Photo Credit: CSIS Despite being one of the most influential scholars of international relations theory, John Mearsheimer took considerable flak for his comments on the war in Ukraine.  Mearsheimer’s interview with the New Yorker last month resulted in an upswell of opposition, moral outrage, and debate for blaming the conflict on the U.S. and NATO.  … Continue reading Reclaiming Agency: The Problem with Prescriptive Realism

A live firing drill during joint exercises between the US and ROK in April 2017 in Pocheon, South Korea. Photo Credit: AFP. In response to an increasingly hostile China, Washington has devised a strategy designed to leverage its existing alliance system in Asia, including its partnership with South Korea, to augment its power. The US-ROK … Continue reading The Strategic Costs of the Weakened US-ROK Exercises

Photo by Juliette Humble/UK DFID By Mike Burnham and Shannon Peterson | How do individuals morally justify participation in ethnic violence? This paper presents original research that attempts to answer this question. Using text analysis software and Jonathan Haidt’s moral matrix, a total of 225 text samples from three different ideological groups—Liberals, Conservatives, and White … Continue reading The Moral Foundations of Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict