International Relations and Diplomacy (ISSN2328-2134) Volume 9, Number 04, 2021

International Relations
and Diplomacy
Volume 9, Number 4, April 2021 (Serial Number 91)
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Editorial Board Members of International Relations and Diplomacy:

★Abdel-Hady (Qatar University, Qatar); ★Martha Mutisi (African Centre for the Constructive
★Abosede Omowumi Bababtunde (National Open Resolution of Disputes, South Africa);
University of Nigeria, Nigeria); ★Menderes Koyuncu (Univercity of Yuzuncu Yil-Van,
★Adriana Lukaszewicz (University of Warsaw, Poland); Turkey);
★Ahmed Y. Zohny (Coppin State University, USA) ★Myroslava Antonovych (University of Kyiv-Mohyla
★Alessandro Vagnini (Sapienza University of Rome, Academy, Ukraine);
Rome); ★Nazreen Shaik-Peremanov (University of Cambridge,
★Ali Bilgiç (Bilkent University, Turkey); UK);
★András Mérei (University of Pécs, Hungary); ★Nermin Allam (University of Alberta, Edmonton,
★Anna Rosario D. Malindog (Ateneo De Manila University, Canada);
Philippines); ★Nadejda Komendantova (International Institute for
★Basia Spalek (Kingston University, UK); Applied Systems Analysis, Austria);
★Beata Przybylska-Maszner (Adam Mickiewicz University, ★Ngozi C. Kamalu (Fayetteville State University, USA);
Poland); ★Niklas Eklund (Umeå University, Sweden);
★Brian Leonard Hocking (University of London, UK); ★Phua Chao Rong, Charles (Lee Kuan Yew School of
★Chandra Lal Pandey (University of Waikato, New Public Policy, Singapore);
Zealand); ★Peter A. Mattsson (Swedish Defense College, Sweden);
★Constanze Bauer (Western Institute of Technology of ★Peter Simon Sapaty (National Academy of Sciences of
Taranaki, New Zealand); Ukraine, Ukraine);
★Christian Henrich-Franke (Universität Siegen, Germany); ★Raymond LAU (The University of Queensland,
★Christos Kourtelis (King’s College London, UK); Australia);
★David J. Plazek (Johnson State College, USA); ★Raphael Cohen Almagor (The University of Hull, UK);
★Dimitris Tsarouhas (Bilkent University, Turkey); ★Satoru Nagao (Gakushuin University, Japan);
★Fatima Sadiqi (International Institute for Languages and ★Sanjay Singh (Ram Manohar Lohiya National Law
Cultures, Morocco); University, India);
★Ghadah AlMurshidi (Michigan State University, USA); ★Shkumbin Misini (Public University, Kosovo);
★Guseletov Boris (Just World Institute, Russia); ★Sotiris Serbos (Democritus University of Thrace,Greece);
★Hanako Koyama (The University of Morioka, Japan); ★Stéphanie A. H. Bélanger (Royal Military College of
★Kyeonghi Baek (State University of New York, USA); Canada, Canada);
★John Opute (London South Bank University, UK); ★Timothy J. White (Xavier University, Ireland);
★Léonie Maes (Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium); ★Tumanyan David (Yerevan State University, Armenia);
★Lomarsh Roopnarine (Jackson State University, USA); ★Zahid Latif (University of Peshawar, Pakistan);
★Marius-Costel ESI (Stefan Cel Mare University of ★Valentina Vardabasso (Pantheon-Sorbonne University,
Suceava, Romania); France);
★Marek Rewizorski (Koszalin University of Technology, ★Xhaho Armela (Vitrina University, Albania);
Poland); ★Yi-wei WANG (Renmin University of China, China);
The Editors wish to express their warm thanks to the people who have generously contributed to the
process of the peer review of articles submitted to International Relations and Diplomacy.
International Relations
and Diplomacy
Volume 9, Number 4, April 2021 (Serial Number 91)
Contents
Humanitarian Regime
European Union’s Policy of Securitisation and Its Reflection on the Turkish Asylum Policy:
The Case of Systematic Expulsion of Refugees 137
Tasawar Ashraf
Regional Security
US “Maximum pressure” From the Perspective of Bottom-Line Thinking—Taking

the Persian Gulf Escort Coalition as an Example 149
SHU Meng
Social Policy
Social Policies in the Thirties in Europe: Crisis and Solution—The Italian Case 158
Maria Teresa Giusti
Islam
National Security and Religious Tolerance in Nigeria: Islamic Perspectives 166

Musa-Jeje Ibrahim Aladire
International Relations and Diplomacy, April 2021, Vol. 9, No. 04, 137-148
doi: 10.17265/2328-2134/2021.04.001
D DAVID PUBLISHING
European Union’s Policy of Securitisation and Its Reflection on

the Turkish Asylum Policy: The Case of Systematic Expulsion of
Refugees
Tasawar Ashraf
Glasgow Caledonian University, Glasgow, United Kingdom
The paper argues that the European Union’s (EU) policy of externalising migration management to transit states
contrasts its founding values. Thereby, values enshrined under Article 2 TEU are intentionally interpreted in such a
way to evade humanitarian responsibility concerning asylum seekers, arising from the EU and international treaty
law. The paper examines the changing meanings of the principle of solidarity and argues that the solidarity has been
interpreted in all possible meanings expect as a humanitarian norm to ensure that Union’s externalisation policy
doesn’t contradict its founding values. It further argues that the Union’s externalisation policy encourages the
transit states to evade responsibility by constructing their asylum policies on the same lines. Therefore, the EU
becomes a source of adversely implicating humanitarian values in the world. The paper concludes by arguing that
humanitarian interpretation of solidarity has become an issue of survival and morality for the Union.
Keywords: asylum, humanitarian regime, refoulement, securitisation, solidarity
Introduction
The aftermath of the Arab Spring and rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria forced millions of Syrian
and Iraqi citizens to leave their home states for seeking protection in the neighbouring states and beyond.
However, a significant portion of these refugees travelled to Europe due to better economic opportunities and
human rights standards. Accordingly, on 26 June 2013, the EU introduced Regulation 604/2013, commonly
known as Dublin Regulation III, to establish a mechanism for determining the Member State responsible for
examining an application for international protection lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country
national or a stateless person.1 Following the adoption of the Regulation, the frontier Member States started to
become overcrowded when rest of the Member States started to return asylum seekers to frontier Member
States—generally the first point of irregular entry in the EU. In return, in solidarity with the frontier Member
States, the EU introduced a mechanism to share their burden associated with the arrival of asylum seekers.
According, the EU and its Member States started to define solidarity as a burden-sharing duty of the
Member States. When the newly interpreted concept of solidarity failed to yield its objectives, the EU started to
emphasis on externalisation as an alternative to internal relocation. Consequently, on 18 October 2016, the EU
Tasawar Ashraf, PhD student, Department of Economics & Law, Glasgow Caledonian University, Glasgow, United Kingdom.
1
European Union, Regulation 2016/1624 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 September 2016 on the European
Border and Coast Guard Agency, OJ 16.09.2016, L 251/1-76.
138 EUROPEAN UNION’S POLICY OF SECURITISATION AND ITS REFLECTION
signed the EU-Turkey statement to relive Greece from the excessive burden of irregular arrivals by returning
asylum seekers to Turkey (European Commission, 2016). Soon after the implementation of the Statement, the
numbers of refugees in Turkey soared up to four million (European Commission, 2021). The situation forced
Turkey to take corrective measures to stem irregular arrivals in the country.
The paper analyses the impact of non-humanitarian interpretation of solidarity on the EU’s founding
humanitarian values enshrined under Article 2 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the EU (TFEU) (European
Union, 1957). The paper further analyses the impact of this phenomena on the adoption of exclusionary
practices in the Turkish asylum policy. The paper extends the existing theoretical work on the Europeanisation
of the external dimension of asylum policy in the EU neighbouring states by using Turkey as a case study
(Soykan, 2010; Trauner & Neelsen, 2017; Lavenex & UçArer, 2004; Aydin & Kirişci, 2013). The paper
particularly focuses on the EU-Turkey migration cooperation as a case study and argues that return of asylum
seekers under the EU-turkey Statement—in disregard of the EU humanitarian values—furthers contraction of
Turkey’s brotherhood policy for asylum seekers originating from Syrian and rest of the Islamic World. The
paper departs from a theoretical review of the principle of solidarity and particularises in the contraction of the
Turkish humanitarian regime under the influence of the EU externalisation policy. The paper consists of two
sections, the first section analyses the scope and assumption of the principle of solidarity in the EU; while the
second section examines the disregard of the EU’s humanitarian values resulting from the EU-Turkey
Statement and its reflection on the Turkish asylum policy.
Solidarity
In the EU, interpretation of the principle of solidarity has never been the same. The concept of solidarity
has different dimensions and sub-dimensions (Siebold, 2017; Karagiannis, 2007; Domurath, 2013). The
existing literature shows that understanding of solidarity has frequently been changing (Siebold, 2017; Pimor,
2017; Novotná, 2018; Domurath, 2013). After the Second World War, solidarity was defined as a reconciliation
of the European people (Siebold, 2017). Later, in 1980, with the formation of Schengen area, inter-community
association achieved through freedom of movement in the Schengen area was termed as Schengen solidarity
(Siebold, 2017). Schengen solidarity persuaded the Member States to reconcile and unite in a team spirit
towards common objectives (Siebold, 2017). Therefore, solidarity was defined in the meaning of social
cohesion of the Member States (Novotná, 2018; Siebold, 2017). Later, with the enlargement of the Schengen
Area, the official meaning of solidarity changed to European Solidarity. Hence, solidarity was read in the
meaning of effective interstate cooperation among the Member States (Domurath, 2013; Siebold, 2017).
Later with the adoption of Dublin Regulation, a mechanism to prevent secondary movements within the
EU by returning asylum seekers to the Member State of first entry was introduced (European Council, 2013).
Since the Regulation has a tendency of increasing the burden on the frontier Member States, in a short span of
time, the asylum systems of the frontier Member States became overburdened (Dragan, 2017; Maani, 2018). To
offset the excessive burden on Greece and Italy—the frontier States of major arrivals—the European Council
adopted two emergency relocation schemes.2 The European Council invoked Article 80 of the TFEU to
relocate 160,000 refugees from both frontier Member States (Karageorgiou, 2016).
2
European Council, Council Decision 2015/1601 of 22 September 2015 establishing provisional measures in the area of
international protection for the benefit of Italy and Greece, Art. 4; and Bauböck (2018).
EUROPEAN UNION’S POLICY OF SECURITISATION AND ITS REFLECTION 139
As the Article 80 TFEU mentions solidarity along with burden sharing, sharing of the burden by the rest of
the Member States was termed as Dublin solidarity (Parusel, 2015), which continues to be the current
interpretation of solidarity in the EU. This means that solidarity has never been interpreted as a humanitarian
norm, especially with regard to asylum seekers. Thereby, the concept of solidarity in European constitutional
law is securitised and state-centred (Mitsilegas, 2014). This newly invented interpretation of solidarity not only
failed to achieve the desired objectives; but it also disregards the principle of equality, human dignity, the
prohibition of discrimination, and respect of human rights—fundamental values of the EU (European Union,
1957). By March 2018, despite repeated calls by the European Commission, out of 160,000 planned relocations
only 33,846 refugees were relocated by the rest of the Member States (Karageorgiou, 2016). Therefore, the
paper argues that the Member States’ solidarity with people in the EU and solidarity among the Member States,
i.e., Dublin solidarity are the internal dimensions of the solidarity, whereas solidarity with asylum seekers
coming in the EU for international protection is the external dimensions of the principle of solidarity. Therefore,
the paper argues for a reinterpretation of solidarity by giving due regard to its external dimension and
humanitarian values of the EU.
Nathalie Karagiannis highlighted the internal and external dimensions of solidarity by drawing a line
between European solidarity and Europe’s solidarity with the rest of the world (Karagiannis, 2007). She argued
that European solidarity is social solidarity within Europe, whereas Europe’s solidarity with the rest of the
world as solidarity is grounded on the name of humanity (Karagiannis, 2007). Similarly, Angela Siebold (2017)
contended that burden-sharing is an internal dimension of the solidarity; therefore, she argues for extending the
scope for solidarity to asylum seekers by emphasising on the external and humanitarian dimension of solidarity.
Similarly, on the humanitarian lines, Irina Domurath (2013) called upon the nations-states to show solidarity
with future generations by protecting the environment.
Valsamis Mitsilegas (2016) and Sonia Morano-Foadi (2017) argued that the present evolution and content
of the principle of solidarity in the EU is predominantly state-centred. This state-centred interpretation of
solidarity is against the concept of human empathy, care and a state’s duty to protect, which are the oldest
norms of human history. Accordingly, Emile Durkheim defined solidarity as a bond holding people together in
a society in shared interests and mutual support where individuals work for the wellbeing and interests and
support of others (Beutler, 2017; De Beer & Koster, 2009). Similarly, Paul De Beer and Ferry Koster (2009)
described solidarity as the human will of helping and supporting people in need without getting or having
immediate chances of getting something in return. These means that people facing an immediate threat to their
lives or freedoms and dependent on the support of others must be the centre of solidarity. Accordingly, Barbara
Prainsack and Alena Buyx (2012) suggested that solidarity must be seen in the context of social justice,
equality, freedom, and humanitarianism. The solidarity towards refugees demands humane treatment, access to
asylum procedures, and dignified treatment of the asylum seekers (Carrera, Blockmans, Gros, & Guild, 2015).
The humanitarian aspect of solidarity requires the Member States to consider the protection needs of
asylum seekers on humanitarian grounds. In 2015, when the Swedish and German governments opened their
borders for asylum seekers on the humanitarian grounds, the act was described as solidarity with asylum
seekers in-line with the states’ humanitarian responsibility to protect (Steinvorth, 2017). Since it is not always
possible to open borders and admit asylum seekers without necessary security and vulnerability check,
unrestricted access to fair asylum determination procedures suffices solidarity with asylum seekers on the
ground of Member States’ humanitarian duty to protect. The Member States must also ensure that asylum
seekers only returned in accordance with the due process of law by fully complying the EU founding values
which are common with all Member States.
Solidarity as a Humanitarian Norm
The grounds for the interpretation of the principle of solidarity are provided under Article 2 of the TEU,
which provides a set of the founding values of the EU—common to all Member States (European Union, 1957).
The article reads,
the Union is founded on the values of respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and
respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities; these values are common to the Member
States in a society in which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and
men prevail. (European Union, 1957, Art. 2)
In H v Council and Commission, the CJEU held that the legal structure of the Union is based on the
fundamental premise that Member States share with each other, and recognise it as a set of common values on
which the EU was founded.3 Therefore, respect of values enshrined under Article 2 TFEU is widely regarded
as the rule of law in the EU (Oliver & Stefanelli, 2016). This means that the breach of the EU humanitarian
values enshrined under Article 2 TFEU can be regarded as a breach of the rule of law. Marcus Klamert and
Dimitry Kochenov (2019) classified values enshrined under Article 2 into two broad categories, i.e., general
values and individual values. According to Klamert and Kochenov (2019), solidarity, human dignity, equality,
non-discrimination, and respect of human rights are individual’s rights against the Member States; therefore,
the paper refers these individual values as humanitarian values of the EU.
Article 2 TFEU unites all the EU Member States on these shared values; thereby the respect of these
founding values and their promulgation in the wider EU society is made obligatory for the Member States
(European Union, 1957). It is incumbent for the Member States that their internal and external policies,
including their asylum policies, should be in confirmatory with Article 2 TEU. Accordingly, Article 21(1)
TFEU (European Union, 1957) enshrines that the Union’s action on the international scene shall be guided by
the principles which have inspired its own creation, development and enlargement, and which it seeks to
advance in the broader world: democracy, the rule of law, the universality and indivisibility of human rights
and fundamental freedoms, respect for human dignity, the principles of equality and solidarity, and respect for
the principles of the United Nations Charter and international law (European Union, 1957).
Therefore, a direction for the Member States to adopt a humanitarian approach towards asylum seekers is
provided under Recital II of the Asylum Procedures Directive (APD) 2013/32 which sets minimum procedural
standards and guarantees for asylum seekers during asylum procedures.4 The recital enshrines “Asylum is a
constituent part of the EU’s objective of establishing progressively an area of freedom, security and justice
open to those who, forced by circumstances, legitimately seek protection in the Union; such a policy should be
governed by the principle of solidarity and fair sharing”.5 This recital highlights the importance of the
humanitarian aspect of solidarity by stressing for the protection of asylum seekers. The recital provides ground
for a humanitarian approach towards people forced to leave their homes or fearing persecution. However,
3
C-455/14 P, EUPM in Bosnia and Herzegovina, EU:C:2016:569, Para. 41.
4
Council of the European Union, Directive 2013/32/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 on
common procedures for granting and withdrawing international protection (Asylum Procedures Directive), 29 June 2013, Recital
II.
5
Ibid.
despite a firm reference to the humanitarian aspect of solidarity, the recital itself does not provide a legal
ground. The reason behind this is that the recital does not reflect on any of the enacting provisions of the APD.
In such a situation, we have to see whether a recital in itself can perform a legal function. Therefore, this
research relies on the Joint Practical Guide for Drafting of EU Legislation hereinafter as Joint Practical Guide
and case law of the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU). According to Para. 10 of the Joint Practical Guide, the
purpose of the recitals is to set out cogent reasons for the chief provisions of the enacting terms (European
Union, 2013). Furthermore, anything which is not a reason for enacting terms must not be included in the
recitals (European Union, 2013). Recitals explain the motivation behind the enacting provisions of the
directives and provide a general guideline for the implementing Member States to ensure similar interpretations
by all the Member States. Therefore, recitals are necessary for optional directives which are implemented by
the Member States (Humphreys et al., 2015).
Nevertheless, the CJEU has given a crucial and equal position to recitals along with enacting terms when it
comes to the interpretation of the EU law. The CJEU case law shows that the Court uses recitals to interpret
enacting terms when there is ambiguity regarding the meaning of any enacting term.6 The Court use of recitals
to interpret enacting terms establishes the authority of recitals as guiding principles which determine the scope
of the directives. Therefore, despite precise lacking legal authority, recital II of the APD continues to hold
significant importance in determining the scope and nature of the enacting terms of the Directive (Klimas &
Vaiciukaite, 2008). The recital prevents the Member States from expanding the scope of the APD beyond the
guideline of its Preamble. It becomes a ground to prevent the Member States from developing their asylum
policies to the extent where the effects of their policies could undermine the fundamental values of the EU.
Therefore, considering the EU values of respect for human dignity, human rights, the rule of law and equality;
Union’s stress on the Member States to develop their asylum policies in solidarity with asylum seekers; strong
commitment to develop the external policies of the Union and the Member States in accordance with the
founding values, solidarity clearly appears as a humanitarian norm. Thereby, humane and dignified treatment of
asylum seekers and respect of their human dignity and human rights must be treated as the humanitarian duty of
the EU and its Member States (Bauböck, 2018; Siebold, 2017). The fact that fair burden-sharing is also
mentioned along with solidarity in the Recital and Article 80 TFEU does not diminish the humanitarian aspect
of solidarity. It just adds the importance of inter-state solidarity with the Member State, which is overburdened
while doing its humanitarian duty of protecting endangered human lives.
The Legality of the EU-Turkey Statement at the Face of Humanitarian Values

