It's a beautiful day in Washington; not so beautiful in New Orleans. Some of this text comes from PM.At political science's other prominent animal-themed blog, Erik Voeten wonders how stupid diffuses.Kate Almquist wonders if the DoD is doing the right thing by...
Even the Evil League of Evil has peer review.One of the laziest sneers directed at us social scientists who use math and statistics in our research is that we suffer from "physics envy."Ha! It...
If you order from Cafe Press on Amazon, tshirts can get delivered by Tuesday - in time to tell APSA that, even if you're going to the conference, you haven't forgotten that APSA is wrong on this...
The left (and even the semi-left) has been legitimately stewed in the past week or so about Todd Akin's remarks about rape. Akin is apparently under the impression that women can't get pregnant from...
North Korea: future REM exporter?Washington accuses Iran of training Syrian militia. It seems to me that the "meddling in Syrian affairs" ship has long sailed. Hayes Brown repots on"Somalia's Struggle for Normalcy." Thomas Oatley argues that breaking up the Eurozone won't solve anything. BLTN: Paul Staniland on "Victory in Afghanistan."What causes democracy? James Vreeland and his collaborators dispute numerous variants of conventional wisdom. Phil Arena holds a grudge... but it's rational.Joshua Hersh's piece on Paul Ryan and foreign policy was getting lots of play on Twitter...
All wars end. Or do they?Rather too often, we are being reminded that the 'war on terror' against the Al Qaeda terrorist network is far from over, in fact that it will never end and even, that it can never end. One military analyst, for example,a former employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency in the US, states OBL and his closest circle in Pakistan were hardly influential to AQ franchises and affiliates. In his last few years as AQ’s leader, OBL was never concerned in the operational aspects of AQ. This perhaps means that the death of OBL, though a great success for counterterrorism,...
One of the defining features of the current era of globalization is the rise in uncertainty and complexity in global politics. There are more actors, more transactions, and more challenges as a result. In the face of this, the United States continues to spend more on national security – the military, intelligence, and homeland security – than almost all other countries in the world combined. And, yet it’s clear that as the world is becoming increasingly more complex, the United States’ ability to influence outcomes – as demonstrated by the Iraq, Afghanistan, and the global economic crisis...
Irena L. Sargsyan warns of renewed conflict between Kurdish-Arab conflict.Matthew Kocher writes a post centered around Jeffrey A. Friedman's working paper on "breakthrough problems" (PDF).Daniel Little ruminates on "mobilizing the masses" and the Chinese Revolution.Paul Dibbs argues against a grand accommodation with China (via Andrew Phillips).Robin Banerji & Patrick Jackson (of the BBC) write about China's "Ghost Towns and Phantom Malls."Dean Dad says "don't get a PhD in the humanities!"Andrew Liptak on Hugo Gernsback, the "father of science fiction."Cosmopolis's message? Contemporary...
Global Trends 2030 has a virtual roundtable on the "Long Peace" and whether or not it will persist. As Allan Dafoe notes in his introduction: "we live during an era of historically unprecedented peace. Whether we look over timescales of decades or centuries, wars have become less frequent." He continues:To probe the persistence of this Long Peace, it would be helpful to know what factors have made the world more peaceful, and the extent to which these factors are likely to persist into the future. Potential causes of the peace include increases in trade, democracy, the difficulty of coercing...
Steve Walt ponders what the 2012 election means for US foreign policy.Chandras Choudry discusses India Against Corruption as it takes on the national parliament (via Zachary Keck).Marc Lynch describes "The Morsi Maneuver: A First Take" as a good, well, first take on the Egyptian defense purge. Edward Hugh has a post looking back at the Great Financial Crisis of 2008 and asking the age-old question: why didn't anyone do anything to stop it? As the post is called the "Owl of Minerva," I am obliged to link to it. Nevertheless, I feel that our blog's title contains an implicit answer to that...
Praeger has published a new two-volume compendium on arms control edited by Robert Williams Jr. and Paul R.Viotti. If you're writing anything on the subject of arms, weapons advocacy or national security governance Volume 1, at least, is a pretty helpful resource - especially if you have research money to cover the hefty price tag.The book begins with some theory, history and definitions; some philosophical views and a section on "Arms Control and the Social Sciences" which includes chapters on human security as a paradigm, conflict resolution as an emerging discipline, and agent-based...
A crass, gaudy, all-American display.Someone named Steven Walt has published an article, wildly posted on the Internet, entitled “The Myth of American Exceptionalism”. I don’t know who Mr. Walt is, but the bio says he is a professor at Harvard University. Unfortunately we are seeing too much of this type of thinking coming out of America’s college professors. I should take the time to offer a point by point rebuttal to Mr. Walt’s article. ...But I have found that people like Mr. Walt don’t really listen to facts or care too much about history. -- D. Hancock, RedState.comAcademics often use...