published in http://www.affarinternazionali.it/libromese.asp?ID=29
STORIA E GEOGRAFIA DELLE GUERRE DEL 21° SECOLO. UN SALTO NEL PASSATO PER UNA FINESTRA SUL FUTURO.
Donatella Cugliandro
Il tema della guerra è sempre stato, e ancora rimane, uno dei più discussi e controversi argomenti nella storia delle relazioni internazionali. Elemento costante dei rapporti tra Stati, la guerra si è trasformata negli anni seguendo i mutamenti della politica internazionale e cambiando i propri schemi per adattarli a quelli delle diverse epoche chen si sono succedute, dalla Pace di Westfalia ad oggi.
Seguire il percorso compiuto da un simile cambiamento in quasi quattro secoli di storia non è opera semplice, soprattutto se durante il cammino ci si imbatte nella nascita e nel declino dello Stato moderno, oltre che nell’immensa rete della globalizzazione, con le sue intricate maglie inter- e trans-nazionali. Egregio tentativo in tal senso è quello perseguito da Alfonso Desiderio nella sua recente pubblicazione, “Guerre del 21° secolo” (Giunti Editore, 2008). L’autore, uno fra i più autorevoli esperti italiani in geostrategia e geopolitica di Internet, non solo si propone di ripercorrere in poco meno di 150 pagine i conflitti che oggi sconvolgono il mondo fin nei suoi angoli più reconditi. Desiderio cerca anche di scovarne le cause e di delineare i possibili scenari delle guerre del nuovo secolo. Un obiettivo arduo, ma che sembra essere raggiunto attraverso il sapiente utilizzo di mappe geografiche che facilitano la collocazione visiva dei conflitti e arricchiscono la lettura della variabile spaziale, che altrimenti mancherebbe in un discorso di taglio essenzialmente storico.
Storia e geografia si intrecciano, dunque, delineando il mutevole scenario dei conflitti di oggi. Sebbene alle guerre mediaticamente più note – Iraq ed Afghanistan – siano riservate le sezioni del libro più dettagliate, Desiderio non dimentica di segnalare la maggior parte dei conflitti ancora in corso, da quelli africani in Congo, Sudan, Sierra Leone, Liberia, agli asiatici in Birmania, Kashmir, Sri Lanka, ricordando anche quelle guerre ormai croniche che sembrano non attrarre più l’attenzione dei media, come ad esempio il conflitto arabo-israeliano. Il libro ci accompagna poi nelle cosiddette zone franche, tutti quei territori nullius in cui i potenti locali dominano indisturbati ed incuranti di un governo centrale ormai fantasma: le giungle della Colombia, ormai proprietà delle Farc, la linea Durand tra Pakistan ed Afghanistan, dove i taliban sono insediati da anni, lo Stretto di Malacca, in cui gli atti di pirateria non appartengono affatto ad un’altra epoca.
“Guerre del 21° secolo” non si limita, tuttavia, ad essere una mera descrizione delle guerre di oggi, ma propone un’analisi del cambiamento di questi conflitti alla luce dei mutamenti storico-politico-tecnologici degli ultimi anni. Da una guerra industriale, combattuta con armi convenzionali e tecnologia limitata, il conflitto si è evoluto verso le forme di una ‘guerra senza limiti’ o di una ‘guerra tra la gente’. Il progresso tecnologico, l’incremento dei mezzi di comunicazione, la globalizzazione, moltiplicano il potenziale per una guerra senza confini. Non esistono più limiti alle armi, siano esse convenzionali e non, ormai considerando come tali anche virus informatici, strumenti finanziari o immagini trasmesse dai network mondiali. Non esistono più limiti geografici, come dimostrato dagli attacchi dell’11 Settembre, i primi a violare il cuore del territorio statunitense. Non esistono più limiti temporali, dal momento che le nuove guerre spesso non si concludono in modo definitivo, ma vengono sommerse da indefiniti tentativi di negoziato per poi riemergere qualche tempo dopo come fenomeni carsici. Si tratta di guerre nuove combattute tra la popolazione, la quale non è più soltanto oggetto delle operazioni militari, ma si trasforma nell’ambiente in cui si svolge la guerra e dove il nemico è infiltrato. È proprio la popolazione a rappresentare la sfida maggiore del 21° secolo: secondo Desiderio l’incremento demografico, che si sta verificando ad un ritmo incredibilmente maggiore nelle aree meno ricche del pianeta, può fomentare ulteriori conflitti in queste zone a causa della crescente scarsità di risorse e del loro sempre più difficile reperimento.
