The globalization of transportation, communication, and ªnance has beneªted not only licit businesses but also professional criminals and terrorists. Arms dealers, drug trafªckers, money launderers, human trafªckers, terrorists, and other sundry criminals, enabled by new, affordable technologies, are increasingly organizing into sprawling global networks. As a result, understanding international organized crime and terrorism in terms of networks has become a widely accepted paradigm in the ªeld of international relations. In this article we seek to clarify that paradigm, probe deeper into the consequences of the network structure, and challenge conventional wisdom about network-based threats to states.A common theme in recent international relations scholarship dealing with organized crime and terrorism is the great difªculty states face in combating network-based threats. According to a growing literature, the primary confrontation in world politics is no longer between states but between states and terrorist networks such as al-Qaida, drug smuggling networks such as those in Colombia and Mexico, nuclear smuggling networks in places such as North Korea and Pakistan, and insurgent networks such as those in Iraq.

Recent studies of autocratic liberalization adopt a rationalist approach in which autocrats’ motives and styles of reasoning are imputed or deduced. By contrast, I investigate these empirically. I focus on liberal social engineering in the Persian Gulf, where authoritarian state efforts to shape citizen hearts and minds conform incongruously to liberal ideals of character. To explain this important but under-studied variant on autocratic liberalization, I present evidence from rare palace ethnography in the United Arab Emirates, including analysis of the jokes and stories ruling elites tell behind closed doors and regular interviews with a ruling monarch. I find that autocrats’ deeply personal experiences in the West as young men and women supplied them with stylized ideas about how modern, productive peoples ought to act and how their own cultures underperform. The evidence also reveals that such experiences can influence autocrats, even years later, leading them to trust in Western-style liberal social engineering as the way forward, despite the risks. Ethnographic findings challenge the contemporary scholarly stereotype of the autocrat as a super-rational being narrowly focused on political survival, illustrating how memory and emotion can also serve as important influences over reasoning and can drive liberal change.

Given that the fictional narratives found in novels, movies, and television shows enjoy wide public consumption, memorably convey information, minimize counter-arguing, and often emphasize politically-relevant themes, we argue that greater scholarly attention must be paid to theorizing and measuring how fiction affects political attitudes. We argue for a genre-based approach for studying fiction effects, and apply it to the popular dystopian genre. Results across three experiments are striking: we find consistent evidence that dystopian narratives enhance the willingness to justify radical—especially violent—forms of political action. Yet we find no evidence for the conventional wisdom that they reduce political trust and efficacy, illustrating that fiction’s effects may not be what they seem and underscoring the need for political scientists to take fiction seriously.

This paper challenges conventional wisdom about the drivers of international community at the individual level. Presenting new data and a novel natural experiment approach to the study of cross-border contact and international community, it tests some of the key microfoundations of international relations theory about how a sense of shared international community may arise and evolve among individuals. The hypotheses are tested using survey data from a large sample (n = 571) of American study abroad students in a range of universities across a treatment and a control group. Surprisingly, findings do not support the main hypothesis that cross-border contact fosters a sense of shared international community. However, the second hypothesis drawn from the liberal paradigm, suggesting that cross-border contact lowers threat perceptions, is strongly supported. The "Huntingtonian" hypothesis that cross-border contact heightens nationalism also garners wide support. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications for theory and future research, especially the potential of rethinking the drivers of international community at the individual level to rely less on a sense of shared identity and essential sameness, and more on a feeling of "enlightened nationalism" and appreciation for difference.

Schooling is widely acknowledged as one of the key arenas in which the basic economic, social, and political attitudes of a population take root. In the UAE, much tends to be assumed about young people’s attitudes toward risk, competition, achievement motivation, responsibility, and other areas relevant to national development. But relatively little research has been conducted to confirm or deny popular assertions in these areas, or to explore the variation that may exist across individual emirates or across school types within each emirate. This paper will report preliminary findings from a study of the economic, social, and political attitudes of youth in Ras al Khaimah, using data collected across a range of secondary schools including two government schools, one elite private school, and two Indian schools. Findings should help construct a more nuanced empirical picture of the UAE’s growing youth population by investigating the different ways in which its members are being socialized. The research may also offer insights into how to improve policymaking for national development. يعرف التعليم على نطاق واسع بأنه أحد الميادين الرئيسية في المواقف الأساسية الاقتصادية والاجتماعية، والسياسية للسكان .