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
Identity Politics and the Orthodoxies of the National Security Policy Community
In 2015, Linus Hagström, a professor of political science at the Swedish Defence University, questioned the wisdom of Sweden joining NATO in a coauthored opinion piece. After its...
I can’t believe I need to explain why the Houthis aren’t heroes
International relations discourse tends to be a bit wonkier than domestic American political debates. While this leads to the frequent lament, from voices like Dan Drezner, that American voters...
The Competition Metaphor in International Relations
When I arrived at the Pentagon in 2009, the Obama administration was just getting its footing as caretakers of the War on Terror. Our focus then was truly global dominion. That meant, yes, killing...
More Recent Posts
The week before 9/11: A Different anniversary
What was I thinking before I realized the world outside my campus was real? The foreign policy world is gearing up for the twentieth anniversary of 9/11 next week. There will be think pieces, roundtables and symposia galore. I will have a piece here on the Duck with some of my own reflections on...
Neoliberals, Anti-Imperialists, and the China Question
Does China's more ambitious foreign policy and bid for "national rejuvenation" come at America's expense? It's a question where some neoliberals and some on the anti-imperialist left converge — in opposition to Washington conventional wisdom. Most of the D.C. Establishment now takes for granted...
Reparations in the Wake of the US Withdrawal from Afghanistan
Though unlikely to happen any time soon, recent calls for the US to pay reparations to the Afghan people provide an opportunity to reflect on the complexities of reparations and global justice.
Fast fashion and the politics of disposability
Fast fashion is generating more than just cheap clothing: it’s also a crisis of disposability affecting livelihoods in the Global South.
The Promise and Peril of Public-Facing Scholarship
Paul Musgrave concludes the “Lab Leaks” symposium by engaging with his interlocutors and reflecting on the challenges faced by political science in an era of public-facing scholarship.
Why Western Conservatives are Freaking about U.S. Decline
I was just about to block "Afghanistan" as a key word in my Twitter timeline when I saw several people asking why British conservatives were even more freaked out about the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan than American conservatives. The question was in response to the UK defense secretary saying...
Liberal Order Beyond Neoliberalism
G. John Ikenberry is one of the most influential scholars of “liberal international order.” It’s likely that he, along with Dan Deudney, is responsible for popularizing the phrase. John’s most recent book, A World Safe for Democracy: Liberal Internationalism and the Crises of Global Order has reportedly shaped the thinking of the Biden foreign-policy team. I interviewed him for a recent podcast.
They Blinded Them With Science
Musgrave’s identification of dangerous ideas is correct, but his metaphor risks entrenching the fundamental problem: the (inevitable) weaponization of “scientific objectivity.”
Leaving the lab
Perhaps the problem isn’t that theories leak from the lab, but efforts to seal the lab in the first place. If political scientists spent more time observing the policy world, me might get both better and more careful theories in the first place.
The Leakage Between Political Science and Policy Goes Both Ways
Political Science isn’t sterile laboratory. The discipline is riddled with politics and deeply influenced by policy concerns.
How Can We Vaccinate Against Viral Political Science?
Some political-science lab leaks are more difficult to control than others.
The Democratic Peace isn’t a Virus
Paul Musgrave has written an important piece discussing how ideas developed within academia can have profoundly negative effects when they escape into the wild of the policymaking world. For someone like me who has been involved for many years in the Bridging the Gap project, whose...