William Maley
Biographic Data
| ID | 730810 |
|---|---|
| NAME | William Maley |
| GIVEN NAMES | William |
| FAMILY NAME | Maley |
| SIGNATURE | MALEY W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Australian National University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0198-3809 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 45 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 81 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 44 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1985 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Ukraine, Afghanistan and the failure of deterrence
Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.Additional informationNotes on contributorsWilliam MaleyWilliam Maley is Emeritus Professor of Diplomacy at The Australian National University. He recently co-authored (with Ahmad Shuja Jamal) The Decline and Fall of Republican Afghanistan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2023); and is author of The Afghanistan Wars, 3rd ed. (New York: Red Globe Press/Macmillan, 2…
Ideology, Clericalism, and Socialization: Some Reflections on the Sociology of the Afghan Taliban
Before the occupation of Kabul by the Taliban movement in 2021, there had been some hopes that in power, it would behave very differently from how it acted when it earlier occupied Kabul from 1996 to 2001. This proved not to be the case. Always inscrutable, the movement prioritized ideology over interests, embodied a “theocratic-descending” model of authority, and was the product of a pathogenic pattern of socialization. Under such circumstances,…
Diplomacy of Disaster: The Afghanistan ‘Peace Process’ and the Taliban Occupation of Kabul
On 29 February 2020 in Doha, the United States signed an ‘Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan’ with the extremist Taliban movement. Yet on 15 August 2021, the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul. This article argues that the Doha Agreement did not simply precede the Taliban takeover; in significant ways it contributed to it. In its negotiation, content and implementation, it created destructive incentives for domestic a…
Drones and Global Order: Implications of Remote Warfare for International Society
Drones and Global Order
Diplomacy, Communication, and Peace: Selected Essays
Institutional Design, Neopatrimonialism, and the Politics of Aid in Afghanistan
State disruption confronted Afghanistan’s rulers and their international supporters with a challenging legacy after 2001. The emergence of a neopatrimonial political order, with formal bureaucratic and administrative structures entwined with informal networks and patronage, has significantly affected attempts at aid delivery. Such dangers need to be recognized and addressed at the outset in internationally supported transitions
What is a Refugee
"With the recent arrival in Europe of over a million refugees and asylum-seekers, a sense of panic has spread across the continent and beyond. William Maley's illuminating introduction offers a guide to the complex idea of "the refugee" and sets the current crisis within the wider history of human exile, injecting much-needed objectivity and nuance into the debate. Arguing that Western states are now reaping the consequences of policies aimed at …
Afghanistan on a knife-edge
Afghanistan finds itself on a knife-edge. The September–October 2015 crisis in Kunduz highlighted the scale of the challenges facing its “National Unity Government”, which does not enjoy widespread popular confidence and is constrained by its neopatrimonial character, inherited from the times of Hamed Karzai. Insecurity contributed to an outflow towards Europe of more than 200,000 Afghans in 2015. Some see negotiation with the Taliban as a way of…
Australia’s refugee policy: Domestic politics and diplomatic consequences
Refugee policy involves a two-level game. For Australia since approximately 1998, the politics of refugees has been toxically affected by domestic politics. This has had potentially negative effects on Australia’s reputation and soft power. This article provides an overview of the issue, explores the ways in which considerations of domestic politics have come increasingly to shape Australia’s policy and concludes with a discussion of the conseque…
Appraising electoral fraud: Tensions and Complexities
Recent years have witnessed the flourishing of literatures dealing with electoral integrity and forensic techniques by which electoral fraud can be identified and analysed. Statistical techniques are now available through which highly improbable patterns of voting can be highlighted as part of the process of investigating whether an election deserves to be categorised as free and fair. Yet relatively little use has been made on the ground of such…
Reconstructing Afghanistan: Civil-Military Experiences in Comparative Perspective
This book identifies some of the main lessons for civil-military interactions that can be derived from the experiences of Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) in Afghanistan. The book has three main themes. Firstly, the volume analyses why the ways in which civil and military actors interact in theatres of operations such as Afghanistan matter -- for both those categories of actors, and for the ordinary people who their interactions serve. Seco…
