There's been significant interest in Steve Saideman's criticisms of Mearsheimer's and Walt's working paper, "Leaving Theory Behind: Why Hypothesis Testing Has Become Bad for IR." Indeed, there are many comments in a discussion that harkens back to older posts at the Duck. Given this, it strikes me as appropriate to add PTJ's and my paper (PDF)--solicited for the same special issue as Mearsheimer's and Walt's--to the Duck of Minerva Working...
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Tuesday Afternoon Linkage Club
In the wide world: Taylor Fravel lets us know about China's surveillance fleet's op tempo (learn more about the China Marine Surveillance) and the role of cell phone service in territorial disputes Thane Gustafson talks about Russia's oil infrastructure Handy capsule history of the international oil market Closer to home: From A Quantitative Peace, an examination of bipartisan appointments to the cabinet and sub cabinet (Would the idea of a...
The Crass Argument for Teaching More Math In Poli Sci Courses
LATE UPDATE: PTJ blogs about undergrad education
Lamenting The Loss of the Light, The Ebbing of Grand Theory and The Decline of Old Boy Networks
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt have written a piece that is critical of the supposed move to hypothesis testing and the failure of IR folks to do grand theory. I have many reactions to this development that I thought I would engage in a bit of listicle: My first reaction was: Next title: why too much research is bad for IR.... As folks pointed out on twitter and on facebook discussions, it seems ironic at the least that someone who made a...
Saturday Afternoon Linkage
Promotional and Disciplinary Peter Henne's guest post -- in which he asks questions about peer reviewing from the perspective of a junior scholar -- has been getting a lot of traffic. But it's a pretty big tell that no one has attempted to answer his questions. Iver Neumann's not the first scholar to be interviewed for both the Duck Podcast and Theory Talks, but he may be the first to have the latter interview released the day after he...
What next for Venezuela?
My colleague, Javier Corrales, has an excellent summary of the internal political dynamics in Venezuela on the news yesterday of President Hugo Chavez's deteriorating health condition. Corrales reports that the "Venezuelan government is busy preparing for the re-inauguration of the country's beloved president, Hugo Chávez, and also for his funeral." The timing of all of this makes for significant confusion: Venezuela's constitution offers some...
Podcast No. 17 – Interview with Iver Neumann
The seventeenth Duck of Minerva podcast features Iver Neumann, then of the London School of Economics.
Award Ballot
As promised, this is my post announcing that we've sent an email out with the ballot for the 2013 OAIS awards.We believe that we sent one to everyone that requested one before the deadline, as well as to a list of people that we generated internally. If you did not receive one and requested one, my apologies. Please email us about getting one (but check your spam filter first). As the voting period lasts until January 31, we can also accomodate...
Thoughts on Peer-Review Standards from a Junior Reviewer
This is a guest post by Peter S. Henne. Peter is a doctoral candidate at Georgetown University. He formerly worked as a national security consultant. His research focuses on terrorism and religious conflict; he has also written on the role of faith in US foreign policy. During 2012-2013 he will be a fellow at the Miller Center at the University of Virginia. So I’ve reviewed several manuscripts for journals in the past year, probably the result...
Friday Morning Linkage: Austerity Edition
Is the tide turning on the idea of austerity? Philip Pilkington takes issue with this week's New York Times feature story on how well the Latvians are enduring austerity. The IMF thinks Latvia has gone too far. Last week, IMF Director Christine Legarde warned Germany to go slower in making cuts. And, yesterday, it (the IMF) acknowledged in a new paper that "“Forecasters significantly underestimated the increase in unemployment and the decline...
The Least Stressful Job of 2013: University Professor
That's what Forbes claims in an article that's generating much mirth in academic social-media circles. University professors have a lot less stress than most of us. Unless they teach summer school, they are off between May and September and they enjoy long breaks during the school year, including a month over Christmas and New Year’s and another chunk of time in the spring. Even when school is in session they don’t spend too many hours in the...
The Right to Mindlessly Look at You-Tube Videos
Happy New Year! I hope you are still enjoying a wonderful break. The holidays for me always mean one thing: a lack of Internet access. As a duck-ling who is from Deliverance/mayonnaise/4-H country, I’m particularly attuned to the argument UN Human Rights Council Special Rapporteur, Frank La Rue, made a couple of summers ago about the human right to Internet access. Of course I need unrestricted access to my favorite websites – how else am I...