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Book The Kivus

Download or read book The Kivus written by and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 62 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book The Trouble with the Congo

    Book Details:
  • Author : Séverine Autesserre
  • Publisher : Cambridge University Press
  • Release : 2010-06-14
  • ISBN : 0521191009
  • Pages : 345 pages

Download or read book The Trouble with the Congo written by Séverine Autesserre and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-06-14 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Trouble with the Congo suggests a new explanation for international peacebuilding failures in civil wars. Drawing from more than 330 interviews and a year and a half of field research, it develops a case study of the international intervention during the Democratic Republic of the Congo's unsuccessful transition from war to peace and democracy (2003-2006). Grassroots rivalries over land, resources, and political power motivated widespread violence. However, a dominant peacebuilding culture shaped the intervention strategy in a way that precluded action on local conflicts, ultimately dooming the international efforts to end the deadliest conflict since World War II. Most international actors interpreted continued fighting as the consequence of national and regional tensions alone. UN staff and diplomats viewed intervention at the macro levels as their only legitimate responsibility. The dominant culture constructed local peacebuilding as such an unimportant, unfamiliar, and unmanageable task that neither shocking events nor resistance from select individuals could convince international actors to reevaluate their understanding of violence and intervention.

Book The Myth of International Protection

Download or read book The Myth of International Protection written by Claudia Seymour and published by University of California Press. This book was released on 2019-03-26 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this viscerally intense, ethnographically-based work, Claudia Seymour, a former child protection advisor and human rights investigator for the United Nations, chronicles the heart-wrenching stories of young people in the Democratic Republic of Congo—young people who live on the front lines of conflict, in neighborhoods and villages destroyed by war, and on the streets in conditions of poverty and destitution. Seymour shares her personal journey, one that begins with the will to do good yet ends with the realization of how international aid can contribute to greater harm than good. The idea of protection and universalized human rights is turned on its head as Seymour uncovers the complicities and hypocrisies of the aid world—that in its promotion of “inalienable human rights”, the complex historical and socio-economic dynamics that lead to the violations of such rights are ignored. The Myth of International Protection offers a new perspective to reframe how the world sees the DRC, and urges global audiences to consider their own roles in fueling the DRC’s seemingly endless violence.

Book Africa s World War

Download or read book Africa s World War written by Gerard Prunier and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2008-12-31 with total page 570 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Rwandan genocide sparked a horrific bloodbath that swept across sub-Saharan Africa, ultimately leading to the deaths of some four million people. In this extraordinary history of the recent wars in Central Africa, Gerard Prunier offers a gripping account of how one grisly episode laid the groundwork for a sweeping and disastrous upheaval. Prunier vividly describes the grisly aftermath of the Rwandan genocide, when some two million refugees--a third of Rwanda's population--fled to exile in Zaire in 1996. The new Rwandan regime then crossed into Zaire and attacked the refugees, slaughtering upwards of 400,000 people. The Rwandan forces then turned on Zaire's despotic President Mobutu and, with the help of a number of allied African countries, overthrew him. But as Prunier shows, the collapse of the Mobutu regime and the ascension of the corrupt and erratic Laurent-D?sir? Kabila created a power vacuum that drew Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, Zimbabwe, Sudan, and other African nations into an extended and chaotic war. The heart of the book documents how the whole core of the African continent became engulfed in an intractible and bloody conflict after 1998, a devastating war that only wound down following the assassination of Kabila in 2001. Prunier not only captures all this in his riveting narrative, but he also indicts the international community for its utter lack of interest in what was then the largest conflict in the world. Praise for the hardcover: "The most ambitious of several remarkable new books that reexamine the extraordinary tragedy of Congo and Central Africa since the Rwandan genocide of 1994." --New York Review of Books "One of the first books to lay bare the complex dynamic between Rwanda and Congo that has been driving this disaster." --Jeffrey Gettleman, New York Times Book Review "Lucid, meticulously researched and incisive, Prunier's will likely become the standard account of this under-reported tragedy." --Publishers Weekly

Book Rebel Rulers

    Book Details:
  • Author : Zachariah Cherian Mampilly
  • Publisher : Cornell University Press
  • Release : 2012-03-27
  • ISBN : 0801462975
  • Pages : 318 pages

Download or read book Rebel Rulers written by Zachariah Cherian Mampilly and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2012-03-27 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When insurgents take and hold territory, they can develop systems of governance that deliver public services to civilians under their control. This book reflects Zachariah Cherian Mampilly's extensive fieldwork in rebel-controlled areas.