Turkey has long been a land of asylum due to its geographical locations as well as shared social, cultural
and historical ties with the Balkans, Europe, and the Middle East (Gülfer Ihlamur-Öner, 2013). Due to shared
land and sea borders with Europe, Turkey has also been a country of transit for irregular migrants seeking entry
in Europe for economic or asylum reasons. Soon after the start of the Syrian Civil War in 2011, numbers of
refugees arriving in Turkey and Europe started to soar up at a rapid phase. Nevertheless, due to better economic
opportunities and limited asylum opportunities in Turkey (Gülfer Ihlamur-Öner, 2013), the numbers of
irregular migrants arriving at the European Borders kept building. Increase in the numbers of irregular arrivals
started to increase anxiety in European Politics. Consequently, the EU leaders engaged Turkey to restrict
6
Case C-244/95, P Moskof AE v Ethnikos Organismos Kapnou [1997], Para. 44.
asylum seekers transiting through Turkey by enhancing cooperation on migration and asylum. The EU leaders
also urged Turkey to lift the geographical limitation on the application of the Refugee Convention for the sack
of establishing an international protection mechanism in Turkey for asylum seekers coming from Syria and
other Middle Eastern countries.
To this end, as discussed above, as stated above, on 18 March 2016, the EU and Turkey reached an
agreement on migration management. Under the agreement, all asylum seekers entering Greece from Turkey
can be returned to Turkey by declaring their asylum applications inadmissible under Article 33 of the APD
(The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, 2013). Greece may declare an application
for international protection inadmissible on the grounds of coming through Turkey—“First Country of Asylum”
(FCA) or “Safe Third Country” (STC) (The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union,
2013). Since the EU-Turkey Statement, almost, restricted asylum seekers access to international protection in
the EU, the Statement has been extensively criticised for diverse human rights violations (Alpes, Tunaboylu, &
Ulusoy, 2017; Ulisoy & Battjes, 2016).
Hence, the EU-Turkey Statement was challenged in the CJEU in joint cases, T-192/16, T-193/16, and
T-257/16 NF, NG, and NM v European Council to determine whether the Statement gave effect to a legal
agreement by or on behalf of the European Council.7 The applicants claimed that the EU-Turkey Statement is
an international agreement between the EU and Turkey.8 The applicants further argued that consideration of
the content and circumstances surrounding the adoption of the EU-Turkey Statement clearly shows that the
Statement was concluded by the EU.9 Therefore, the applicants requested the annulment the EU-Turkey
Statement under Article 263 of the TFEU due to diverse violation of the human rights of the asylum seekers.10
In its defence plea, the European Council claimed that the EU-Turkey Statement as a result of an
international summit of the heads of the states.11 In the view of the European Council, the heads of the
participating states acted in the capacity of their respective governments to reach a political deal with regard to
the management of irregular arrivals in the corresponding Member States.12 The European Council further
argued that the term EU in the Press Release No. 144/16 titled EU-Turkey Statement was for information and
journalistic purpose and that all the official correspondence used the term Heads of the states instead of the
EU.13 Considering the official documents and other material submitted by the European Council, the General
Court accepted the plea of the European Council and held that it lacks jurisdiction to rule on the lawfulness of
the international agreement concluded by the Member States. Accordingly, the Court dismissed the applications
by concluding that no institution of the EU was involved in the conclusion of the agreement between the
Member States and Turkey.14
Later, the First Chamber of the CJEU dismissed joint appeals against the order of the General Court on the
ground that the appellants failed to identify contested elements of the decision of the General Court and that no
argument was presented in support of the appeal.15 Therefore, the issue of the diverse human rights violations
7
Joint cases T-192/16, T-193/16, T-257/16, NF, NG, NM v European Council [2017] 128.
8
Ibid, Para. 14.
9
Ibid, Para. 39.
10
Ibid, Para. 14.
11
Ibid, Para. 38.
12
ibid.
13
Ibid, Para. 58.
14
Ibid, Para. 70.
15
Joint cases C-208/17 P, C-209/17 P, C-210/17 P, NF, NG, NM v European Council [2018] 705, Para. 16.
under the EU-Turkey escaped full judicial scrutiny. The order of the General Court disregarded the existing
case-law regarding judicial review under Art. 263 TFEU (European Union, 1957). The CJEU has earlier
established in joint cases C-181/91 and C-248/91 that it is not enough to describe an act as a decision of the
Member States to escape judicial scrutiny under Art. 263 TFEU.16 The Court held that due regard must be
given to the content and circumstances under which the act was adopted, to determine if the act in question is a
decision of the European Council or the Member States.17
As regards the content of the Statement, the subject of the area freedom, justice, and security comes under
the shared competence of the EU and its Member States (European Union, 1957). The Member States can only
exercise jurisdiction in the area of shared competence if the Union has not exercised or ceased to exercise its
competence (European Union, 1957). In the present case, the EU has already concluded a legally binding
readmission agreement with Turkey, which is still in force.18 Therefore, the Member States are prohibited from
exercising their competence in the area. Furthermore, EU treaty law empowers the European Council to adopt
provisional measures on the recommendation of the European Council when a Member State is confronted by
the sudden arrival of irregular migrants (European Union, 2012). Therefore, it can be concluded that, so far, the
content of the EU-Turkey statement has not been assessed, particularly under the prism of the humanitarian
values enshrined under Art. 2 TFEU. Accordingly, hereunder, I assess the human rights issues raised before the
CJEU and their legitimacy at the face of humanitarian values of the EU and its Member States.
As discussed above, the EU-Turkey Statement allows Greece to return of all new asylums through Turkey.
Greece subjects asylum applicants to fast-track asylum procedures for the reason of coming through a STC
(The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, 2013). This means that Greece does not
consider asylum application on their merits, rather it assesses whether Turkey was a safe country for the
applicant to apply for asylum there. Thereby, majority of asylum applications are declared inadmissible without
assessing the protection needs of the applicants and without giving due regard to the fact that Turkey applies
geographical limitation to the Refugee Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951) (Yıldız &
Uzgören, 2016). Therefore, asylum seekers, originating countries other than Europe are automatically excluded
from the Turkish humanitarian regime. On the one hand, the Turkish asylum system offers temporary
protection to Syrian asylum seekers who are displaced due to the ongoing civil war in Syria (Turkish
Parliament, 2013). The law treats Syrian refugees as hosts on the assumption that they will return to their home
state as soon as conditions allow (Corabatır, 2016). Once the Turkish Council of the Ministers is satisfied that
the conditions in the country of origin of temporary protection holders have improved, it can revoke temporary
protection status of the nationals of the concerned country under Article 9 of the Law on Foreigners and
International Protection (LFIP) (Turkish Parliament, 2013). On the other hand, asylum seekers originating from
places other than Europe and Syria are offered conditional protection subject to relocation to other states by the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (Turkish Parliament, 2013).
Asylum-seekers returned to Turkey under the EU-Turkey Statement are at risk of further deportation to
places, from where they escaped at the first instant. Therefore, asylum seekers returned under the EU-Turkey
Statement are at high risk of being subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment. This makes the EU and
16
Joined cases C-181/91 and C-248/91, Parliament v Council and Commission, ECLI:EU:C:271.
17
Ibid, Para. 14.
18
Agreement between the European Union and the Republic of Turkey on the readmission of persons residing without
authorisation [2014] L 134/3.
Greece complicit in the violation of the principle non-refoulement, which prohibits the return of asylum seekers
to places where they could be subject to inhuman and degrading treatment (Nollkaemper & Jacobs, 2013;
International Law Commission, 2001). Furthermore, the return of asylum seekers on the ground of coming
through Turkey without assessing the merits of asylum claims undermines the right to apply asylum guaranteed
under Article 18 of the Charter of Fundamental Right of the European Union 2001 (CFR) (Council of the
European Union, 2012). Moreover, since the adoption of the EU-Turkey Statement, the return of asylum
seekers from the countries of low recognition rate, such as Pakistan, on the ground of coming through STC has
become a common practice (Tsitselikis, 2019). Hence, the EU-Turkey Statement also discriminates asylum
seekers on the ground of nationality (UN General Assembly, 1951).
Since the adoption of the EU-Turkey Statement, refugees’ numbers in Turkey have soared up to four
million (European Commission, 2021). Out of these four million, only 230,000 people are hosted in 21 refugee
camps where refugees have access to shelter, health, education, food and social activities. Majority of Syrian
and non-Syrian asylum seekers amounting to over 90 percent of total four million asylum seekers in Turkey
reside in privately rented accommodations in the suburbs of cities, with very limited state assistance (Bélanger
& Saracoglu, 2018; European Council on Refugees and Exiles [ECRE], 2021a; Kaya, Rottmann, Aras, &
Mencütek, 2020). High rent prices have forced two to three families to live together in one place to afford rents
(ECRE, 2021a; Kaya et al., 2020). Many are forced to live in tents while some have converted empty
warehouses and sheds into shared accommodation (ECRE, 2021a; Kaya et al., 2020). According to UN Women,
a large number of women have left refugee camps and relocated to urban areas due to poor living conditions
and risk of violence (ECRE, 2021b). Continued return of asylum seekers to Turkey despite clear evidence of
poor living condition and drawbacks in the Turkish asylum system, vindicates that the EU asylum policy
prioritises externalisation over its founding humanitarian values. Thereof, there has been no effort to interpret
solidarity in the humanitarian meanings to avoid unnecessary attention on the disregard of the founding values.
This disregard and the externalisation policies adopted thereto also enforce contraction of the Turkish asylum
regime. The section below analyses this phenomenon in detail.
Reflection on the Turkish Asylum Policy
Existing literature shows that Turkey’s domestic policies have developed under a significant influence of
the policies of the EU (Nas & Özer 2016; Noutcheva & Aydin-Düzgit, 2011; Yilmaz, 2016; Soykan, 2010).
The literature links Europeanisation of Turkish policies to Turkey’s prospective membership of the EU and
foreseeable political and economic advantages (Noutcheva & Aydin-Düzgit, 2011; Nas & Özer, 2016).
Accordingly, Umut Aydin and Kemal Kirisci (2013) argued that the EU policies create pressure to adapt if
there is a misfit between the Turkish and EU policies. Similarly, the development of the Turkish asylum policy
is also seen as an extensive process of Europeanisation (Aydin & Kirişci, 2013; Macmillan, 2016; Tholen,
2004). Alexander Bürgin and Derya Aşıkoğlu (217) argued that external influence of the EU was more
persuasive than domestic factors to reform the Turkish asylum policy. The process of Europeanisation of
Turkish asylum policies has continued despite Turkey’s suspicions about the prospective membership. This is
mostly because of Turkey’s transformation from a transit state to a destination state, largely because of the
EU-Turkey Statement. Turkey’s transformation to a destination state has opened a new chapter of the
Europeanisation of the external policies (Lavenex & UçArer, 2004); and the downfall of the Turkish Muslim
brotherhood policy for asylum seekers from Muslin states. The externalisation policy of the EU has introduced
a new chapter of the Europeanisation of externalisation policy in the Turkish asylum system (Bauer, Knill, &
Pitschel, 2007).
Chapter 24 of the EU Accession Partnership Document entitled “Justice, Freedom, and Security” requires
the applicant state to take various securitisation measures in its asylum system. Thereby, Turkey was required
to strengthen the border control mechanism in line with the Schengen system, sign Readmission agreements
with third countries, and align its visa policy with the EU.19 To this end, Turkey has already taken the
responsibility of patrolling the integrated border along with the European Border and Coast Guard Agency
since the implementation of the EU-Turkey Statement (Dimitriadi, Kaya, Kale, & Zurabishvili, 2018). Turkey
has also signed readmission agreements with 14 countries, including Bosnia & Herzegovina, Belarus, Greece,
Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Montenegro, Moldova, Nigeria, Pakistan, Romania, Russia, Syria, Ukraine, and Yemen,
while readmission agreements with Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Cameroon, Eritrea, Morocco, Ghana,
Myanmar, the Republic of Congo, Somali, Sudan and Tunisia are going through the negotiation process (Kart,
2016).
Furthermore, the LFIP, on the line of the APD, limits the arrival of asylum seekers by replicating many
controversial clauses of the APD. Under Articles 73 and 74, the LFIP replicates the notion of FCA and STC to
ensure the return of asylum seekers to countries which have signed readmission agreements with Turkey
(Turkish Parliament, 2013). An abridged timeline of appeal procedures, hasty returns arrangement, and
restrictive nature show that the LFIP (2013) replicates the APD to deal with asylum seekers’ arrival. In line
with Article 46(6)(10) of the APD, the LFIP denies administrative review to second instance applicants whose
applications are considered inadmissible under the notion of FCA or STC (Turkish Parliament, 2013).
Procedures for asylum seekers whose application are declared inadmissible are fast-tracked by allowing only 15
days for filing a judicial appeal (Turkish Parliament, 2013). A decision on a Judicial appeal is made within 15
days of lodging the appeal and following the outcome applicant is denied right to appeal against the decision of
the first instance court (Turkish Parliament, 2013). The LFIP (2013) also replicates the hotspot approach by
restricting the beneficiaries of conditional or subsidiary protection to reside only in the assigned towns (Turkish
Parliament, 2013).
Moreover, to mitigate the impact of the EU-turkey Statement, Turkey launched three military operations in
Northern Syria and established safe zones for Syrian refugees. After that, Turkey suspended the registration of
newly-arriving Syrian asylum seekers and stepped up efforts to relocate Syrian refugees in the safe zone
(Simpson, 2019). Similarly, in April 2018, the Turkish Prime Minister, during his visit to Afghanistan, reached
an informal agreement with Afghanistan to ensure the return of Afghan asylum seekers from Turkey (ECRE,
2018). Following the agreement, Turkey deported thousands of Afghan asylum seekers (Amnesty International,
2018). Considering the adoption of these externalisation measures, exactly in line with the EU externalisation
policy, replication, it can be concluded that contraction of the Turkish humanitarian regime is influenced by the
disregard of the EU’s humanitarian values.
Conclusion
The EU interprets the principle of solidarity in non-humanitarian meanings to avoid asylum seekers
becoming legal duty of its Member States. It helps the EU and its Member States to return asylum seekers to
19
Council Decision 2008/157/EC of 18 February 2008 on the Principles, Priorities and Conditions Contained in the Accession
Partnership with the Republic of Turkey.
third countries without considering the protection needs of asylum seekers. However, such interpretation also
undermines humanitarian values enshrines under Article 2 of TFEU. The disregard of the humanitarian values
also undermines the rule of law as the respect of values enshrined under Article 2 has been regarded as the rule
of law by the CJEU. Therefore, externalisation of asylum to third countries in disregard of the rule of law and
humanitarian values creates serious issues in the EU legal order. Further, it influences the partner states, Turkey,
in the present case, to follow the EU model of externalisation to return asylum seekers to other countries down
the line. This means that contraction of the EU humanitarian regime in breach of the rule of law and
humanitarian values enforces the EU partner states to shrink their humanitarian regimes as well. According, we
see Turkey shrinking its humanitarian regime, i.e., brotherhood policy for asylum seekers originating from the
Islamic world. Thereby, it can be concluded that the contraction of the EU’s humanitarian regime excludes
asylum from humanitarian regimes beyond the EU territorial limits. Accordingly, as Giorgio Agamben (1998)
argued, asylum seekers have become excess or leftover of the political processes.
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doi: 10.17265/2328-2134/2021.04.002
D DAVID PUBLISHING
US “Maximum pressure” From the Perspective of Bottom-Line

