Journal of International Studies

A mixture of oil, diesel fuel, water and mud sprays as roughnecks wrestle pipe on a True Company oil drilling rig outside Watford, North Dakota, October 20, 2012. Picture taken October 20, 2012. REUTERS/Jim Urquhart America has moved from oil scarcity to oil abundance, and our attitudes need to change in order to keep up. If the  stream  of headlines  and panels is any indication, you’d have to be an idiot to disagree with that claim. So call me stupid, because I just don’t see it. There’s no question that U.S. oil production is booming. The country  has passed  Saudi Arabia as the world’s biggest liquid fuels producer and is  now producing  more oil than it imports. The rise in U.S. output, which is poised to continue, is  good news  for the economy and national security. It’s also something that leaders need to adjust to as they develop policy and strategy. But setting production records and passing milestones is fundamentally diff...

Left with a tattered economy after nearly three years of war, an effective economic recovery plan should be a cornerstone of Syria’s reconciliation. The Syrian conflict is destroying the economy and creating a long term economic crisis for Syria that will make a lasting peace in the future even more difficult. With the ongoing fighting, the economy’s downward trend persists and experts expect Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to decrease by a further 13.9 percent by year-end (it is already  down 14.4 percent in 2012 ). Furthermore, de-industrialization, debt, and geographic division worsen the outlook of Syria’s economy beyond the current conflict. Addressing the country’s economic crisis and presenting viable measures for an economic recovery should go hand in hand with the political reconciliation process. The country’s main economic drivers were hit particularly hard. Among those, Syria’s oil sector is at a standstill. The energy infrastructure has been severely damaged, wel...

Iran is a major sponsor of terrorism, striking Israel, U.S. Arab allies, and at times Americans. The twin blasts on Tuesday that destroyed the Iranian embassy in Lebanon and killed at least twenty people, however, should remind us that Iran faces a serious terrorism problem of its own. It is tempting to enjoy Iran getting a taste of its own medicine, but the growing violence risks further destabilizing the Middle East and harming U.S. interests there. A History of Violence Since the 1979 Islamic revolution,  Iran has backed an array of terrorist groups . These groups have fostered unrest in Iraq and the oil-rich Gulf Kingdoms, killed Iran’s enemies in Europe, and struck at enemies like Israel and the United States. Most infamously for Americans, Iran has backed the Lebanese Hizballah, providing it with hundreds of millions of dollars, sophisticated arms, and advanced training. Among its many operations, Hizballah in 1983 bombed the U.S. embassy and the Marine barracks hos...

China’s reliance on coal has serious environmental consequences, but is keeping U.S. companies in business.

Obama can expect some difficult conversations when he heads to Asia in April.

The U.S. needs to rethink its current position on reopening negotiations with Pyongyang.

Introduction International Relations, as an academic discipline, is considered an ever changing subject which has greatly evolved through the years due to the emergence of different and diverse political theories. It is from these that various interpretations are drawn and used to understand events and conflicts that shape how the world functions today. When studying the subject, one is confronted with three main approaches: Liberal Internationalism, the English School, and finally, realism. All of these dogmas have distinct outlooks on the nature of the state, on war, and on the international society. Realism and Liberal Internationalism (which, for the continuation of this essay, will also be referred to as liberalism or idealism) are identified as the two extremes of the academic arena. On one hand, the main realist theme is that “states find themselves in the shadow of anarchy such that their security cannot be taken for granted” (Dunne, Schmidt, 2008: 95). Liberalism on the o...

By Christopher L. Daniels Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2012

A generation ago, it was common and uncontroversial for federal judges to rely upon legislative history when interpreting a statute. But since the 1980s, the textualist movement, led by Justice Scalia, has urged the banishment of legislative history from the judicial system. The resulting debate between textualists and their opponents—a debate that has dominated statutory interpretation for a generation—cannot be truly understood unless we know how legislative history came to be such a common tool of interpretation to begin with. This question is not answered by the scholarly literature, which focuses on how reliance on legislative history became permissible  as a matter of doctrine (in the  Holy Trinity Church  case in 1892), not on how it became  normal, routine, and expected  as a matter of judicial and lawyerly practice. The question of normalization is key, for legislative history has long been considered more difficult and costly to research than other i...

On October 7, Brookings  hosted Oxford University Professor Margaret MacMillan  to talk about her new book on World War I,  The War that Ended Peace: The Road to 1914 , and specifically what comparisons may be drawn between the world leading up to that war and tensions around the world today. After an introduction by  Ted Piccone , acting vice president of Foreign Policy at Brookings, Senior Fellow  Robert Kagan responded to MacMillan's opening remarks and moderated questions from the audience. Kagan and MacMillan engaged in an interesting discussion about the changing understanding of World War I's origins, China's rise and how it might echo Germany pre-1914, and whether contemporary global tensions have any useful parallels to the world of 1914. Margaret MacMillan: "And I think we can’t learn clear lessons from history. What we can learn is to watch out for dangerous possibilities." MacMillan called the origins of World...

The End of Hypocrisy By Henry Farrell and Martha Finnemore Foreign Affairs In one of this week’s most talked about articles, Farrell and Finnemore assess the real threat leakers like Snowden and Manning pose to American diplomacy. Rather than a direct assault on national security, they argue that leakers compromise the U.S.’s ability to act hypocritically and get away with it. Al Qaeda’s Teenage Fan Club By Hannah Lucinda Smith Vice Al Qaeda’s success in Syria is as much about savvy marketing strategy as it is about political vision. Smith describes how moderate, even friendly, young men are joining extreme jihadist forces. On the Ground with Syria’s News Struggle By Matthew Shaer New Republic Shaer explores Reyhanli, a town bordering Syria that was once a backwater and has now become the hub of many Syrian citizen journalists. Through accounts given by citizen journalists, Shaer reflects on the difficulties and increased dangers of the Syrian media en...

President Barack Obama listens to Deputy Secretary of Energy Daniel B. Poneman The Russia Left Behind By Ellen Barry The New York Times Through a string of narratives about towns and villages stretching between Moscow and St. Petersburg, Barry captures the deterioration of small-town Russia and explores how these towns — while not very far from the Kremlin’s reach — are worryingly far from modernity. The War For Nigeria By James Verini National Geographic In what ought to be “God’s own country in Africa,” a brutal conflict is tearing apart the north. James Verini explores the Boko Haram, the extremist group behind the chaos, and the Nigerians enduring its terror. My Year with Malala By Christina Lamb The Sunday Times From social activism to nominations for the Nobel peace prize, Malala Yousafzai’s accomplishments are unique for a sixteen year old girl. Christina Lamb highlights an equally intriguing personal account of the Pakistani girl’s story. ...