Book Twenty first century Peace Operations

Download or read book Twenty first century Peace Operations written by William J. Durch and published by US Institute of Peace Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 706 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This superbly edited volume addresses the question of what has been accomplished and what lessons have been learned from ten years of peace operations in post-conflict societies.

Book Global Governance and Corporate Responsibility in Conflict Zones

Download or read book Global Governance and Corporate Responsibility in Conflict Zones written by M. Feil and published by Springer. This book was released on 2011-12-02 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Corporations in conflict zones and their provision of security are particularly relevant for understanding whether private actors are increasingly sources of governance contributions that regulate public goods. Feil highlights the discrepancies between political and theoretical expectations of corporate engagement and governance contributions.

Book Joining the Fray

Download or read book Joining the Fray written by Zachary C. Shirkey and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-05-06 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: National leaders often worry that civil wars might spread, but also seem to have little grasp on which civil wars will in fact draw in other states. An ability to understand which civil wars are most likely to draw in outside powers and when this is likely to happen has important policy implications as well as simply answering a scholarly question. Joining the Fray takes existing explanations about which outside states are likely to intervene militarily in civil wars and adds to them explanations about when states join and why. Building on his earlier volume, Is this a Private Fight or Can Anybody Join?, Zachary C. Shirkey looks at how the decision to join a civil war can be intuitively understood as follows: given that remaining neutral was wise when a war began something must change in order for a country to change its beliefs about the benefits of fighting and join the war. This book studies what these changes are, focusing in particular on revealed information and commitment problems.

Book The Roots of Ethnic Conflict in Africa

Download or read book The Roots of Ethnic Conflict in Africa written by Wanjala S. Nasong'o and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-01-26 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book focuses on the problem of ethnic conflict in Africa and seeks to explain its root causes. The main thesis of the book is that ethnic political mobilization is essentially a function of deeply-felt grievances on the part of the groups so mobilized.

Book The Costs and Consequences of Dodd Frank Section 1502

Download or read book The Costs and Consequences of Dodd Frank Section 1502 written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Financial Services. Subcommittee on International Monetary Policy and Trade and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies written by Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2014-06-12 with total page 785 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Refugee and Forced Migration Studies has grown from being a concern of a relatively small number of scholars and policy researchers in the 1980s to a global field of interest with thousands of students worldwide studying displacement either from traditional disciplinary perspectives or as a core component of newer programmes across the Humanities and Social and Political Sciences. Today the field encompasses both rigorous academic research which may or may not ultimately inform policy and practice, as well as action-research focused on advocating in favour of refugees' needs and rights. This authoritative Handbook critically evaluates the birth and development of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, and analyses the key contemporary and future challenges faced by academics and practitioners working with and for forcibly displaced populations around the world. The 52 state-of-the-art chapters, written by leading academics, practitioners, and policymakers working in universities, research centres, think tanks, NGOs and international organizations, provide a comprehensive and cutting-edge overview of the key intellectual, political, social and institutional challenges arising from mass displacement in the world today. The chapters vividly illustrate the vibrant and engaging debates that characterize this rapidly expanding field of research and practice.

Book Formal Peace and Informal War

Download or read book Formal Peace and Informal War written by Zoë Marriage and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-02 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Northern interventions into African countries at war are dominated by security concerns, bolstered by claims of shared returns and reinforcing processes of development and security. As global security and human security became prominent in development policy, Congo was wracked by violent rule, pillage, internal fighting, and invasion. In 2002, the Global and All-Inclusive Peace was promoted by northern donors, placing a formal peace on the mass of informalised wars. Formal Peace and Informal War: Security and Development in Congo examines how the security interests of the Congolese population have interacted with those of northern donors. It explores Congo’s contemporary wars and the peace agreed on in 2002 from a security perspective and challenges the asserted commonality of the liberal interventions made by northern donors. It finds that the peace framed the multiple conflicts in Congo as a civil war and engineered a power-sharing agreement between elite belligerents. The book argues that the population were politically and economically excluded from the peace and have been subjected to control and containment when their security rests with power and freedom.