Thinking—Taking the Persian Gulf Escort Coalition as an
Example
SHU Meng
Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai, China

This article attempts to take the formation of the Persian Gulf Escort Coalition after the oil tanker attack and
detention as the starting point to discuss the bottom-line thinking of the parties involved in and the dilemma of US
“maximum pressure”. The “maximum pressure” is the product of zero-sum thinking. In the case of "maximum
pressure", the allies may predict the worst outcome out of bottom-line thinking, which will change their support for
the US, resulting in not only being unable to isolate their opponents, but also isolating the US itself. And in the case
of "maximum pressure", the opponent will also prepare for the worst out of bottom-line thinking, which will easily
make the contradictions more intensified and cause unnecessary strong backlash from the opponent. Under the
guidance of bottom-line thinking, out of consideration of history or other factors, allies or opponents may make
choices that are different from expectations, leading to the risk of strategic-misjudgment. In summary, the
formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf was an unsuccessful act of "maximum pressure", and the
"maximum pressure" strategy that time did not achieve the expected results because of the bottom-line thinking of
the allies.
Keywords: Bottom line thinking, Persian Gulf Escort Coalition
Bottom line thinking is a way of thinking that accepts the worst results, which guides the actors to
consider the worst possible situation, and prepare and respond to it. In recent years, the US has continued to
exert "maximum pressure" on Iran. After it officially announced its withdrawal from the nuclear agreement, the
US resumed its economic sanctions against Iran. Among them, sanctions on Iranian oil exports hit the lifeblood
of Iran’s economy. At the same time, the US has continued to increase its pressure on Iran in other areas,
including accusing Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization and adding troops to the
Middle East. In the process of US "maximum pressure", all actors involved have chosen different behaviors
based on their bottom line thinking. After successive attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf region, the regional
situation has become even more complicated. Therefore, this article attempts to take the formation of the
Persian Gulf Escort Coalition after the oil tanker attack and detention as the starting point to discuss the
bottom-line thinking of the parties involved in and the dilemma of US "maximum pressure".
SHU Meng, Ph.D, Assistant Researcher, Middle East Studies Institute, Shanghai International Studies University, Shanghai,
China.
150 US “MAXIMUM PRESSURE” FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF BOTTOM-LINE THINKING
Forming a Persian Gulf Escort Coalition—An Attempt to Exert "Maximum pressure"

