It struck me as I was reading their book that, though they didn’t examine them in much depth, landmines played a crucial role in delineating the boundaries around these “cartographic fantasies.” That so many mines were laid is an indication of how much violent effort was required to  ’unmix’ Bosnia’s cosmopolitan geography. To emplace a minefield is an exercise in violent mapmaking, an effort to draw an explosive border between an ‘Us’ and a ‘Them’. Unsurprisingly then, demining has been integrated into massive international effort, described by Toal and Dahlman, that has gone into reversing ethnic cleansing. Nonetheless, this has not been a straightforward process — my research in Bosnia showed that the removal of mines has sometimes played into nationalist efforts to stymie and obstruct efforts to build a cosmopolitan future.

The mine action sector has somewhat of an obsession with maps. Walk into the offices of any demining agency and you will see walls plastered with maps of every scale, covered in red dots and “polygons”. What is somewhat surprising is that the sector as a whole tends to think of them rather straightforwardly and unproblematically. Toal and Dahlman come at maps from an alternative perspective, that of “critical geopolitics“, a broad critique of the social science tradition of accepting maps, borders and geography as unproblematic and “scientific.” For Toal and Dahlman, geopolitics is “less a determining location or a stable hierarchy”  than “a culturally embedded practice operating across networks of power” and a “field of competing political constructions.” A map tells you as much about the person(s) drawing it as the place that is drawn.

The demining map can be ”deconstructed” in a similar way. Charles Mather has shown how mine action’s obsession with  technical expertise, ‘information management’ and geographic information systems (GIS) mapping functions to depoliticize and marginalize local community voices in planning demining efforts. He tries to unpack the mine map to show how it is a product of “cadastral politics”, not simply a “scientific” process. Similarly, in my research on South Sudan I found that unintentionally, coloring red on UN maps roads that were not verified as mine-free may have contributed to the marginalization of “remote areas” in distribution of humanitarian aid.

In short, demining can never be an entirely “apolitical” and technocratic process because minefields are artifacts of political conflict, an attempt by political actors to reshape territorial space. Everything about the process of mine clearance – from information gathering to map-drawing to removing ordancne — is intrinsically political.

To read my full review of Toal and Dahlman’s book, click here.

At its root, my research into the political economy of aid for mine action is essentially a critique of the uncritical acceptance of conventional economic wisdom that privatization, deregulation and liberalization will lead us to a more prosperous and efficient economy. For years I had run into commercial demining managers parroting simplistic economic models suggesting that commercial tendering would make demining cheaper, faster, more efficient and safer. I heard many representatives of donor agencies repeating this line too. However, in my quantitative and qualitative PhD research at the London School of Economics I found that this conventional wisdom was not quite so straightforward. Making demining more competitive often led to higher accident rates, lower quality demining and less focus on the top humanitarian priorities. Competition, particularly in a region where there is a problem with enforcing the rule of law, can sometimes make public services worse (Read my book Foreign Aid and Landmine Clearance for more details, an extract is available for free here).

Since completing my PhD, I have found similar research findings in other sectors, including humanitarian aid in Haiti, and a church’s social services. There is not a straightforward line between neo-liberal reforms and a better world. In fact, privatization, deregulation and liberalization can lead to greater inequality, a reduction in the quality of social services and political fragmentation.

This is why I, like the economists in the video embedded above, have joined the Occupy Movement. As I explained in my interview with the Daily Beast last month, while I do not always agree with some of the Movement’s more radical fringes, I believe they have opened up a conversation about what is wrong with our economy — the system that distributes scarce resources. When some 1.4 billion people live in poverty and over 925 million are hungry, we cannot pretend that our global political economy is serving humanity well. We need something better — a system that enables a more prosperous and equitable world, a system that protects us from economic and other risks, a system that fosters the ‘good life’, not ‘bare life’, for all human beings.

Traditional economists are often suspicious of politics — having assumed it out of their models, they are irritated when political reality comes crashing in and ruins their neat production functions. But the ‘actually existing economy’ rarely mirrors neo-classical models, which assume perfect competition, equal access to information, rules that apply to everyone and a lack of violence. It is only through political mobilization — nonviolent activism – that we can call attention to the ‘market imperfections’ and ‘market failures’ that have actually become remarkably ‘normal’  and ‘accepted’ in our economy. Only through politics can we have a dialogue and discussion about ways to organize, and yes, regulate, our economy so that it serves society, not the other way around.

“The message from the failed efforts today is clear – cluster bombs are indiscriminate, kill long after they are dropped and are illegal,” said Amy Little of the Cluster Munition Coalition. “Countries like China, India, Israel, Russia and the US who say they are seriously concerned about the humanitarian impact, should go home and immediately begin destroying their stockpiles.”

For more details on the campaign against cluster munitions and what it means for international politics, read this article I co-wrote with Thomas Nash in Global Policy. For Nash’s thoughts on this latest victory for the campaign, click here.

The Daily Beast posted an interview with me about Occupy Wall Street today. Zuccotti Park, aka “Liberty Plaza” is just a few blocks from where I teach in Lower Manhattan.

Please sign the global petition organized by Avaaz calling on governments “to do all in your power to stop cluster bombs being used.” Over 75,000 people have signed so far — please add your name to the list.

To learn more about how cluster munitions have “killed and injured thousands of civilians during the last 40 years and continue to do so today”, visit the Cluster Munition Campaign.

For more details on the campaign against cluster munitions and what it means for international politics, read this article I co-wrote with Thomas Nash in Global Policy.

In the article I say that the globalization of social service provision in Haiti has in some ways eroded the power of Haitian parliamentarians. Yet it also offers them new opportunities to link up with international actors to advance their social agendas.

This article was based on my earlier report on the governance of the Haitian relief effort, written for the London School of Economics, available here.

On 12 January 2010, Haiti suffered literal state collapse, as thousands of buildings crumbled in the 21st century’s deadliest earthquake. Over 200,000 were killed, 300,000 injured and 1.5 million displaced. Almost 20% of federal government employees were killed. The Presidential Palace lay in ruins and 27 of 28 federal government buildings were destroyed. An estimated 4,000 prisoners escaped from incarceration. In a remaining government building a couple months after the earthquake, one could still see civil servants rolling up bed mats in the morning, as they sought nightly refuge in their offices and the surrounding compounds. One UN official described it as the worst disaster the UN had ever had to confront. In this nightmarish context, to whom should a Haitian turn for protection from violence and ‘downside risks’ ?

Into the vacuum left by the implosion of the state apparatus, compounded by a sudden and overwhelming need for physical and social protection, has rushed a vast complex of global public and private actors. Street patrols, food distributions, teacher training, epidemiological surveys and child protective services are being provided by a mix of bilateral, multilateral and NGO agencies.

In a new paper written for the London School of Economics Global Governance program, I explore and interrogate this emerging political system of global governance in Haiti, particularly regarding its implications for ‘human security.’ The paper draws on some of the themes and theoretical work I developed in my book, Foreign Aid and Landmine Clearance, which looked at the global governance structures involved in clearing landmines and cluster munitions.

Click here to read the report.