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1. A Roundtable on Christopher Dietrich, A Companion to U.S. Foreign Relations

Author:
Thomas W. Zeiler, Grant Madsen, Lauren F. Turek, and Christopher Dietrich
Publication Date:
04-2021
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (SHAFR)
Abstract:
When David Anderson, acting as a conduit for editors at the Journal of American History, approached me at a SHAFR meeting in 2007 to write a state-of- the-field essay, I accepted, in part because we were sitting in a bar where I was happily consuming. The offer came with a responsibility to the field. I was serving as an editor of our journal, Diplomatic History, as well as the editor of the digitized version of our bibliography, American Foreign Relations Since 1600: A Guide to the Literature. Because these positions allowed me to survey our vibrant field, accepting the offer seemed natural. And I was honored to be asked to represent us. Did I mention we were drinking? I’m sure that Chris Dietrich accepted the invitation to oversee this next-gen pioneering Companion volume from Peter Coveney, a long-time editorial guru and booster of our field at Wiley-Blackwell, for similar reasons. This, even though there were times when, surrounded by books and articles and reviews that piled up to my shoulders in my office (yes, I read in paper, mostly), I whined, cursed, and, on occasion, wept about the amount of sources. What kept me going was not only how much I learned about the field, including an appreciation for great scholarship written through traditional and new approaches, but both the constancy and transformations over the years, much of it due to pressure from beyond SHAFR that prompted internal reflections. Vigorous debate, searing critiques, sensitive adaptation, and bold adoption of theory and methods had wrought a revolution in the field of U.S. diplomatic history, a moniker itself deemed outmoded.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, History, and Diplomatic History
Political Geography:
United States and Global Focus

2. Toward an Inclusive & Balanced Regional Order: A New U.S. Strategy in East Asia

Author:
Michael D. Swaine, Jessica J. Lee, and Rachel Esplin Odell
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
The world faces twin crises — a global pandemic and rising climate chaos — even as an epochal change in the balance of power unfolds in East Asia. In response to these trends, the United States has doubled down on efforts to contain a rising China and maintain its eroding military dominance in the region. Simultaneously, it has neglected economic engagement and diplomatic cooperation with East Asian nations, thereby undermining its ability to manage the Covid–19 pandemic and the climate change challenge. This failed approach is directly harming the interests of the American people.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Regional Cooperation, Military Strategy, and International Order
Political Geography:
United States and East Asia

3. Toward an Inclusive Security Arrangement in the Persian Gulf

Author:
Trita Parsi
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
• Abandon dominance. For many of the United States’ security partners, even a dysfunctional Pax Americana is preferable to the compromises that a security architecture would inevitably entail. The preconditions for creating a successful security architecture can emerge only if the United States begins a military withdrawal from the Persian Gulf and credibly signals it no longer seeks to sustain hegemony. • Encourage regional dialogue, but let the region lead. The incoming Biden administration’s hint that it will seek an inclusive security dialogue in the Persian Gulf is a welcome first step toward shifting the burden of security to the regional states themselves. For such an effort to be successful, the United States should play a supporting role while urging regional states to take the lead. • Include other major powers. The regional dialogue should include the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and major Asian powers with a strong interest in stability in the Persian Gulf. Including them can help dilute Washington’s and Beijing’s roles while protecting the region from inter–Asian rivalries in the future.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, National Security, United Nations, Military Strategy, Hegemony, Military Affairs, and Grand Strategy
Political Geography:
United States, Iran, and Persian Gulf

4. The Dominance Dilemma: The American Approach to NATO and its Future

Author:
Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
Despite the Biden administration’s push to revitalize U.S. alliances, U.S. relations with NATO are due for a reset. The United States should incentivize European members of NATO to take on additional responsibilities for their defense. Encouraging the European allies to take initiative will help the United States focus on its other domestic and international priorities and may facilitate improving relations with Russia. This approach will also prove attractive to European states concerned about the future direction of U.S. foreign policy. Recalibrating the U.S. role in Europe would conform with the United States’ post–World War II efforts to stabilize European security — and stand as the fruit of Washington’s success in this regard.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, NATO, International Security, Military Strategy, Military Affairs, and Alliance
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and Global Focus

