The Wikileaks releases are political dynamite not just because of the specific issues they discuss. Also, and more importantly, they challenge a dominant mode of foreign policymaking in the U.S. and many other countries: government secrecy dumps—routinely stamping vast amounts of information “top secret,” thereby placing it beyond the eyes of all us "untrustworthy" citizens. For this reason alone, the Wikileaks releases are important—and...
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Feminist IR 101, Post #3: What is “feminist” about “feminist IR”?
So I've been accused elsewhere in the blogosphere (not linked here because of profane language) of just posting a lot of overlong (language cleaned up) definitions in service of a poststructuralist cause which is "irrelevant (insert choice words here)." I could get all defensive or argumentative (insert sarcastic comment about feminists here), but I think that I'll those comments as proof that perhaps the explaining needs to continue. I posted...
Overdue introduction
We're pleased to introduce a new guest blogger, PM, whose first post -- on the contemporary field of International Political Economy (IPE) and the continuing financial crisis -- appears just below. He should do an excellent job of improving our coverage of multiple facets of international politics, and we're looking forward to his future contributions.
In political economy, politics comes first
Recent developments in Europe, and especially the ongoing meltdown in Ireland, should force political economists to reevaluate how well their theories can explain the perpetuation of current international regimes. The past twenty years of IPE theorizing has been exceptionally exciting and productive, but as Kathleen McNamara and others have argued the tendency toward intellectual monoculture may have left the discipline without a toolkit for...
Mega-Leaks: Right Idea, Wrong Strategy
I've been asked over the past week to comment on Wikileaks in the press, primarily to answer the question "is Wikileaks good or bad?" It may seem like a silly way to frame the debate (and I'm grateful to Vikash especially for trying to move the debate forward) but that's where the media cycle remains. And it's a fair question for the media to be trying to sort out: the Wikileaks site (currently down) claims that “publishing improves...
Will transparency take a hit?
I really like the posts from Vikash and from Chris and at the risk of a bit of overkill on the topic (and upsetting Bill's stomach further), I'll add one more angle. This is from my monthly column at Current Intelligence:...aside from a small cadre of foreign policy scholars, a few foreign national intelligence services, and Jon Stewart, I’m not sure who benefits from this release. Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s stated intent for the...
The Wikileaks Rap
In keeping with the Duck tradition of reducing IR issues to rap videos...(It is worth sticking around until 4:55 for the cameo...)From The Juicemedia and Mother Jones
Let’s whack them
Got to love the neocons. They are outraged by Wikileaks and by the Obama administration's response. William Kristol challenges President Obama with a series of questions: Why not use our various assets to harass, snatch or neutralize Julian Assange and his collaborators, wherever they are? Why can't we disrupt and destroy WikiLeaks in both cyberspace and physical space, to the extent possible? Why can't we warn others of repercussions from...
Why Wikileaks Matters
The initial release of a mere 291 out of 251,287 diplomatic cables has generated a predictable buzz on the blogosphere and established media outlets. Pundits have quickly maneuvered into standard structural roles in relation to the content of the leaked documents: the ho-hum nothing-to-see-here-move-it-along dismisser, the passionate defender, the morally outraged diplomat, etc. What seems to be missing is an analysis of this phenomenon as a...
2011 Grawemeyer winner
Kevin Bales, President of Free the Slaves, has won the 2011 Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order. The prize is worth $100,000 this year.The press release describes the award-winning ideas from Ending Slavery, the most recent book published by Bales with University of California Press:In the book, Bales outlines steps to end the enslavement of some 27 million people worldwide. Slavery and human trafficking are tightly interwoven into...
American Foreign Policy research and Wikileaks
There may not be a whole lot of diplomatic shockers in Sunday's release, but this really has the potential to be a game changer for American foreign policy research over the next several years. I’m still not convinced we’ll actually see the full set of 250,000+ documents, but if we do, it will be big.Most of American foreign policy scholarship evolves in subsequent waves over the course of 30 years or so. The first wave usually relies on press...
Riverdance your way through through the Irish Bailout in two minutes: Taiwan animation style!
From NMA – those who brought you the Tiger Woods Video, and the USA-China Currency Crisis Rap Battle video comes the Ireland Bailout video (which I can't make fit in the frame! Edit: Fixed!)As an IR blogger with an interest in econ, you might be interested in this animated take on Ireland's current state of financial distress. I can't vouch that a leprechaun really charged into Biffo's office as he was taking in a Guiness, but we tried our...