Browsing by Author "Huebert, Robert N."

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    After the Ice Age: The effects and implications of federal media policy changes on Northern science communication and the Northern science-policy interface during the Harper era
    (2020-06-16) Wells, Talia Justine; Huebert, Robert N.; Franceschet, Antonio; Moorman, Brian J.; Huebert, Robert N.
    A rise in global temperatures in tandem with polar amplification means that the Arctic is warming at a rate three times that the rest of the earth. This is occurring with major implications for the region and is accompanied by a need for adaptive governance and policy initiatives informed by robust science. From 2006 to 2015, the Canadian government, led by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, frequently asserted the importance of the Arctic, speaking to the environmental challenges facing the region. Consistent with this, the Government of Canada invested substantial resources in both Northern science and Northern research infrastructure as demonstrated by its support of polar projects such as the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory, the Canada High Arctic Research Station and the 2007-2008 International Polar Year. In early 2008, changes to federal departmental communications and media policies, controlling how federal scientists were contacted and communicated with journalists, prompted the first article of what would become a decade long fixture in the Canadian news media: the muzzling of Canada’s federal scientists. From 2008 to 2015, the ‘muzzling’ of federal scientists was largely narrated by the media and discussed independently of the science communication literature. Notwithstanding the investigation and conclusions drawn by the Office of the Information Commissioner, no further insight into the federal management of science communication under the conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper was offered. This study demonstrates that federal scientists experienced a significant reduction in capacity to communicate their science to the media as a result of the changes made to departmental communication and media policies. These changes created institutional barriers to the communication of federal science, withholding valuable taxpayer funded science from both the media and consequently, the Canadian public. The science-policy interface as it existed prior to the media policy changes was severely eroded due to a reduction in transparency, trust and the timely delivery of science.
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    'All Four Seasons and I Will Die': A Typology of Displacement Atrocities
    (2019-07-15) Basso, Andrew Robert; Hiebert, Maureen S.; Terriff, Terry; Ray, Donald Iain; Huebert, Robert N.; Alvarez, Alex
    In this dissertation I answer the question: why is displacement used to commit genocide? To answer this question, a typology and theory of Displacement Atrocity (DA) crimes is offered. Perpetrators of DA crimes uniquely fuse forced displacement with systemic deprivations of vital daily needs in order to destroy populations in whole or in part. DA crimes are typically perpetrated in large political geographies which are transformed into spaces of annihilation. There are two subtypes of DA crimes. First, perpetrators of kettling DA crimes use area squared to displace populations into and confine them in these large areas to annihilate them. Second, perpetrators of escorting DA crimes use linear distance to forcibly march their targeted populations along and annihilate them. This potent indirect killing method has yet to be fully understood in relevant literatures. The inductive typology I present is based on comparative historical analysis of Germany’s Genocide of the Herero (Herero Genocide) in German South-West Africa (1904-1908) and the Ottoman Genocide of Christian Minorities (1914-1925) in the Ottoman Empire/Turkey. The DA crime theory is then tested against two counter-cases which occurred in the same political geographies: Germany’s Genocide of the Nama (Nama Genocide) (1905-1908) and the Hamidian Massacres (1894-1896). The potential future uses of the DA crime concept in the 21st-Century are offered in the conclusions section.
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    British Doctrine and Canadian Guns: The Evolution of Canadian Artillery Tactics in the First World War
    (2018-04-03) Torkelson, Cody Mackenzie; Bercuson, David Jay; Marshall, David B.; Huebert, Robert N.
    During the First World War, artillery was an integral component of military operations on the Western Front. The Canadian Corps, as part of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), relied heavily on the power of the artillery to support offensive operations. The Canadian Corps has been substantially analyzed by military historians, but the role of the artillery in the success of the Canadian Corps has been insufficiently studied. There is also considerable debate about the extent to which the Canadian Corps possessed a uniquely Canadian way of fighting. This raises the question: to what extent did Canadian artillery differ from prevailing British practice? By using archival documents and secondary sources, this thesis compares the Canadian usage of artillery on the Western Front with the development of artillery tactics and doctrine by the BEF. Through key decisions made before the war and from experience gained during difficult fighting on the Western Front, the BEF led the way in the development of artillery tactics. The Canadian Corps then effectively adapted and employed the tactics pioneered by the BEF during the Corps’ own battles, like Mount Sorrel, Vimy Ridge, and the Hundred Days offensives. Analyzing the tactics and doctrine of British and Canadian artillery on the Western Front demonstrates that the employment of the artillery by Canadian gunners did not differ substantially from the tactics and doctrine of the wider BEF.
