Ansgar Baums – författare

Seminar paper from the year 2001 in the subject Politics - Topic: German Foreign Policy, grade: 1.0, Free University of Berlin (Otto-Suhr-Institut), language: English, abstract: In the summer of 1991, Yugoslavia was on fire. Two of the Yugoslav republics - Slovenia and Croatia - had held referendums on independence from Belgrade. In December 1990 and May 1991, the great majority in both states voted for independence. Since August 1991, Germany supported the recognition of Slovenia and Croatia actively. Finally, on the 23rd of December 1991, the German foreign minister Genscher announced Germany's recognition of Croatia and Slovenia as sovereign states. A long debate about what became known as "e;recognition policy"e; followed. Germany's unilateral recognition was widely criticized as the most profound mistake of German foreign policy since 1945 or - as Horsley put it - "e;a deadly sin of German foreign policy"e;. The criticism not only came from the German political left, who accused the Kohl government of a retardation to a Bismarckian Machtpolitik. Even Germany's closest allies in Europe criticized Germany harshly. The French foreign minister Dumas warned Genscher that a unilateral recognition by Germany "e;will set Europe back twenty years"e;. Uncertainties about Germany's future role in Europe may partly explain the critizism. France and Great Britain were unsure whether Germany would continue its policy of self-restraint or if it would implement a more unilateralist policy, especially towards its new neighbours in the east. Unsurprisingly, only one year after reunification, the question of recognition was perceived as a paradigmatic case of a "e;new German foreign policy"e;. Was it the beginning of unilateralist power politics, a mere muscle play or just a diplomatic mistake? It has since become obvious that the unilateral recognition was not the beginning of a "e;new German foreign policy"e;. Germany kept on the multilateral track. Today, more than a decade later, Germany is still a driving force behind the integration and enlargement of the EU. Nevertheless, the reasons why Germany acted the way it did, remain unclear. It is not difficult to understand the defection of Germany from multilateral cooperation in December - this is easily explained by a spiral of mistrust between Germany, France and Great Britain. [...]

Essay from the year 2004 in the subject Politics - Region: Near East, Near Orient, grade: 16.5, University of St Andrews, language: English, abstract: What must go wrong before economists label a scarce and strategically valuable commodity like oil a "e;curse"e;? Fundamental economics suggests that they are almost as good as cash. Abundant natural resources can help a country prosper through earnings of hard currencies, larger and diversified domestic investments in physical and human capital, and acquisition of foreign technology. Furthermore, despite attempts to diversify the energy portfolio, oil still is the world's most important energy source. Nevertheless, when BBC launched the TV series "e;The Curse of Oil"e; in September 2004, no incident of protesting economists became known. This might be due to another lesson from history, namely the "e;natural resources paradox"e;: Oil - or natural resources in general - might not exactly be "e;as good as cash"e;. Rather, they could have negative impacts on the development of an economy, i. e. a process towards a stable, sustainable and diversified economy. The most obvious example of the natural resources paradox are conflict-ridden countries like Nigeria. Analysts argue that natural resource abundance is one of the reasons for destructive political conflicts. But even politically stable countries, which enjoy a high GDP per capita due to the exploitation of natural resources, show a negative correlation between oil and development. An obvious example of this is the performance of the member countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). On the one hand, all of these oil monarchies enjoy a high GDP per capita (cf. figure 1).

Essay from the year 2005 in the subject Economics - International Economic Relations, grade: 20, University of St Andrews (Department of Economics), language: English, abstract: The debate about the effects of globalisation on cities is controversial. On the onehand, scientists and journalists predicted the end of the city due to technologicalchange, especially in the area of telecommunications implying that an increasednumber of home-workers and the possibilities of video-conferences would makecalm suburbs or rural areas more attractive in comparison to a grid-locked and expensivedowntown area.1 Yet, whenever the abstract idea of globalisation is illustratedin newspapers or TV, it is not a suburb or the green hills of Fife that areshown. Rather, symbols of globalisation like Manhattan or Tokyo look more likeRidley Scott s Nighttown in Bladerunner. In contrast to the prediction of decliningcities, globalisation seems to boost the growth of cities in a way that many scientists influenced by the ideas of Alfred Marshall and Joseph Schumpeter started to writeabout global cities , world-cities or global city-regions . Leamer/Storper calledglobal cities the big winners of the Internet Age.2 But what are exactly the effectsof globalisation on the functions and economy of cities? In order to examine theseeffects, it is useful to address two questions: (1) why do firms choose cities as a locationin general? (section 2.1); and (2) how does globalisation affect this reasoning?(section 2.2). Section 3 summarises the results.