5. Responsible Statecraft Requires Remaking America’s Foreign Relations Tool Kit

Author:
Gordon Adams
Publication Date:
02-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
To meet today’s foreign policy challenges, the United States needs to end its overreliance on military superiority and intervention and instead put creative and persistent diplomacy in the lead to promote locally owned solutions to national, bilateral, and regional security issues and to address global challenges not amenable to military force. This rebalancing will not succeed if civilian statecraft is dysfunctional and unprepared. More funding and more diplomats will not solve this problem. What is needed is fundamental reform of structures, processes, and personnel practices, particularly at the State Department. These include strategic planning, resource planning, institutional integration, clear authority over security assistance programs, and moving away from nation-building and toward conflict prevention. Far-reaching changes in the way diplomats are recruited, trained, and promoted are also required. Without such changes, there is substantial risk that our diplomatic tools will be ineffective, resulting in even greater militarization of U.S. foreign policy when diplomacy fails.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Regional Cooperation, International Security, Bilateral Relations, Military Affairs, Grand Strategy, Alliance, and Statecraft
Political Geography:
United States

6. De-Risking the India Relationship: An Action Agenda for the United States

Author:
Sarang Shidore
Publication Date:
03-2021
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
In the wake of a sharp deterioration in U.S.–China and India–China relations, there is an increasing emphasis in U.S. relations with India on military-to-military ties and bloc formation over other forms of relationship-building. Washington is steadily militarizing the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or “Quad,” a four-member security group that is intended to counter Beijing, of which New Delhi is a member. This, combined with India’s stalled economy and the outlook for longer-term post-pandemic weakness, is accentuating a risk-prone asymmetry in U.S.–India relations. There also remain key divergences in the specifics of U.S. and Indian interests, even on the question of countering China. Over-militarized U.S.–India relations could help push Asia closer to a paradigm of military blocs, frontline states, and zero-sum games, while also planting seeds for a nationalist backlash against the United States in South Asia as a whole. The United States should therefore reorient its vital partnership with India according to these four recommendations: Limit the relationship’s increasing militarization and instead emphasize nontraditional areas of security cooperation such as climate change and peacekeeping, which lend themselves to inclusion rather than exclusion. The Quad should be returned to its original political-normative focus; Create conditions favorable to India’s comprehensive development, particularly in the energy, environmental, and supply-chain spaces, as a lower-risk path toward catalyzing a multipolar Asia; Drop demands on India to scale back ties with U.S. adversaries such as Russia and Iran; Resist the temptation to use India as a force-multiplier to pressure smaller South Asian states as to their global alignments.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Military Strategy, and Alliance
Political Geography:
United States and India

7. Nothing Much to Do: Why America Can Bring All Troops Home From the Middle East

Author:
Eugene Gholz
Publication Date:
06-2021
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft
Abstract:
U.S. interests in the Middle East are often defined expansively, contributing to an overinflation of the perceived need for a large U.S. military footprint. While justifications like countering terrorism, defending Israel, preventing nuclear proliferation, preserving stability, and protecting human rights deserve consideration, none merit the current level of U.S. troops in the region; in some cases, the presence of the U.S. military actually undermines these concerns.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, War, Military Affairs, Military Intervention, War on Terror, and Troop Deployment
Political Geography:
United States and Middle East

8. Fall 2020 edition of Strategic Visions

Author:
Alan McPherson
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Strategic Visions
Institution:
Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, Temple University
Abstract:
Contents News from the Director Fall 2020 Lecture Series ……………2 Fall 2020 Prizes …………………….3 Funding and the Immerman Fund ….3 Note from the Davis Fellow …………4 Temple Community Interviews Dr. Joel Blaxland …………………5 Dr. Kaete O’Connell ……………….6 Jared Pentz ………………………….7 Brian McNamara …………………8 Keith Riley …………………………9 Book Reviews Kissinger and Latin America: Intervention, Human Rights, and Diplomacy Review by Graydon Dennison …10 America’s Middlemen: Power at the Edge of Empire Review by Ryan Langton ……13 Anthropology, Colonial Policy and the Decline of French Empire in Africa Review by Grace Anne Parker ...16 Latin America and the Global Cold War Review by Casey VanSise ……19
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Human Rights, Military Intervention, and Empire
Political Geography:
United States, France, Latin America, and Global Focus

