Define "Rogue state"

[Ingvina Freyr]

Every now and then, we hear politicians and journalists talk about rogue states. AFAIK there is no clear definition of the term. What, in your opinion, does it take for a government to be called "Rogue"?

I am serious about the subject, so please keep off the "i don't like them"-answers.

 

[Elta]

Any state that doesn't follow the rules set by a seris of orginzations - U.N. (yes this may make the U.S. one ) , WTO etc etc

 

[Ramius75]

Countries that are irresponsible, dont coorperate with the majority of countries, Polluctors, loner, detrimental to the well being of the "rest of the world", bullies, imperialist, unilateralist, Countries that own money and due to the UN, also countries that made the world a less safer place to live in.

 

[Ingvina Freyr]

Countries that are irresponsible, dont coorperate with the majority of countries, Polluctors, loner, detrimental to the well being of the "rest of the world", bullies, imperialist, unilateralist, Countries that own money and due to the UN, also countries that made the world a less safer place to live in.

Are there any "good" countries left?

 

[Ramius75]

Are there any "good" countries left?

yes, i think there is, Iceland, New Zealand looks not bad, So is Switziland, Sweden, Norway, Guam ??, Singapore is quite law-abidding too(or in fact too much). I think most countries that are eager to please

 

[Elta]

yes, i think there is, Iceland, New Zealand looks not bad, So is Switziland, Sweden, Norway, Guam ??, Singapore is quite law-abidding too(or in fact too much). I think most countries that are eager to please

Yes if more countrys were like Iceland we would be better off (and no that is not sarcasim).

 

[Homie]

Pretty much all the small western countries who are too small to be expected to do anything are the "good ones". E.g. The already mentioned Iceland, New Zealand, The Scandinavian countries, Finland, San Marino, Andorra, Malta, Luxemburg.

The thing is, they don't have to do anything that people later will blame them for.

 

[plarq]

Yea, if more country relies on tourism as Iceland, we'll have more pollution due to ships and planes full of passengers.

BTW, Norway is drilling petroleum, which looks like a cold Middle East.

 

[Homie]

Yea, if more country relies on tourism as Iceland, we'll have more pollution due to ships and planes full of passengers.

BTW, Norway is drilling petroleum, which looks like a cold Middle East.

Iceland relies on tourism? This is news to me.

 

[ComradeDavo]

Iceland relies on tourism? This is news to me.

Shows you have much to learn.

 

[Rambuchan]

"Rogue state" is a term very much defined by the party using it. In other words, it cannot stand alone in its meaning and is inextricably linked up to the subjective view of the world that said party takes.

A "rogue state" is therefore any state which acts, threatens to act, or is seen to have the potential to act against the interests of those issuing the label.

 

[zenspiderz]

By the definitions given by

Ramius75 - Countries that are irresponsible, dont coorperate with the majority of countries, Polluctors, loner, detrimental to the well being of the "rest of the world", bullies, imperialist, unilateralist, Countries that own money and due to the UN, also countries that made the world a less safer place to live in.

and

Elta - Any state that doesn't follow the rules set by a seris of orginzations - U.N. (yes this may make the U.S. one ) , WTO etc etc

(with which I agree)

the US and Isreal are the top two Rogue States by a long margin.

When US elites however talk about Rogue States they mean states that do not drop their trousers and bend over for the US empire inc.

 

[Rambuchan]

Here is something related to the question the OP asks:

What is Terrorism?

Well that brings us back to the question, what is terrorism? I have been assuming we understand it. Well, what is it? Well, there happen to be some easy answers to this. There is an official definition. You can find it in the US code or in US army manuals. A brief statement of it taken from a US army manual, is fair enough, is that terror is the calculated use of violence or the threat of violence to attain political or religious ideological goals through intimidation, coercion, or instilling fear. That’s terrorism. That’s a fair enough definition. I think it is reasonable to accept that. The problem is that it can’t be accepted because if you accept that, all the wrong consequences follow. For example, all the consequences I have just been reviewing. Now there is a major effort right now at the UN to try to develop a comprehensive treaty on terrorism. When Kofi Annan got the Nobel prize the other day, you will notice he was reported as saying that we should stop wasting time on this and really get down to it.

But there’s a problem. If you use the official definition of terrorism in the comprehensive treaty you are going to get completely the wrong results. So that can’t be done. In fact, it is even worse than that. If you take a look at the definition of Low Intensity Warfare which is official US policy you find that it is a very close paraphrase of what I just read. In fact, Low Intensity Conflict is just another name for terrorism. That’s why all countries, as far as I know, call whatever horrendous acts they are carrying out, counter terrorism. We happen to call it Counter Insurgency or Low Intensity Conflict. So that’s a serious problem. You can’t use the actual definitions. You’ve got to carefully find a definition that doesn’t have all the wrong consequences.

http://www.zmag.org/GlobalWatch/chomskymit.htm

And immediately after the above in that talk / article is this...

Why did the United States and Israel Vote Against a Major Resolution Condemning Terrorism?

