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The Duck of Minerva
Vikash Yadav
Vikash is an Associate Professor of Political Science and Asian Studies at Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, NY. His main areas of academic interest are (post-) globalization, economic development, and economic freedom, with a regional focus on South Asia
Recent Posts
Concert of Asia in Crisis
by Vikash Yadav | 29 September, 2012 | Featured
The often maligned aspiration for a "Concert of Asia" appears to be even more unlikely this year as Japan and China trade barbs at the UN and spray water cannons at each other over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea.  Meanwhile in Southeast Asia, China has succeeded in fracturing the unity of ASEAN ministers over disputed territorial claims in the South China Sea. Even though these conflicts are unlikely to lead to war, the disputes matter because they influence whether the region will become increasingly bi-polar or whether an international institution/society will be...
Gangnam Style and IR
by Vikash Yadav | 23 September, 2012 | Featured
So North Korea has issued a "Gangnam Style" video to mock a South Korean presidential candidate, Park Guen Hye, from the ruling conservative party. According to Malaysia's The Sun Daily:"The parody, posted on the official government website Uriminzokkiri, shows a crudely photo-shopped image of Park doing the "horse-riding dance" created by South Korean rapper Psy on the original "Gangnam Style" video.The North Korean version mocks Park as a devoted admirer of the "Yushin" system of autocratic rule set up by her father, Park Chung-Hee, after he seized power in South Korea in a 1961 military...
ASEAN+6 In the Lead
by Vikash Yadav | 10 September, 2012 | Featured
It's time for the annual Asian multilateral alphabet soup round up... Long story short: APEC's proposed Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific (FTAAP), the US backed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and the Chinese backed Tripartite Agreement all appear to have lost some of their thunder to the ASEAN+6's decision to begin negotiating the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) next year.In fact, if the ASEAN+6 negotiations are substantively successful and not riddled with exceptions clauses it will create the largest economic bloc in the world, the Asian Economic Community (AEC), by...
Prometheus and Lawrence of Arabia
by Vikash Yadav | 19 June, 2012 | Featured
[Spoiler Alert: Obviously, you shouldn't read this post if you want to see the movie unfiltered.]Ridley Scott's "Prometheus" (2012) is a film about creation, abortion, and redemptive self-sacrifice.  Although elements of the plot do not have as much art or integrity as one might like, the film has moments of complex and sedimented allegory. The film obviously operates at the granular level of biopolitics as well as posing the fundamental questions of philosophy, but it is Michael Fassbender's role as the android David who is obsessed with Peter O'Toole's portrayal of T.E. Lawrence in...
Mall Culture in a Global City
by Vikash Yadav | 2 June, 2012 | Featured
Starbucks in the Ibn Battuta MallGreetings Ducklings! Â Just sending y'all a little post-card from the United Arab Emirates where I am spending a couple of weeks in Dubai and the neighboring emirates trying to learn more about the political economy of this fascinating and dynamic country particularly since the housing bubble burst in 2008.Between meetings I seem to find myself visiting a lot of malls. Â With the summer time heat, the many malls here become the center for public life or at least a site of perambulation in a nominally open, air-conditioned space by ethnically segregated family...
A Dothraki Complaint
by Vikash Yadav | 27 April, 2012 | Featured
Drogo as angry brown man.Source: dothraki.orgGraddakh! We the brown people of Vaes Dothrak collectively curse the producers of HBO and the slanderous "creator" of our world, which you call the Game of Thrones. We know that your people have a long standing tradition of questionable and objectionable racial imaginings in your "fantasy fiction" genre.  So we are not surprised by your ifaki ignorance of our civilization.  Anyway, we have also come to understand that much of your television programming broadcasts an unreflective and unapologetic world of whiteness, so maybe you can't help but...
The Monopoly
by Vikash Yadav | 4 March, 2012 | Featured
Why should academics and policymakers prioritize a state's acquistion of  "... the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory"? Obviously, this monopoly is fundamental to masking the violence of the state in daily domestic affairs, but what about in areas where that violence cannot be masked under the guise of a neutral, rational-legal state that speaks for the "nation" in the first place? Is a Eurocentric model of the state still an appropriate priority for all territories, particularly in regions which have a long history of embattled states as well as...
House MD Epistemologist
by Vikash Yadav | 23 January, 2012 | Featured
Like many of my nerdy friends, I am eagerly awaiting the return of  the second half of this season's "House MD." But let's be honest, the show basically substitutes a flow chart for a plot. No one with half a brain actually watches the show for the "medical mystery"; after all the show is premised on a suspension of disbelief. It's entertaining and a guilty pleasure because of the wit and antics of the ever gruff Hugh Laurie.But the show can be read as more than a series of implausible medical escapades; it is also a commentary on epistemology and society. Here is a quick round-up of what I...
Duck Stuff: In with the Old, in with the New
by Vikash Yadav | 23 January, 2012 | Featured
We are pleased to announce roster changes at the Duck. Patrick Porter and Brian Rathbun have agreed to become permanent contributors. Quacktacular!And today we want to introduce a new guest blogger - Robert Kelly. Bob teaches IR at Pusan National University in Korea and writes a lot on East Asian IR now. He went to Ohio State; his areas are security and IO. He has own site, which we recommend: Asian Security Blog. His favorite work to date is this. We are glad to have him.