One of the consequences of the ISA 2014 conference here in Toronto is that my extended blogging hiatus is coming to an end. Thanks to some experimental research in India, I haven't had a lot of time to share my thoughts in the past few months. In fact, I haven't had...
Mark your calendars for one week from tonight! Please join us for the second annual IR blogging awards and reception at ISA next week: Thursday, March 27 from 7:15pm to 8:30pm in Sheraton Ballroom C...
Lots of words have been spilled on this Crimea thing, and so it is reasonable to ask whether our opposition to Crimean self-determination might be more about our feelings about Russia than about...
In light of Russia's annexation of Crimea, Josh raised the question this morning about how we are all feeling about the war decline thesis. Also in reaction to Russia's actions, Mlada Bukovansky...
Everything is awesome! But I do wonder if the song from the Lego movie (see below) is not just a secret appeal to irredentism: "Everything is cool when we are part of a team!" So, everything is better when folks are united, and what is more united than a mother country with its lost territory? "Everything is better when we stick together!" Better when we ethnic kin are unified? "Side by side you and I are gonna win forever!" Seems like an irredentist appeal to me. "We're the same. I'm like you. You're like me" Homogeneity for the win? "Everything is awesome when we are living our...
*I was a bit too quick to post last week and had to add quite a few recent events. Nothing changed my original analysis (BV 3/10/2014) With my most of research right now heavily focused on cyber conflict, it might be useful to review all the news on the cyber situation between Ukraine and Russia. There have been many posts on the Duck and elsewhere (Monkey Cage macro post) covering the conflict (here, here, here, here, here), so I will refrain from summarizing the basics. The cyber situation on the other hand has shown a remarkable amount of restraint, defying conventional wisdom but also...
In the all Ukraine all the time edition of the Duck, here are some essential reads from this week. Will ad more in a bit. Dan Nexon channeling his inner Henry Kissinger on the Monkey Cage Henry Kissinger channeling his inner Henry Kissinger in the WaPo Joshua Rovner on why Russia's intervention in Ukraine is a blunder What will Germany, one of Russia's main trading partners, do? Obama administration issues new sanctions Crimea prepares for a snap referendum in 10 days on secession Bob Gates tells Republican critics of Obama and Ukraine policy to cool it Hillary unhelpfully compares Putin to...
Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine naturally prompted a lot talk about the limits of international law. Eric Posner noted: “ 1. Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine violates international law. 2. No one is going to do anything about it.” Julian Ku argued: “International law can be, and often is, a very important tool for facilitating international and transnational cooperation. But it is not doing much to resolve to Ukraine crisis, and international lawyers need to admit that.” For Ku, the current crisis supports the claims of Rationalist law-skeptics, international law works...
Today, I fly to give a talk at my alma-mater. As my advisor told me, it’s a victory lap. It feels good – 5 years post PhD, great job, excitement about the future, and my family still intact. However, the thought of going back also has me a little anxious: you see, I don’t have good memories about life in grad school. My university was great, my advisors were fantastic, and my colleagues were super smart. However, the whole experience was wrought with periods of anxiety, stress, and depression. In short, my mental health really sucked in grad school. And, for much of my academic...
Keith Darden points out that if Crimea secedes from Ukraine, electoral outcomes in Ukraine would shift with fewer pro-Russia voters in the political system, and that would be bad for Russia. This is not unique to this case. In any successful secession or irredentist effort (the latter refers to annexing a "lost" territory inhabited by ethnic kin), the boundary moves, changing who votes in the rump state (Ukraine in this case) and who votes in the new state (Crimea if independent, Russia if this is irredentist and Crimea gets annexed). In this case, new voters in Russia would be largely...
This is a guest post by former Duck of Minerva blogger Betcy Jose, Assistant Professor at University of Colorado-Denver and contributor to Al-Jazeera and Foreign Affairs. As the number of posts here suggest, lots of us are watching the fast-moving and somewhat unexpected events in Ukraine with great concern and interest. Others have expertly discussed the reasons for Russian military intervention in Ukraine and how the international community might respond to it (here, here, here, and here). I’d like to contribute a different angle to this complex story by inquiring into Russian narratives...
I don't have an answer for this, as I'm not sure how globally integrated Russia is in to the world economy at this juncture or vulnerable given its fossil fuel resources, but I, along with anyone who knows how to buy shares see that the Russian stockmarket declined this morning as has the value of the ruble. I know Russia experienced significant economic crises in the 1990s after the breakup of the Soviet Union that made it dependent on IMF support, but my sense is that the resurgence of the country's petro economy bolstered its international economic position. That said, I wonder if the...