Sul futuro l’autore sembra non avere dubbi: il concetto di guerra senza limiti raggiungerà il suo climax estendendosi fino allo spazio. Mentre gli Stati Uniti hanno deciso di tagliare i fondi Nasa – civili – per la ricerca spaziale, affidando gran parte dei progetti alla Difesa, la Cina fa sviluppare il proprio programma spaziale direttamente dalle forze armate. A ruota seguono l’Europa, che disperatamente cerca di uscire dalla sua condizione di nano politico, il Giappone e la Russia, ormai indietro nella corsa allo spazio rispetto a quanto fu l'ex grande madre Urss.
Lo scritto di Desiderio, dunque, si presta ad una facile lettura per chiunque voglia una panoramica ricca e sintetica alle guerre di oggi. Dalla guerra industriale a quella al terrorismo, il libro è un omaggio alla geostrategia, cche combina l’importanza della variabile tecnologica – information warfare – al ruolo crescente della dimensione post-statuale del sistema internazionale, secondo i noti canoni dell’era globale.
Alfonso Desiderio Guerre del 21° secolo, Giunti Editore, 2008
Friday, November 14, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Some Remarks on the Project
After having explained the overall project, I need to give some more detailed information about the work. First, I do not wish to be regarded as an idealist who aims at changing the world, too young or too naive. I am well-aware of the setbacks I am going to meet and takle.
This is why I do not intend to focus at once on the Center. What is of the essence now is to create a forum which links young students and researchers from the South, if possible from Calabria and Reggio Calabria, whose field of study is IR. I would like to see published op-eds or academic essays on IR issues. I would like to create some different sections within the forum, each focusing on different geographical areas (e.g. Transatlantic Relations, Middle East, EU) or different topics (e.g. arms control, human trafficking). I would like someone who works as a reviewer, someone else as an administrator, etc. In sum, before thinking about a real Reggio-based Center I need to know that other people will going to help me developing the project. Acting otherwise would be too idealist and naive.
Of course, those who intend to work on the project must be aware of the final goal, i.e. to found a Center of IR in Reggio Calabria. This means, for instance, that people should then be able to move to Reggio, at least for limited periods of time, because THAT would be the "center of the Center". Internet technology allows each of us to be closest than ever and this is an asset for the project as well. Students and researchers from every part of Italy, and abroad, are invited to join this forum and to cooperate on the project. But the goal is to create something positive for Reggio and its citizens. We should aim at creating a Center where local students and researchers can find research material without moving, for instance, to Rome. Or where they can ask questions to well-qualified academics. But this is the future. For the time being we need to create something powerful enough to be also regarded as feasible to those whose help is of the essence for the realization of the Center in Reggio.
This is why I do not intend to focus at once on the Center. What is of the essence now is to create a forum which links young students and researchers from the South, if possible from Calabria and Reggio Calabria, whose field of study is IR. I would like to see published op-eds or academic essays on IR issues. I would like to create some different sections within the forum, each focusing on different geographical areas (e.g. Transatlantic Relations, Middle East, EU) or different topics (e.g. arms control, human trafficking). I would like someone who works as a reviewer, someone else as an administrator, etc. In sum, before thinking about a real Reggio-based Center I need to know that other people will going to help me developing the project. Acting otherwise would be too idealist and naive.