Book Annual Review of United Nations Affairs 2009 2010

Download or read book Annual Review of United Nations Affairs 2009 2010 written by Joachim Muller and published by . This book was released on 2011-04-15 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: a. The set generally Since the publication of its first edition in 1950, the Annual Review of United Nations Affairs has stood as the authoritative resource for scholars, students, and practitioners researching the latest developments of that august body. From the insightful introduction, prepared each year by a distinguished expert on UN affairs, to the full-text presentation of reports and resolutions and the helpful subject index, ARUNA provides a practical tour of each year's U.N.actions and debates. The expert selection of documents by Joachim Muller and Karl Sauvant and the topic-based organization of those documents make any researcher's task much easier than the vast searching, sorting, and pruning required by the U.N.'s website. The series' topic-based organization of the materials and subject index lend invaluable guidance to all researchers. ARUNA presents comprehensive documentation of the work of the UN on an annual basis, starting in September of each yearwith the beginning of the regular sessions of the General Assembly. Coverage of the UN's key organs is provided, including the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the International Court of Justice, and the UN Secretariat. In addition, selected reports of intergovernmental bodies and expert groups are included. Solely official UN documentation is used. ARUNA occupies a special place in the publications on the work of the UN, as it allows readers toobtain an overview of the principal developments in its key organs. This makes it an important reference source for policy-makers and academic researchers. b. The 2009-2010 volumes This year's edition continues to focus on the world financial crisis and the reaction of the United Nations and the international financial system to that crisis. The Overview to this year's edition, written by Joachim Muller and Karl Sauvant, examines the changing role of the United Nations and explores waysin which the management of the financial crisis has impacted that role. The Introduction to this year's edition also examines the effects of this crisis; this Introduction is drawn from the "Report of the Commission of Experts of the President of the United Nations General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System," as well as a slightly edited version of a Preface to that report written by Professor Joseph E. Stiglitz. The Introduction discusses the findings ofthe Commission and proposes the creation of a new institution, a Global Economic Coordination Council, which would be supported by an International Panel of Experts with a geographically diverse membership that would represent the interests of emerging and developing countries as well as those of developed countries. Dr. Joseph E. Stiglitz, who served as Chairman of the Commission and wrote the Preface to the Commission's Report, holds joint professorships at Columbia University's EconomicsDepartment and its Business School. He is also Co-founder and Co-President of the Initiative for Policy Dialogue. From 1997 to 2000 he was the World Bank's Senior Vice President for Development Economics and Chief Economist. From 1995 to 1997 he served as Chairman of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers and as a member of President Clinton's cabinet. From 1993 to 1995 he was a member of the Council of Economic Advisers. He was previously a professor of economics at Stanford, Princeton, Yale,and All Souls College. Dr. Stiglitz is also a leading scholar of the economics of the public sector and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2001 in addition to the American Economic Association's biennial John Bates Clark Award in 1979. His recent publications include Freefall: America, Free Markets, and the Sinking of the World Economy (2010), Making Globalization Work (2006), Fair Trade for All (2005), and Globalization and its Discontents (2002). The 2009-2010 volumes of ARUNA therefore also devote considerable attention to the financial crisis as well as other international crises. Among the documents in the 2009-2010 volumes are the complete General Assembly resolutions, as well as the Report and Resolutions of the Security Council and the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). Annual Reports of note include reports of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the UN Development Programme and UN Population Fund, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN HighCommissioner for Refugees, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, and the World Food Programme. Mr. Muller and Dr. Sauvant have also selected progress reports on key peacekeeping, peace-building, and political missions, including those for Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Iraq, the Middle East, Sudan, and West Africa. c. Volume VI (this volume) This volume contains the following: Chapter 1: General Assembly, Sixty-fourth Session (continued) 3. Resolutions Adopted by the General Assembly at Its Sixty-fourth Session (continued) (Resolutions 64/104 through 64/199) d. Guest Authors