There are some other problems. Some of them came up in December 1987, at the peak of the first war on terrorism, that’s when the furor over the plague was peaking. The United Nations General Assembly passed a very strong resolution against terrorism, condemning the plague in the strongest terms, calling on every state to fight against it in every possible way. It passed unanimously. One country, Honduras abstained. Two votes against; the usual two, United States and Israel. Why should the United States and Israel vote against a major resolution condemning terrorism in the strongest terms, in fact pretty much the terms that the Reagan administration was using? Well, there is a reason. There is one paragraph in that long resolution which says that nothing in this resolution infringes on the rights of people struggling against racist and colonialist regimes or foreign military occupation to continue with their resistance with the assistance of others, other states, states outside in their just cause. Well, the United States and Israel can’t accept that. The main reason that they couldn’t at the time was because of South Africa. South Africa was an ally, officially called an ally. There was a terrorist force in South Africa. It was called the African National Congress. They were a terrorist force officially. South Africa in contrast was an ally and we certainly couldn’t support actions by a terrorist group struggling against a racist regime. That would be impossible.

And of course there is another one. Namely the Israeli occupied territories, now going into its 35th year. Supported primarily by the United States in blocking a diplomatic settlement for 30 years now, still is. And you can’t have that. There is another one at the time. Israel was occupying Southern Lebanon and was being combated by what the US calls a terrorist force, Hizbullah, which in fact succeeded in driving Israel out of Lebanon. And we can’t allow anyone to struggle against a military occupation when it is one that we support so therefore the US and Israel had to vote against the major UN resolution on terrorism. And I mentioned before that a US vote against…is essentially a veto. Which is only half the story. It also vetoes it from history. So none of this was every reported and none of it appeared in the annals of terrorism. If you look at the scholarly work on terrorism and so on, nothing that I just mentioned appears. The reason is that it has got the wrong people holding the guns. You have to carefully hone the definitions and the scholarship and so on so that you come out with the right conclusions; otherwise it is not respectable scholarship and honorable journalism. Well, these are some of problems that are hampering the effort to develop a comprehensive treaty against terrorism. Maybe we should have an academic conference or something to try to see if we can figure out a way of defining terrorism so that it comes out with just the right answers, not the wrong answers. That won’t be easy.

 

[DYNAMICS]

well according to john Bolton anything Anti-American.

 

[Ingvina Freyr]

Good posts, Rambuchan! It shows that these expressions most often come from a subjective point of view, and that they're very difficult to define objectively (should one try). Yet, there are so many expressions used daily, among politicians, in media, and by people on the streets, that everybody defines differently. Rouge states, terrorism, democracy, welfare, liberty/freedom are just a few examples.

In Sweden, for example, a politician can be aggressively attacked by another politician for wanting to destroy "the welfare". Media will then side with the attacker and the defendant will probably withdraw his suggestion instead of replying; What is welfare? How can you say I'm destroying something you yourself can not define?

So here are a few new topics for you all to answer:

When is a state a Democracy?
What is freedom?
What is terrorism?

Good luck!

 

[Panda]

Does anybody except the US use the term anyways?

 

[Rambuchan]

Ingvina Freyr: I think your terrorism question was answered above right? Or are you looking for more?

Anyway, what this thread highlights and confirms is: Politics is foremost a contest over langauge.

 

[zenspiderz]

Ingvina Freyr: I think your terrorism question was answered above right? Or are you looking for more?

Anyway, what this thread highlights and confirms is: Politics is foremost a contest over langauge.

No doubt 100% clear as day to anyone not in denial.

 

[Bozo Erectus]

Define "Rogue state"

Apparently its any state that doesnt obey the United States and the EU.

 

[Richard Cribb]

Good thread and some good observations here.
The best summary is this one I think; I also agree on which are the top two rogue states:

By the definitions given by

Ramius75 - Countries that are irresponsible, dont coorperate with the majority of countries, Polluctors, loner, detrimental to the well being of the "rest of the world", bullies, imperialist, unilateralist, Countries that own money and due to the UN, also countries that made the world a less safer place to live in.

and

Elta - Any state that doesn't follow the rules set by a seris of orginzations - U.N. (yes this may make the U.S. one ) , WTO etc etc

(with which I agree)

the US and Israel are the top two Rogue States by a long margin.

When US elites however talk about Rogue States they mean states that do not drop their trousers and bend over for the US empire inc.

Everybody is well advised to carefully note this wise statement, which among other things saves us from sifting through the dialogues of Plato, of which many are pretty tedious:

Politics is foremost a contest over language.

Bravo, Ram! And bonus point for reading Zmag!
And speaking of tedious, as late as last week I was involved in a "debate" with one of the most devoted Busheviks here, who claimed that his beloved US of A couldn't be a rogue state, apparently because it was supported by other countries on its assault on Iraq.
I might as well post the same link here as I did then; this article is quite old, but worth to look at anyway:
http://www.zmag.org/zmag/articles/feb98herman.htm