Of course, those who intend to work on the project must be aware of the final goal, i.e. to found a Center of IR in Reggio Calabria. This means, for instance, that people should then be able to move to Reggio, at least for limited periods of time, because THAT would be the "center of the Center". Internet technology allows each of us to be closest than ever and this is an asset for the project as well. Students and researchers from every part of Italy, and abroad, are invited to join this forum and to cooperate on the project. But the goal is to create something positive for Reggio and its citizens. We should aim at creating a Center where local students and researchers can find research material without moving, for instance, to Rome. Or where they can ask questions to well-qualified academics. But this is the future. For the time being we need to create something powerful enough to be also regarded as feasible to those whose help is of the essence for the realization of the Center in Reggio.
Monday, October 20, 2008
EDITORIAL
To Whom It May Concern,
this is the first timid attempt on the part of a Calabrian resident, as far as I know, to create a Forum on International Relations. The blog is indeed part of a greater project which intends to develop and foster links between the most profound South of Italy and the "near and far abroad".
Unfortunately, so far the "near abroad" has ironically meant the Northern regions of the peninsula, Capital included. This approach, together with the enormous and still unsolvable problems burdened by our Region, has excluded thousands of students and researchers from being "incapsulated" in IR issues, as if the argument was too distant from us.
Notwithstanding, hundreds of people moved and still move to the North, or abroad, attempting at investigating such astonishing issue. I am one of those. My name is Donatella Cugliandro and I am an MA student in International Relations at the University of Bologna. I will be finishing my MA in October and currently I am working as a trainee at the Institute of International Affairs (www.iai.it) in Rome. My field of interest is Turkey and its EU bid, especially focusing on the US stance on the issue and the Washington possible sway on it. This was the argument of my thesis last year, after a 9-month period of study in the US. I studied at the University of California and I moved from there to Washington D.C. for a 3-month internship at the Center of Strategic International Studies (www.csis.org), where I worked for the Turkey Project.
From such experiences, I have learned the passion for IR, how fascinating they can be, how open-minded you become while studying them. But, constantly, one thing overshadowed my personal achievements: being more and more distant from my own world. First and foremost I wished I become an ambassador, however my dream seems to sound quite meaningless if I take into account how much I could do for my own country. And as a country, I intend my origin, my soul, my heart. I intend Italy, but I also intend Calabria.
All of us know intimately why we left, why we decided to go somewhere else. But I cannot believe that at least some of us do not wish to use their new knowledge, their new experience, their new mind, to improve their country, to develop their local institutions, to give a different future to others. I personally moved elsewhere because I did not want to accept Calabrian - Southern - rules. After 6 years traveling around I realized that the most useful way not to accept existing rules is not by running away, but by trying to change the rules. And this was a very reasoned thought, which I developed slowly and in contradiction with my egoism that prayed to me, and still does, not to follow this crazy voice inside my mind.
Yet I do. I want to do it. I intend to devote myself, or part of myself, to a project. As the title of this blog says, I would like to create a Reggio Calabria-based Center of International Relations. To someone, this might sound unfeasible and unuseful. The former because of the absence of any institutions, either private or public, devoted to the issue of IR in Reggio Calabria. Hence nobody could or would help me. The latter because a Center of IR becomes useful when it is linked to their counterparts across the country and beyond it. And Rome, Milan or Turin seem to be the right place, not Reggio Calabria. To both objections I will answer.
To the former: of course we do not have institutions interested in the issue, otherwise some Centers, as the one I would like to found, would already exist. This is a matter of lobbying local, national and European institutions to provide funds and give their blessing for the opening of the Center. Nobody said it is an easy task. To the latter objection: it is precisely because all, both from the North and from the South, still think that the navel of Italy is only in few Northern regions, that nobody has created a Center of IR, among other things, in Calabria. After all, Reggio Calabria is distant from Rome as much as Turin.
For all these reasons I have just created this blog. I WANT TO CHANGE THINGS. But I cannot do it alone. I need you. I need people like me, interested in IR, capable of creating a Reggio-based Center. I need qualified people, who have had study experiences abroad, who speak and write fluently - and in a well-suited academic style - at least one foreign language, who worked or had an internship in an acknowledged institution delving into IR. Mostly, I need young people, motivated, fond of writing, researching, learning. I would like to create a link among us before moving the proposal of a Center of IR to public institutions. But what I first and foremost ask to those who want to share this project with me is reliability and passion.