Statebuilding in Afghanistan: Challenges and pathologies
The process of statebuilding in Afghanistan since 2001 has been complicated by a diverse set of problems, including the unintended consequences of early political decisions, the choice of institutional forms that have fostered dysfunctional policy-making, and the slide towards a neopatrimonial system combining bureaucracy with patronage. These problems have had a corrosive effect on the statebuilding enterprise, leaving an ambiguous legacy as Afg…
Afghanistan as a Cultural Crossroads: Lessons From the Writings of Ella Maillart, Annemarie Schwarzenbach and Nancy Hatch Dupree
Much has been written about Afghanistan, a complex cultural space that different people see in different ways. But not all of their views are of equal value. Stereotypes do no-one any favours. Ella Maillart and Annemarie Schwatzenbach were two Swiss women writers who set off for Afghanistan in June 1939. Ella was a traveller who wrote, Annemarie a writer who travelled, but their books give a sense of the realities of Afghanistan, Nancy Dupree fir…
Afghanistan in 2011
Afghanistan confronted further turbulence in 2011, involving the assassinations of prominent figures, tense regional relations, and uncertainty about where the draw down of foreign forces in Afghanistan might lead. Popular confidence in Afghanistan's future direction remains weak, and President Hamid Karzai has had little success in boosting his government's standing
Challenges of Political Development in Afghanistan: Mass, Elite and Institutional Dimensions
The transition in Afghanistan is manifestly beset by multiple challenges, yet behind obvious issues such as insecurity and corruption lie a range of deeper problems related to the way in which the Afghan political system has developed. Trust deficits, real conflicts of interest, and parallel and potentially conflicting systems of authority, have affected both the mass population—many of whom feel disconnected and disenfranchised—and political eli…
Afghanistan in 2010
Afghanistan in 2010 witnessed a number of important events including cabinet changes, legislative elections, and several major international conferences focused on its problems. It continued to be confronted by long-term problems of insecurity, compounded by uncertainty about both the trajectory of U.S. policy and the legitimacy of its own rulers
Afghanistan: An historical and geographical appraisal
Afghanistan's current difficulties are in large measure the product of a troubled history and a troubled geographical location. These have combined to produce a debilitated state, open to meddling from a range of external powers, that has now experienced decades of trauma. The current insurgency that afflicts the country is sustained by the sanctuaries in Pakistan from which the Taliban operate. Unless and until there is progress on this front, t…
Global Governance and Diplomacy: Worlds Apart?
Rescuing Afghanistan (Briefings)
Trends and options in transnational policy: A conference report
A More Secure World: Some Reflections
Asylum-seekers in Australia's international relations
The paper is divided into five sections. In the first, I offer some observations on the nature of 'sovereignty', and on the place of 'border controls' within sovereignty discourse. In the second, I discuss what it means to be a 'middle power', and what 'soft power' resources a middle power may need to use. In the third, I argue that crude populism has shaped recent responses to asylum-seekers, with scant regard to some of the wider consequences f…
The ‘War against Terrorism’ in South Asia
Terrorism is a complex rather than a simple phenomenon, and if powers are to respond appropriately to terrorist challenges, these complexities must be taken into account. The cases of Afghanistan, Pakistan and India illustrate some of the diverse forms of terrorism, and suggest that there is no easy solution to the problem that terrorism poses. At the same time, the interconnections between Afghanistan, Pakistan and India require the integration …
Twelve Theses on the Impact of Humanitarian Intervention
Armed external intervention may sometimes be required to halt barbaric attacks on the vulnerable, but rebuilding political, economic and social order in the aftermath of an intervention is fraught with difficulty. Post-intervention problems may include coping with new and fractious actors, managing complex processes of change, addressing fundamental questions of political philosophy, coping with 'spoilers' and low levels of trust, and avoiding in…
Fundamentalism Reborn?: Afghanistan Under the Taliban
Statebuilding in Afghanistan: Challenges and pathologies
The process of statebuilding in Afghanistan since 2001 has been complicated by a diverse set of problems, including the unintended consequences of early political decisions, the choice of institutional forms that have fostered dysfunctional policy-making, and the slide towards a neopatrimonial system combining bureaucracy with patronage. These problems have had a corrosive effect on the statebuilding enterprise, leaving an ambiguous legacy as Afg…
