The Duck of Minerva

Steve Saideman

Steve Saideman is Professor and the Paterson Chair in International Affairs at Carleton University’s Norman Paterson School of International Affairs. He has written The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy and International Conflict; For Kin or Country: Xenophobia, Nationalism and War (with R. William Ayres); and NATO in Afghanistan: Fighting Together, Fighting Alone (with David Auerswald), and elsewhere on nationalism, ethnic conflict, civil war, and civil-military relations.

Recent Posts

Imposters at the ISA?

by Steve Saideman | 29 March, 2014 |

Long ago, Dan Drezner posted about the imposter syndrome.  The basic idea is that many folks feel as if they will be found out, that there are other folks out there that are smarter, more informed and that one is just getting away with being less than that until eventually getting found out. That piece resonated with me way back then, and it was funny to hear multiple people raise it this week in Toronto at the ISA.  I suddenly realized why this might be the case: there are so many impressive people doing impressive stuff that everyone seems better, more expert and so on, so more folks feel...

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Are We Russophobes?

by Steve Saideman | 20 March, 2014 |

Lots of words have been spilled on this Crimea thing, and so it is reasonable to ask whether our opposition to Crimean self-determination might be more about our feelings about Russia than about secession/irredentism. Chris Blattman asked: Bleg: Someone please explain to me why I should accept that the annexation of Crimea is a terrible thing https://t.co/Op7T0aNN7T — Chris Blattman (@cblatts) March 20, 2014 It raises a legitimate question: shouldn't people be allowed to choose their destinies?  Shouldn't folks be allowed to engage in self-determination?  I responded with heaps of tweets,...

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Friday Nerd Blogging: Textual Analysis Edition

by Steve Saideman | 7 March, 2014 |

Everything is awesome!  But I do wonder if the song from the Lego movie (see below) is not just a secret appeal to irredentism: "Everything is cool when we are part of a team!"  So, everything is better when folks are united, and what is more united than a mother country with its lost territory? "Everything is better when we stick together!" Better when we ethnic kin are unified? "Side by side you and I are gonna win forever!" Seems like an irredentist appeal to me. "We're the same. I'm like you. You're like me" Homogeneity for the win? "Everything is awesome when we are living our...

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Electoral Politics of Boundary Changing: Crimea is Complex!

by Steve Saideman | 4 March, 2014 |

Keith Darden points out that if Crimea secedes from Ukraine, electoral outcomes in Ukraine would shift with fewer pro-Russia voters in the political system, and that would be bad for Russia. This is not unique to this case. In any successful secession or irredentist effort (the latter refers to annexing a "lost" territory inhabited by ethnic kin), the boundary moves, changing who votes in the rump state (Ukraine in this case) and who votes in the new state (Crimea if independent, Russia if this is irredentist and Crimea gets annexed). In this case, new voters in Russia would be largely...

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Analogies Aplenty: Ukraine is ….

by Steve Saideman | 2 March, 2014 |

Lots of folks are speculating about what Ukraine/Crimea/Russia is like, including not Abkhazia.  Right now, the analogies that come to mind for me are: coups d'etat and poker. Coup?  Yes, because in a coup, the anti-incumbents (for want of a better term), move first, trying to create facts on the ground that are hard to reverse.  If this fait accompli is successful, the incumbents are then put in a position where they are the ones with the pressure to use force.  The onus is on them.  Which is why Putin would be smart to stick to Crimea.  Other deployments in Ukraine might mean trying to...

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Reacting to Ukraine/Crimea

by Steve Saideman | 1 March, 2014 |

Yesterday, I suggested that there is little the US/NATO could do about the Russian intervention in Ukraine.  That still is very much true.  Obama's statement referred to costs--that this would cost Russia and it will (trade, the G8 summit, etc).   But that is not a redline or a serious effort at deterrence--just a statement of reality.  Russia's relations with the US, EU, NATO and others will be "taxed" by this event--Russia will get less in the near future because of what it does here. The questions this morning (other than "is that a tank or not") revolve around what can we call this...

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Tuesday Morning Links

by Steve Saideman | 25 February, 2014 |

Will this morning's links betray my grumpiness?  I hope not but today's meme that the US and the West are in danger of losing Ukraine drives me a bit crazy.  It wasn't in my pocket... was it in yours? Anyhow, the big news out of Washington, DC is about the big defense cuts proposed by SecDef Hagel.  Lots of choices being made, including controversial ones like eliminating the A-10s for a plane that is still mostly air (the F-35) and so on.  How much of this will actually happen?  No idea.  But it has produced some interesting thoughts including Lt. General H.R. McMaster on the fallacies of...

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