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- Title
- RETURNING HOME: UNHCR'S STRATEGIES FOR REPATRIATION FOR AND REINTEGRATION.
- Creator
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Domenech, Tania, Sadri, Houman, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Under what conditions is the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) able to successfully repatriate and reintegrate refugees to their country of origin? This work aims to evaluate the success of UNHCR's initiative to sponsor the repatriation and reintegration of political refugees who voluntarily chose to return to their homeland. The study of political refugees is essential in International Relations, since it entails the failure of preventing ethnic violence and civil unrest....
Show moreUnder what conditions is the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) able to successfully repatriate and reintegrate refugees to their country of origin? This work aims to evaluate the success of UNHCR's initiative to sponsor the repatriation and reintegration of political refugees who voluntarily chose to return to their homeland. The study of political refugees is essential in International Relations, since it entails the failure of preventing ethnic violence and civil unrest. Overall, the emergence of refugees is the product of the inability of conflict prevention. Voluntary repatriation and reintegration of these refugees provides a message of mending relations, state re-building and hope. Successful repatriation is the return of refugees with the expectation of a safe return to society. Successful reintegration however ensures their inclusion in society. Therefore, both terms may be related, but must be discussed separately. This inclusion is essential to reconciliation, and the formation of a peaceful, stable society. Hence, this research will bring a better understanding of victims of conflict, the inability of the state to protect its citizens, and possible patterns of repatriation, reintegration and conflict resolution. To answer the question of the success of UNHCR's policies of repatriation and reintegration, I will use two cross-regional case studies: Guatemala and Afghanistan. I will address the hardship undergone by political refugees, the policies they have encountered from UNHCR, and the scenario of voluntary repatriation patterns. I will then evaluate the conditions on the ground to which refugees are returning. Clearly, if these have a high violence rate, a sustainable life and successful reintegration is very unlikely.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2005
- Identifier
- CFE0000650, ucf:46523
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0000650
- Title
- A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF REFUGEES AND IDPS.
- Creator
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Sanchez, Laura, Sadri, Houman, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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There is a grave concern for the life, liberty and security of individuals who have been forced to leave their homes and have become dispersed within their native countries and throughout the Asian continent. These internally displaced persons and refugees are the subject of this study. Some of the themes that will be discussed include: civil war, human rights violations and the economy, since these are the problems affecting the populations of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Myanmar. These case...
Show moreThere is a grave concern for the life, liberty and security of individuals who have been forced to leave their homes and have become dispersed within their native countries and throughout the Asian continent. These internally displaced persons and refugees are the subject of this study. Some of the themes that will be discussed include: civil war, human rights violations and the economy, since these are the problems affecting the populations of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Myanmar. These case studies are of particular interest because Afghanistan is where most refugees come from, Myanmar has the longest-running military regime and Pakistan hosts the most refugees in the world. All three case studies are currently in a state of civil war, are breeding grounds for violations of human rights and have corrupt economies. Thus, the goal is to end armed conflict, to put an end to the human rights violations that come with it and to restructure the economies in each of these nation states so that the internally displaced persons and refugees can be repatriated, since displacement has become too much of a burden for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Myanmar's neighboring countries, who have been taking in all of the refugees from said countries. Theoretically, if the issues causing displacement were to be solved, then the countries that host refugees would be able to concentrate on their own populations. This study can potentially address the gap between knowledge, policy formation, and policy implementation to realize the goals of the international community in dealing with the displacement crisis.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFH0003829, ucf:44731
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0003829
- Title
- THE EFFECTS OF SUICIDE TERRORISM IN AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ ON US POLICY AND MILITARY STRATEGY.
- Creator
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Whalen, Michelle, Sadri, Houman, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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The international political landscape of the 21st century is strewn with terrorist groups that choose to act violently in order for their political messages to be heard. Around the world groups have been formed to defend their ideologies and fulfill their political agendas through acts of terrorism. The Baader-Meinhof Gang [also known as the Red Army Faction], the Weather Underground, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Hezbollah, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, HAMAS, and the...
Show moreThe international political landscape of the 21st century is strewn with terrorist groups that choose to act violently in order for their political messages to be heard. Around the world groups have been formed to defend their ideologies and fulfill their political agendas through acts of terrorism. The Baader-Meinhof Gang [also known as the Red Army Faction], the Weather Underground, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, Hezbollah, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, HAMAS, and the Irish Republican Army have existed for many decades. They represent only a small handful of terrorist groups that have kidnapped, targeted public institutions with bombs, and employed suicide terrorism. More often than not innocent civilians become involved in the carnage of an act of terrorism when they are caught off guard as unassuming bystanders. On September 11th, 2001 both the American public and US government officials bore the weight of that horrific day. Since 9-11, Americans were robbed of their sense of safety, and the American dream of tranquility was shattered. A general unease spread from the wreckage of the World Trade Centers, and with the passing of time a keen sense of awareness about terrorism took its place. The events of 9/11 have made US citizens fully cognizant that there are many actors actively plotting the destruction of the US. Now, eight years later, Americans live with the daily realization that such a heinous act could happen again, in some other unimaginable form. For the US government, the past eight years have been marked with as many successes as failures. The consequences of the inability of the US intelligence community to foresee the international plot unfolding, within and outside of the homeland, resulted in a major reorganization within the US government. The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was established on November 25, 2002, and was created solely to address US vulnerabilities highlighted by the actions of nineteen al-Qaeda suicide terrorists. The DHS' main responsibility is to improve communication and information sharing among various intelligence-gathering agencies, so another attempt to plan an attack like 9/11 on US soil would be foiled before it materialized. The US government would no longer be noncommittal in the face of terrorism, as it had before 9/11. Clear messages to terrorists were sent on October 7th, 2001, through the US invasion of Afghanistan, and subsequently on March 20th, 2003 through the US invasion of Iraq. Thus, the US' stance on the War on Terrorism was effectively and clearly communicated to al-Qaeda and throughout the rest of the world. The US might once have been labeled a paper tiger, but hitting the US at the core of their financial and military symbols struck a nerve. The terrorist attacks of 2001 taught the US government a vital lesson, but the military campaigns of Afghanistan and Iraq would demonstrate that the US had even more to learn about the newest military tactics and techniques employed by the enemy, and how these tactics impacted on US military operations, strategies, and policies.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- Identifier
- CFE0002921, ucf:47996
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002921
- Title
- THE CASPIAN SEA REGION'S KEY POSITION IN THE RISE OF MILITANT ISLAM.
- Creator
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Cage, Graham, Sadri, Houman, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Researchers and policy experts point to key issues and groups such as the Palestinian/Arab‐Israeli Conflict, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Saudi exported Wahhabism, and, in more recent times, the Iraq wars as being the source of militant Islam in this day in age. However, this perspective ignores key issues and ideals in to how this new form of Islam has emerged in recent decades. For instance, with all the conflicts that have occurred in recent decades, except for the 1979...
Show moreResearchers and policy experts point to key issues and groups such as the Palestinian/Arab‐Israeli Conflict, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Saudi exported Wahhabism, and, in more recent times, the Iraq wars as being the source of militant Islam in this day in age. However, this perspective ignores key issues and ideals in to how this new form of Islam has emerged in recent decades. For instance, with all the conflicts that have occurred in recent decades, except for the 1979 Revolution in Iran, why have they not yielded Shari'a inspired Islamic states in Yemen, Lebanon, the Occupied Territories and Iraq? Currently the only Islamic states in the Arab world are ones that lay on the Persian Gulf that were established during their independence from colonial rule. One only has to look further east and to the north of the Middle East to see militant Islam taking hold in places like Chechnya, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Afghanistan, Waziristan and a host of other areas which do not get the attention from many people in the West. After the demise of the Soviet Union and the years directly after, a political vacuum was formed that received almost no attention from the outside world except for states with historical and cultural similarities. Here Islam has and is being used as a military and political doctrine to accomplish goals and as an ideological base for launching new attacks against its proclaimed enemies. Indeed many of the key theologians and figures have come from the Arab world, but the rise of militant Islam could not have formed with this alone. Many of the fighters on the ground in al‐Qaeda and its direct affiliated groups are indeed not Arabs but come from a wide range of different ethnic groups such as Afghans, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Uyghurs and Pakistanis who have answered bin Laden's call of lesser jihad against the West. Rather than examining militant Islam through a Middle Eastern perspective, this author wishes to give an alternate view that the current rise of militant Islam in the world is directly associated with the internal political situation of the Greater Caspian Sea Basin and not the Middle East as so many people have proposed in the past. To examine this idea, this author will look extensively at the internal conditions of states that have allowed militant Islam to arise and mature in such a short time span in this often forgotten region. The primary purpose of the proposed paper is to examine the rise of militant Islam through a Caspian Sea region lens rather than a Middle Eastern one. This study will also examine violent groups in various states to understand how groups are able to form and how they differ from each other. Countries ranging from as far as Turkey to the Xinxiang Province in China and from the southern reaches of the Russian Federation to Pakistan will be the primary focus.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2008
- Identifier
- CFE0002313, ucf:47873
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0002313
- Title
- WAR IN PAKISTAN: THE EFFECTS OF THE PAKISTANI-AMERICAN WAR ON TERROR IN PAKISTAN.