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    Falling short: suboptimal outcomes in Canadian defence procurement
    (2018-09-26) MacMillan, Ian; Bercuson, David Jay; Huebert, Robert N.; Hiebert, Maureen S.; Nesbitt, Michael E.; Boucher, Jean-Christophe
    Why do Canada’s military procurement projects often fall short of their primary goals? Otherwise known as a suboptimal result, defence acquisitions regularly fall short of established delivery schedules, accruing cost-overruns, sometimes resulting in cancellation of key materiel. One-hundred percent of the twenty-five Major Crown Projects at the Department of National Defence have experienced delays in achieving key milestones. Aside from cost, suboptimal results are injurious to Canada’s tri-force military. Fortunately, the matter has not gone unchecked. A fairly recent surge in procurement research has generated a critical mass of Canadian-focused literature. Preliminary research for this study shows a connection between suboptimal results and the organizations and personnel that populate procurement processes. Based on the bureaucratic politics model, a competitive interaction between uniquely conditioned policy players causes suboptimal delays and costs. Players orient outcomes to suit personal and organizational interests. The advantage of the bureaucratic politics model is the clarity with which it illustrates decision processes. Its simplistic structure serves as an ideal model for comparing three cases in Canadian procurement. Taken from the Department of National Defence’s Status Report on Transformational and Major Crown Projects, this study tests the bureaucratic theory against the Tank Replacement Project, the Joint Support Ship Project, and the ongoing project(s) to replace Canada’s CF-18 Hornets. The objective is to see if these cases share common findings contributing to suboptimality. The bureaucratic model assists the methodological goal of a structured, focused comparison. Two of the three cases demonstrate the competitive interaction between players as a factor in determining delays and cost-overruns. Although the Joint Support Ship Project included a host of unique players competing to determine decision outcomes, the factor that contributed to schedule slippage was the result of widespread agreement on a build in Canada approach. This consensus led to reliance on one underequipped shipyard to approach an overambitious project. Based on the overall study, three findings prevail. First, reports by bureaucratic institutions like the Parliamentary Budget Office and the Office of the Auditor General have tremendous political capital. Second, domestic production schemes are noble, but sometimes unrealistic. Third, competition for goods is always necessary.
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    Making Sense of the Arctic: U.S.-Canadian Foreign and Defense Relations and the Establishment of JAWS and the DEW Line, 1944-1957
    (2018-04-10) Woitkowitz, John; Randall, Stephen J.; Huebert, Robert N.; Dolata, Petra; Towers, Frank; Ferris, John Robert; Lackenbauer, P. Whitney; Keeley, James F.
    This dissertation examines the diplomatic history of U.S.-Canadian foreign and defense relations in the Arctic from 1944 to 1957. World War II and the emerging Cold War transformed the Northern and Arctic regions of North America from a peripheral region of international politics to a frontline of military planning. The Cold War confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States, the advent of the nuclear age, and the advancements in the field of long-range aviation fixed foreign policy and continental defense planners’ attention on Northern and Arctic Canada, devising plans for the establishment of the Joint Arctic Weather Stations (JAWS) in 1947 and the Distant Early Warning (DEW) Line in 1955. This study analyzes the origins, negotiations, and the construction of these Northern defense projects at the intersection of an emerging Cold War security crisis, an evolving legal landscape for Arctic sovereignty, and conceptions of the Arctic as a symbolic marker in the construction of Northern nationalisms. Existing studies of the JAWS and DEW Line talks by historians Shelagh Grant, Whitney Lackenbauer, Alexander Herd, and Peter Kikkert discuss these defense projects within the framework of sovereignty and security. More recent studies have adopted epistemological perspectives, exploring the construction of Arctic knowledge. This dissertation builds on this literature and contributes an analysis of the ideas and perceptions that guided key decision makers in Ottawa and Washington during the bilateral talks. By exploring unpublished personal papers and re-examining the ministerial records of Canada and the United States with a new research focus, this thesis explores how global and national conceptions of Arctic defense interacted with bureaucratic cultures within the Canadian and American foreign and defense establishments. Moreover, this study sheds new light on the relationship between non-governmental actors such as explorers, artists, novelists, and scientists and the realm of diplomacy and foreign policy-making. At the intersection of security, sovereignty, and nationalism, this dissertation, therefore, provides a fresh perspective on the way foreign and defense officials in Ottawa and Washington made sense of a rapidly changing international security situation and managed a yet nascent defense relationship in Northern and Arctic Canada.
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    Regional Influences on the Italo-Ethiopian Crisis, 1934-1938
    (2019-06-04) Holbert, Quentin Colin; Stapleton, Timothy J.; Elofson, Warren M.; Huebert, Robert N.
    The Italo-Ethiopian Crisis (c. 1934-1938) is both a common case study for the failure of the League of Nations; and as a major event leading up to the Second World War. Much of this existing research focuses on international diplomacy, but far less on people in East Africa. Regional actors, be it colonial officers, soldiers, or civilians, had a major impact on the conduct of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War. The main conflict that led to the outbreak of war, the December 1934 Welwel Incident, was not a conspiracy, but rather a culmination of several decades of tensions that escalated into an international affair. The British colonial officers in East Africa, fearing provocation of Italy, adopted a strict neutrality during the Second Italo-Ethiopian War itself. Non-Governmental Organizations, like the Red Cross and Women’s Suffrage groups, took sides during the war and during Italy’s early colonization of Ethiopia. Religious affiliation largely indicated who Ethiopian civilians supported during the war with Ethiopian Catholics and Muslims supporting the Italians, and Orthodox Ethiopians and Protestant missionaries in opposition.
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    Securitization Theory and the Canadian Construction of Omar Khadr
    (2018-05-18) Pirnie, Elizabeth Irene; Keren, Michael; Schneider, Barbara; Taylor, Gregory; Williamson, Janice; Huebert, Robert N.
    While the provision of security and protection to its citizens is one way in which sovereign states have historically claimed legitimacy (Nyers, 2004: 204), critical security analysts point to security at the level of the individual and how governance of a nation’s security underscores the state’s inherently paradoxical relationship to its citizens. Just as the state may signify the legal and institutional structures that delimit a certain territory and provide and enforce the obligations and prerogatives of citizenship, the state can equally serve to expel and suspend modes of legal protection and obligation for some (Butler and Spivak, 2007). This dissertation presents the case of Omar Khadr as a means of highlighting the discursive dynamics by which some threats - and some people - come to be understood under the rubric of ‘security’ and the significance of this naming as an act of national identity construction (Fierke, 2007: 103-104). Demonstrating the insights of new avenues of securitization theory research and the continued real-world relevance of the case, my research looks to the constitutive role of security discourses and constituent acquiescence in determining security realities within the context of a politically unsettled period in Canadian history: 2001 to 2005. The adoption of a securitization theory lens points to key social, historical and political discourses contributing to and challenging Omar Khadr’s nomination for ‘jettisonship’. It also leads me to find his expulsion from Canadian protections and belonging as an emergent phenomenon articulated through discourses of Canadian national identity imposed by both the Canadian state and an acquiescing citizenry. The tracing of these discourses, processes of threat construction and identity contestation present in relief an evolving security dynamic inherent to ideations of citizenship and what it means to be Canadian during a time of national and global insecurity.
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    Thebe ya Sechaba: A History of the Botswana Defence Force, c. 1977-2007
    (2021-01-11) Mocheregwa, Bafumiki; Stapleton, Timothy J.; Chastko, Paul A.; Apentiik, Caesar Roland; Hill, Alexander; Huebert, Robert N.; Thomas, Charles G.
    The protracted liberation struggles of Southern Africa that began in the 1960s, particularly in Rhodesia (Zimbabwe today) eventually prompted the Botswana government to establish its own defence force in 1977. Due to budgetary constraints and relative internal political stability, Botswana had relied on a small paramilitary force called the Police Mobile Unit (PMU) since the early 1960s for all defence – related issues. By the late 1970s, the sharp escalation of the struggle for Zimbabwe resulted in cross-border incursions by Rhodesian security forces who were pursuing armed freedom fighters. In these numerous violations of Botswana’s territorial integrity, many Batswana who lived in towns and villages adjacent to the Rhodesian border lost their lives while other were abducted, women raped, children maimed, and houses set ablaze by Rhodesian forces. This study explores the circumstances around the establishment of the Botswana Defence Force (BDF) in April 1977 in reaction to the Rhodesian war. This study also traces the development of the defence force into a professional military between the time it was established and the early 2000s taking into account internal and external factors that determined this evolution. Internally, the lack of funds during the BDF’s formative years meant that the government could only acquire limited equipment and manpower but the discovery of diamonds and economic stabilization beginning in the 1980s resulted in more expansive budgets and the acquisition of lethal hardware. Externally, it was regional contentions in the 1980s, mainly aggression from apartheid South Africa, that largely shaped the development of the BDF. After the end of apartheid, the BDF adopted a more aggressive expansion policy that was supported by the strong diamond – based economy of Botswana. It was in this period that the BDF started to participate in international peacekeeping operations which not only taught valuable lessons to it personnel but highlighted Botswana as a democratic country that helped restore peace and stability in fellow African nations. The decisions to professionalise its officer corps in the late 1990s and early 2000s as well as the recruitment of women into the force were important indicators of growth. These represented necessary steps that the leaders of the BDF took to mould it into a professional apolitical military.
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    Yeoman of the Woods: The Operations of the Canadian Forestry Corps During the Great War 1916-1919
    (2019-09-19) Bartlett, Cameron John Acton; Marshall, David B.; Huebert, Robert N.; Stapleton, Timothy J.; Marshall, David B.
    The operations of the Canadian Forestry Corps (the “CFC”) are the primary focus of this paper, but a thorough understanding of soldiers’ background in the logging industry and the economic situation in Great Britain from the outbreak of the war to January 1916 is required to set the context before discussing the CFC’s inception and initial deployment.