the trauma. Although the government vehemently denied the claims and proceeded to arrest reporters and shutter newspapers, Girifna managed to keep the story online sparking the ‘We are all Safia’ campaign on Facebook. Eventually even staunch NCP supporters were convinced that the incident was a breach of Islamic law.

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FEATURE TWO

Continued on page 10 >

1 http://www.sd.undp.org/mdg_fact.htm 2 Van Stekelenburg, Jacquelin and Bert Klandermans, “Social Movement Theory.” Movers and Shakers, 2009. p18 3 Diamond, Larry, “Liberation Technology.” The Journal of Democracy, Vol. 21, No. 3, 2010. p70

THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE INVOLVED IN ANY SINGLE PROTEST IS THE

BEST METHOD OF DEMONSTRATING TO OTHERS NOT TO FEAR THE GOVERNMENT AND INSTEAD

TO JOIN THE COLLECTIVE PUSH.

A message on the Girifna Non-violent Resistance Movement website.Translation: Dr. Hind Al-Abadleh, Wilfrid Laurier University

WE ARE NYALA (the capital city of Darfur)

WE’RE FED UP!

WE ARE ALL FED UP!WE ARE ALL SUDAN! (we all belong to Sudan)

NEW EDITORIAL TEAM AND HOST INSTITUTION FOR GLOBAL GOVERNANCE (2014 -2018)Following the completion of a vigorous, competitive, and open search process, ACUNS is very pleased to announce the new editorial team and host institution for the journal Global Governance for volumes 2014-2018.

The new editorial team features Ramesh Thakur, Australian National University, as editor-in-chief; and as editors, Monica del Carmen Serrano Carreto (El Colegio de Mexico), Brian Job (University of British Columbia), and Diana Tussie (FLACSO-Argentina). The Colorado-based editorial office will be hosted by the One Earth Future Foundation (OEF), an NGO whose mandate is to support research and practice in the area of effective, peaceful governance. OEF’s Roberta Spivak will serve as the journal’s full-time managing editor.

In partnership with Lynne Rienner Publishers (cofounder and publisher of the journal), ACUNS, and OEF, the new team looks forward to upholding and further developing the profile of Global Governance as an indispensible resource and outlet for original work and interpretive essays for scholars and practitioners of the United Nations, multilateralism, and global governance. The new editors have already begun their work, and submissions for the 2014 issue are now being accepted at globalgov@oneearthfuture.org.

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BOARD NOMINATIONS

A C U N S S E C R E TA R I AT > Wilfrid Laurier University, 75 University Avenue West, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3C5

Nominate or be nominated.AS OF JUNE 2013 multiple positions will be open on the ACUNS Board of Directors.

ACUNS members are invited to nominate qualified individuals, including themselves, for these positions.

Please send nominations with curriculum vitae, bio (300-500 words), and a short supporting statement outlining what the nominee will bring to ACUNS.

TO NOMINATE

> All nominations should be sent to bburns@wlu.ca by March 31, 2013.

Questions? Please email admin@acuns.org or call (1) 226.772.3121

THANK YOU

> ACUNS and Lynne Rienner Publishers would like to take this opportunity to thank the current editorial team at Denver University: Editors Tom Farer and Timothy Sisk, Managing Editor Matthew Klick, and Assistant Managing Editor Jessica Harig.

QUARTERLY NEWSLETTERIssue 1 > 2013

Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS) Quarterly Newsletter is published four times a year with the support of the Department of Communications, Public Affairs & Marketing (CPAM) at Wilfrid Laurier University.

ACUNS SECRETARIAT

Wilfrid Laurier University75 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON, Canada N2L 3C5

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In spite of these successes, as very few Sudanese have access to the internet (the International Telecommunications Union estimates that only 10.2% of Sudanese can be considered ‘Internet users’ – defined as using the internet once from any location within the past 12 months) and therefore to social media, the effectiveness of the protests has been limited in what remains a largely rural country in comparison to its neighbours. As a result, activists from Girifna also convey their message via graffiti in poorer neighbourhoods and Sharara has distributed leaflets in Khartoum’s outdoor markets.

Although commentators suggest the future of the protest movement remains unclear, and

it is under constant threat from the state security apparatus, if fuel prices rise and the border war with South Sudan flares up again, public anger will undoubtedly worsen and SMOs will gain more and more ground.

The SMOs’ greatest strength in Sudan is their ability to educate and mobilise disparate groups of people in the cities. In a poor country like Sudan where the vast majority of the populace have no access to the internet or satellite television channels, which proved so critical to the success of the uprisings in Egypt, the number of people involved in any single protest is the best method of demonstrating to others not to fear the government and instead to join the collective push. Given the economic

constraints on the government, if SMOs remain united and can overcome increasingly rigorous forms of repression, then meaningful political reform seems inevitable in Sudan.

The proverbial ball is most definitely rolling.

* Nicholas Bishop is a research fellow with the Atlantic Council of Canada and recently completed a posting in Cape Town with the Parliamentary Monitoring Group (PMG) in cooperation with the CIDA. He holds a law degree and an MA in International Relations from Osaka University.

Nicholas has worked for several think tanks in Europe and Canada and as a refugee case worker with Amnesty International.

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ACUNS ANNUAL MEETING CALL FOR PAPERS - WORKSHOP PANELS

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17-19 JUNE, 2013 LUND UNIVERSITY | SWEDEN

APPL ICAT ION PROCEDURE

Submissions: To submit an individual proposal or a full panel proposal, you will be required to upload full contact information, the paper/panel title(s), abstract(s) of no more than 200 words, and biographical note(s) of no more than 250 words at acuns.org/2013panels/

Proposals: Proposals will be accepted and evaluated, and panel spaces will be allotted, on a first-come rolling basis subsequent to the issuance of this Call. Once all panel spaces have been filled, a waiting list will be established for any subsequent proposals that are received.

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ANNUAL MEETING THEME Leadership in Global GovernanceThe Academic Council on the United Nations System (ACUNS) now is accepting workshop paper and panel proposals for presentation at the 2013 Annual Meeting. Proposals on the Annual Meeting theme – “Leadership in Global Governance” – and on the subthemes and issues raised in the introductory note, in addition to other topics relating to the UN System and the broader mandate of the Council, will be considered.

Current ACUNS members in good standing (including new or newly-renewed members) will be given priority consideration for their proposals, but non-members are welcome to submit proposals. Please note that in order to present at the AM13, Council membership will be required: this includes all persons participating in a full panel team proposal.

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