The ISA statement lacks not only comparative history but also local historical depth. It also distorts moral responsibility.
Why Land Acknowledgements?
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Recent Posts
Trauma in Common: US Gun Violence and Violence in Armed Conflict
This is a guest post by Betcy Jose, Assistant Professor of Political Science at University of Colorado-Denver “This is a really good school, and now it’s like a war zone.” This is how one parent...
Crimea River
One of the most predictable elections is just around the corner: even Google has already proclaimed Putin the winner of the presidential race of March 18th 2018 in Russia. The only marginal hiccup...
Are IR Schools Broken? Nah.
IR program rankings are out in Foreign Policy. Discuss. Steve Walt has a provocative column in the same issue that I'm sure he didn't title that suggests "America's IR Schools Are Broken." The...
More Recent Posts
A gulf in understanding?
Last week I participated in a workshop at the Al Jazeera Center for Studies in Doha, Qatar, which brought to an end the ESRC’s Radicalisation & Violence programme of research projects, led by Prof. Stuart Croft. I was one of several researchers invited to present recent research on ‘terrorism,...
Fun and Games in Delhi
The Commonwealth Games begin tomorrow in Delhi, which offers a good excuse for some thoughts on two neglected topics in contemporary international relations – India and the Commonwealth. With 54 nations involved the Games are a major international sporting event, and were bid for by India as a way...
The Case Against the Case Against Blast Weapons
A (way) while back Charli posted a link to a report by Landmine Action. The short version is that it is calling for a ban on so-called ‘blast-weapons’ as a method of warfare.From the outset I’m going to admit that it’s simply not easy to defend things that can blow innocent civilians to...
The Calculus of Counter-narcotics
$250 million = the amount spent just by the US in FY2010 to counter narcotics in Afghanistan$100 million = the amount earned annually by the Taliban from narcotics trafficking304,000 acres = the number of acres devoted to opium in 2009304,000 acres = the number of acres devoted to opium in 2010$64...
Flashback: Afghanistan “Mission Accomplished”
I've been teaching Af-Pak in my security class these past few weeks. The war has been going on for so long that many "highlights" now seem like distant history.For instance, everyone remembers the farce that was George W. Bush's May 1, 2003, celebration of the end of major combat operations in...
Prisoners of America’s Wars (A shameless self-promotion kinda morning…)
My (first) book, Prisoners of America’s Wars: From the Early Republic to Guantanamo is now shipping on Amazon.com (or Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, etc.). Considering that this would be the closest thing to offspring that I have ever produced, I thought that I would post it in the hope that it may be...
Miliband of Brothers (Stolen from Channel 4, but too good not to reuse)
For my first Duck post to be so parochial is a shame, but I can’t resist commenting on the result of Labour’s leadership election, declared a couple of hours ago. For someone such as myself who was once, briefly, one of Ralph Miliband’s students at LSE in the 1960s, the idea that the son of the...
Cyber warfare and legal responsibility: drifting further apart?
Two cyber warfare trends are catching the eye, but both raise the same major question. First, cyber attacks have been democratised in recent years because of social media and easy to use denial of service attack (DDoS) tools. Popular armies have returned, made up not of a mass of bodies charging,...
Driving Parents Crazy: Why are some violent radicals fathers?
My blogging has been light lately as I have been on the road travelling a lot. This recent period has had me travelling like something of a crazy person with trips all over the Centre/East Coast of North America.Part of this trip included some time in Ottawa, where it was some interesting times....
Institutionalized Riot Systems and the Hyper-real Koran
Fourteen civilians and two security officers have now died in Kashmir in violence related to rumors about the "Burn a Koran Day" in Florida. When added to the death in Afghanistan, this brings the total number of deaths to seventeen so far. Many more will die in the coming weeks and months even...
The Local is Global
For those of you who do not know, I live in Gainesville, Florida, a college town in Northeast Florida with lots of wonderful things - like a great bunch of colleagues, a great bunch of graduate students, weather to write home about, and a (frequently) rocking football team. It is (largely) a...
The APSA Drinking Game
The following, unless otherwise specified, result in the taking of one drink for every observation/sighting at the Annual Conference of the American Political Science Association. The Duck of Minerva is not responsible for any liver damage or unfortunate choice of panel questions that may result...