To all of you the responsibility of creating something positive for our region. It is the least we can do.
this is the first timid attempt on the part of a Calabrian resident, as far as I know, to create a Forum on International Relations. The blog is indeed part of a greater project which intends to develop and foster links between the most profound South of Italy and the "near and far abroad".
Unfortunately, so far the "near abroad" has ironically meant the Northern regions of the peninsula, Capital included. This approach, together with the enormous and still unsolvable problems burdened by our Region, has excluded thousands of students and researchers from being "incapsulated" in IR issues, as if the argument was too distant from us.
Notwithstanding, hundreds of people moved and still move to the North, or abroad, attempting at investigating such astonishing issue. I am one of those. My name is Donatella Cugliandro and I am an MA student in International Relations at the University of Bologna. I will be finishing my MA in October and currently I am working as a trainee at the Institute of International Affairs (www.iai.it) in Rome. My field of interest is Turkey and its EU bid, especially focusing on the US stance on the issue and the Washington possible sway on it. This was the argument of my thesis last year, after a 9-month period of study in the US. I studied at the University of California and I moved from there to Washington D.C. for a 3-month internship at the Center of Strategic International Studies (www.csis.org), where I worked for the Turkey Project.
From such experiences, I have learned the passion for IR, how fascinating they can be, how open-minded you become while studying them. But, constantly, one thing overshadowed my personal achievements: being more and more distant from my own world. First and foremost I wished I become an ambassador, however my dream seems to sound quite meaningless if I take into account how much I could do for my own country. And as a country, I intend my origin, my soul, my heart. I intend Italy, but I also intend Calabria.
All of us know intimately why we left, why we decided to go somewhere else. But I cannot believe that at least some of us do not wish to use their new knowledge, their new experience, their new mind, to improve their country, to develop their local institutions, to give a different future to others. I personally moved elsewhere because I did not want to accept Calabrian - Southern - rules. After 6 years traveling around I realized that the most useful way not to accept existing rules is not by running away, but by trying to change the rules. And this was a very reasoned thought, which I developed slowly and in contradiction with my egoism that prayed to me, and still does, not to follow this crazy voice inside my mind.
Yet I do. I want to do it. I intend to devote myself, or part of myself, to a project. As the title of this blog says, I would like to create a Reggio Calabria-based Center of International Relations. To someone, this might sound unfeasible and unuseful. The former because of the absence of any institutions, either private or public, devoted to the issue of IR in Reggio Calabria. Hence nobody could or would help me. The latter because a Center of IR becomes useful when it is linked to their counterparts across the country and beyond it. And Rome, Milan or Turin seem to be the right place, not Reggio Calabria. To both objections I will answer.
To the former: of course we do not have institutions interested in the issue, otherwise some Centers, as the one I would like to found, would already exist. This is a matter of lobbying local, national and European institutions to provide funds and give their blessing for the opening of the Center. Nobody said it is an easy task. To the latter objection: it is precisely because all, both from the North and from the South, still think that the navel of Italy is only in few Northern regions, that nobody has created a Center of IR, among other things, in Calabria. After all, Reggio Calabria is distant from Rome as much as Turin.
For all these reasons I have just created this blog. I WANT TO CHANGE THINGS. But I cannot do it alone. I need you. I need people like me, interested in IR, capable of creating a Reggio-based Center. I need qualified people, who have had study experiences abroad, who speak and write fluently - and in a well-suited academic style - at least one foreign language, who worked or had an internship in an acknowledged institution delving into IR. Mostly, I need young people, motivated, fond of writing, researching, learning. I would like to create a link among us before moving the proposal of a Center of IR to public institutions. But what I first and foremost ask to those who want to share this project with me is reliability and passion.
To all of you the responsibility of creating something positive for our region. It is the least we can do.
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