Tom Coburn’s Grudge, Part II

Via Jennifer Diascro's Twitter feed: The Economist has an article up addressing the specific targeting of Political Science Research by Senator Coburn. The article addresses a point that I've brought up a couple of times in the past (see here for example). Specifically, why only political science? The Economist: The real debate seems to be over … Read more

Links Galore

It's been a while since my last post, so I thought it was time to put up at least a little something: Senate Republicans are, for the moment, blocking Chuck Hagel's nomination as Defense Secretary. Admittedly, my attention to current events has been spotty over the past couple of months, but it seems that every time … Read more

Of QP Publications and International Relations

Two new pieces from QP authors.  First, Michael Flynn has a solo-authored piece in an upcoming Foreign Policy Analysis that has an early view avaible. Abstract:  How does political competition among domestic actors influence foreign policy choice? Studies examining these questions often focus on the role of economic or partisan interests, and how they influence … Read more

Chuck Hagel and Bipartisanship in Foreign Policy

The news surrounding Obama’s nomination of Chuck Hagel and John Brennan as Secretary of Defense and Director of the CIA (respectively) has primarily been focused on the “controversial” Hagel’s previous statements and positions. Republican commentators have been complaining about Hagel’s nomination, claiming that his nomination sends a powerful signal that the Obama administration is putting more … Read more

Quick Plug on New Pubs (Shameless partial self-promotion edition)

A bit of shameless self-promotion before the holidays. The kind folks at International Studies Quarterly have put a new article by Colin Barry, Chad Clay, and myself up on early view. The link to the article, entitled "Avoiding the Spotlight: Human Rights Shaming and Foreign Direct Investment", is here, and here's the abstract: Nonstate actors, … Read more

Change & Stability in Physical Integrity Rights Abuse

Over at Political Violence @ a Glance, Reed Wood makes a strong argument that global respect for human rights, measured via the global mean of the Political Terror Scale, has not increased over time.  Amanda Murdie goes on to demonstrate that the same stability over time is present in the Physical Integrity Rights Index from the CIRI Human Rights … Read more

Quick Plug on New Pubs

Just some quick and dirty near-self-promotion. Michael Allen (Boise State) and Matthew DiGiuseppie (University of Mississippi)—both of whom are proud, card-carrying Binghamton PhDs—have a new piece on credit and alliance formation that is now available on International Studies Quarterly's early view. The link to the paper can be found here. Take a look. Michael FlynnMichael … Read more

Updates

Just a couple of links, comments, etc. Six seismologists in Italy have recently been convicted and sentenced to six years in prison (each) for issuing a "falsely reassuring statement" prior to the 2009 earthquake in L'Aquila, Italy (BBC Article). The seismologists have been charged with manslaughter over the deaths of over 300 people in the … Read more

Paul Ryan’s Foreign Policy Views

  Much has been made lately of the idea that Romney’s pick of Paul Ryan as VP signals that he is doubling down on the economy for the election. Ryan is clearly known more for his activities on the House Budget Committee than anything else, and that’s fine, but just because it’s a major signal … Read more

(Mis)Understanding Political Science and Some Other Stuff

Let me preface this by saying that I started writing this post a little while ago, so some of the content is a bit dated at this point. That said, over at the Duck, Steve Saideman has a post up that continues the ongoing discussion on political science, its utility, and its relationship with the … Read more