by Jon Western | 29 Nov 2011 |
Ante Markovic, the last Prime Minister of Yugoslavia died today at the age of 87. From 1989 to 1991, he was seen by many as the last person who could stop the disintegration of the Yugoslav federation and avert war. A darling of liberals, he tried to institute a series of political and economic reforms and to alleviate the rising nationalist discourses and pressures -- especially in Croatia and Serbia. His last ditch appeal to the international...
by Steve Saideman | 29 Nov 2011 |
The other day I briefly pondered what a Political Science Store would look like, after hearing about Anthropologie--a national chain of clothing stores.* I received a bunch of ideas via facebook, twitter, and my blog, so I had to come up with different sections of the store:Used: Tables (mostly in 2x2 dimensions); old Prisoner Dilemmas; Linear Regressions with several assumptions already violated; Political Culture arguments that come with...
by Brian Rathbun | 28 Nov 2011 |
Inspired by the post below on the broken letter of recommendation system, I began to think about the difference between what I write and what I mean. Here are the results. Please fill in your own personal favorite euphemisms below. WHAT WE WRITE: Dear Admissions Committee, I am delighted to write a letter of recommendation for Nicolette Mediocrides, who was a student in my class on international relations in Fall 2009. Nicolette was a very good...
by Charli Carpenter | 25 Nov 2011 | Featured
On this weekend, I thank HBO for this early Festivus present:Nice plug for the personal being political. Told you Game of Thrones was all about feminist theory...
by Dan Nexon | 24 Nov 2011 |
Do academics use Linkedin for anything? I inquire because a small, but not insignificant, number of people ask to join my network. Their requests accumulate. The auto-generated reminders become annoying. I log into the site and expand my professional ties. The process begins anew. No other circumstances compel me to visit Linkedin. I suppose I could cancel my membership, but that seems like too much effort. Am I missing something?
by Jon Western | 23 Nov 2011 |
Erik Voeten is spot on with his post at The Monkey Cage today on the flaws in the current recommendation letter system: There may be all kinds of things wrong with law schools but they sure have figured out how to run an applications process. You submit one letter for a student, answer a few questions about how to rank the student compared to others, and that’s it!By contrast, each policy school and PhD program has its own application process....
by Josh Busby | 22 Nov 2011 |
I'm just back from the Halifax International Security Forum where I had the good fortune to meet fellow Duck blogger Jon Western. The Atlantic's Steve Clemons described the gathering as Davos for the security set, which certainly is a nice ego-boost, whether or not it's true. The forum is in its third year and is backed by the Canadian government among other sponsors. The forum of 200 plus draws mightily on traditional transatlantic security...
by Vikash Yadav | 20 Nov 2011 | Featured
I remember once when I was exploring the Indian hill station of Shillong in Meghalaya, I read a random factoid in a guide book which said the town was geographically closer to Hanoi than Delhi. It was not actually very difficult to believe that in the remote states of Northeast India, the gravitational pull begins to shift towards Southeast Asia. I also knew that India's Nicobar Islands were less than 100 miles from the coast of Indonesia....
by Dan Nexon | 19 Nov 2011 |
Why would anyone even suggest such a thing?THE [Irish] GOVERNMENT has complained to the European Commission over the release in Germany of a document disclosing confidential details about new taxes to be introduced in Ireland over the next two years. In a deeply embarrassing development the document – identifying austerity measures of €3.8 billion in next month’s budget and €3.5 billion in budget 2013 – was made public after being shown to the...
by Dan Nexon | 18 Nov 2011 | Featured
Theory Talks interviewed PTJ. Go check out the results. A sample: I don’t have some kind of extraordinary experience fueling my interest… It’s an old insight about how the United States, if you’re a citizen of the US, you can kind of ignore the rest of the world—it’s the privilege of empire or hegemony. So international relations never really had a direct impact on me growing up; the rest of the world was simply out there some place, or it was...
by Vikash Yadav | 17 Nov 2011 | Featured
President Hamid Karzai has called another jirga (assembly) to attempt to gain support for the creation of a long-term defensive pact with the United States. The traditional Loya Jirga is a mechanism for legitimizing the creation of a new dynasty or constitutional order in Afghanistan, but it is not supposed to be used in place of the parliament that was created with the new constitution nearly a decade ago. Most scholars would agree that the...
by Josh Busby | 16 Nov 2011 |
Occupy AustinSource: Austin American StatesmanWith New York City police and cities around the country cracking down on Occupy Wall Street encampments, it seems like the nascent movement might dissipate even before winter sets in. While a full assessment is obviously premature, it is fair to ask whether or not OWS possesses characteristics that have made past movements successful. At this point, will OWS' legacy be more significant than getting...