The Persian Gulf Escort Coalition was proposed by the US in July 2019, through which the US hopes to
realize the concept of maritime security guarantee. In the US expectation, this coalition will be led by the US,
but actual actions mainly rely on the participation of the member states of the coalition. The apparent goal of
forming this coalition is to ensure the safety of important waterways such as the Strait of Hormuz, the Strait of
Mande, and the Gulf of Oman. The more important thing is to counter what it sees as a renewed maritime threat
from Iran (Gambrell, 2019).
The direct background for the formation of the Persian Gulf Escort Coalition was the time of frequent oil
tankers attacks and hijackings in the Strait of Hormuz and its surrounding waters. On May 12, 2019, a number
of explosions occurred in the Fujairah Port of the UAE, which is adjacent to the Strait of Hormuz, causing a fire
on seven to 10 oil tankers and four ships were stuck. Of the four commercial ships targeted in the May 12
attack, one was flying a UAE flag, two were tankers owned by Saudi Arabia, and the fourth was a Norwegian
tanker (Roth, 2019). Later in June 13, two tankers were apparently attacked in the Gulf of Oman in
international waters near the Strait of Hormuz. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blamed Iran for the attacks,
saying the assessment was based on intelligence but offered no evidence to support his claim, while Iran’s
Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said “suspicious doesn’t begin to describe” (Cotovio, Regan, & Fox,
2019). On July 4, the Gibraltar government said its law enforcement agencies and the Royal Marines had
detained Iranian Grace 1 in the Strait of Gibraltar, alleging the vessel was headed to the Banyas Refinery
which belongs to an entity subject to the EU sanctions against Syria. However, Iran denied the allegations,
saying its navy vessels carried out their regular patrolling missions in the Gulf (Xinhua News Agency, 2019).
The detention was originally for two weeks, but the detention period was extended again. In response,
Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards seized the British oil tanker, Stena Impero, for failing to respect the
international maritime rules while passing through the Strait of Hormuz. After these incidents, the situation
surrounding the Persian Gulf continued to enter a white-hot stage, and the US sent thousands of additional
troops, an aircraft carrier, B-52 bombers and advanced fighter jets to the region as tensions with Iran rise.
Facing the US military deterrence, Iran’s attitude is equally tough. Against such backdrop, the US announced
that it hopes to form the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf to ensure the safety of navigation in the
surrounding waters.
The development from the oil tankers incidents to the formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf
is an important practice of the US policy of "maximum pressure". In the process of forming the Escort
Coalition in the Persian Gulf, the US has taken several key measures to exert "maximum pressure":
First, prompt the incident to escalate. After the 6.13 Fujairah tanker bombing, US Secretary of State
Pompeo quickly claimed that Iran was responsible for launching the tanker attack in the Gulf of Oman. Then
US National Security Adviser John Bolton has said that Iran was “almost certainly” behind the attacks. The US
Central Command released a grainy video which it said showed an Iranian patrol boat “removing the
unexploded limpet mine” from the ship (China Daily, 2019), but even Japanese-owned Kokuka Courageous,
owner of the vessel also expressed there is no claim of responsibility for the blasts. In a number of oil tanker
incidents, the US tried its best to link the incidents with Iran, and expanded the impact of the incident in various
ways to promote the escalation of the incident. Its attitude was even stronger than that of allies whose oil
tankers were directly attacked or detained, in order to provide reasons for further pressure.
US “MAXIMUM PRESSURE” FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF BOTTOM-LINE THINKING 151
Second, bundle related topics together. In the process of responding to the oil tanker attacks and detentions
and calling for the formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf, the main goal of the US is to deal with
potential threats from Iran. However, in its external propaganda, the establishment of the Escort Coalition was
tied to issues such as the safety of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, the freedom of global oil shipping routes,
and the energy security of the Middle East, to urge allies to join. At the same time, the US has also linked
economic sanctions with the incidents as an opportunity to further increase pressure on Iran. Such bundling
related topic is one of the most important means of exerting "maximum pressure".
Third, win over “stakeholders”. After the oil tanker attacks and detentions, the US quickly put forward a
proposal for the formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf. There are a large number of
oil-producing countries around the Persian Gulf, and the Strait of Hormuz is an important oil export
transportation channel for Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, and other countries. It is just
33-kilometer wide at its narrowest point, but guards the main artery of global oil resources. It is the only place
to pass from the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean. Therefore, after linking the safety of navigation in the Strait
of Hormuz with the threat of Iran, the US hopes to expand the influence of the global anti-Iran camp by
winning over stakeholders who are involved in the safety of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz to counter Iran
together.
Fourth, test Iran’s resilience repeatedly. In the process of promoting the escalation of tanker attacks, the
US has continued to speak harshly and even strengthened its military deterrence to test Iran’s resilience. Such
repeated probing measures are also among most important means of exerting "maximum pressure".
However, due to the apparent anti-Iranian nature of the Escort Coalition described by the US, its
establishment may bring some risks. In this case, it is easy to arouse the bottom-line thinking of stakeholders,
leading to the failure of "maximum pressure" behavior in forming the coalition.
Inconsistent Bottom-Line of the Allies—Failure of the Maximum-Pressure Attempt

After the US launched the initiative on Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf, the various parties reacted
differently. In the plan of the US, the Escort Coalition is jointly participated by more than 60 countries, among
which the US is mainly responsible for intelligence sharing, and allies are responsible for specific escort
missions. But allies reacted various to the initiative. First of all, the US as the country that proposes and plays a
leading role, has limited substantive contributions to the coalition. Secondly, the anti-Iranian nature of the
coalition is obvious, which may easily intensify regional conflicts. Finally, and most importantly, the formation
of the Escort Coalition is not entirely consistent with the individual interests of all allies.
In such a case, countries at different levels are also different in terms of their actual benefits that the
coalition may bring and the risks that allies may need to bear, leading to different bottom-line thinking
among allies. Under the influence of bottom-line thinking, the decisions made by various actors are mainly
based on the worst situation they anticipate and the different bottom-line they can bear. In the formation of the
Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf, inconsistent bottom-line thinking led to different choices among different
allies.
Power Allies Outside the Region: Take Britain and Germany as Examples
Allies of powers outside the Middle East have doubts on the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf as a
whole. However, under the doubt, according to the difference between the preset bottom line and the acceptable
bottom line of different countries, the choices of these powers are different, like the Britain and Germany have
made different decisions on whether to join the Escort Coalition.
The bottom line of the UK is based on the inertia of pro-American diplomacy, the freedom of the
navigation in the Strait of Hormuz and its balanced national interests. In the process of forming the Escort
Coalition in the Persian Gulf, the Britain was directly involved in the detention of the oil tanker in Strait of
Hormuz. In early July 2019, the authorities of Gibraltar detained Iranian boat with the assistance of the British
Navy, and subsequently, Iran took retaliatory arrest of British oil tanker passing through the Strait of Hormuz,
leading to an escalation of incidents. In the incident of the mutual detention of oil tankers, the British side’s
attitude was more eased. British side said that Britain would facilitate the release of the detained Grace 1 oil
tanker if Tehran gave guarantees it would not go to Syria. Gibraltar local government also said it was seeking to
de-escalate tensions arising with Iran since the detention. Even after Iran seized the British tanker, Britain
insisted on releasing the Iranian tanker. It can be seen that in this incident, the British side does not want the
situation to escalate, which is contrary to the expectations of the US.
Britain’s interests in the Strait of Hormuz is to ensure the safety and free navigation of the waterways, but
the possible regional conflicts induced for this reason are to cross the bottom line that Britain can bear.
Therefore, when the US proposed to form an Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf, London’s response was
relatively indifferent. Although the Britain sent two warships to the Persian Gulf that month, London
emphasized that the move was for the safety of British oil tankers, rather than responding to the call of the US.
For London, the formation of an escort coalition is necessary, but the coalition should not have the nature of
obviously opposing Iran or intensifying contradictions. Therefore, in order to ensure the freedom of navigation
in the Strait of Hormuz, the Britain calls on the EU to establish a joint fleet and conduct a European-led escort
operation in the Persian Gulf, which won the support from countries such as France, Italy, and Denmark.
However, due to the unsuccessful advancement of European-led escort activities and the differences in the UK
on whether to follow the US to join the escort coalition, London finally announced on August 5, 2019 that it
officially joined the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf initiated by the US. For London, joining the US-led
Escort Coalition is the result of the balance and compromise of three factors: the inertia of pro-American
diplomacy in the UK, the bottom line to protect the freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, and the
failure to establish and lead the European escort fleet.
Compared with Britain’s hesitation, Germany, which is also an US ally outside the Middle East, has a
clearer bottom line. After the US proposed the formation of the Escort Coalition, senior German officials
expressed in an interview that they were very skeptical of the US proposal, because the urgent task should be to
avoid conflicts, and the escort operation risks may further aggravating the situation. For US powerful
allies outside the Middle East, they are stakeholders in protecting the safety of navigation in the Persian Gulf,
but the risk of being involved in regional conflicts following the US is far greater than the risk that its oil
tankers may encounter in the Persian Gulf waterway, because the former situation may lead to the worst
possible situation beyond their acceptable bottom lines. Therefore, these powers are generally skeptical of the
Escort Coalition.
Small Allies Outside the Region: Take Japan and Poland as Examples
Compared with power allies outside the region outside the region, the allies of the small countries outside
the region obviously do not have that high diplomatic autonomy, but their ability to withstand the possible
bottom-line situation is even worse. Therefore, as to whether to join in the Persian Gulf initiated by the US, the
decision of allies of small countries outside the region is mainly based on their own interests.
Japan’s response to the Escort Coalition was not positive. Japan is an important oil importer in the
international community, and oil from the Middle East accounts for an important proportion of Japan’s total oil
imports. Therefore, the normal passage of the Strait of Hormuz is vital to the safety of Japan’s energy lines. The
relationship between Japan and Iran has always been relatively close. Iran was once Japan’s largest trading
partner in the Middle East, and Japan has always been a communication channel between the Western camp
and Iran. After the Gulf War and the Cold War, as the US began to impose sanctions on Iran, Japan’s oil
imports from Iran gradually decreased, and the business exchanges between Japan and Iran were also
significantly affected. But although Iran’s share is getting lower and lower, the Gulf region is still the most
important source of Japan’s oil imports. However, as some ally outside the Middle East, although Japan is
diplomatically pro-American and is also a stakeholder in the safety of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, it
anticipates the worst possible situations that the Persian Gulf Escort Alliance may cause: Firstly, the formation
of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf will seriously affect the relationship between Japan and Iran. If
Japan joins the coalition, it will not only be unable to serve as a link between the West and Iran, but it may also
incur retaliatory activities against Japanese boats in the Strait of Hormuz by Iran. Secondly, according to
Japan’s 1947 Peace Constitution, Japan cannot have an army, only the Japan Self-Defense Force. If Japan sends
its Self-Defense Forces to the Persian Gulf waters and participates in an escort coalition that is clearly opposed
to Iran, the move will cause strong opposition from both the international community and Japan’s domestic
society. Out of concerns about the worst possible situation, Japan did not join the Escort Coalition. Even after
the Japanese oil tanker was attacked during Japanese Prime Minister Abe’s visit to Iran, it did not agree with
the accusation made by the US that Iran was involved in the attack.
Also as a small country outside the Middle East, Poland’s attitude is slightly different from that of Japan,
because Poland government’s bottom line and its priority were to maintain the legitimacy of the government.
After the US initiated to establish an escort coalition, when many countries expressed doubts, the Polish
Foreign Minister expressed that Poland was willing to join this coalition in any form. This decision was made
at the time by the domestic political situation in Poland. Poland’s accession to the EU is an important result of
the EU’s eastward expansion, but when the escort coalition was formed in 2019, Poland’s ruling party was the
right-wing conservative party Law and Justice Party (PiS). The PiS has always been skeptical about European
integration, and it has even argued that Poland needs to recoup some of its sovereignty and to be more assertive
in defending its national interests (Foy & Robinson, 2016). Since the PiS took over the Polish government, it
has repeatedly emphasized that Poland and Germany still have unpaid war arrears, its relationship with
Germany has deteriorated, and it seeks to withdraw politically from the EU and strengthen relations with the
US. For Poland, the country’s crude oil imports that year were mainly from Russia rather than the Middle East.
Although Poland had recently begun to seek diversification of its own energy sources and signed a long-term
agreement with Saudi Aramco before the tanker attacks, the generally the country’s tankers are unlikely to
encounter risks in the Strait of Hormuz. For the ruling party PiS, it is the government’s bottom line to adhere to
the party’s consistent pro-US and exit-EU diplomatic policy and maintain the legitimacy of the current ruling.
Under the influence of this bottom-line thinking. Poland’s response to the formation of the Persian Gulf Escort
Alliance by the United States has been relatively positive.
From the perspective of bottom-line thinking, for small allies outside the Middle East, whether or not they
choose to join the Escort Coalition is based on their own national interests. Because small countries have a low
stake in the freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz and weak ability in resisting risks, they are more
inclined to make a cautious and prudent diplomatic choice. And for small countries outside the region, the
political significance of joining the Escort Coalition is far greater than its military significance. If a small
country chooses to join the Escort Coalition and is targeted by Iran as a result, it is in fact difficult for the
coalition to provide adequate shelter for the small country’s tankers.
Regional Allies: Taking Saudi Arabia and Israel as Examples
Unlike countries outside the region, US allies within the Middle East have more tangible interests in the
Strait of Hormuz, so the response of regional allies was much more positive.
The bottom line of Saudi Arabia was to contain any possible development of Iran. On September 18, 2019,
Saudi Arabia announced that it would join the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf initiated by the US, saying
that this was to express support for the international community’s efforts to contain the threat of maritime
navigation and global trade. Before Saudi Arabia announced its accession, the two oil facilities of Saudi
Aramco, the world’s largest oil company, caught fire after being attacked by drones. The Houthis in Yemen
expressed responsibility for it. Although the Houthis have released relevant evidence, the Saudis have always
believed that the attack has a lot to do with Iran. Saudi Arabia and Iran are both regional powers, and the two
sides have always had differences on sectarian issues, ethnic issues, and political systems, and there is also a
competitive relationship between them in the energy market. As the geopolitical tension between the two
countries intensifies, do everything possible to prevent the development of Iran from becoming Saudi Arabia’s
primary goal. If Iran is not contained in the Strait of Hormuz, Iran may get a respite and develop, which is the
worst situation that Saudi Arabia cannot accept. In order to prevent this situation from taking place, Saudi
Arabia did not hesitate to compromise in other areas, and even contacted Israel to jointly oppose Iran. In
addition, with the reorganization of different camps in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia urgently needs the support
of the US. Therefore, under the influence of the bottom line thinking of preventing Iran’s development, Saudi
Arabia has a very positive attitude towards a Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf. Saudi Arabia hopes to use the
influence of the US taking the formation of the coalition as an opportunity to jointly build a global alliance
against Iran.
Like Saudi Arabia, another country that actively participates in the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf is
Israel, which is also in the Middle East. Israel’s bottom line is its survival in the region. After Britain, Israel
became the second country to participate in the Escort Coalition and the first regional country to announce its
membership in the coalition. There have been many years of grievances between Israel and Iran. In recent years,
the two sides have also had frictions on many occasions. Israel regards Iran as the biggest threat to its own
development. It has been accusing Iran of expanding its power in the Middle East and turning Syria into a
forward position against Israel. In order to contain Iran’s development to the greatest extent, Israel has also
tried to persuade the US to withdraw from the Iran nuclear agreement. For Israel, its most important bottom line
is its own survival security, and any factors that may threaten Israel’s survival security must be eliminated in
advance. Therefore, Israel’s demand to contain Iran is even more urgent than that of the US. From Israeli
perspective, joining the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf may lead to a retaliatory attack by Iran, but such
attacks have occurred many times before, so it will be a situation that Israel is fully acceptable and capable of
responding to. And after Israel joins the Escort Coalition, it will mainly provide intelligence rather than actual
escort support. Therefore, under the influence of such bottom-line thinking, it is not surprising that Israel joined
the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf without hesitation.
It can be found that the regional allies are directly related to the safety of navigation in the Strait of
Hormuz, and there is a consensus among these allies with the US on containing Iran. Joining the Escort
Coalition meets the actual interests of these countries and will not have an unacceptable impact on the current
regional security from their perspectives. Under such circumstances, regional allies generally supported the US
initiative to form an Escort Coalition.
To sum up, with regard to the formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf, the bottom line and
needs of the US allies at all levels are different, so the decisions they make are also various. That’s why after
the US proposed the initiative, the reaction of many allies was relatively indifferent, and only a few allies
actively joined. This is mainly a decision made by countries after considering their own national interests and
estimating whether the worst possible scenario will break through their own bottom line. In this case, the
formation of the escort coalition finally is no long concerned.
Stalemate Between Bottom-Line Thinking and "Maximum pressure"—US-Iran

