Professor Julie Kaarbo discusses Foreign Policy Analysis.
Episode 4: Julie Kaarbo
read more
IR theory
The International Relations Enlightenment and the Ends of International Relations Theory
From its very inception IR was a substantive normative and political project.
Memory Loss as Imperial Effect
That was the apex of Dependency Theory in the US, I am betting. It wasn’t long before it was shelved in the curio cabinet. Dependency Theory had died from neglect, not from critique.
Core, periphery and (neo) imperalist IR
Other entries in the symposium--when available--may be reached via the "EJIR Special Issue Symposium" tag.Terms such as core and periphery (or third world) are largely passé, and may even be...
More IR theory Posts
What I Learned Teaching IR in Asia (1): Learning to Love US Hegemony
<img alt="" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('e6403e01-e0de-49ce-a231-02a0ef2f117a'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "";" src="https://lh5.ggpht.com/--9rqXXXWaCY/TxzqyXkDwmI/AAAAAAAAACw/Nly5J93m9N8/videob4f2a8e66e2f%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" />If you haven’t seen this yet, it’s pretty hystericalI’d like to thank Duck contributors/editor, especially Vikash, for soliciting my contribution. The Duck is a great site, one I link to a lot on my own blog, so I am happy to come aboard. Thank you.I have been teaching IR in...
Epistemic Communities and their Discontents
Of note to those following developments in autonomous lethal robots should be an article published this summer in the Columbia Science and Technology Law Review, entitled “International Governance of Autonomous Lethal Robots.” It is co-authored by a bevy of individuals calling themselves the Autonomous Robotics Thrust Group of the Consortium on Emerging Technologies, Military Operations and National Security (CETMONS), a collection of ethics and technology experts from various North American universities. According to the article: “A variety of never-before-anticipated, complex legal,...
Realist Dreams
The Realist tradition in International Relations long ago won the big battle by getting the best name. By calling itself Realism, the realist tradition makes all other approaches to IR seem idealistic, based in dreams but not realities. Anything but grounded in hard, cold calculations of how things really are. But the joy of realism is how often its acolytes indulge in fantasy. Ah, but only if we could have the good old days of the cold war, for instance.* * Insert gratuitous cite of Mearsheimer's piece in International Security.Who do realists look to as their latter-day Bismarck? ...
Friday Nerdism, A Day Early
Charli Carpenter has thrown down the gauntlet. She has pondered (on facebook) whether/why IR folks have not been blogging about Game of Thrones. Why? Because we are tired. Every episode is such great TV that we are left in awe. Our brains are so focused on getting the names straight, understanding the dynamics within each family and between them, that we no brainpower left to use.Spoilers lurk below: Ok, that was an excuse. The real reason is that I have not read the books yet, so my spelling of all of the names would suck. But, let me use some simple IR theory to predict the next...
Papa Don’t Preach: Rationalism is an Ism
Just yesterday I cautioned a graduate student not to get on the wrong side of some powerful people for the sake of principle if he could not truly effect change. And yet here I sit typing this right now, about to begin a rant on David Lake's new ISQ article: "Why ''isms' are evil: Theory, Epistemology, and Academic Sects as Impediments to Understanding and Progress." Nexon started it. It is his fault.The piece is taken from David Lake's keynote address as ISA president and identifies five pathologies with dividing our field up the way we do, along 'ism' lines. We reify research traditions,...
Ned is dead, baby. Ned is dead.
So I have finally caught up on all the back episodes of Game of Thrones, so I know what the hell you are all talking about. I thought I'd take up Charli's challenge about the paradigm that Dead Ned represents because I think that it says something deeper (always deeper) about something missing in IR theory these days.Ned represents duty, honor and integrity as opposed to old school Machiavellianism (although I guess duty, honor and integrity are even more old school). But that is not liberalism, not at all. Those are all deeply conservative virtues. They are more romantic than rationalist,...
Friday Nerd Blogging
And so on.* H/T WinterisComingBitch. Scott Meslow ponders the human security implications of Ned's choices. *Oh, the pedagogical possibilities! Does Ned Stark represent constructivism? Or does he represent the mocking realist riposte to constructivists as naive fools? Or only a mockery of that riposte? (For readers not yet following Game of Thrones on HBO, this. For viewers who wish more depth on the Starks, this. To those viewers who've also already read the books, please no series spoilers in comments.)
Random Friday stuff
Blogger has finally started to restore posts, but it doesn't look like everything is back yet. Meanwhile, my partner's off to Kazakhstan, I've got 38 seminar papers and 16 short essays to grade, and my daughter's become obsessed with Naruto. So, in lieu of posting anything substantive:Rob Farley has some thoughts on the air campaign in Libya;PM's thoughts on qualitative and quantitative methods deserves more commentary from our academic readers;Al Jazeera chronicles how Saudia Arabia's new protectorate, the Bahrain's government, is using its Arab Spring crackdown to systematically destroy...