In 2014, John Mearsheimer authored a Foreign Affairs article in which he blamed that year’s Ukrai…
Episode 22: So a Deputy Foreign Minister and an Academic Realist Walk into a Bar…
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Recent Posts
Fear-Mongering about U.S. Power
This is a guest post from Clifford Bob, Professor and Chair of Political Science at Duquesne University. A free press is a major check on shoddy government policies and bad ideas, but if...
The State of the Field in Climate and Security
After nearly fifteen years of study, what do we know about the relationship between climate change and security? I recently attended a Woodrow Wilson Center event organized by the Peace Research...
BPM (Beats Per Minute), AIDS Politics in France, and the Lessons for Resistance Today
This is a guest post by Michael Bosia, Associate Professor of Political Science at St. Michael's College in Colchester, Vermont. You can find him on Twitter at @VTPoliticsProf. In December 2001 –...
More Recent Posts
Laws of the Jungle
While rereading Kipling's 1894 classic The Jungle Book, I began to think about the curious ways in which the author constructed the relations between communities of animals in the jungle. Here are a few observations:1. The jungle is neither anarchic nor Darwinian in Kipling's narrative. It is in...
Is there a time and place for (humanitarian) shock and awe?
Don't feel bad though. It's disempowering.Look. I get the whole ‘stop the portrayal of Africans as victims’ debate. I really do. Empowerment and portrays of empowerment are important. But I can’t help but be slightly frustrated with this entry at UN Dispatch which discusses the “shock and awe”...
Stereotypes and suspicion: Nicer words won’t change anything
A new report was released yesterday, ‘Suspect Communities’, comparing how UK media and government have framed Irish and Muslim communities since the 1970s. The authors find that the ideas underpinning counter-terrorism measures and the way politicians, policymakers and the media discuss who might...
Israel in Washington
Last week I had the great pleasure of visiting Boston and Washington DC.During this academic junket research-related visit, sparkling conversation was had with some of the liveliest minds on foreign policy in the US, including the established heavy-hitters Andrew Bacevich and Edward Luttwak, as...
R2P, Louise Arbour and the Responsibility to Reality
She's cool, but she's wrong.I have a short piece on the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) in the October 2010 Review of International Studies Special Supplement on "Evaluating Global Orders" (that came out last week? I don’t get journals). It’s basically a reply to Louise Arbour, former Chief...
New Deal for BBC World Service Weakens Britain’s Soft Power?
Una Marson, George Orwell, T.S. Eliot and others at the World Service during WW2The reputation of the BBC World Service around the world reflects that of Britain generally. It’s an institution tied to colonial history. It aspires to global reach. Through its journalism it tries to uphold values of...
Groupthink at the IMF?
This week, the Independent Evaluation Office at the International Monetary Fund released its report on the relevance and utility of research at the Fund (see also today's Financial Times article on the report). The report itself echoes an earlier IEO report on the Fund's performance running up to...
What We Talk About When We Talk About Neoconservatism
A Guest Post by Jonathan Caverley in reply to Dan NexonThe irony of being accused of taking texts in directions their original authors might not have intended by the scholar behind Harry Potter and International Relations is too delicious to pass up. Plus I am sensitive to accusations like Nexon’s...
Targeting Targeted Killing
I was asked to step-in at the last minute to write a chapter on targeted killing for a textbook on isses in the War on Terror. Given the recent OBL killing and debate about raids, etc, I was surprisingly excited at the prospect of engaging with the issue. Although my chapter is almost done (no...
Crisis and Change in International Organizations
The ongoing saga over the leadership crisis at the IMF poses a bigger existential question about crisis and change in international organizations: do crises in fact provoke change? This was the question at the forefront of my mind as I was driving from Texas to DC last week to start teaching a...
Whither the Praetorian State?
As part of a forthcoming project to re-assess the analytical relevance of the concept of the "praetorian state" in contemporary South Asian and Middle Eastern politics, I've been fascinated by tracing the history of the phrase.Although the term "praetor" or "Praetorian Guard" entered the English...
Making me Mlad: Why you can’t compare the Mladic and Osama bin Laden raids
Charli has been writing about international justice, arguing against ‘myths’ – and comparing the efforts to bring Mladic to justice as opposed to the rush to shoot Osama bin Laden in the face. Others, such as John Feffner at Foriegn Policy in Focus have made similar arguments.I agree and disagree...