Recent News and Activities -- Prof. Joshua S. Goldstein
Updated Feb. 3, 2010
Recent Books:
International Relations (Pearson Longman), 9th Edition and 5th Brief Editions in print. The 2010-2011 Update edition (for Fall 2010 use), is in print as of March 2010, and includes a new insert section
on Global Challenges in 2030 containing eight essays each written by a well-known IR professor:
Joe Nye, Beth Simmons, Shibley Telhami, John Ruggie, Charli Carpenter, Andy Moravcsik, Dan Drezner, and Michael Doyle.
Principles of International Relations (Pearson Longman, July 2008).
As authors of the top-selling introductory IR textbook, Jon Pevehouse and I have realized that
professors like to teach this course in many different ways. For those who do not use a textbook,
but want a short, affordable book to cover the essential concepts and principles, this new book
fills the bill. About 225 pages long, it covers
all the major theories in the field and includes many graphics, but no color, photos, or pedagogical
features (such as text boxes and glossaries). ISBN 0-205-65266-2.
Current Major Research Interest -- Decline of War:
Most of my time these days is going into a new book project about the decreasing number and size of wars
worldwide -- Winning the War on War: The Untold Story of Peace Increasing around the World.
The book is more than half drafted by not yet close to completion. I hope to finish the manuscript in 2010 and shop it
around to publishers.
I published an Op Ed on the
subject a few years ago, and met with the
Conflict Data Project staff
in Uppsala, Sweden in Dec. 2007. They are an impressive group and are the primary source for all of us tracking
the ups and downs of the world's armed conflicts. In January 2010 I met with the researchers at PRIO in Oslo,
Norway to discuss the ups and downs of armed conflict.
I chaired a panel at the ISA conference in New York in February 2009 on
"The Decline of War? Empirical and Causal Arguments." This was a chance to get the major researchers
on this topic together in one place. Participants included Bruce Russett, Andrew Mack, Nils Petter Gleditsch,
Joseph Hewitt, Peter Wallensteen, Neta Crawford, John Mueller, and Karin Fierke.
Abstract: The claimed recent trend toward fewer and smaller wars worldwide has generated intense interest among IR scholars, including a strongly attended panel at the 2007 ISA convention and the Gleditsch presidential address at the 2008 meeting. This roundtable will bring together the leading researchers working on this topic from 5 countries to review the current state of knowledge. Presenters will discuss the reality and reliability of the trend and its putative causes ranging from changing norms to international institutions, democracy and economic growth. The session should develop closer cooperation among scholars from North America and Northern Europe, and enhance ties among the four leading centers publishing reports on this topic (Uppsala University, International Peace Research Institute Oslo, Simon Fraser University, and the University of Maryland).
With Neta Crawford, I co-chaired an all-day
conference May 5 at CCNY in memory of my friend
Randy Forsberg on the subject of "the end of
war." The program is here.
Other News:
My article "On Asterisk Inflation" about standards of statistical significance in political science,
is in PS, January 2010. I sent copies to the main political science journal editors.
In Fall 2008 I was a visiting professor emeritus at Yale and taught a graduate course on Theories of International Relations for Masters students.
I was on a roundtable about Hayward R. Alker (my dissertation advisor)
at the International Studies Association conference
in San Francisco, March 2008. I chaired a panel at a conference in memory of Hayward at the Watson
Institute at Brown University, June 6-7, 2008.
In April 2008 I participated in a day-long conference on deterrence at the
University of Maryland, organized by Shibley Telhami and Thomas Schelling.
University of Maryland -- I am Nonresident Sadat Senior Fellow, at the
Center for International Development and Conflict Management. I have been helping
Shibley Telhami, holder of the
Sadat Chair for Peace and Development, with analysis and presentation of fascinating data from
public opinion polls taken in six Arab countries over recent years. This appointment has also
let me visit the university and dabble in some other projects there from time to time.
I have a chapter on Chicken games in international negotiations in
a forthcoming volume on cooperation edited by William Zartman and Saadia Touval (Cambridge U. Press).
War and Gender:
On April 15, 2010 I will be talking about the history and recent experiences of women
soldiers, at the Kennedy School at Harvard.
In January 2010 I traveled to Oslo, Norway to give a keynote address at a
conference on gender sponsored by the Norwegian Armed Forces, "Gender in military operations:
Why it matters and how it should be done." I also gave a talk on gender and war at PRIO.
I wrote a short article on "Female Combatants" for the forthcoming
Encyclopedia of War edited by Gordon Martel (Wiley Blackwell).
December 2007 -- I was the keynote speaker at the final conference
of the Genderforce project
in Sweden, an amazing collaboration of the Swedish armed forces,
police, rescue services, and a foundation. I loved talking about gender to a big room filled
with as many men as women and including top military commanders. I learned that for military
officers, the reasons for understanding gender are "operational effectiveness" and "force protection."
I organized a visit by the gender advisor to Sweden's armed forces (founder of Genderforce),
Charlotte Isaksson, at Harvard July 18, 2008. Cynthia Enloe, Carol Cohn, Katharine Moon, and others
contributed to a lively exchange of ideas.
Details here.
April 2007 -- I was keynote speaker at a European Union conference in Budapest
on gender in
the EU's security and defense policy. The EU does a lot of peacekeeping but we also had
interesting discussions of lessons the United States is learning about gender during its stay in Iraq.
In the August 2007 issue of International Studies Perspectives, I participated
in a forum on "Mainstreaming gender into the IR curriculum," organized by Charli Carpenter.
During its first three years I served on the editorial board of the new APSA journal, Politics
and Gender.
Stress Reduction:
Relax and take a few deep breaths while looking at the
view from my office window.
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