- Creator
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Qureshi, Akhtar, Sadri, Houman, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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This research paper investigates the current turmoil in Pakistan and how much of it has been caused by the joint American-Pakistani War on Terror. The United States' portion of the War on Terror is in Afghanistan against the Al-Qaeda and Taliban forces that began after the September 11th attacks in 2001, as well as in Pakistan with unmanned drone attacks. Pakistan's portion of this war includes the support to the U.S. in Afghanistan and military campaigns within it's own borders against...
Show moreThis research paper investigates the current turmoil in Pakistan and how much of it has been caused by the joint American-Pakistani War on Terror. The United States' portion of the War on Terror is in Afghanistan against the Al-Qaeda and Taliban forces that began after the September 11th attacks in 2001, as well as in Pakistan with unmanned drone attacks. Pakistan's portion of this war includes the support to the U.S. in Afghanistan and military campaigns within it's own borders against Taliban forces. Taliban forces have fought back against Pakistan with terrorist attacks and bombings that continue to ravage the nation. There have been a number of consequences from this war upon Pakistani society, one of particular importance to the U.S. is the increased anti-American sentiment. The war has also resulted in weak and widely unpopular leaders. The final major consequence this study examines is the increased conflict amongst the many ethnicities within Pakistan. The consequences of this war have had an effect on local, regional, American, and international politics.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFH0003789, ucf:44725
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFH0003789
- Title
- Positive Political Outcomes From Feminist Islam in Afghanistan: Identifying Development Program Features that Raise the Status of Women.
- Creator
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Barnard, Margaret, Hamann, Kerstin, Owens, J. Thomas, Dolan, Thomas, Kinsey, Barbara, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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Existing literature establishes a connection between elevating the status of women in less developed countries and positive political outcomes including: increased national stability, decreased likelihood of civil conflict, and international stability. In particular, the literature suggests that working within the dominant cultural framework of a country makes development projects more successful. This thesis expands upon these bodies of literature and examines the outcomes of the work of two...
Show moreExisting literature establishes a connection between elevating the status of women in less developed countries and positive political outcomes including: increased national stability, decreased likelihood of civil conflict, and international stability. In particular, the literature suggests that working within the dominant cultural framework of a country makes development projects more successful. This thesis expands upon these bodies of literature and examines the outcomes of the work of two major development agencies in Afghanistan, the UN and USAID in the area of women's education and healthcare. The thesis analyzes some specific characteristics that influence the effects of these programs in the Afghan context. It argues that when development agencies work within the unique cultural context of Afghanistan, and promote development gains for women within an Islamic framework, they are more likely to be effective than if they do not work within this framework. The thesis tests this hypothesis with a comparative qualitative analysis of the goals and accomplishes of the UN and USAID and compares the results of the analysis with survey data from The Asia Foundation Survey of the Afghan people, which provides data from 2006-2013 regarding attitudes of the Afghan people. Based on a qualitative analysis, the study's results, although tentative, identifies patterns of success using the Islamic framework.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2014
- Identifier
- CFE0005460, ucf:50368
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0005460
- Title
- DIVIDED GOVERNMENT AND CONGRESSIONAL FOREIGN POLICY: A CASE STUDY OF THE POST-WORLD WAR II ERA IN AMERICAN GOVERNMENT.
- Creator
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Feinman, David, Houghton, David, University of Central Florida
- Abstract / Description
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The purpose of this research is to analyze the relationship between the executive and legislative branches of American federal government, during periods within which these two branches are led by different political parties, to discover whether the legislative branch attempts to independently legislate and enact foreign policy by using "the power of the purse" to either appropriate in support of or refuse to appropriate in opposition to military engagement abroad. The methodology for this...
Show moreThe purpose of this research is to analyze the relationship between the executive and legislative branches of American federal government, during periods within which these two branches are led by different political parties, to discover whether the legislative branch attempts to independently legislate and enact foreign policy by using "the power of the purse" to either appropriate in support of or refuse to appropriate in opposition to military engagement abroad. The methodology for this research includes the analysis and comparison of certain variables, including public opinion, budgetary constraints, and the relative majority of the party that holds power in one or both chambers, and the ways these variables may impact the behavior of the legislative branch in this regard. It also includes the analysis of appropriations requests made by the legislative branch for funding military engagement in rejection of requests from the executive branch for all military engagements that occurred during periods of divided government from 1946 through 2009.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2011
- Identifier
- CFE0003657, ucf:48840
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/ucf/fd/CFE0003657