The State of the Union is Grim
The Republic as we knew it is over. The fight now is whether the new one will be a fascistic, competitive authoritarian regime or a pluralist democracy that, one hopes, is better than what came before.
6+1 Questions about American Conquest: The Northwest Indian War and the Making of US Foreign Policy
What’s the name of the book, and where can we find it? American Conquest: The Northwest Indian War...
Will the recognition of Palestine matter? What IR scholarship says
The UN General Assembly meeting has seen a growing number of states recognizing a state of...
Trump’s Foreign Policy and the Purpose of the MAGA State
How can we understand Tump 2.0 foreign policy? It’s the product of the fusion of two different forces: Christian Nationalism and Personalist Rent-Extraction.
New
NATO, Putin, and Ukraine
The problem with saying that Russia had legitimate security fears and that NATO expansion is partly to blame for Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is that it omits some parts of the picture while exaggerating others. It creates a lopsided view. It magnifies every remote and hypothetical security threat to Russia, while ignoring the very real security threats to Russia’s neighbors, and ignoring Western efforts to accommodate Russia’s security concerns. The framing reflects habitual blindspots that have distorted many left-wing perspectives on Vladimir Putin and Russian foreign policy.
The Invasion of Ukraine is Russia’s Fault
For Mearsheimer “freedom” and “prosperity” are simply weapons of great power politics rather than aspirations sought by the Ukrainian people.
A tale of two realisms
It's been a rough...
Featured
Benjamin de Carvalho
Dr. Benjamin de Carvalho joins the Hayseed Scholar podcast. Ben was born in Switzerland to a...
Who wants AI in the classroom?
I get emails. Sometimes they find me well; sometimes they try to convince me that I need to bring...
After Anarchy? On Hierarchy, Heterarchy, and Multiplicity
Kenneth Waltz famously claimed that anarchy—i.e., the absence of a global sovereign—is the...
Recent
How do we think about 9/11 in 2025?
I used to feel compelled to write something on 9/11. Some of this was just to participate in the...
6+1 Questions about “The U.S.: A (Mostly) Hands-Off Superpower”
Drew Hogan answers 6+1 questions about how the United States does, and does not, support its overseas citizens.
Is there a strategy behind Rubio’s State Department cuts?
The foreign policy world is still making sense of the Trump Administration’s massive cuts to...
ACADEME
Why have so many Muslim communities embraced radicalism?
Over two decades have passed since the horrifying 9/11 attacks. Do we have a consensus...
Joseph Nye’s other big idea
Renowned international relations scholar and practitioner Joseph S. Nye passed away last week....
6+1 Questions about Waging War with Gold: National Security and the Finance Domain Across the Ages
Charles A. Dainoff, Robert M. Farley, and Geoffrey F. Williams answer questions about their new book
6+1 Questions about “Race, Shaming, and International Human Rights”
Can human-rights organizations avoid accusations of racism when they criticize certain governments? Can they avoid fueling racism? Zoltán I. Búzás and Lotem Bassan-Nygate test the effectiveness of tactics to counter racism when trying to shame perpetrators.