Andrew Ehrhardt
When scholars and commentators speak about the ‘post-1945 international order’ today, there is often little attention paid to the diplomats and officials who sought to ‘order’ such a system during the Second World War. Historical narratives of this so-called ‘ordering moment’, have largely focused on the influence of the United States, much to the detriment of other governments involved. Among those who planned for and negotiated certain tenets of this post-war system, the United Kingdom played a prominent role. …
Karen E. Smith
EU decision-making has often been depicted as technocratic and unemotional, or, as Luuk van Middelaar has put it, ‘de-dramatized’. Emotions are widely seen as having been deliberately removed from intra-EU relations, to avoid the risk that anger could lead to violence or even war. From the early 1970s, EU member states designed a process for cooperating on foreign policy that became increasingly bureaucratized and as such, depoliticized. The kind of ‘foreign policy’ that the EU normally does is not the stuff of high drama, but rather the patient building of long-term, structured relations such as those with African, Caribbean and…
Miranda Melcher
A year into mass-online teaching, facing the prospect of blended learning in September, educators are in a key moment to ensure that improvements to flexibility and accessibility in higher education remain intact. Blended learning, an amalgamation of face-to-face and online learning, has the advantage of being infinitely scalable but also presents key challenges when it comes to inclusivity.
Part of my research focuses on students with learning differences and neurodiversities, including ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, and autism. …
Joseph Bodnar
On 6 January 2021, Riley June Williams stormed the US Capitol building, stole a laptop from the speaker of the house and failed in an attempt to sell the device to Russia’s foreign intelligence service, according to court documents. Williams’ plan highlights the disruptive potential of the illiberal forces that Russian President Vladimir Putin has charmed and supported across the United States and Europe. This sprawling network is an increasingly effective extension of Russia’s foreign policy. …
Anum Farhan
Understanding the linkages between the environment, conflict and peacebuilding is key to building and sustaining peace in post-conflict societies. Natural resources such as water, land, timber, diamond, gold, minerals and oil have been significant drivers of conflict when exploited by opposing parties, and when the environment itself is targeted, it threatens people’s health, livelihoods and security. With the increasing impacts of climate change on the poorest regions, water availability, food security, disease, and population migration all have the potential to increase vulnerabilities, aggravate existing tensions and generate new conflicts. …
Stephanie C. Hofmann and Benjamin Martill
It is difficult to deny the importance of political parties as an influence on foreign policy. In the US, the election of Joe Biden has heralded dramatic changes from a reaffirmed commitment WHO membership to re-joining the Paris Climate Agreement. In the UK, the resounding electoral victory in 2019 of Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party was instrumental in providing a mandate to ‘Get Brexit Done’ that produced a ‘thin’ agreement with the EU opposed by Labour and Conservative moderates. …
Krisztina Csortea
Every issue of International Affairs features a comprehensive book review section which assesses the latest writing on all facets of international studies. In this, the latest in our Top 5 Books series, Book Reviews Editor Krisztina Csortea presents her picks from the March 2021 issue. Join the conversation and share your must-read new books on global politics and international relations in the response section below. Enjoy!
1) International Relations in a relational universe
Andrew R. Hom and Ryan K. Beasley
If a foreign policy matters to the UK government, chances are it is on the clock. While Brexit focused discussions on sovereignty, immigration, and the notion of ‘Europe’, our recent research published in International Affairs shows that time — and especially timing — frequently drove UK policy-making debates, deliberations, and decisions.
The many times of Brexit
References to time saturated Parliamentary discussions and government remarks about Brexit, with ‘ticking clocks’ and ‘deadlines’, ‘transition period’ and the UK’s ‘future relationship’ with the EU, all framed by an ‘unprecedented moment in history’ (all quotes from Hansard can be found in our original article). While ‘time’ is an…
Ali Bilgic and Athina Gkouti
If we were to… have a blanket policy of not detaining pregnant women… I fear we would find quite a lot of people saying they were pregnant as another method of delaying their departure from the UK… I do not want this to be an excuse that women who are not pregnant dream up in order to throw a legal obstacle in the way.
These were the words of Mark Harper, former Minister for Immigration, in a UK Parliament debate on the detention of pregnant women on 5 September 2013. …
Kerry F. Crawford and Leah C. Windsor
Patriarchy is embedded in the structure of academia. When individuals — or particular groups — face unfair, inequitable, or discriminatory situations in the academy, the infractions are often dismissed as anomalies. They’re not. We counter with the observation that bias on the basis of gender and parenthood is pervasive at all levels of the academy and these ‘everyday injustices’ are rooted in structural and institutional shortcomings, policy failures, and reliance on the historical status quo as a default.
It’s not a pipeline; it’s a winding and interrupted path
As we have discussed, the path from graduate school to the rank of full professor does not look like a pipeline that…
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