of previous years' editions Each annual edition of ARUNA is introduced by a Guest Author, a distinguished expert on UN affairs, who highlights the outstanding themes of the year in review. Together with an overview provided by the editors, this introduction is intended to facilitate access to the material and, above all, to make it easer for users of ARUNA to "see the forest for the trees." This year's ARUNA includes excerpts from the "Report of the Commission of Experts of the President of the United Nations General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System" (21 Sept. 2009), and from a slightly edited version of a Preface to that report written by Professor Joseph E. Stiglitz. However, the roster of distinguished experts who have contributed this introduction in the past is also worthy of mention: Jose Antonio Ocampo: ARUNA 2008/2009 edition Professor Jose Antonio Ocampo is Co-President of the Initiative for Policy Dialogue. He is also Professor in the School of International and Public Affairs and Fellow of the Committee on Global Thought at Columbia University. Professor Ocampo previously held the positions of Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations for Economic and Social Affairs, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, and Minister of Finance, Agriculture, and Planning of Colombia. In 2009, he was a member of the Commission of Experts of the President of the United Nations General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System. Professor Ocampo is also the author of numerous books and articles on macroeconomics policy and theory, economic development, international trade, and economic history. His recent publications include Stability with Growth: Macroeconomics, Liberalization and Development, with Joseph E. Stiglitz, Shari Spiegel, Ricardo Ffrench-Davis and Deepak Nayyar (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006). Jeffrey D. Sachs: ARUNA 2007/2008 edition Professor Jeffrey D. Sachs is Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Advisor to the Secretary-General of the UN on the Millennium Development Goals. Professor Sachs's introduction to ARUNA 2007/2008 was titled "Towards a New Global Protocol on Climate Change," in which he arguedthat solving the climate change problem will demand four steps: scientific consensus, public awareness, the development of alternative technologies, and a global framework for action. He dealt, in particular, with the science underpinning the negotiations for a new global protocol on climate change, as a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. Professor Sachs argued that climate change crises can only be solved through the goals, leadership, and treaty mechanisms of the UN. Edward C. Luck: ARUNA 2006/2007 edition Professor Edward C. Luck is UN Special Advisor on the Responsibility to Protect and Vice President and Director of Studies at the International Peace Academy. From 1984 to 1994, he served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the UN Association of the USA (UNA-USA). Professor Luck's introduction to ARUNA 2006/2007 covered "The responsible sovereign and the responsibility to protect," in which he addressed the scope and content of what was agreed at the 2005 World Summit, the implications of the responsibility to protect (RtoP) for notions of state sovereignty, and some of the conceptual, architectural, and policy challenges then facing UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's commitment to "operationalizing" the responsibility to protect and translating it "from words to deeds." Louise Frechette: ARUNA 2005/2006 edition Ms Louise Frechette is Distinguished Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, Waterloo, Ontario. Until March 2006, she was the first Deputy Secretary-General of the UN; before that, she was Permanent Representative of Canada to the UN. Ms Frechette's introduction to ARUNA 2005/2006 covered "United Nations reform: an unfinished story." As the first Deputy Secretary-General of the UN, Ms Frechette was uniquely positioned to undertake a personal assessment of what has changed and what has not changed in the past decade at the UN and why. She examined if the UN is functioning better than it was 15 years ago, why reform is so difficult to achieve and what the future holds for the institutions. Rubens Ricupero: ARUNA 2004/2005 edition Mr Rubens Ricupero is Dean of the Fundacno Armando Alvares Penteado (FAAP), Sao Paulo and was formerly Secretary-General of UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Minister of Finance of Brazil. Mr Ricupero's introduction to ARUNA 2004/2005 covered "The difficulty of building consensus in an age of extremes" and examined the mysteries of the negotiating process leading to the outcome of the 2005 World Summit. Rather than a "Grand Bargain" of a comprehensive UN reform in the areas of development, security and human rights, it is argued that the Summit ended more on a note of lamentation and regret over a missed opportunity. Mr Ricupero concludes that contrary to the daring proclamation at the outset by the Secretary-General, the conditions indispensable to succeed were not in place. Indeed, it was hard to imagine that an ambitious and balanced reform package for the UN could have had any real chance of succeeding.