Confrontation in the Tanker Incidents
The "maximum pressure" strategy first appeared in the former US President Trump’s North Korea policy.
In 2017, the US abandoned the strategic tolerance strategy of the Obama era and began to exert "maximum
pressure" on North Korea. According to US media reports, the "maximum pressure" is divided into two parts:
The first step is to use all diplomatic, military, economic, and other means to put pressure on North Korea to
abandon its nuclear and missile programs. The second step is that if North Korea accepts negotiations with the
goal of nuclear abandonment, the US will start a dialogue with it directly. Judging from the development of the
situation, the US has indeed met its original expectations. Under "maximum pressure", North Korea finally
changed its views and agreed to engage with the US with the goal of nuclear abandonment. Then, the US also
chose a strategy of "maximum pressure" on the Iran issue, hoping to use pressure to promote change inside Iran.
Therefore, after frequent incidents of oil tankers being attacked or detained in the Persian Gulf, the US chose to
use this as an entry point to further exert "maximum pressure" on Iran. Looking at the process of the US
"maximum pressure" policy from the occurrence of the tanker incidents to the formation of the Escort Coalition
in the Persian Gulf, its "maximum pressure" is exerted in progressive:
First, establish goals and predict the situation. Former US President Trump has always made "maximum
pressure" the key to his new Middle East policy. After the oil tanker incidents, the US quickly linked the
incidents with Iran, hoping to take this opportunity to gain control of the Strait of Hormuz and increase pressure
on Iran. US decision-making is mainly based on two pre-judgments: The first is that Iran guards the entrance to
the Strait of Hormuz, and its existence threatens the safety of the channel of the Strait of Hormuz, so the strait
needs to be guarded; the second is that when the incidents escalate, allies may clashed with Iran in the Strait of
Hormuz, which will increase Iran’s diplomatic pressure. However, whether in fact or in the assessment of allies
outside the region, Iran’s threat to the Strait of Hormuz is not that great. Although both Saudi Arabia and the
UAE have opened pipelines that bypass the Strait of Hormuz, Kuwait, Qatar, and other Gulf countries still rely
on the Strait of Hormuz to export oil and natural gas. During the years that Iran has controlled the entrance to
the strait, there has been no interruption of the crossing route. Instead, many explosions and attacks mainly
occurred after the US withdrew from the Iran nuclear agreement. Therefore, the allies worry that if the escort
coalition is successfully formed, the security environment in the sea area may further deteriorate.
Second, put great pressure on a single goal. In the process of forming the Escort Coalition in the Persian
Gulf, the US hopes to exert multiple pressures on Iran. Therefore, while the US continued to promote the
escalation of the situation, exaggerated provocative words, and sent armed forces to the Persian Gulf, it also
calls on all stakeholders involved in the security of the Strait of Hormuz to join. However, the pressure exerted
by the US itself is not sufficient enough to promote change in Iran. The key to "maximum pressure" is based on
its own monopoly on superior resources to make the other party know that it could no longer maintain the
status quo. However, in these incidents, Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz is difficult to shake, and even
if the US obtains control of the Strait of Hormuz, it has not enough capability to maintain the security of the
strait. Currently, the accident of any US aircraft carrier on global cruises will cause huge financial losses. The
US is unable to maintain sufficient military power to cruise in the Strait of Hormuz, and what it could do is just
cruising with its allies. So the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf is proposed by the US, but is designed to be
undertaken by allies, for US decreasing of capability.
Third, win over external forces to exert multiple pressures. As mentioned above, the US plan to win over
external forces to jointly exert pressure was frustrated. Due to the inconsistent bottom-line thinking of allies,
the US was unable to achieve diplomatic isolation of Iran. In the case of unable to win over external forces to
exert pressure, the pressure the opponent faced is insufficient, causing the front to be dragged too long, and the
effectiveness of the "maximum pressure" strategy would be greatly affected.
Generally speaking, it is difficult for the US to achieve a balance of three aspects with the "maximum
pressure" to build an escort coalition: First, the balance between exerting "maximum pressure" and avoiding
large-scale conflicts. The formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf further intensified the situation
in the Persian Gulf, but the US does not have a feasible plan to deal with possible regional conflicts, nor is it
enough capability to deal with it. Moreover, regional conflicts are not in the interests of some allies. Avoiding
regional conflicts is the bottom line that some allies of major powers outside the region are unwilling to cross.
Second, the balance between the interests of the US and the interests of allies. In recent years, under the
guidance of pragmatism, the support of allies needed by the US has increasingly shifted from legal support to
practical support. The US has even actively weakened its dominant position in regional security supply, which
has also been reflected its position in the shaping of the security order in the Gulf region. Under such
circumstances, the divergence between the interests of the US and the interests of allies has gradually increased,
resulting in a decline in the US influence over allies and a decline in the credibility of its security commitments.
Third, the balance between maximizing the pressure and minimizing the possible consequences brought by the
opponent’s bottom line thinking. If the possible results of the US’s "maximum pressure" exceed the bottom line
acceptable to Tehran, Tehran may take tough measures under the influence of bottom line thinking, adding
uncertainty to the regional security environment.
The so-called "maximum pressure" is the product of zero-sum thinking. In the case of "maximum
pressure", the allies may predict the worst outcome out of bottom-line thinking, which will change their support
for the US, resulting in not only being unable to isolate their opponents, but also isolating the US itself. In the
case of "maximum pressure", the opponent will also prepare for the worst out of bottom-line thinking, which
will easily make the contradictions more intensified and cause unnecessary strong backlash from the opponent.
Under the guidance of bottom-line thinking, out of consideration of history or other factors, allies or opponents
may make choices that are different from expectations, leading to the risk of strategic-misjudgment. In
summary, the formation of the Escort Coalition in the Persian Gulf was an unsuccessful act of "maximum
pressure", and the "maximum pressure" strategy that time did not achieve the expected results because of the
bottom-line thinking of the allies. But as far as the regional security situation is concerned, this failure of
"maximum pressure" is not a bad thing.
References
China Daily. (June 15, 2019). Iran denies US claims on Gulf of Oman tanker attacks. Retrieved from
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/kindle/2019-06/15/content_37481169.htm
Cotovio, V., Regan, H., & Fox, K. (2019). Two tankers struck in apparent attack in Gulf of Oman. CNN. Retrieved from
https://edition.cnn.com/2019/06/13/middleeast/sea-of-oman-tanker-intl/index.html
Foy, H., & Robinson, D. (January 16, 2016). Poland-EU: Stand-off in the east. Financial Times. Retrieved from
https://www.ft.com/content/16a8f504-bb72-11e5-b151-8e15c9a029fb
Gambrell, J. (September 3, 2019). US-led Persian Gulf patrols put Iran on notice. Navy Times. Retrieved from
https://www.navytimes.com/news/your-navy/2019/09/03/us-led-persian-gulf-patrols-put-iran-on-notice/
Roth, R. (June 7, 2019). Initial findings on Gulf tanker attacks point to a “state actor” but Iran not mentioned by name. CNN.
Retrieved from https://edition.cnn.com/2019/06/06/middleeast/uae-saudi-oil-tankers-intl/index.html
Xinhua News Agency. (July 14, 2019). Britain voices conditional release of detained Iranian oil tanker, Iran says to continue oil
exports. Retrieved from http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/europe/2019-07/14/c_138225492.htm
doi: 10.17265/2328-2134/2021.04.003
D DAVID PUBLISHING
Social Policies in the Thirties in Europe:

Crisis and Solution—The Italian Case
Maria Teresa Giusti

University “G. d’Annunzio” of Chieti-Pescara, Abruzzo, Italy
Drawing from historiography and literature on the subject and considering the consequences produced on the
European society by World War I and the 1929 Wall Street Crisis, this article aims at analysing some aspects of the
fascist construction of welfare state. The model suggested by the fascist regime in the thirties was a typical
totalitarian welfare state, which used social policies to strengthen the home front and to build consensus for the
regime. Despite the fascist regime had the war as its goal, it did not mobilize the country on the eve of World War
II, but preferred to invest in social assistance and welfare, for reasons of political convenience. Moreover, the
analysis of fascist social policy measures, such as social security, points out that some flaws in the social security
system, such as excessive spending, or the categorical approach to assistance and social security typical of fascism,
were borrowed from republican Italy.
Keywords: World War I, Fascism, Propaganda, Welfare State, Social Policies
The Legacy of World War I

After World War I and especially in the thirties and forties, there was an exceptional development of
social policies, aimed at facing the worsening of the living conditions of large masses of the population. In
Europe, the institutionalization of social policies in the 1930s took different paths according to the different
social and political contexts, so it did not take place in a linear manner but changed according to the different
countries and political regimes. Anyway, all the regimes, liberal democratic and totalitarian ones shared the
same social and economic problems connected to the effects of the just finished world war. Moreover, with the
1929 Wall Street Crisis, the public discourse spread, recognizing the market left to itself as the main culprit of
the crisis. During the Great Depression of the 1930s, the English economist John Maynard Keynes “developed
an analytical framework designed to save what he clearly saw as a very imperfect entrepreneurial economic
system that we call capitalism” (Davidson, 2009, pp. 5-6). Keynes was among the first to analyse the situation
and to suggest a radical approach to the question, capable of marking a real revolution in the field of economic
science and social policy (Davidson, 2009; Keynes, 2004). Despite its imperfections, he believed that
capitalism was the best system ever devised by humans to achieve a civilized economic society, anyway, he
admitted that capitalism had two major liabilities: failure to provide full employment for all who want to work,

