The Onion reports on a story of profound importance to readers of this blog. Well, go read!
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The Onion reports on a story of profound importance to readers of this blog. Well, go read!
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) includes a right that many grad students and professors probably feel is constantly under attack: the right to leisure. It’s there, clearly laid out...
REK: I am pleased to guest-post my friend Dave’s longer, fuller version of a book review he wrote for CSIS. My thanks to CSIS as well. If you aren’t reading Dave yet, I’d recommend it. “Is America...
The staff of the Duck of Minerva is very pleased to announce: (1) the first-ever blogging reception at the International Studies Association (ISA) annual convention; and (2) the Online Achievement...
The basic theory behind the Obama Administration's "Reset" policy was that US-Russian relations could be disaggregated: that it is possible for two countries to disagree on a range of issues and still cooperate on matters of common interest. That bet looks to be correct; despite a significant deterioration in relations between Washington and Moscow, the pursuit of common interests persists. The Russian government has given approval for the United States and its NATO allies to use a Russian air base in the Volga city of Ulyanovsk as a hub for transits to and from Afghanistan. The decree is...
Blogging might be sporadic for some of the Duck of Minerva team. Here's why:The WTOP slideshow is worth a look, as is its explanation of the particular weather phenomenon involved.We have a generator, but it doesn't run our air conditioning. Oh, well.At least we have it better than the poor folks in Colorado, not to mention an innumerable number of places outside of the developed world.
Christopher Preble has a solid critical review of Robert Kagan's new book at The National Interest. Preble is particularly concerned with the free-rider problem:EVEN THOSE inclined to believe Kagan’s assessment of the international system and America’s role in it must contend with one central fact that Kagan elides: the costs of maintaining the status quo are substantial and likely to grow. That is because Washington’s possession of vast stores of power—and its willingness to use that power on behalf of others—has created an entire class of nations that are unwilling to defend themselves and...
H/T Steve.
Dan Drezner asks "Dear realists: please explain Russia":I raise all of this because a few days ago Charles Clover in the Financial Times wrote an interesting story about Russia's foreign policy in Syria:A respected Moscow-based military think tank has published a report that is likely to fuel more questions about the wisdom of Russia’s uncompromising support for the Syrian regime. It concludes that Russia really has few – if any – fundamental national interests to defend in Syria.... Russian support for Syria appears to be more emotional than rational, according to the Centre for Analysis of...
Robert drove a great deal of traffic to the Duck with his provocative posts on retrenchment and US alliances. His efforts to "grade" allies by strategic importance has led to some interesting results and fascinating discussions. But I think he's working with an overly narrow view of what alliances are good for. Here I agree with Steve Walt in general, although I have a somewhat different spin. Robert's analysis treats alliances as if they are basically cooperative security arrangements, produce little in the way of externalities, and amount to a net negative investment only offset by the...
As my post on "open access" demonstrates, I've been thinking a lot about International Relations  journals over the last few months, particularly with respect to digital media. Charli's excellent presentation on the discipline and "web 2.0" fell at an interesting time for me, as I was working on a journal bid. My sense is that academic International Relations journals have a mixed record when it comes to fulfilling their varied functions in the field, and that better internet integration would help matters. This post seeks to make that case -- albeit in a very preliminary way -- but also...
From https://www.zazzle.com/This is the last in a series of guest posts by Stuart J. Kaufman of the University of Delaware. Stuart advances a long-running dispute with PTJ about whether "what goes on inside people's heads" is relevant to social constructionism. PTJ doesn't think so; Stuart disagrees. The first post can be found here, the second here. You may also download a complete PDF.None of this is intended to deny the importance of structural insights offered by constructivist analysis. The argument, rather, is that “psychology provides the microfoundations for the motives behind...