Now that the fighting is over in the town of Marjah, how did the Afghan media perceive Operation Moshtarak? Here is a cursory round up of opinions from some of the newspapers in Afghanistan.(Unfortunately, I am dependent on reading translations of the local newspapers from thousands of miles away, but I still think it is fruitful to try to see events through the eyes of local elites rather than relying on military propaganda.)1. Weesa...
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Current “Current Intelligence”
It's been a busy week for me adjusting to new blog formats in multiple spaces. So while LGM readers wait for their heads to stop spinning at this site's facelift, I encourage them to hop on over and check out the new Current Intelligence site, also just renovated this week. Current Intelligence, where I post from time to time about the laws of war, used to be an off-shoot of Complex Terrain Lab but is now an online journal with a blog, a set of...
Methodology411: science and truth
Fascinating little op-ed over at The Guardian Online today (h/t Jesse Crane-Seeber) called, provocatively, "Scientists should stop deceiving us." The punchline of the piece is that "in holding that the intellectual aim of science is truth alone, scientists seriously misrepresent its real, problematic aims, and thus prevent urgently needed critical assessment by scientists and non-scientists alike." Chief among these "problematic" aims, we...
Dissing Biden
OK, so not only did the Israeli Defense Ministry announce the permit for 112 new apartment units at Beiter Illit on the eve of Biden's visit (which the Americans were reluctantly willing to overlook), but then the government announced the approval of construction of 1,600 new Jewish homes in East Jerusalem. I'm not sure which is more surprising -- the stupidity or the brazenness of the Israeli actions. I realize there are bureaucratic...
My £0.02 on the “Keep America Safe” Crowd/”al-Qaida Seven”
I’m finding it difficult to usefully add to the debate over the “Guantanamo Lawyers”/"al-Qaida Seven" that has emerged over the last week or so. Basically, the fundamental issue is that people “we” dislike or who have (allegedly) done horrible things are actually entitled to certain fundamental rights under both American and international law – including international law signed and ratified by the US Senate. That this law applies to terrorists...
Foreign Funders Should Donate More Wisely
James Ron has a guest post at Steve Walt's blog about the problems of NGO dependence on Western funding. His argument is a logical extension of his earlier work with Alex Cooley on the negative externalities associated with the political economy of the NGO sector, and it also builds on newer scholarship critically assessing the relationship between domestic NGOs, targets of influence, third-party governments and private donors. Ron offers an...
The Hurt Locker, again
Duck of Minerva bloggers have already written quite a bit about "The Hurt Locker," which won the Best Picture prize at this week's Academy Awards ceremony. I saw the movie on DVD a few weeks ago and have been digesting some of the reactions to the film. Like many critics of this film, Michael Kamber of the NY Times offers a list of serious errors in "The Hurt Locker." Viewers see the bomb disposal team leave on missions without much other...
For Only $3,000 You Too Can Read My Latest Piece
It sounds like a lot, but for 4,000,000 words and 12 volumes, the International Relations Encyclopedia is really quite an amazing deal for any independently wealthy intellectually astute student of world affairs. Dan Drezner has more about this exciting development in the discipline.If you or your library buy access rights (or if you are happily already a member of the International Studies Association), you can check out my contribution with...
Foreign Policy Charade
A few weeks ago, Steve Walt relied upon his own recent experiences writing about the Israeli Lobby to generate "a list of the lessons" he learned from "grabbing the third rail" of foreign policy discourse.Interestingly, Walt's somewhat older list of foreign policy taboo positions did not include challenging U.S. foreign policy towards Israel (or Israeli security policy). Had Walt declined to grab the rail this time?I was reminded of the...
Agathe Habyarimana, France, and the Rwandan “Genocidaires” fifteen years on
Early this year, an improvement in French-Rwandan relations led to the French government finally beginning to take note that many of the most serious war criminals in the 1994 Rwandan genocide were living in France without having been tried or punished for their crimes. The French government's previous apathy towards these suspects was part of a long list o problems with accountability for the genocide in other states, internationally (in the...
Think like a methodologist
[Cross-posted at Signal/Noise]In keeping with Patrick's theme on methodological discussions, I thought I would cross-post this recent piece from my personal blog.Nathan at Flowing Data puts words to an idea I've had for a while, but could never figure out how to communicate. He writes, "[T]he most important things I've learned [in statistics courses] are less formal, but have proven extremely useful when working/playing with data." Some of the...
Methodology411: defining “methodology”
Vikash's comment on my announcement post suggests to me that it might be useful to have a less elliptical and, so to speak, inside-baseball-y declaration of intent for the Methodology411. Even though I've written about and railed against it on numerous occasions, I often forget how firmly ingrained the equation of the terms "methodology" and "statistical methods" is in anglophone Political Science and IR -- and that equation (combined with my...