The Duck of Minerva

Symposia
Indeterminacy, Uncertain Contexts and the Dual Nature of Norms

Indeterminacy, Uncertain Contexts and the Dual Nature of Norms

by Lucrecia García Iommi | 8 December 2022, 1241 EST | , , , | 0 Comments

When it comes norm dynamics and how we theorize them, uncertainty presents something of a paradox. We study norms because we think that they matter. But if norms are inherently uncertain, then how is it possible that they constitute, constrain, and otherwise shape the behavior of global actors? Unless norms produce stable and defined expectations, then how can they have the power to structure international politics?

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More Symposia Posts

Doing PhD Research While Staying in Place

Doing PhD Research While Staying in Place

by Steve Saideman | 2 April 2020, 1524 EDT | ,

Last night, I taught another session of our Dissertation Proposal Workshop class, and the topic was the methodology section of one's proposal.  That is, how am I going to research this question and how do I justify the choices I made?  This is after going through the other pieces--the question, the proposed answer, what other folks have said about this or have said about other stuff that you want to bring to this project, the theory, and the hypotheses.  How does one test the hypotheses was the question du jour (or nuit).  Before I start, to be clear, no one should expect...

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Deploying targeted digital health conversations to fight the twin pandemics of COVID-19 and misinformation

Deploying targeted digital health conversations to fight the twin pandemics of COVID-19 and misinformation

by Josh Busby | 1 April 2020, 1052 EDT | ,

This is a guest post from Ben Bellows, PhD (UC Berkeley, epidemiology), currently a researcher at the Population Council in Washington DC and a co-founder and the Chief Business Officer at Nivi Inc., a digital health company empowering consumers in emerging markets. Nivi is supporting the COVID-19 response here.   Background: the problem Disease outbreaks are as much a social phenomenon as a biological one. Rumor, innuendo, and public sentiment drive disease transmission dynamics. Covid-19 is no different; the fact checking website, Snopes.com, has a dedicated “covid-19” tag to run the...

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Public Health Research in Mainstream International Relations Outlets

Public Health Research in Mainstream International Relations Outlets

by Cullen Hendrix | 30 March 2020, 1728 EDT | , ,

Steve Saideman’s recent Duck piece on international relations scholars’ relative silence on issues of pandemics, and public health more generally, has ruffled feathers[1]and generated a lot of discussion: about marginalization of certain research outlets and methodologies, about the value of interdisciplinary work in a self-identifying-as-such-but-still-not-all-that-interdisciplinary discipline, and about what it means to say “IR as a field has little to say” vs. “individual IR scholars having said quite a bit.” This all hits pretty close to home. As an IR scholar whose main area of...

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Covid-19, remote learning and work-life balance

Covid-19, remote learning and work-life balance

by Peter Henne | 30 March 2020, 0900 EDT | ,

The Covid-19 pandemic has led to many useful discussions about public health, social responsibility, and tips for online learning. See the many great posts that have gone up here. One thing that hasn't been discussed enough, in my opinion, is work-life balance. Given all the pressures of the modern University, how do we ensure the expansive demands of remote learning don't swamp us and--for those of us with families--undermine our commitments to our kids or an equitable marriage? I'll start with my situation. My wife has been home with our kids (2&4) and was actually planning on going...

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Experts, Public Intellectuals, and the Coronavirus

Experts, Public Intellectuals, and the Coronavirus

by Josh Busby | 29 March 2020, 0031 EDT | ,

This is a guest post from Peter Verovšek, a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Politics/International Relations at the University of Sheffield The Coronavirus has turned us all into amateur epidemiologists. This desire for greater understanding makes sense in the face of a threat as novel and as dangerous as COVID-19. The shutdown of massive sections of the economy and state-mandated orders to engage in social – or, more accurately, physical – distancing has left the majority of us stuck at home, wondering when things will go back to normal and worrying that they never will. As a result of...

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Public Health Research in Mainstream International Relations Outlets

Why Have Mainstream IR Journals Largely Ignored Pandemics*

by Steve Saideman | 28 March 2020, 1101 EDT | , ,

* I have changed the title as I got plenty of pushback on twitter--that there is plenty of IR on Pandemics, not just in the major journals. And I will add an update at the bottom later to address the criticisms later. People are wondering why there has not been much scholarship on the international relations of pandemics in the mainstream journals. out of curiosity, looked at how many times the term “pandemic” has appeared in top IR journalsIO: 0APSR: 0JCR: 0WP: 0AJPS: 3EJIR: 6JPR: 8JOP: 8IS: 13ISQ: 17— Seva (@SevaUT) March 15, 2020 Not a scientific survey of the literature, but it gives you...

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Take a lesson from Hong Kong: don’t wait for your government, save yourselves from COVID-19

Take a lesson from Hong Kong: don’t wait for your government, save yourselves from COVID-19

by Josh Busby | 25 March 2020, 0949 EDT | ,

This is a guest post from Karen A. Grépin, Associate Professor, School of Public Health, University of Hong Kong As cases of COVID-19 soar globally, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan have garnered accolades from the international community for having kept their epidemics relatively under control through mid-March - despite the incredible threat they all faced earlier in the year of imported cases from China. With all of the praise flowing to Hong Kong, one might expect citizens to also have good things to say about their government’s handling of the outbreak - but you would be wrong. In fact,...

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Public Health Research in Mainstream International Relations Outlets

Trump’s Coronavirus Response Shows How Much Leaders Matter

by Steve Saideman | 24 March 2020, 1836 EDT | , ,

This is a guest post by Richard W. Maass, an Associate Professor at the University of Evansville. His research focuses on international security, US foreign policy, terrorism, and diplomatic history. He has a forthcoming book on how democracy and xenophobia limited US territorial expansion (Cornell UP, May 2020). The international experience of COVID-19 will have many implications for international relations. Scholars have already begun discussing its implications for IR theories, hegemonic stability theory, and measures of state capacity. When all is said and done, I think the central...

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