Maritime Security Studies Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words - 1

Maritime Security Studies - Essay Example This paper shall be discussed based on expert opinions by theorists and practitioners in the international and political arena. This study is being carried out with the hope of establishing a clear and comprehensive understanding of the subject matter, as it applies in the contemporary context. This study sets forth that marine terrorism in its most general context is not on the decline. However, the international community has consistently established better ways of dealing with marine terrorism. For which reason, marine terrorists have not been getting away with their activities as they have in the past. This has not stopped them however in perpetuating their terrorist activities. The Working Group of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific has set forth the most complete definition for marine terrorism. They set forth that marine terrorism is â€Å"the undertaking of terrorist acts and activities within the maritime environment, using or against vessels or fixed platforms at sea or port, or against any of their passengers or personnel, against coastal facilities or settlements, including tourist resorts, port areas and port towns or cities† (as cited by Marine Terrorism Research Center, 2011). In addition, it is also defined as the â€Å"use of threat or violence against a ship, its passengers or sailors, a port facility, or if the purpose of solely a platform for political ends† (Marine Terrorism Research Center, 2011). It is an act which is based on political ideals and goals. Various acts of maritime terrorism have been seen in different parts of the globe. Off the coast of Somalia, acts of piracy have increased the cost of transporting goods in the Gulf of Aden (Shortland and Vothknecht, 2011). A greater issue in the Gulf of Aden however is that of international security and regional stability as Somali piracy might be used to transport weapons or

Sexed Crime Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Sexed Crime - Essay Example Significantly, changes in the meaning of 'sex' as well as challenges to the speaking positions of the dominant groups have led to an ultimate shift from the use of sex crime to sexed crime. One of the most essential concerns of Adrian Howe's Sexed crime in the News has been to analyse whether the concept of sexed crime has a potential to expand one's understanding of sexual violence and Howe claims that "calling sex crime 'sexed crime' does have interesting, destabilising effects." (Howe 1998, P. 6). According to Howe, the complacency and self-evidence of sex crime is disturbed by the use of sexed crime instead of sex crime. In an understanding of the other important destabilising effects, it becomes lucid that speaking about sexed rather than sex crime "problematises the 'sex' of crimes of violence", "acknowledges that women are not the only sex - men have a sex too," and "speaking about sexed crime sexes violence in the sense of asking questions about the fundamental, but often ign ored, sexed and sexual aspects of that violence." (Howe 1998, P. 6). ... Various pertinent questions crop up in an attempt to analyse the difference between the concepts 'sex crime' and 'sexed crime' such as what is 'sexed' crime, can sexual assaults be considered as sex crime, is family violence sex crime, etc. According to Howe, there are several destabilising effects of 'calling sex crime sexed crime' and the latter is broader in scope than the former. Thus, calling sex crime sexed crime can disturb the self-evidence of sex crime, and sexed crime covers all forms of violence in which the gender of the victim, as well as the perpetrator, is significant to the violent act. "Sexed crimeis violence which can only be fully understood within the context of relationships which are profoundly sexed but which are not often recognised as such, precisely because they are dismissed as having something to do with a vaguely defined, amorphous 'gender'. The point of questioning the sex of sex crime is to challenge the taken-for-granted ways in which sexed and gendere d relations are represented in public discourses such as those of the media." (Howe 1998, P. 6). Therefore, it is essential to realise that Howe (1998), in her Sexed crime in the News, comes up with a new and somewhat different approach to the issue of sex crime, which is critical of the idea purported by Keith Soothill and Sylvia Walby in Sex Crime in the News (1991). Sex crime is a term which is commonly used in order to refer to the sexual assaults against females across the globe and there have been reference to the age of sex crime in the modern times. Sex and violence in the contemporary world have been closely interconnected in the recent day world and they are