Book Democratic Republic of Congo

Download or read book Democratic Republic of Congo written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on International Relations. Subcommittee on Africa and published by . This book was released on 2003 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Property and Political Order in Africa

Download or read book Property and Political Order in Africa written by Catherine Boone and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-02-10 with total page 439 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In sub-Saharan Africa, property relationships around land and access to natural resources vary across localities, districts, and farming regions. These differences produce patterned variations in relationships between individuals, communities, and the state. This book captures these patterns in an analysis of structure and variation in rural land tenure regimes. In most farming areas, state authority is deeply embedded in land regimes, drawing farmers, ethnic insiders and outsiders, lineages, villages, and communities into direct and indirect relationships with political authorities at different levels of the state apparatus. The analysis shows how property institutions - institutions that define political authority and hierarchy around land - shape dynamics of great interest to scholars of politics, including the dynamics of land-related competition and conflict, territorial conflict, patron-client relations, electoral cleavage and mobilization, ethnic politics, rural rebellion, and the localization and "nationalization" of political competition.

Book Bits and Atoms

    Book Details:
  • Author : Steven Livingston
  • Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
  • Release : 2014-02
  • ISBN : 0199941610
  • Pages : 210 pages

Download or read book Bits and Atoms written by Steven Livingston and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2014-02 with total page 210 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bits and Atoms explores the governance potential found in the explosive growth of digital information and communication technology in areas of limited statehood. The chapters explore when and if the growth in digital technology can fill some of the governance vacuum created by the absence of an effective state.