Asylum-seekers in Australia's international relations
The paper is divided into five sections. In the first, I offer some observations on the nature of 'sovereignty', and on the place of 'border controls' within sovereignty discourse. In the second, I discuss what it means to be a 'middle power', and what 'soft power' resources a middle power may need to use. In the third, I argue that crude populism has shaped recent responses to asylum-seekers, with scant regard to some of the wider consequences f…
Security, People-Smuggling, and Australia's New Afghan Refugees
2001). Security, People-Smuggling, and Australia's New Afghan Refugees. Australian Journal of International Affairs: Vol. 55, No. 3, pp. 351-370
Diplomacy of Disaster: The Afghanistan ‘Peace Process’ and the Taliban Occupation of Kabul
On 29 February 2020 in Doha, the United States signed an ‘Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan’ with the extremist Taliban movement. Yet on 15 August 2021, the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul. This article argues that the Doha Agreement did not simply precede the Taliban takeover; in significant ways it contributed to it. In its negotiation, content and implementation, it created destructive incentives for domestic a…
The Ottawa Convention on Landmines: A Landmark Humanitarian Treaty in Arms Control
Institutional Design, Neopatrimonialism, and the Politics of Aid in Afghanistan
State disruption confronted Afghanistan’s rulers and their international supporters with a challenging legacy after 2001. The emergence of a neopatrimonial political order, with formal bureaucratic and administrative structures entwined with informal networks and patronage, has significantly affected attempts at aid delivery. Such dangers need to be recognized and addressed at the outset in internationally supported transitions
Australia’s refugee policy: Domestic politics and diplomatic consequences
Refugee policy involves a two-level game. For Australia since approximately 1998, the politics of refugees has been toxically affected by domestic politics. This has had potentially negative effects on Australia’s reputation and soft power. This article provides an overview of the issue, explores the ways in which considerations of domestic politics have come increasingly to shape Australia’s policy and concludes with a discussion of the conseque…
The ‘War against Terrorism’ in South Asia
Terrorism is a complex rather than a simple phenomenon, and if powers are to respond appropriately to terrorist challenges, these complexities must be taken into account. The cases of Afghanistan, Pakistan and India illustrate some of the diverse forms of terrorism, and suggest that there is no easy solution to the problem that terrorism poses. At the same time, the interconnections between Afghanistan, Pakistan and India require the integration …
Twelve Theses on the Impact of Humanitarian Intervention
Armed external intervention may sometimes be required to halt barbaric attacks on the vulnerable, but rebuilding political, economic and social order in the aftermath of an intervention is fraught with difficulty. Post-intervention problems may include coping with new and fractious actors, managing complex processes of change, addressing fundamental questions of political philosophy, coping with 'spoilers' and low levels of trust, and avoiding in…
The Future of Islamic Afghanistan
Political Legitimation in Contemporary Afghanistan
In an article published in 1984, the American journalist Selig Harrison argued that the concept of legitimacy has little meaning against the backdrop of recent Afghan political history.1I This is a startling claim, for as Dolf Sternberger has suggested, is hard to discover any sort of historical government that did not either enjoy widespread authentic recognition of its existence or try to win such recognition.2 In sharp contrast to Harrison, on…
Peace, Needs and Utopia
The well-entrenched minimalist notion of peace has recently been augmented by a notion of positive peace, defined as the absence of structural violence. This paper opens with a critique of Johan Galtung's usage, which conflates ideas better approached separately. It then criticizes the notion of human needs used by Christian Bay as the normative foundation for his idea of positive peace, and by comparing positive peace with Berlin's notion of pos…
Ukraine, Afghanistan and the failure of deterrence
Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.Additional informationNotes on contributorsWilliam MaleyWilliam Maley is Emeritus Professor of Diplomacy at The Australian National University. He recently co-authored (with Ahmad Shuja Jamal) The Decline and Fall of Republican Afghanistan (New York: Oxford University Press, 2023); and is author of The Afghanistan Wars, 3rd ed. (New York: Red Globe Press/Macmillan, 2…
Ideology, Clericalism, and Socialization: Some Reflections on the Sociology of the Afghan Taliban
