What IR means to me

IR means the world to me.. how the world interacts and why certain things happen in the world.  It explains many economic and political decisions from a broad perspective that affect us daily.  It also allows us to understand issues on the micro level: why do some leaders act the way they do? Why can’t we stop poverty? Increase health?  IR is a basic answer to the accomplishments and problems of the relationships between societies, states, and individuals.

Al-qaeda and International Financial Institutions

After the terrorist attacks on 9/11, the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF) expanded its mission to include combating the financing of terrorism and adopted eight special recommendations on terrorist financing which have been recognized by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank as the appropriate international standard. FAFT also developed the FAFT 40 Recommendations for dealing with money laundering and terrorist financing. The World Bank and the IMF have established a collaborative framework with the FATF for conducting comprehensive AML/CFT assessments of countries’ compliance with the FATF Recommendations.

An ends-based analysis of 9/11

9/11 which was planned and carried out by members of al-Qaeda was a consequentialist, or ends-based action rather than a rule-based action. According to Osama bin Laden, the attacks were meant to threaten US security and to harm the US economically, benefitting the Muslim/Arab world, which he believed was being oppressed by the United States. Al-Qaeda was not concerned with the morality of killing thousands of innocent civilians. They were only morally concerned with the consequences of their actions - the harm it would cause to the US, and therefore the supposed benefit it would bring to Arabs and Muslims in places like Palestine and Lebanon where the US interferred with their liberty. In some ways, Osama bin Laden and his cohorts did acheive there goal. The American Stock Exchange closed from September 11-17, this was the longest closure since the Great Depression in 1929. US stocks lost $1.2 trillion in value for the week. The security of Americans has also been greatly threatened which is evident in the extreme tightening of airport security and regulations. Although al-Qaeda influenced the US as they had intended, the beneficial impact on the Arab/Muslim world is debatable to say the least.