Book Annual Review of United Nations Affairs 2008 2009

Download or read book Annual Review of United Nations Affairs 2008 2009 written by Joachim Müller and published by . This book was released on 2010-04-15 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the publication of its first edition in 1950, the Annual Review of United Nations Affairs has stood as the authoritative resource for scholars, students, and practitioners researching the latest developments of that august body. From the insightful introduction, prepared each year by a distinguished expert on UN affairs, to the full-text presentation of reports and resolutions and the helpful subject index, ARUNA provides a practical tour of each year's U.N. actions and debates. Theexpert selection of documents by Joachim Muller and Karl Sauvant and the topic-based organization of those documents make any researcher's task much easier than the vast searching, sorting, and pruning required by the U.N.'s website. The series' topic-based organization of the materials and subject index lend invaluable guidance to all researchers. ARUNA presents a comprehensive documentation of the work of the UN on an annual basis, starting in September of each year with the beginning of the regular sessions of the General Assembly. Coverage of the UN's key organs is provided, including the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), the International Court of Justice, and the UN Secretariat. In addition, selected reports of intergovernmental bodies and expert groups are included. Solely official UN documentation is used. ARUNA occupies a special place in the publications on the work of the UN - it allows readers to obtain an overview ofthe principal developments in its key organs. This makes it an important reference source for policy-makers and academic researchers. The highlight of this year's edition is the introductory essay written by the highly esteemed Jose Antonio Ocampo, who is Professor of Professional Practice in International and Public Affairs, Director of the Program in Economic and Political Development at the School of International and Public Affairs, and Fellow of the Committee on Global Thought, ColumbiaUniversity. Professor Ocampo previously held the positions of Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations for Economic and Social Affairs, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, and Minister of Finance of Colombia. In 2009, he was a member of the Commission of Experts of the President of the United Nations General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System. Professor Ocampo is also the author of numerousbooks and articles on macroeconomics policy and theory, economic development, international trade, and economic history. His recent publications include Stability with Growth: Macroeconomics, Liberalization and Development, with Joseph E. Stiglitz, Shari Spiegel, Ricardo Ffrench-Davis and Deepak Nayyar (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006). Professor Ocampo, relying on his expertise as a policy economist and his own considerable experience working on economic issues at the United Nations, has written an incisive introductory essay focusing on the United Nations and the global economic crisis. Professor Ocampo's essay examines the history of the economic policy recommendations of UN institutions and concludes that they have often been more far-sighted and accurate than those of the Bretton Woods Institutions, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. He applies this analysis in particular to the recent global financial crisis, and shows how the Monterrey Consensus of 2002, which once again made the UN a forum for global economic issues, gave serious consideration to the concerns of developing countries and set many goals that might have helped to stave off the global financial crisis if they had been more actively pursued. Professor Ocampo also examines the UN's role in the wake of the global financial meltdown, particularly with regard to the Doha follow-up Conference and the Commission of Experts on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System, convened by the General Assembly and led by Joseph Stiglitz. In spite of some resistance to these initiatives from the United States and other developed countries, Professor Ocampo advocates in this essay for a more influential role for the UN's institutions in global financial reform, especially in light of their superior track record in anticipating economic problems resulting from "the inherent tendency of financial markets to experience boom-bust cycles." The 2008-2009 volumes of ARUNA therefore also devote considerable attention to the financial crisis as well as other international crises. Among the documents in the 2008-2009 volumes are the complete General Assembly resolutions, as well as the Report and Resolutions of the Security Council and the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). Annual Reports of note include reports of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the UN Development Programme and UN Population Fund, the UN High Commissioner for HumanRights, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugee in the Near East, and the World Food Programme. Mr. Muller and Dr. Sauvant have also selected progress reports on key peacekeeping, peace-building, and political missions, including those for Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Iraq, Kosovo, the Middle East, Somalia, Sudan, and West Africa. Each annual edition of ARUNA is introduced by a Guest Author, a distinguished expert on UN affairs, who highlights the outstanding themes of the year in review. Together with an overview provided by the editors, this introduction is intended to facilitate access to the material and, above all, to make it easer for users of ARUNA to "see the forest for the trees". As has been mentioned above, ARUNA is fortunate this year to have Jose Antonio Ocampo as the author of its introduction, but the roster of distinguished experts who have contributed this introduction in the past is also worthy of mention: Jeffrey D. Sachs: ARUNA 2007/2008 edition Professor Jeffrey D. Sachs is Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University and Special Advisor to the Secretary-General of the UN on the Millennium Development Goals. Professor Sachs's introduction to ARUNA 2007/2008 was titled "Towards a New Global Protocol on Climate Change", in which he argued that solving the climate change problem will demand four steps: scientific consensus, public awareness, the development of alternative technologies, and a global framework for action. He dealt, in particular, with the science underpinning the negotiations for a new global protocol on climate change, as a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. Professor Sachs argued that climate change crises can only be solved through the goals, leadership, and treaty mechanisms of the UN. Edward C. Luck: ARUNA 2006/2007 edition Professor Edward C. Luck is UN Special Advisor on the Responsibility to Protect and Vice President and Director of Studies at the International Peace Academy. From 1984 to 1994, he served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the UN Association of the USA (UNA-USA). Professor Luck's introduction to ARUNA 2006/2007 covered "The responsible sovereign and the responsibility to protect", in which he addressed the scope and content of what was agreed at the 2005 World Summit, the implications of the responsibility to protect (RtoP) for notions of state sovereignty, and some of the conceptual, architectural, and policy challenges then facing UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's commitment to "operationalizing" the responsibility to protect and translating it "from words to deeds". Louise Frechette: ARUNA 2005/2006 edition Ms Louise Frechette is Distinguished Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, Waterloo, Ontario. Until March 2006, she was the first Deputy Secretary-General of the UN; before that, she was Permanent Representative of Canada to the UN. Ms Frechette's introduction to ARUNA 2005/2006 covered "United Nations reform: an unfinished story". As the first Deputy Secretary-General of the UN, Ms Frechette was uniquely positioned to undertake a personal assessment of what has changed and what has not changed in the past decade at the UN and why. She examined if the UN is functioning better than it was 15 years ago, why reform is so difficult to achieve and what the future holds for the institutions. Rubens Ricupero: ARUNA 2004/2005 edition Mr Rubens Ricupero is Dean of the Fundacno Armando Alvares Penteado (FAAP), Sao Paulo and was formerly Secretary-General of UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and Minister of Finance of Brazil. Mr Ricupero's introduction to ARUNA 2004/2005 covered "The difficulty of building consensus in an age of extremes" and examined the mysteries of the negotiating process leading to the outcome of the 2005 World Summit. Rather than a "Grand Bargain" of a comprehensive UN reformin the areas of development, security and human rights, it is argued that the Summit ended more on a note of lamentation and regret over a missed opportunity. Mr Ricupero concludes that contrary to the daring proclamation at the outset by the Secretary-General, the conditions indispensable to succeed were not in place. Indeed, it was hard to imagine that an ambitious and balanced reform package for the UN could have had any real chance of succeeding.