Before the occupation of Kabul by the Taliban movement in 2021, there had been some hopes that in power, it would behave very differently from how it acted when it earlier occupied Kabul from 1996 to 2001. This proved not to be the case. Always inscrutable, the movement prioritized ideology over interests, embodied a “theocratic-descending” model of authority, and was the product of a pathogenic pattern of socialization. Under such circumstances,…
Afghanistan on a knife-edge
Afghanistan finds itself on a knife-edge. The September–October 2015 crisis in Kunduz highlighted the scale of the challenges facing its “National Unity Government”, which does not enjoy widespread popular confidence and is constrained by its neopatrimonial character, inherited from the times of Hamed Karzai. Insecurity contributed to an outflow towards Europe of more than 200,000 Afghans in 2015. Some see negotiation with the Taliban as a way of…
Afghanistan as a Cultural Crossroads: Lessons From the Writings of Ella Maillart, Annemarie Schwarzenbach and Nancy Hatch Dupree
Much has been written about Afghanistan, a complex cultural space that different people see in different ways. But not all of their views are of equal value. Stereotypes do no-one any favours. Ella Maillart and Annemarie Schwatzenbach were two Swiss women writers who set off for Afghanistan in June 1939. Ella was a traveller who wrote, Annemarie a writer who travelled, but their books give a sense of the realities of Afghanistan, Nancy Dupree fir…
Afghanistan in 2011
Afghanistan confronted further turbulence in 2011, involving the assassinations of prominent figures, tense regional relations, and uncertainty about where the draw down of foreign forces in Afghanistan might lead. Popular confidence in Afghanistan's future direction remains weak, and President Hamid Karzai has had little success in boosting his government's standing
Challenges of Political Development in Afghanistan: Mass, Elite and Institutional Dimensions
The transition in Afghanistan is manifestly beset by multiple challenges, yet behind obvious issues such as insecurity and corruption lie a range of deeper problems related to the way in which the Afghan political system has developed. Trust deficits, real conflicts of interest, and parallel and potentially conflicting systems of authority, have affected both the mass population—many of whom feel disconnected and disenfranchised—and political eli…
Afghanistan: An historical and geographical appraisal
Afghanistan's current difficulties are in large measure the product of a troubled history and a troubled geographical location. These have combined to produce a debilitated state, open to meddling from a range of external powers, that has now experienced decades of trauma. The current insurgency that afflicts the country is sustained by the sanctuaries in Pakistan from which the Taliban operate. Unless and until there is progress on this front, t…
Australia and the East Timor Crisis: Some Critical Comments
(2000). Australia and the East Timor Crisis: Some Critical Comments. Australian Journal of International Affairs: Vol. 54, No. 2, pp. 151-161
Mine Action in Afghanistan
Afghanistan is severely contaminated by anti-personnel mines, which pose major physical, social and economic threats to repatriating refugees. Fortunately, mine action - a multidimensional effort to address these problems through survey, detection, clearance, mine awareness, and victim assistance - is well developed in Afghanistan, with the Afghan Mine Action Program a model of good practice. That said, mine action faces ongoing challenges, of wh…
The dynamics of regime transition in Afghanistan
(1997). The dynamics of regime transition in Afghanistan. Central Asian Survey: Vol. 16, No. 2, pp. 167-184
Laws and Conventions Revisited
Peace, Needs and Utopia
The well-entrenched minimalist notion of peace has recently been augmented by a notion of positive peace, defined as the absence of structural violence. This paper opens with a critique of Johan Galtung's usage, which conflates ideas better approached separately. It then criticizes the notion of human needs used by Christian Bay as the normative foundation for his idea of positive peace, and by comparing positive peace with Berlin's notion of pos…
A comment on rules and the soviet political system
Images of Afghanistan
The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 has prompted a large number of scholars and journalists to embark on the analysis of Afghan affairs. Even before the invasion, much valuable material was available in Western languages to the interested reader. The internal politics of Afghanistan had been studied by Louis Dupree, Vartan Gregorian, Hasan Kakar, Leon B. Poullada, and Richard S. Newell; Maxwell J. Fry and Gilbert Etienne had analy…
Political Legitimation in Contemporary Afghanistan
In an article published in 1984, the American journalist Selig Harrison argued that the concept of legitimacy has little meaning against the backdrop of recent Afghan political history.1I This is a startling claim, for as Dolf Sternberger has suggested, is hard to discover any sort of historical government that did not either enjoy widespread authentic recognition of its existence or try to win such recognition.2 In sharp contrast to Harrison, on…