9. Spring 2021 edition of Strategic Visions

Author:
Alan McPherson
Publication Date:
04-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Strategic Visions
Institution:
Center for the Study of Force and Diplomacy, Temple University
Abstract:
Contents News from the Director Colloquium………………………..2 CENFAD sponsored lectures……...3 Prizes………………………………4 CENFAD Workshop………………4 Thanks to the Davis Fellow……….5 News from the CENFAD Community…6 Note from the Davis Fellow……………9 Book Reviews A Wall of Our Own: An American History of the Berlin Wall Review by Brandon Kinney…..11 Civil Aviation and the Globalization of the Cold War Review by Michael Fischer…..13 Imperial Metropolis: Los Angeles, Mexico, and the Borderlands of American Empire, 1865–1941 Review by Amanda Summers..15 Educating the Empire: American Teachers and Contested Colonization in the Philippines Review by Madison Ingram…17 Fantasy Island: Colonialism, Exploitation, and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico Review by Graydon Dennison..19 Beatriz Allende: A Revolutionary Life in Latin America Review by Michael Onufrak….21
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Cold War, Military Affairs, Empire, Diplomatic History, and Statecraft
Political Geography:
United States, Philippines, Germany, Latin America, Global Focus, and Puerto Rico

10. How Syria Changed Turkey’s Foreign Policy

Author:
Francesco Siccardi
Publication Date:
09-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
Between August 2016 and the present, Turkey has launched four military operations in northern Syria. Each operation has served specific objectives and was designed to respond to rapidly changing scenarios on the ground. It is possible to identify the key priorities that have informed Turkey’s Syria policy over the years. Boiled down to its core, the Turkish government’s activism in Syria has been driven by domestic politics and has helped Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) preserve power. Domestically, Ankara has used the Syrian conflict as a pretext to suppress the rights of the Kurds living in Turkey and limit their parliamentary representation to secure a landmark constitutional reform in 2017. In the following years, successive military operations in Syria have helped Erdoğan connect with increasingly nationalistic constituencies and drum up support around key electoral dates. Finally, after the failed coup in July 2016, the Turkish government’s Syria policy played a major role in rebuilding the credibility of the Turkish Armed Forces while redrawing the balance between civilian and military power. In foreign policy terms, Turkey’s military operations in Syria have resulted in increasingly tense relations with the United States. Washington’s support for the Syrian Kurds has alienated Ankara to an extent that U.S. policymakers failed to anticipate. The thorniest topic of the day in the U.S.-Turkey bilateral relation—Ankara’s decision to deploy the Russian S-400 missile system—is also deeply related to the Syrian crisis. This decision was made in the context of a strategic realignment between Turkey and Russia that has helped both countries pursue their respective objectives in Syria: the survival of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad’s regime for Moscow and the weakening of the Syrian Kurds for Ankara. Finally, Ankara’s involvement in Syria has also given Turkey new leverage over the EU when it comes to the management of refugee flows. Solving the question of Syrian refugees in Turkey has been a priority of the Turkish government since the early stages of the Syrian civil war—and a main driver of Ankara’s policies toward both Syria and the EU. Overall, Ankara’s involvement in Syria has not only been a source of conflict—or rapprochement—with its traditional partners and neighbors across the region. It has also equipped Turkey with new tools for conducting a more aggressive, nationalistic foreign policy. The strategies Turkey has employed in Syria have boosted the country’s image and international role. These operations have secured a seat for Turkey at the negotiating table with Russia and the United States. Ankara has used these tools, these lessons learned, and its new capabilities to inform its revisionist foreign policy posture. Going forward, and with an eye on the country’s 2023 presidential election, Turkey will continue to use these tools to reinforce its position in the international arena.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, European Union, Syrian War, and Military
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria