Most versions of the left gain little and sacrifice much in accepting a realist epistemology. Theories of international relations are just tools for making sense of patterns and puzzles in the world; they don’t need groupies.
For the first year of the Trump Administration, the Washington D.C.- based denizens of the U.S. foreign policy establishment assured themselves that although Donald Trump had tipped over the...
This post comes from James Goldgeier, professor of international relations at American University, Visiting Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and a co-director of the Bridging the...
The following is a guest post by Mason Richey, an associate professor of international studies at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. I am Trump; I am Trump. Trump I am. That...
I was shocked, shocked to read Brian Rathbun's characterization of me in a recent Canard as a "robot" who has only been posing as a Battlestar Galactica addict as part of my cover (!):The academic and foreign policy worlds were rocked today by the news that Charli Carpenter -- prolific academic,...
Each year I try to write on the SotU (2010, 2011). I know they are preposterously scripted, usually forgettable, and almost meaningless as a guide for the upcoming policy season/budget debate. But the political scientist in me thinks that showing the whole panorama of democratic government in one...
Even Brian Fratbun will have to admit this is pretty brilliant!More on the most anticipated Super Bowl Commercials of 2012.
THE CANARD"All the fake news that fit to print."-- AmherstThe academic and foreign policy worlds were rocked today by the news that Charli Carpenter -- prolific academic, policy wonk, and mom -- is in fact a robot. She was taken captive this morning in a rare joint operation by the FBI, the CIA,...
LA Times' latest article on drones raises the spectre of "robot weapons" in relations to the X-47B, Northrup Grumman's new drone prototype with the ability to fly solo - part of an ongoing force restructuring as the US military cuts back significantly on human personnel. While one might well ask...
Before I launch in, I just wanted to say quickly to Dan Nexon and all the folk at the Duck, thanks for letting me stay on board! I normally lose respect for institutions that decide to keep me as a member, but this is one exception.Its a little late in coming, but I wanted to post some thoughts on...
At ThinkProgress Alyssa Rosenberg shares a lovely new short film about robots and prejudice:No Robots from YungHan Chang on Vimeo.Rosenberg draws a distinction between the representations of robots in this film and the scarier representations in much popular culture:Often, when we see robots in...
Peter Singer has an op-ed in the Times which carefully makes the case against drones by carefully putting forth the proposition that their use undermines democracy: What troubles me, though, is how a new technology is short-circuiting the decision-making process for what used to be the most...
Antony Njuguna / NairobiThe big news out of the ICC today was the confirmation of charges against four of the "Ocampo Six" Kenyan elites accused of orchestrating and inciting the country's post-election violence in 2007-2008. Ruto, Arap Sang, Muthaura and Kenyatta had their charges confirmed and...
Has the worm finally turned? Reuters today featured a story on the emerging market economies' push-back against the status quo of Western-dominated global economic governance. The piece features an explicit demand (and overt exercise of financial leverage) for a power shift in the predominant...
Over the past few weeks we’ve had to endure military brass and top government officials falling over themselves to condemn American GIs – first for urinating on dead Afghans, and more recently for beating a sheep. Earlier in the Iraq and Afghan wars, we’ve suffered through pious denunciations of...
I apologize to Duck readers for being such a slacker this past semester. Some things on the home/work front have had me tied down a bit, and the truth is I won't be fully back in the saddle until after this manuscript is done. But. In the words of George R. R. Martin, fire cannot kill a dragon,...