No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government
except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time (Churchill, 2008). That is the second reading of the British
Parliament on 11 November 1947.
Maria Teresa Giusti, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of Management and Business Administration, University “G.
d’Annunzio” of Chieti-Pescara, Abruzzo, Italy.
SOCIAL POLICIES IN THE THIRTIES IN EUROPE 159
inequitable distribution of income and wealth. These faults lead to system instability and to periods of
economic collapse. So, he argued that the governments had a pivotal role in mitigating and even removing the
social system flaws and defects. However, the 1929 Economic Crisis was one of the forces that produced the
implementation of welfare policies in the thirties. The pressures that generated these politics were the
destructive tensions that followed the end of World War I and the attempts at social stabilization, although the
early spring of the peoples of 1848 had also been a sign of a social malaise in Europe, on which the Russian
revolution would feed.
World War I had represented a clash of civilizations and the end of a decisive balance among governments;
in fact, as Élie Halévy (1998) argued in studying the causes of World War I, wars burst when the balances
established by previous peace agreements stipulated between states are altered. On the eve of World War I,
there were two political forces: the ones that tended to revolution, in the opposition of class against class, a
conflict of a supranational type, and the forces that pushed towards war, in the opposition of nation against
nation, therefore of a national type (Halévy, 1998). In Europe, the second revolutionary impulse, that of
nationalities, or the manifestation of independence of some nations with respect to an empire, prevailed leading
to a war that involved millions of men, including combatants and civilians who had been forced to make
sacrifices that somehow had to be rewarded.
Measures to Be Taken After the War

The necessary social protection measures were intended as a means of strengthening national cohesion and
identity: The unity of the nation against the enemy therefore involved the reduction of social differences. The
war had also brought destruction and a burden of dead, disabled and wounded who were part of a changed
social context: The families had dissolved, food products were rationalized, the income capacity of families had
been reduced, the role of women in society had significantly changed, also due to their mobilization in
productive activities, including military ones, hygienic and sanitary conditions had gotten worse and worse
leading to an increase in infectious diseases and infant mortality. During the conflict, the military effort had
revealed all the inadequacy of a purely welfare approach. The war had changed societies and their approach
towards governments, the contribution of millions of men in fighting for their own nation, compelled the states
to intervene with precise projects and measures in social policy. State interventionism in social policies—an
interventionism that had already had a considerable expansion in the economic field during the war—was
determined in the postwar period by various needs: firstly, the assistance to families of millions of military dead;
secondarily, the urgent need to quickly convert industrial production into production of peace, which could,
among other things, reintegrate thousands of veterans; and thirdly, the need to compensate people for further
impoverishment produced by inflation which in a short time had pulverized private savings, insurance funds
and capital. Despite these needs, the future of social policies, in the immediate post-war period, still seemed
uncertain. For instance, there was no agreement on the fact that the protection measures, adopted during the war
years, should have a lasting or a temporary nature, or if they should be granted as a personal merit or as a
universal right, that is, extended to everyone without any distinction. The discourse was essentially on two
different ideas of welfare: According to the first, the social protection had to be meant as an alternative to the
full political participation of the industrial proletariat, an approach to social policy that was influenced by the
fear of a revolution in Europe like the one burst in Russia. The second view pertained to social citizenship as
the fulfillment of political democracy. This concept was introduced by the English sociologist Thomas H.
160 SOCIAL POLICIES IN THE THIRTIES IN EUROPE
Marshall well-known for his argument that introduced a new form of citizenship, the social citizenship.
According to him, the right of citizenship is implemented in three phases: In the first phase, the civil element of
citizenship is established, in the second the political element of citizenship is affirmed (in the 19th century with
the enlargement of suffrage), and finally the social element of citizenship is claimed: Once the civil and the
political rights have been acquired, the following step is to acquire the rights to education and to social services
(Marshall, 2000). In other words, Marshall (2000) argued that social citizenship supplemented and strengthened
the civil and political citizenship that had been acquired in Western Europe and North America in the 18th and
19th centuries. The war had in this discourse a pivotal role, since the mass of people mobilized in the armies,
involved in the defense of their state and nation, now asked for their participation in political life and in the
redistribution of the national income. From the overlap of these challenges, on a systemic level, an irreversible
crisis was generated in the liberal state which was unable to stem this mobilization nor was it able to translate
the bonds of national solidarity created by the conflict into effective politics. The emerging mass parties were
able to take advantage of this situation, furthermore the confrontation became more radical when the
mobilization of the masses was encouraged by the Russian Revolution and was driven by liberal intransigence.
In the 1920s fascist regimes implemented an early repression to prevent the Bolshevik Revolution from
expanding to the West, stifling any demand for change to the exclusive advantage of the ruling classes. As for
their part, the democracies trying to resume the path taken with the reforms were engaged in the solution of two
problems: The first question the social policies had to solve was unemployment, produced by the
demobilization of the war industry and the conversion of military production into peacetime production. The
second one was represented by the reorganization of assistance and the health system. Furthermore, in
democratic regimes interest in the question of education, vocational training and housing was also growing. In
this context, the policies of countries, such as Sweden, Denmark and England, began to excel.
In the 1920s and 1930s, social policy interventions became possible because the political and social
scenario had changed: For instance, in Italy under the liberal Giovanni Giolitti’s government in 1912, a law was
approved which extended suffrage to all men (universal suffrage in Norway was introduced in 1898, in Austria
in 1907). In the same year, the state monopoly on life insurance was approved, showing the will of the state to
control the field of assurance. With the new enlarged parliamentary composition (in 1919, in Italy, there was
the first vote on a proportional basis), intervention initiatives were no longer determined according to a
top-down criterion, that is they were no longer decided only by the elite, but they also became the result of the
pressure exerted by the components of the workers’ movement.
Social Policy and Fascism

In Italy, the “red two-year period” (1919-1921) characterized by strikes, by the occupation of factories and
by requests for employment showed clearly how critical the post-war social situation was. Historiographic
research has tried to establish the anticipated or posthumous nature of the fascist reaction in facing the workers’
mobilization and the insurrectionary movement that characterized Italy at the turn of the 1920s. Many scholars
are inclined to believe that when Fascism asserted itself the workers’ uprisings were already dying out and no
longer seemed to take revolutionary drifts. Rather, fascism seems to be characterized as one of those
phenomena used by the liberal forces in power, led by Giolitti, as a counter-mobilization tactic: In fact, it was
Giolitti’s method to use para-military groups outside the government, Mussolini’s “black shirts” (camicie nere),
led by the “fasci di combattimento”1, as a counter-revolutionary force to stifle the revolts of the working class.
In this way, the government elites freed themselves from the responsibility of restoring order, implicitly
entrusting this task to Mussolini. As an act of gratitude, the fascists would have been co-opted into the
government and Mussolini would have obtained a ministry. Italian historiography agrees in believing that the
liberal leadership underestimated Mussolini and fascism, a completely new political phenomenon that had
social and political revolution as its goal2.
Mussolini’s policy in the field of social interventions is emblematic of an entire era and fundamental in the
study of social policy phenomena in Italian history. After the “march to Rome” (la marcia su Roma) on the 28
October 1922 and after being appointed Prime Minister of Italy by the king Vittorio Emanuele III, Mussolini had
to form a coalition government because the Fascists did not have yet control over the Italian parliament (Payne,
1995; Paxton, 2004). The fascists began their attempt to entrench fascism in Italy with a new electoral law (the
Acerbo law) which guaranteed the majority of the seats in parliament to any party or party coalition list that in an
election received 25% or more of the vote. Giacomo Matteotti, the leader of the Unitary Socialist Party,
denounced the fascist methods of violence and intimidation which led to the victory of the National Fascist Party
(PNF) in the 1924 elections and for this reason was kidnapped and killed. This was a moment of crisis for the
regime, but the other political parties were not able to take advantage of the opportunity and took different
positions3, while the king did not ask for Mussolini’s resignation.
In general, we can divide the regime’s policy into two phases: a first free market, which characterized the
first three years of fascism; and a second dirigiste phase that took place in the second half of the 1920s but
established itself and consolidated in the 1930s. The first phase was aimed at rewarding the agrarians and
industrialists who had supported fascism, so the first interventions of the fascist policy were in fact the tax
exemption of capital; the privatization of businesses; the increase in personal taxes; and the reduction of wages.
However, the extent of the sacrifices imposed with the reduction of wages and the increase in personal taxes
risked undermining consent to the regime, after all, one of the cornerstones of the affirmation of fascism was to
create and obtain an ever-wider consensus, obviously forced through propaganda, but also through social
policies. In 1925, the mutual funds, category or territorial, were created: They were financed with the
contribution of employers with the aim of guaranteeing workers a daily sickness allowance and a partial
reimbursement of health expenses. The same year it was established that the right to stipulate contracts for
workers was entrusted only to the fascist trade unions and to the corporations of entrepreneurs. As a result, in a
few months, the Catholic and Socialist trade unions were dissolved4. The role of the fascist union was also
clarified in the Labor Charter of 1927, not a state law but a political manifesto, which introduced the theory of
fascist corporatism, a new concept in the relationship between capital and labor that wanted to be an alternative
to liberalism and socialism, the so-called third way (Gagliardi, 2010; Stolzi, 2007).
The dirigiste phase began in the period between 1926 and 1929 and was characterized by a contraction in
international trade, due to the 1929 Wall Street Crisis and to a general increase in unemployment, inflation and
devaluation of national currencies. In this phase, fascism strengthened its character as a mass authoritarian
1
The “Combat Fasci” was established by Benito Mussolini in Milan on 23 March 1919 with the aim of “highlighting the Italian
victory and advocating national ideals”.
2
For an in-depth analysis of the characteristics of fascism, among the others, see De Felice (1981) and Gentile (2005; 2011).
3
The liberals and the leftist minority (not he communist) in parliament walked out in protest in what is known as the “Aventine
Secession”, see Payne (1995, p. 114).
4
On fascist syndicalism, see Parlato (2008) and Cordova (2005).
regime by making the state, which came to coincide with the party, the unique actor of social and economic
policies5. A typical rule of fascism, often implemented in the dirigiste phase, was that of compensating classes
or social groups that were loyal to fascism and had sided in favor of the regime. An example of this social
policy was the approval in 1929 of new forms for invalidity and old-age insurance and the establishment of a
compulsory insurance against occupational diseases. Another example: In 1934, family allowances were
granted to the unemployed and to certain categories of workers. If we analyze these and other forms of
intervention during the fascism, according to the classification of welfare models made by Titmuss, it is evident
that the fascist regime tended to use welfare and social policies as a form of reward and discrimination, since
the system covered only few categories6. In this way, the regime implemented the formula of “divide et impera”
which was most effective to control the country. The “divide et impera” policy is also found in the
reorganization process of state entities: In a few years, fascism created a plethora of entities and
sub-entities—typical of totalitarian regimes—aimed at distributing remuneration and guarantees to some
classes rather than others, obviously favoring the most trusted categories and the closest ones to fascism7. In
1933, the National Fascist Institute of Social Security (INFPS) and the National Fascist Institute for the
Assistance of Accidents at Work (INFAIL) were born, which had to manage the accident retirement benefits of
employees in the private sector8. The INFPS was the result of the reorganization of various pension funds,
including its forerunner, the National Social Insurance Fund (CNAS), born in December 1923. In the fascist
period, the INFPS became a real mastodon of social security and after the collapse of the regime, in 1943, it has
been inherited by Republican Italy with the name of INPS—the only change was the purging of letter “f” for
fascist—preserving the same characteristics which it had during the fascist regime. The INFPS is a
paradigmatic case of the intervention of fascism in the social field: Its creation shows the instrumental use that
fascism made of social legislation, making it an instrument of propaganda, of consolidation of power and of its
own hegemonic strength, representing also a typical “categorical” welfare instrument of a totalitarian regime.
Between 1939 and 1942, with the lowering of the retirement age, the number of old-age pensions nearly
doubled. To these, which went from 260,000 to 400,000, we must add disability pensions, thus reaching the
total of 760,000 (Giorgi & Pavan, 2021).
Welfare measures were also introduced to justify the exclusion of women and young people from work:
So, the social services aimed at the person were born. For this purpose, too, in 1925, the National Maternity and
Childhood Work (ONMI) was established, and a dense network of pediatric clinics and nursery schools was
activated. Fascist social policies of intervention in the female sphere were mainly an expression of the
demographic growth policy, and “measures reserved for women” were “not proposed by women” (Thane, 2007,
pp. 25-26). In fact, the recognition of women’s rights was based on a conception that considered them, in the
social sphere, only as mothers, as procreators: With respect to this, fascism has left a heavy legacy to the Italian
5
The most important state interventions in the economic field were “quota 90”, the self-sufficient principle according to which a
pound was worth 90 lire and the founding of IRI (the Industrial Recovery Institute) in 1933.
6
To grasp the characteristic features of the welfare state in a national modern system, Richard Titmuss (1956; 1958/2019; 1974)
developed a typology in which at the lower level he placed residual welfare, at a second the categorical corporate welfare and at
the top of the social policies implemented by a state, the universalistic and redistributive welfare.
7
In fact, INADEL (1925), ENFDEP (1928), and ENFPAS (1942) were created to protect the employees of local authorities and
public entities of the state.
8
In 1943, the National Fascist Institute for Sickness Assistance (INFAM) was established, the compulsory insurance for sickness,
the last of the major risks not yet covered. For an in-depth analysis of the social security policies of fascism, see Giorgi (2004).
Republic and to its leadership which would take a long time to recognize women the same rights as men in the
workplace and to guarantee their access to certain professions through legislative interventions.
Sporting initiatives and recreational and cultural activities, like Italian National Olympic Committee
(CONI) and the Italian Youth of the Lictor (GIL)9 were aimed at promoting new forms of aggregation and at
creating a strong and healthy image of the Italian people. At the same time, in the mid-thirties, the regime
significantly increased the budget on social policies, aimed at strengthening the home front: If in the second
half of the 1920s, social expenditure was equal to 300-400 million lire per year; in the following decade, it
reached 1-1.5 billion lire, exactly triple (Rapini, 2012). So, not surprisingly, in 1936, the national fund for
family allowances for industrial workers was created to ensure the support of that category to the regime, but
the law on family allowances was passed only in 1940 when the war began. The amounts did not increase and
remained modest (Giorgi & Pavan, 2021)10. At the same time, the public works policy—which had already
begun in the 1920s and continued in the 1930s—was extended, with the result of a significant reduction in
unemployment. Between 1926 and 1936, public spending increased from less than 20% of gross domestic
product (GDP) to over 33%.
Starting from the early twenties, the regime had preached war and conquest and had militarized society,
Mussolini’s political speeches referred to conquest projects and to the idea of a “new Mediterranean order” in
which Italy would have had a hegemonic role: In the mid-thirties, Italy was already engaged in the war of
conquest in Ethiopia and between 1936 and 1939 in the civil war in Spain11, alongside Nazi Germany, to
support Francisco Franco (Burgwyn, 2012; De Felice, 1990)12. Anyway, this program of conquest did not
correspond to investments in the military industry, or to an actual increase in the country’s war potential. In
other words, Mussolini did not mobilize the country for a war of great proportions. At the same time, he feared
that excessive pressure and the demand for further sacrifices after the wars in Ethiopia and Spain could provoke
a popular reaction. Therefore, the partial mobilization had the purpose of not alarming the country, of giving
the idea that the war was not so difficult and demanding to endure (Giusti, 2016). At least until all of 1934, the
“Western” and peaceful foreign policy conducted by Mussolini produced a strong sense of security among the
Italians, in turn generating consensus towards the regime (De Felice, 1975; 1990).
This kind of propaganda in reassuring Italian people and the investments in social policies in mid-thirties
confirm what William Beveridge observed about totalitarian regimes. After working in the organizations
responsible for the mobilization of resources during World War I, and after the direction of the London School
of Economics (LSE) in the thirties, Beveridge was convinced that fascisms have also established themselves on
the ground of the integration of the masses (Harris, 1994). To defeat them and immunize societies from the
fascist virus therefore, in his opinion, it is not enough to win the war and not even to ideologically condemn the
brutality of dictators, it is necessary instead to face them on the ground of citizenship, concretely demonstrating
the inclusive strength of a renewed democracy. In fact, according to Titmuss (1958/2019), “the war could not
9
The GIL was the consolidated youth movement of the National Fascist Party of Italy that was established in 1937.
10
Law No. 1278 of 6 August 1940.
11
About Italian participation in the Spanish civil war, see Coverdale (1975).
12
The alliance with Hitler, the Rome-Berlin Axis, in 1936, was interpreted by some historians as a turning point in Italian foreign
policy in the wake of common interests with Germany, while, according to Renzo De Felice, the greatest scholar of fascism, it
was purely instrumental: Mussolini used it as a means of pressure on Great Britain and France to strengthen the position of Italy,
isolated from sanctions after the Ethiopian war. For the first interpretation see the contribution by Petersen (1975). For the second
theory, see De Felice (1981, p. 467) and also Aga-Rossi (1997, p. 272).
be won unless millions of ordinary people, in Great Britain and overseas, were convinced that we had
something better to offer than our enemies—not only during but after the war” (p. 49).
In other words, the challenge is to “win the peace” by learning from the catastrophic lesson provided by
the first post-war period, when the illusion of a substantial restoration of the 19th century liberal order and the
emergence of nationalisms had accelerated the collapse of democracy (Mazower, 2013). The Beveridge Report
of 1942 captured the public imagination with its principles of universal social insurance in Britain. Beveridge’s
idea was that the use of universal benefits should remove the poverty caused by certain contingencies, such as
unemployment or disability; his ideas influenced social security but the reality, over the subsequent 50 years, has
been very different from the principles and from the vision he expressed. Despite this, Beveridge’s important
legacy has been the notion of a national minimum income: a safety net covering all. This idea has substantial
present-day relevance as the countries of the European Community debate the issue of political as well as
economic convergence.
Conclusion
When Mussolini came to power, in 1922, a welfare system had already been started during the previous
liberal governments. For example, the prime minister Francesco Crispi at the end of the nineteenth century had
introduced a social security system for some categories of workers. Mussolini’s goal was that of gaining a
centralized control by the state, unifying all forms of social security, created during the liberal regime, under
single institutions. He did the same with all the different institutions whose purpose was the assistance of all
workers suffering injuries due to work. This policy led to the creation of large administrative bodies, like
INFPS and INFAIL, which were inherited after the collapse of fascism and the end of the war, without any
changes, by the Italian Republic generating in future substantial expenses in the state budget. The
implementation of social policies during the fascist regime had two important goals: to reiterate that only the
state could manage welfare, in order to control the population; and second, to use social policies as an
instrument of propaganda, aimed at generating consensus among population and at reinforcing the regime: a
kind of politics which required money. At the same time, from the middle thirties Mussolini initiated a phase of
more aggressive foreign policy, starting a colonial war to conquest Ethiopia and participating in the Spanish
civil war alongside Nazi Germany to support Francisco Franco. These conflicts caused waste of energy and
money for Italy which from 1939 started the conquest of the Balkans (with the annexing of Albania) and on 10
June 1940 entered the war, a year later after the beginning of World War II. This decision depended on the
weakness of the Italian war potential of which Mussolini was aware. In fact, in the thirties the Italian military
potential among the seven world powers was the lowest, owing not only to the lack of raw material, but also to
the deficiency of financing of the war industry. The generous spending on social policies had guaranteed for
some time the population's support for the regime, but the tragic defeats of the Italian army (especially in
Russia and Africa) in World War II, the drama into which fascism had plunged the country demonstrated the
weakness of the regime and finally led to its collapse.
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doi: 10.17265/2328-2134/2021.04.004
D DAVID PUBLISHING
National Security and Religious Tolerance in Nigeria:

Islamic Perspectives
Musa-Jeje Ibrahim Aladire

Federal University of Kashere, Gombe, Nigeria
Nigeria, which is multi-ethnic and multi-religious in nature, is faced with religious violence. Religion that is
supposed to be a unifying factor among several ethnic groups in Nigeria has turned out to be one of the catalysts
that are causing destruction of lives and properties due to narrow-mindedness misunderstanding, fundamentalism
and fanaticism and religious adherent. Islam as a religion of peace attaches premium attention to peace in all its
ramifications to pave the way for peaceful co-existence among adherents of different faiths in any nation. This
paper shall explore causes, consequences and provide remedies from Islamic perspectives. The method employed in
this paper is historical and analytical. Historically, the paper tends to unravel the historical events that are pertinent
to the topic while analytical methods are meant to analyze the findings from the historical events; it ends with
conclusions and recommendations. In carrying out this paper, the author has relied on history books, journals,
newspapers and recent research works on the major scholars of Arabic and Islamic studies. In the end, the reader
would have been convinced that Islam is a religion of peace, calling for peace at any time, at any place.
Keywords: national security, religious, tolerance and Islam
Introduction
Since independence in 1960, Nigeria has witnessed its share of conflicts, including the civil war in
1967-1970 when the southeast tried to secede as Biafra. The numerous coups and attempted coups have often
had a regional/ethno-religious flavor. Since the return to civilian rule in 1999—the so-called Fourth Republic
insurgencies have flared up in the south-south (Niger Delta) and the northeast (especially Borno, Yobe, and
Adamawa states), postelection violence was serious in Kaduna in 2011, and in the Middle Belt, herder-farmer
violence continues. Another two great militant groups sprang up again which claimed more lines and properties
than what the people of Nigeria had experienced before and the Niger Delta Militant Group known as
Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) are Jama’at Ahl-Sunnah Li Da’awat wal Jihad
popularly known as the Boko Haram. All these crises led to what we can refer to as national insecurity that
gave birth to national disintegration. Conflict and crises are associated with virtually all the sectors in the
country, especially religious, educational and political sectors (Ibeanu, 2006). It is observed that some
contemporary politicians hold the view that political position can only be attained through force.
Islam is a comprehensive and universal religion that encompasses all ways of life of mankind, such as
economic, social, political, security. Security in Islam is considered as basic. The purpose of Islamic law
(Maqasidu-Shar’iah) is security. Security of life, property progeny, religion, honour and Intellect is the primary
Musa-Jeje Ibrahim Aladire, PhD student, Department of Religious Studies, Federal University of Kashere, Gombe, Nigeria.
NATIONAL SECURITY AND RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE IN NIGERIA 167
function of Islamic law. (Oloyede). Islam prohibits any act that threatens the security of people. Security in
Islam goes beyond protection of physique and wealth. It is therefore clear that in Islam, whatever is necessary
to enhance peaceful coexistence of the community is considered a security measure for which every Muslim
must work. National security should not be restricted to the security of government or Governor. It is an
aggregate of the preservation of persons, communities and legitimate public and private institutions.
Causes of National Insecurity and Religious Intolerance in Nigeria

Conflict and crises are believed to be great obstacles to the progress and development of Nigeria as they
become parts and parcel of the lifestyle of Nigerians directly or indirectly. The reasons for this indecorous
situation have been the concern of researchers and intellectuals since the causes are so numerous and complex
that they vary from a form of national insecurity and religious intolerance in a society to another. Thus, a
United State government publication concludes, as quoted by Remi (2006), that:
There is no single cause…. Which is more or less potent. In fact, usually, there are multiple causes and important
contributing conditions rooted in historical relationships and brought to violence by a variety of catalyst … each conflict
has been unique.
From the above quotation, it can be deducted that the cause of national insecurity and religious intolerance
in Nigeria cannot be linked to a single factor; rather they are linked to many factors which are as follows:
Economic Causes
The role played by the nation’s poor state of economy on occurrence of national insecurity and religious
intolerance in Nigeria cannot be underrated. The fear of poverty has lured many youth into their involvement in
crisis in order to earn a living. Poverty is widely spread due to unequal access to the control of natural resources
which Khatari (1979) described as “the major source of conflict between individuals and groups within and
between political systems”. The mal-distribution of resources brings about unemployment for the majority who
are being used for the act, i.e., crisis. The marginalization of the poor by the government is another economic
cause of the crisis in Nigeria. Thus, the able-bodies youths, who have become handiwork of the devil, are
recruited for causing national insecurity and religious intolerance. It has been observed that some of the
crisis-makers are not religiously devoted to their faith but take advantage of crisis to boost their economic
status either by collecting money from their “God father” or by looting the properties of others during violence.
The wide gap between the “expected need” and “actual need” of the masses brings frustration and frustration
normally leads to anger, aggression and violence. (Khatari, 1979)
Social Causes
The social causes of national insecurity and religious intolerance in Nigeria can be traced to many societal
values, such as religious belief, ethnic affiliation, ethnic issues, modernization, etc. Ethnicity has been one of
the major causes of national insecurity and religious intolerance in the country with the country having over
200 ethno-linguistic groups who are adherents of either traditional or Christian or Islamic religion. Thus, people
behave less as Nigerians than as religious bodies by this, an injury done to a member of an ethnic group or tribe
is an injury to all.
Also, statements of some ethnic leaders ignite ethnic conflict or crisis leading to political instability in the
country. This made Himmelstand (1969) to observe thus:
168 NATIONAL SECURITY AND RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE IN NIGERIA
The Nigerian tribalism of recent year is mainly a political tribalism stemming not from primordial ethnic loyalties as
such but from political exploited and reinforced reaction to contemporary African societies, conflict of an economic nature
infested with tribalism as a result of the competitive strain of modern political and economic structure.
Another social cause is the misinformation from the media and misconception of information on the part
of the masses. discrimination as identified by Ekpenyoung (2010).
Religious Causes
According to Imam (2004), ignorance of the religion is a major factor causing crisis especially religious
conflict crisis in Nigeria. Majority of the adherents of each religion of others and this brings unnecessary hatred
and rivalry among them. They act in contrary to the teachings and practices of the religion.
Another cause is the inability of the adherents of different religions to tolerate the religious teachings of
one another as a result of their high level of religious bigotry.
Political Causes
The attainment of power in Nigerian society has been viewed as the only key to success irrespective of the
means to get the position. Political power and position have become a do or die affair to earn livelihood and
respect in the society. Thus, the politicians employ trouble-makers to cause crisis among the political parties in
order to achieve their aims and objectives. On this, Sowemimo (1980) noted as quoted in Jakande (1971) that:
On the evidence before me, it would appear that politics generally in Nigeria has been conducted with a certain
amount of bitterness. It appears that a person belonging to party becomes an enemy of another who belong to rival party.
Political parties are equivalent to warring camps—elections are conducted with party thugs protecting the campaigners and
this state of affairs has been described to have assumed a pitch that no method would be spared however vindictive or
extreme by any rival political party as against another in order to score over one or the other.
Consequence of Religious Insecurity and Intolerance in Nigeria

