Today at the LSE there are two fabulous (read: fabulously nerdy) events on Science Fiction and IR. Even better, it's full of ducks! The event was organized by Chris Brown and features Dan Nexon and Prof PTJ. The first event, chaired by Chris Brown, features three prominent Science Fiction authors: Jon Courtenay Grimwood, Paul McAuley, Ken McLeod. The second event features several prominent academics who will be discussing the implications for...
This is not my usual forte – Charli is much better on NGOs, networks and social things. (I just like tweeting.) However, last night when I checked my twitter, a fairly odd message came up from the American Red Cross:Slightly different from their usual “please donate blood” or “how are you preparing for the blizzard?” kind of emails.Within an hour, the tweet was withdrawn and replaced with this:Colour me impressed. A 130 year old humanitarian...
Condi Rice writes some fancy words this morning:As I watched Hosni Mubarak address the Egyptian people last week, I thought to myself, "It didn't have to be this way."In June 2005, as secretary of state, I arrived at the American University in Cairo to deliver a speech at a time of growing momentum for democratic change in the region. Following in the vein of President George W. Bush's second inaugural address, I said that the United States...
I have an essay online at Current Intelligence on Michael Gross's recent book. Moral Dilemmas of Modern Warfare explores the ways in which "new wars" are challenging the existing law of armed conflict. I'll have more to say about his proposals in a forthcoming Foreign Affairs essay, but in this piece I focus on his characterizations of "asymmetric war" and on his notions of "norm change." I think the asymmetries to which he refers may be more...
I have a new article in the journal International Organization entitled "Vetting the Advocacy Agenda." It tries to explain why some issues get noticed by transnational campaigners and others don't, using weapons advocacy as a focal point of study. Key argument: it matters which organizations take up the issue; the global agenda is as much a function of structural relations within advocacy networks as of relationships between advocacy groups and...
Friends at the National Priorities Project have a quick assessment on President Obama's budget. Here's their take on the defense and security budget:Defense spending, which accounts for roughly 58 percent of discretionary spending and 20 percent of total federal spending (both based on FY 2011 estimates), will continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace than in recent years.The $553 billion base-line Department of Defense request is approximately...
"Much contemporary post-prefixed critical theory seeks to re-enchant the word."Oh, I see that this is old news.Behind the times, as always, I suppose.Still, I bet there's a Zombie connection here somewhere.
The Internnational Studies Association-Northeast is pleased to announce the inauguration of its book award, named for Yale H. Ferguson. Information on the award below the fold. The Yale H. Ferguson Book AwardThe Yale H. Ferguson award, presented by International Studies Association-Northeast, recognizes the book that most advances the vibrancy of international studies as a pluralist discipline. Any book or edited volume published within the...
Congressional hand-wringing over America’s inability to forecast the Egyptian and Tunisian revolts is unsurprising given the foreign policy hubris that dominates in Washington today. How can it be, the cry goes out, that America, was blindsided by these earthshaking events? Doesn’t “exceptional” America see further and act more wisely than other nations? Sadly, that arrogant and delusional mindset is unlikely to be changed even by this...
On 4 June 2009 US President Obama went to Cairo to make a speech to the Muslim world, where, among other things, he addressed the question of political reform and democracy in the Middle East. In February 2011 one Al-Jazeera columnist has associated the tumultuous changes in Egypt and Tunisia to the persuasive technique Inception, the film in which Leonardo DiCaprio tries to plant ideas in individuals’ minds by infiltrating their dreams. Larbi...
Apparently separate and relatively peaceful revolutions have now toppled dictatorial regimes in two North African states. What provoked these events? While there are a wide range of political and economic factors as well as organizations that had been building for years, the proximate causes that triggered the call for protests were quite similar.A cartoon by Carlos Latuff depicting the lateKhaled Said's revenge on President Hosni MubarakThe...
Noah Schachtmann at Wired:In the last three years, America’s military and intelligence agencies have spent more than $125 million on computer models that are supposed to forecast political unrest. It’s the latest episode in Washington’s four-decade dalliance with future-spotting programs. But if any of these algorithms saw the upheaval in Egypt coming, the spooks and the generals are keeping the predictions very quiet.Instead, the head of the...