The buzzword of the first Trump administration was “Great Power Competition.” That was also a lie.
So much for “Great Power Competition”
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Recent Posts
Grabbing the world by the norms
With the news avalanche that is Trump, it’s hard to keep track of all the outrageous things he says and does. With his recent very vocal attempts at land grabs (that we are not entirely sure will...
O Canada/Ô Canada: A defense of Canada in international affairs
Things have been rough for Canada. It's engulfed in political turmoil, as Justin Trudeau steps down from leadership and the country braces for a contentious election. Incoming US President Donald...
Jimmy Carter’s legacy: a challenge to recognize and act on religion’s significance
US President Jimmy Carter's funeral is being held today in Washington, DC at the National Cathedral. Since he passed away shortly after Christmas, tributes have abounded about a man once derided as...
More Recent Posts
6+1 Questions about “The Fossil-Fueled Roots of Climate Inaction in Authoritarian Regimes”
What is the name of the journal article (or book) and what are its coordinates? What is the name of the journal article (or book) and what are its coordinates? “The Fossil-Fueled Roots of Climate Inaction in Authoritarian Regimes” is available in FirstView at Perspectives on Politics. What’s...
Migration as the Outcome of States’ War against Nations
While immigration has not only continued but also increased in recent years, the strict stances of some politicians and policy makers of destination countries, especially European countries, brings to mind the question: Who should host states oppose: immigrants or their corrupt undemocratic...
What to Do About Clausewitz: Saving Strategic Studies From Itself
“A specter is haunting strategic studies—the specter of peace.” These bizarre words are from Richard Betts, who provocatively presented peace itself as a problem in a largely forgotten article from 1997 asking, “Should Strategic Studies Survive?” Betts answered his title question in the...
Jamie Frueh
Associate Provost and W. Harold Row Professor of Global Politics Jamie Frueh, of Bridgewater College, joins the Hayseed Scholar podcast. Jamie and Brent have been friends for over 15 years, meeting at the ISA-Northeast conference in 2009. Jamie is also the only (other) person on this podcast...
And All That Jezebel
Ah, the avalanche of racism and misogyny that came after the Kamala Harris announcement. The “Kamala is not really black” narrative has been dissected by Adam Serwer in great detail. Spoiler alert: all of these “DEI” discussions are inherently racist and white supremacist because they assume that...
Was the Trump shooting terrorism?
The implications of the attempted assassination of Donald Trump over the weekend remain unclear. Will it lead him to strike a more conciliatory tone during the upcoming Republican National Convention? Will it make more Americans sympathize with him? And then there are the questions of what led to...
Bloody Carnival
A lot of ink has been spilled and bytes spent on the reflections over Trump's failed assassination this past weekend. I won't pretend I know better, although as a regular academic that's kind of my job and an occupational hazard. But as soon as my co-author texted me about the events in Butler,...
The Munich Agreement, but Negotiated by Oswald Mosley
When I was but a lad, it was still quite common for foreign-policy hawks to invoke “Munich” as an all-purpose rebuttal to compromise with (they would say the “appeasement of”) rival states, most notably the Soviet Union. The failure of the 1938 agreement — which handed Adolf Hitler and the Third...
The Frontier Politics of Horizon
In the recent Settling for Less: Why States Colonize and Why They Stop, Lachlan McNamee makes a rationalist argument—“colonization projects” are “characterized by a triangle of actors—settlers, indigenes, and the central state,” and for his purposes, we can “assume that all settler migration is...
6 + 1 Questions about “Compliance in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights”
1. What is the name of the article and what are its coordinates? Aníbal Pérez-Liñán and Angie García Atehortúa. 2024. “Oversight Hearings, Stakeholder Engagement, and Compliance in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.” International Organization. 2. What’s the argument? Compliance with...
Eurovision suggests both sides on Israel-Palestine need to invest in some public diplomacy
Last year I was on a sabbatical in Edinburgh, and my family and I watched Eurovision for the first time. We loved the out-there electro-pop versions of local folk music, got bored by the slow ballads, and generally bought into the hype. This year, we were excited to discover it was streaming for...
The Contradictions of “Progressive Realism,” and How to Overcome Them
Labour MP David Lammy has a new piece in Foreign Affairs called, “The Case for Progressive Realism.” Where his manifesto is punchiest is in its unsparing critiques of British foreign policy: the Conservative Party has, over 14 years…sank deeply into nostalgia and denial about the United Kingdom’s...