The Duck of Minerva
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Featured
We Urgently Need to Support Girls’ Education in Afghanistan
Since the Taliban’s takeover in Afghanistan in August 2021, there have been growing calls by...
Playing the Waiting Game: The Harsh Truth of Academic Timelines
Academics depend on slow processes subject to unfortunate slowdowns. And, unfortunately, academic timelines can make or break careers.
Business Meetings are part of the “hidden curriculum””
Business meetings are part of the “hidden curriculum,” academia’s unwritten set of rules They’re also important to attend, especially for those scholars most likely to be unfamiliar with those rules. This post explains why – and what more senior scholars can do to get junior ones involved.
Latest
Are you writing an MA thesis at APSIA-type program? Here are some things to consider
Many MA programs at so-called professional schools of international affairs require students to...
Do Liberals Believe in Diplomacy or Not?
When I first started teaching introduction to international relations, I included a lecture on the...
6+1 Questions about How to Prevent Coups D’état: Counterbalancing and Regime Survival
Coup d’états are less likely to succeed against rulers who “counterbalance” their militaries with presidential guards, militarized police, and other security forces outside of military command. But there may be downsides.
Symposia
ACADEME
Middle East Studies: More Intellectual Diversity, or Better Public Outreach?
Middle East scholars recently released the results of the new Middle East Scholar Barometer. What does it tell us about Middle East Studies itself? Does it suggest the field is rich and progressing, or in need of an intellectual shakeup?
And Lo, the Heavens Parted to Reveal an Article on Bad Habits to Avoid in Academic Writing
If you’ve written a guest post for the Duck of Minerva recently, or published a piece at International Studies Quarterly while I was editor, you know that I really hate “heavy noun phrases.” Scholars seem to really like using them. I don’t know why. Perhaps they think it makes their writing sound more sophisticated. There’s an article at PS which is good at diagnosing the problem (but offers bad fixes).
6+1 Questions about “Why NATO survived Trump: the neglected role of Secretary-General Stoltenberg””
Not many know that Trump was on the verge of publicly announcing U.S. withdrawal from the alliance at the 2018 summit. Congress would have prevented a formal end to U.S. membership, but Trump’s announcement itself would have caused irreparable damage. Why then did Trump change his position on NATO in 2019? And why was NATO, at least in military terms, in better state when Trump left office than when he began his term?
6+1 Questions about The Origins of Overthrow: How Emotional Frustration Shapes US Regime Change Interventions
The United States has repeatedly used its military to overthrow foreign regimes – at least sixteen times from 1906 to 2011 – but these interventions seldom work out particularly well. So why does Washington continue to engage in violent regime change? The answer is that US leaders forcibly overthrow regimes to relieve emotional frustration.
Classic Blog Experience
Subfields
No, Critical Race Theory was not a “thing” in the Soviet Union
According to a recent tweet, which I am not going to link to, “CRT” led to...
James Bond Made Redundant
There is perhaps no greater film institution than the James Bond franchise. Over 27 movies and 59...
6+1 Questions about A research agenda for political demography
Name Of The Book… And Its Coordinates? Jennifer D. Sciubba, ed. 2021. A Research Agenda for...
Adam Sandler and the Rise of the Rest: Theoretical Myopia and the Liberal International Order
Film critics have approached Adam Sandler’s films the same way that IR scholars have analyzed the rise and fall of the Liberal International Order (LIO)
Want to Start a National Security Think Tank?
You’re going to need some help. Since 2017, when I departed the Beltway in favor of...
Podcasts
🎧 Podcasts
Topics
Decolonizing Corruption
Corruption is an issue largely off the radar screens of many IR scholars. How can they better theorize corruption’s pervasiveness in international politics, while avoiding the biases of past approaches?
The End of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell: Remembering the Silence
At a press conference on Sept. 20, 2011 Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) displayed a postcard. It was...
Why Addressing the Climate Crisis Can Help Build More Sustainable Peace
Climate change poses substantial national, international and human security risks, but analysts have only recently shifted their focus toward how to simultaneously build peace in post-conflict environments and grapple with the dual challenges of mitigating and adapting to climate change.
Misreading the post-9/11 consensus: the dangerous allure of emergency politics
Numerous pundits have lamented the that Americans have not responded to the Covid pandemic with the unanimity they demonstrated after 9/11. But do we really want to return to the post-9/11 era of emergency consensus?
The Power of Philanthropic Foundations
Divorces don’t usually send shockwaves through the global policy field. They almost never create...
Fighting Analogies in International Relations
“Kuzushi” is the concept of off-balancing. It refers to a tactic of getting your opponent out of a fixed position where he’ll be vulnerable, maybe getting his weight tilted too much to one side or making him overcommit to a move. With kuzushi, you aren’t achieving anything; you’re opening up a window of opportunity. Window ajar, you have a split second to advance your position. A sweep or submission attempt that would’ve been impossible under normal conditions suddenly works against an unbalanced opponent.
Why isn’t IR funnier?
While political comedy thrives, IR comedy, whatever that phrase might mean, is virtually non-existent. omedy gap’? Is it a figment of my imagination or a real problem?
The Promise and Peril of Public-Facing Scholarship
Paul Musgrave concludes the “Lab Leaks” symposium by engaging with his interlocutors and reflecting on the challenges faced by political science in an era of public-facing scholarship.