Both the phenomenon of terrorism and our conception of it depend on historical context—political, social, and economic—and how the countries, groups and individuals who participate in or respond to the actions we call terrorism related to the world in which they act. The causes and effects of terrorism are comprehensible only in terms of political conflicts in specific historical periods. The current gap between Latin America and the United States on the conception of terrorism and the policy guidance that will establish a common anti-terrorist strategy in the Western Hemisphere respond to the unpredictability and dynamic of this phenomenon. Therefore, in order to reduce this present gap we require an effective guide to anti-terrorist policy formulation in Latin America and the United States under a common, clear, and prospective strategy that will be able to establish, enforce, and continually refine a holistic political-military plan and generate consistent national and international support.
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This paper discusses the enrollment of women and homosexuals in the Armed Forces of South American and NATO countries. There are discrepancies in the discussion of this issue in both groups of countries. It seems to be easier for the military to deal with the enrollment of women than to accept the enrollment of homosexuals. The paper conducts a detailed analysis of the development of this issue in Brazil, because this is the country where the writer of this paper has the larger bulk of information and the one that, militarily speaking, is the most important in South America. This is a preliminary study, and some data are lacking, precisely due to the fact that there has not been a widespread academic debate on the issue at hand. However, the purpose of this paper is to encourage discussion, to disseminate previously collected information and to present a number of possible viewpoints.
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A key concept that countries have tried to push forward is that related to the establishment of a set of Defense principles that enable society to understand, support and commit to its needs and goals in defense matters. In the past few years, the traditional gap between the military and civil society grew substantially wider due to the fact that most western nations embarked in a process leading to professional armed forces. Social marketing models that were successfully applied to advance other social causes are extremely useful to raise awareness as to national defense matters and to create a set of international defense principles, a group of values, beliefs, identities, institutions and procedures that support regional Security and Defense policies. This paper examines the potential of social marketing as a catalyst that may be used to disseminate, foster and bring about changes related to the abovementioned set of defense principles, the main stages of their planning process and the basic design elements of such set of principles, as well as the communication strategy to be applied and the contents thereof.
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The purpose of this paper is to discuss the principles that underlie the creation of an Inter-American System for Cooperation in Security and Defense Matters that would be utilized to respond to the new threats facing the hemisphere. The paper reviews the theoretical background of international regulations and of the Rio Treaty with a view to determining whether there is a current Inter-American system for cooperation in defense-related matters, or whether there is no such system and efforts need to be made in order to create it.
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The purpose of this paper is to assess the extent to which the Ministry of Defense, an institution of critical importance for today's societies, is impacting civil-military relations in Brazil. Ultimately, this translates into a strengthening of civil controls geared toward achieving civil supremacy over the Armed Forces, which are a fundamental tool that the government has at its disposal. The process of establishing and implementing a Ministry of Defense is not linear, but winding. It depends both on the policies adopted by the Ministry of Defense itself and on the relationships established among the military personnel, the Government and the rest of society. After a brief analysis of the problem and of the Brazilian situation, we tried to examine the "hits and misses" of the Ministry of Defense in connection with civil-military relations in Brazil. We also looked at the organization of the defense system in our country. Indeed, Brazil is still far from a situation where civil supremacy is a reality, notwithstanding the fact that major gaps in the "echelons" of civil supremacy are being bridged. Since the creation and implementation of a Ministry of Defense is a process, the decisive involvement of the country?s politicians and of large segments of the civil society become necessary in order to do away with much of the apathy that Brazil is currently experiencing.
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The purpose of this paper is to analyze the involvement of civil police forces in peacekeeping operations. The theoretical background of civil police forces, as well as their characteristics and specific elements, will be examined. This paper also contains a discussion of the participation of the Chilean police forces in peacekeeping operations.
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This paper describes the organizational structure of the Peruvian National Defense System. After discussing the role of the different entities that make up the Defense System, the budget assigned to each sector is analized. Special emphasis is placed on transparency of the defense sector budget and, in particular, of the budget of the intelligence service. The initial analysis of the defense sector and its budget indicate that the available information is scarce and almost useless given that it does not allow for analysis of the social worth of individual projects associated with that sector. Likewise, a large part of the budget is destined for actions oriented toward social spending programs. This causes a distorsion in the analysis of the rest of the government's social spending policy. It is difficult to measure how defense spending destined for social programs complements or substitutes other government actions. A common theme throughout the sector is the cult of secrecy and the lack of transparency, as well as difficulty in accessing data. The situation has recently improved with the publication of the Defense White Paper. However, in our opinion, there is still much to done.
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