So the New York Times reported on Beverly Gage, a history professor at Yale University, resigning from her post as head of the Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy because of donor pressure. There's a lot at stake in this. As an academic field, grand strategy has a reputation for being very conservative, and for advocating a didactic, great-man view of history. The Yale program has not only been the premier school for grand strategy,...
Academic freedom is a very important value. Professional integrity is another. Both values admit complexity, and are the subject of reasonable disagreement among colleagues and leaders of academic institutions. At the same time, the modern academy would not be what it is, or at least aspires to be, were it not for these values. A very wide range of behaviors are consistent with and protected by these values. But for these values to have...
Jeffrey C. Isaac served as Editor-in-Chief of Perspectives on Politics: A Political Science Public Sphere, a flagship journal of APSA, for eight years. During this time (2009-2017), he also served as an ex-officio member of the APSA Governing Council. In 2017, he was awarded APSA’s Frank J. Goodnow Award for his contributions to the public engagement of the political science discipline.
The academic job market is terrible. It’s worse for international students.
Over the past six months or so, I've gotten a lot of pings about NATO and the "Big 3" (UK, France, and Germany) taking on a role in Asia — and specifically a bigger military presence in the region. The issue has come up a few times on my podcast. I got an early preview of a book about a closely related question by a European scholar. I've had EU parliamentary staffers reach out to me about this. And I gave an interview to a lefty newspaper in...
While political comedy thrives, IR comedy, whatever that phrase might mean, is virtually non-existent. omedy gap’? Is it a figment of my imagination or a real problem?
Gregorio Bettiza is Sr. Lecturer (Associate Professor) in International Relations at the University of Exeter. His research interests include the role of ideology, religion, and civilizational identities in international relations. His work has been published, among other journals, on International Theory, European Journal of International Relations, Journal of Global Security Studies, Review of International Studies, and International Studies...
At a press conference on Sept. 20, 2011 Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) displayed a postcard. It was signed only “An Army Soldier.” She read the postcard aloud. “I will still be deployed in Afghanistan on 20 Sept. when DADT is finally repealed,” it read. “It will take a huge burden off my shoulders – a combat zone is stressful enough on its own. Thank you for your courage to vote in favor of repeal as a Republican. I will repay your courage with...
Australia’s attempt to balance against China using nuclear submarines is not just a material decision. It’s one shaped by over a century of deep fear about Australia’s role as an outpost of whiteness in Asia.
Professor Rebecca Adler-Nissen joins the Hayseed Scholar podcast. Professor Adler-Nissen is a proflic scholar known for her work on diplomacy, integration, practice theory, and her deep knowledge and use of social theory. She talks to Brent about growing up in Denmark, but also Israel and the United States. Before going to uni, Rebecca spent some time working on boats, sailing at one point to the Canary Islands where she looked for more work at...
The twentieth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks has come and gone. We've reflected on what led to the attacks, its human toll, how well America handled it, and what impacts the US response has had on the world. I thought it was also worth asking what effects these attacks had on the sub-field of international relations, particularly mainstream security studies. The answer? Not much. As a result of these attacks, IR...
Every self-respecting foreign policy expert who fancies themselves part of a realpolitik tradition talks as if the balance of power were everything. Now, I don't necessarily think of myself as a realist (in the IR sense), but I too think global and regional balances of power are something that policymakers ought to pay attention to. Nobody should want a single actor to achieve regional or global control (pay no attention to the United...