For most of modern history, the Arctic has been a geopolitical anomaly — an economically, strategically, and environmentally vital region governed primarily through diplomacy and institutionalism, not power politics. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, however, looks to have shifted the regional paradigm. Moscow’s diplomatic and economic decomposition has created a golden opportunity for China – a...
Review of Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict with China by Hal Brands and Michael Beckley (New York, NY: Norton and Company, 2022). America must take decisive action in the coming decade to remain the dominant global power. As China seeks to establish itself as a global hegemon bent on undermining the American-led order, the West...
During the Cold War, developing countries watched the United States benefit from four-and-a-half decades of technological productivity, economic cooperation with Western Europe, and a consensus over major foreign policy objectives. Today’s race for geopolitical superiority, however, looks radically different. Middle powers will refuse to choose between the United States and its principal adversaries; rather, they...
The current epoch is characterized by both promise and peril. This is an age of relative peace, with the stabilizing influence of the American-made and -led liberal international order preventing the recurrence of great power war since 1945. [1] This peace, coupled with economic liberalization in nations like China and India, has lifted over one...
The United States, in its accelerating competition with the People’s Republic of China, faces an adversary with a superior defense industrial capacity. Shipbuilding alone is indicative of this broader disparity: the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy is the largest naval force in the world with 340 ships, and it is expected to boast 440 ships...
The question of government intervention in the economy and business has long occupied American economists, businessmen, and lawmakers. Does the government have a duty to ensure the competitiveness of American firms? Does national security trump wealth and free trade? Since the 1980s, messages based on individual liberty and prosperity have established that businesses were better...
According to the world’s great powers, sovereignty – the right to impose law and make war and peace – remains the exclusive privilege of the territorial nation-state. Even amid the troubles of post-colonial and post-imperial rule, states assert that they alone may order the space within their borders — whether on land or in the...
The term restrainer calls to mind many different images: on one hand, a group of anti-war activists disillusioned by American failures in Iraq and Afghanistan; on the other, a cohort of ivory tower academics with years of experience immersing themselves in the study of international relations. Most restrainers are usually somewhere in between these archetypes....
Russian President Vladimir Putin has pointed directly to his imperial ambitions as the purpose of the war in Ukraine. The question of what caused the war is vital, because any answer would include a claim about who Putin really is, which is necessary to understand the path to success. In assessing the nature of their...
In the years since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the liberal democratic world has become complacent. Challenges from both the political Left and Right have brought infighting and disunity to adrift Western societies. However, this directionlessness was shattered by Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine again in early 2022. The Eastern European resistance to...