The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan
The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan
The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan
Australian politics
David Black (ed.), The House on the Hill: A History of the Parliament of Western Australia 1832–1990 (Perth: Parliament of Western Australia, 1991) pp.558. $n.p. ISBN 0 7309 3983 9. D.H. Borchardt, Commissions of Inquiry in Australia: A Brief Surrey (Melbourne: La Trobe University Press, 1991) pp.107. $24.95 ISBN 1 86324 011X. John Connell and Richard Howitt (eds), Mining and Indigenous Peoples in Australasia (Sydney: Sydney University Press in a…
The Future of Islamic Afghanistan
Women and public policy in Afghanistan: A comment
Afghanistan observed
Barnett R. Rubin, The Fragmentation of Afghanistan: State Formation and Collapse in the International System. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995. xvii + 378 pp. No price given. Barnett R. Rubin, The Search for Peace in Afghanistan: From Buffer State to Failed State. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995. xi + 190 pp. US$25.00 (paper). David B. Edwards, Heroes of the Age: Moral Fault Lines on the Afghan Frontier. Berkeley & Los Angeles: Unive…
The dynamics of regime transition in Afghanistan
(1997). The dynamics of regime transition in Afghanistan. Central Asian Survey: Vol. 16, No. 2, pp. 167-184
The United Nations and Ethnic Conflict Management: Lessons from the Disintegration of Yugoslavia
On 14 December 1995, an agreement as the Elysée Treaty (earlier initialled in Dayton after weeks of difficult negotiation) was signed in Paris by the Heads of State of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Republic of Croatia, and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. One of the witnesses at the ceremony was the Secretary-General of the United Nations, Dr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, and, in a real sense, it marked the nadir of his term of office.…
Fundamentalism Reborn?: Afghanistan Under the Taliban
Mine Action in Afghanistan
Afghanistan is severely contaminated by anti-personnel mines, which pose major physical, social and economic threats to repatriating refugees. Fortunately, mine action - a multidimensional effort to address these problems through survey, detection, clearance, mine awareness, and victim assistance - is well developed in Afghanistan, with the Afghan Mine Action Program a model of good practice. That said, mine action faces ongoing challenges, of wh…
The Ottawa Convention on Landmines: A Landmark Humanitarian Treaty in Arms Control
Australia and the East Timor Crisis: Some Critical Comments
(2000). Australia and the East Timor Crisis: Some Critical Comments. Australian Journal of International Affairs: Vol. 54, No. 2, pp. 151-161
Afghanistan: Mullah, Marx, and Mujahid
Security, People-Smuggling, and Australia's New Afghan Refugees
2001). Security, People-Smuggling, and Australia's New Afghan Refugees. Australian Journal of International Affairs: Vol. 55, No. 3, pp. 351-370
Twelve Theses on the Impact of Humanitarian Intervention
Armed external intervention may sometimes be required to halt barbaric attacks on the vulnerable, but rebuilding political, economic and social order in the aftermath of an intervention is fraught with difficulty. Post-intervention problems may include coping with new and fractious actors, managing complex processes of change, addressing fundamental questions of political philosophy, coping with 'spoilers' and low levels of trust, and avoiding in…
Asylum-seekers in Australia's international relations
The paper is divided into five sections. In the first, I offer some observations on the nature of 'sovereignty', and on the place of 'border controls' within sovereignty discourse. In the second, I discuss what it means to be a 'middle power', and what 'soft power' resources a middle power may need to use. In the third, I argue that crude populism has shaped recent responses to asylum-seekers, with scant regard to some of the wider consequences f…
The ‘War against Terrorism’ in South Asia
Terrorism is a complex rather than a simple phenomenon, and if powers are to respond appropriately to terrorist challenges, these complexities must be taken into account. The cases of Afghanistan, Pakistan and India illustrate some of the diverse forms of terrorism, and suggest that there is no easy solution to the problem that terrorism poses. At the same time, the interconnections between Afghanistan, Pakistan and India require the integration …
Trends and options in transnational policy: A conference report
A More Secure World: Some Reflections
Political science (38 works) · Law (31 works) · Law (25 works) · Politics (25 works) · Politics and Conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Middle East (22 works) · Sociology (21 works) · Political economy (17 works) · Economics (11 works) · Development economics (9 works) · History (9 works)