In the view of the above discussion, the major effects and consequence security challenge are as follows:
Loss of Lives and Properties
Violence of various types has claimed the lives and properties of many Nigerians. The recent attack on
Agatu people of Benue State by Fulani herdsmen left 40 people dead and over 7,000 displaced. Over two
million Nigerians in northeast have been displaced by Boko Haram attacks, including over 800,000 children
while thousands of lives have been lost, government, corporate and private properties lost in billions of Naira.
This has come with the task of rebuilding the affected communities in the post Boko Haram era.
Socio-economic Stagnation
For states affected by Boko Haram attacks in northeast Nigeria, social and economic activities were
paralyzed for several months; schools were shut down and pupils withdrawn, businesses were shut down and
the economic movement in the region became extremely difficult. The violence has stagnated socio-economic
activities; peace is paramount to economic growth.
Social Tension
Violence breeds tension in the society. For example, if an Igbo man is killed in northern Nigeria by a
Hausa man, it creates immediate tension, not only for Igbos in northern Nigeria, but also Hausas in Eastern
Nigeria due to reprisal attack. Often, a state of emergency/curfew is declared in violent ridden areas of the
nation while the government is working to restore peace.
Unstable Peace
Unstable peace is a situation in which tension and suspicion among parties run high, but violence is either
absent or only sporadic. A “negative peace” prevails because although armed force is not deployed [or
employed], the parties perceive one another as enemies and maintain deterrent military capabilities… A
balance of power may discourage aggression, but crises and war are still possible.
Remedies to Religious Insecurity and Intolerance in Nigeria

The security challenges in Nigeria and its consequences as analyzed by Elesin can therefore be adequately
addressed by following teachings in Islam according to:
God-Consciousness
In addition to the above enunciation, Islam lays great emphasis on creating Allah’s-consciousness in
people’s minds. Allah’s-consciousness (Taqwallah) breeds the fear of Allah and righteousness. One who is
Allah’s-conscious and righteous will, both in public and in private, act rightly even in the absence of law
enforcement agents. Such a person will not do anything that could undermine the peace and security of other
individuals and the nation at large. This is another secret of countries, like Saudi Arabia and the Vatican City,
where peace and security reign supreme. In such countries, children are given the right and proper upbringing.
They are trained in the path of Allah and brought up to be Allah’s-conscious. Qur’an says:
O’ Mankind! Be dutiful to your lord, who created you from a single person (Adam), and from him (Adam) He created
his wife [Hawwa (Eve)], and from them both He created many men and women, and fear Allah Through whom you
demand (your mutual rights) and (do not cut the relations of) the wombs (kinship). Surely, Allah is Ever an All-Watchers
over you. (Q4:1)
Qur’an also says:

Verity, those who have attained to faith (in this divine writ), as well as those who follow the Jewish faith, and the
Sabians, and the Christians all who believe in God and the Last Day and do righteous deeds, no fear need they have and
neither shall they grieve. (Q5:69)
In another verse, it says:

Verily, as for those who have attained to faith (in this divine writ) and those who follow the Jewish faith, and the
Sabians, and the Christians, and the Magians (on the one hand) and those who are bent on ascribing divinity to aught but
God (on the other hand). Verily, God will decide between them on the Resurrection Day: For, behold, God is witness unto
everything. (Q22:17)
Justice
Islam, recognizing the fact that security will be elusive in a society where there is injustice, lays great
emphasis on justice and fair play. It enjoins those in authority to deal justly with every individual and every
section of the State. Islam frowns against discrimination and not giving a person their right on account of being
a minority. So long they are citizens of a place. Islam stipulates that whatever rights and privileges those who
belong to the majority tribes enjoy must equally be enjoyed by the minority. The implication of this is that no
section should be marginalized or treated as second class citizens. In this regard, the Glorious Qur’an Chapter 5
Verse 88 admonishes thus:
O’ you who believe! Stand our firmly for Allah as just witness: and let not the enmity are hatred of others make you
avoid justice. Be just that is nearer to piety; and fear Allah. Verily, Allah is well-Acquainted with what you do. (Q5: 88)
It is instructive therefore, for any nation that wishes to stem the tide of insecurity to know that peace and
security will remain elusive as long as there is injustice. Allah has categorically stated in the Glorious Qur’an
Chapter 6 Verse 82 that peace and security will not be attainable with faith alone but in conjunction with justice.
It is quite indisputable that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. Therefore, all efforts must be
made to subdue injustice anywhere and establish justice everywhere. To show Allah’s abhorrence of injustice,
Allah, according to a prophetic hadīth, declares that He has made injustice forbidden unto Himself, and that He
has equally forbidden it among people.
Welfare
Islam, in order that the human society might attain peace and security, enjoins those in authority to provide
for the overall well-being of the individuals within the society. This welfare lies in complete justice, mercy and
provision of at least, basic amenities, such as housing, good roads, potable water, healthcare delivery, light,
education, etc. Both Imam Ghazāli and Ibn Taimiyyah have submitted that promoting the welfare of the people
which lies in safeguarding their faith, their life, their intellect, their posterity and their property are the objectives
of Ash-Sharīʻah; and that therefore whatever ensures the safeguard of these five serves public interest and is
desirable. The reigns of Umar I and Umar II were vivid examples in the Islamic history of how Muslim leaders
exemplified the teachings of Islam regarding welfare. Everyone in the Muslim community during the caliphate
of Umar II was comfortable such that Zakāt (alms) was collected and there was no one single needy to receive it.
Campaign Through Admonition and Guidance Counseling (Daʻwah)
Most Nigerians are religious. Those who perpetrate criminal acts thereby constituting security threat to the
society are either mosque or church goers. The truth also is that religious scholars, both Muslims and Christians
are closer to the people. Apart from the emphasis on the worship of Allah, campaigns through admonition and
guidance counseling could also be mounted to address social problems, such as murder, hire-killing, robbery,
kidnapping, etc. Through such an effort, criminals might turn a new leaf and eschew criminal acts.
One instance among others when the Prophet employed admonition and guidance counseling as a means
of reformation was when a young man came to him seeking permission to commit zina. The companions there
present were astonished and condemned the young man. The Prophet, instead, drew him close to himself and
asked the following questions: “How would you feel if you see someone fornicating with your sister?” The man
replied that he would abhor it. The Prophet then went further: “What, if it is with your wife, or your mother or
your daughter?” For each, the man showed his abhorrence. The Prophet then remarked:
Do you not know that when you commit zina, the woman involved is either a sister, a daughter, a wife or a mother of
someone and; why would you do to others what you would not like them to do to you.
The young man became sober and thereupon, the Prophet prayed for him that Allah should make zina hateful in
his sight. Qur’an says:
Say: O people of the scripture, come to a word that is equitable between us and you that we will not worship except
Allah and sot associate anything with Him and not take another as lords instead of Allah. But if they turn away, then say,
Bear witness that we are Muslims. (Q3:64)
The above verse is the basis of dialogue between Islam and Christianity. This is what was in operation
during the time of the Prophet and his companions who made the Christians enjoyed full rights in the Muslim
terrain. Rahim (2001) said:
In 6 A.H/628 A.D, the Prophet granted to the Christians a charter which is a monument of enlightened toleration. It
accorded them the rights of religion, life and property and they were treated with fairness and justice ... no Christian was to
be force to renounce his religion. There should be no demolition of the Christian churches.
Implementation of Capital Punishment

Another Islamic panacea is implementation of capital punishment called Hadd in Ash-Sharīʻah. Certain
capital punishments are stipulated for some categories of heinous crimes in Ash-Sharīʻah chiefly to serve as a
deterrent for potential criminals. Though, seriously criticized especially by human rights activists, the truth
which cannot be controverted is that Islamic countries, such as Saudi-Arabia has been able to reduce crime and
insecurity to the barest minimum largely as a result of the implementation of capital punishment. The
punishment stipulated by Ash-Sharī‘ah for criminals when considered in good faith are not only retributive but
are also of deterrent and reformative value. They are also meant to restore the confidence of the victim in the
ability of the state to defend and protect his rights. Through the implementation of Hadd, Islam is able to
realize the fundamental objectives of Ash-Sharīʻah which include protection and preservation of life (Hifzu
An-Nafs), intellect, progeny and property and that each and every one of these objectives has its own specific
capital punishment (hadd). It should, however, be noted that (hadd) punishment is introduced and applied only
after the government has adequately provided for the basic needs of its citizenry. Nigeria can benefit from
them.
Recommendations
 Proper religious training/teaching should be given to the children at home.
 National security and religious tolerance should be included in school curriculum at all levels.
 Welfare of the masses should be prioritized.
 Religious leaders/scholars should avoid any issue(s) that may cause conflict and crisis in the society.
Conclusion
So far, this paper has established the fact that national insecurity and religious intolerance are natural
phenomena in the life of man the development of life. It has been established that Islam affirmed and proffered
solutions to conflicts and crises before occurrence. Measures are also put in place to address post conflicts and
crises. A series of factors have been identified to be the cause of religious insecurity and intolerance, especially
in a multi-religious country, such as Nigeria which is also multi-ethno and political in settings. The paper found
causes to include economic, social, political and religious issues. It has been established that ethno-religious
and economic reasons are in the forefront of other causes. The summary of crises that had happened in Nigeria
before and after the independence was discussed.
The paper conclusively strongly recommends that people should first reform their characters in line with
the sound and noble teachings of Islam so as to ease conflict management and crisis control in the society. The
impact of this will be felt during the reconciliation and negotiation process as it will be easy to persuade and
win their heart toward reconciliation of the warring parties. Indeed, application of the mentioned Islamic
mechanism on conflict management; promotion of social justice, dialogue, reconciliation, negotiation, ground
shifting and mutual consultation will go a long way in shaping the thinking of the leaders on how to avoid
mismanagement of the national resources both human materials.
References
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International Relations and Diplomacy (ISSN2328-2134) Volume 9, Number 04, 2021

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International Relations and Diplomacy (ISSN2328-2134) Volume 9, Number 04, 2021

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International Relations

David Publishing Company

Aims and Scope:

David Publishing Company

David Publishing Company

Editorial Board Members of International Relations and Diplomacy:

US “Maximum pressure” From the Perspective of Bottom-Line Thinking—Taking

National Security and Religious Tolerance in Nigeria: Islamic Perspectives 166

European Union’s Policy of Securitisation and Its Reflection on

Keywords: asylum, humanitarian regime, refoulement, securitisation, solidarity

The Legality of the EU-Turkey Statement at the Face of Humanitarian Values

US “Maximum pressure” From the Perspective of Bottom-Line

Keywords: Bottom line thinking, Persian Gulf Escort Coalition

Forming a Persian Gulf Escort Coalition—An Attempt to Exert "Maximum pressure"

Inconsistent Bottom-Line of the Allies—Failure of the Maximum-Pressure Attempt

Stalemate Between Bottom-Line Thinking and "Maximum pressure"—US-Iran

Social Policies in the Thirties in Europe:

Maria Teresa Giusti

Keywords: World War I, Fascism, Propaganda, Welfare State, Social Policies

The Legacy of World War I

Measures to Be Taken After the War

Social Policy and Fascism

National Security and Religious Tolerance in Nigeria:

Musa-Jeje Ibrahim Aladire

Keywords: national security, religious, tolerance and Islam

Causes of National Insecurity and Religious Intolerance in Nigeria

Consequence of Religious Insecurity and Intolerance in Nigeria

Remedies to Religious Insecurity and Intolerance in Nigeria

Qur’an also says:

In another verse, it says:

Implementation of Capital Punishment

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