Introduction

2017 ◽  
pp. 3-30
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Grimm Arsenault
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Research Methods ◽  
The United States ◽  
Legal Scholarship ◽  
Life Cycle Theory

This chapter introduces the research puzzle: How could the United States violate laws and norms that are so deeply internalized in its identity and practice? It then provides the argument, explains the relevance of norms on detainee treatment, provides a discussion of the norm life cycle theory, and outlines the research methods. Chapter 1 describes the contribution of this book to international relations and international legal scholarship as well as details the gaps in those disciplines.

Trust, but Verify

2016 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
East West

This book uses trust—with its emotional and predictive aspects—to explore international relations in the second half of the Cold War, beginning with the late 1960s. The détente of the 1970s led to the development of some limited trust between the United States and the Soviet Union, which lessened international tensions and enabled advances in areas such as arms control. However, it also created uncertainty in other areas, especially on the part of smaller states that depended on their alliance leaders for protection. The chapters in this volume look at how the “emotional” side of the conflict affected the dynamics of various Cold War relations: between the superpowers, within the two ideological blocs, and inside individual countries on the margins of the East–West confrontation.

The Rise and Fall of Great Powers

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geir Lundestad
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Nuclear Weapons ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Powers ◽  
Foreseeable Future ◽  
The West ◽  
Economic Modernization

There are no laws in history. Realists, liberals, and others are both right and wrong. Although no one can be certain that military incidents may not happen, for the foreseeable future China and the United States are unlikely to favor major war. They have cooperated well for almost four decades now. China is likely to continue to focus on its economic modernization. It has far to go to measure up to the West. The American-Chinese economies are still complementary. A conflict with the United States or even with China’s neighbors would have damaging repercussions for China’s economic goals. The United States is so strong that it would make little sense for China to take it on militarily. There are also other deterrents against war, from nuclear weapons to emerging norms about international relations. It is anybody’s guess what will happen after the next few decades. History indicates anything is possible.

Specters of Belonging

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrián Félix
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Life Cycle ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Life ◽  
The Political ◽  
Mexican Migrants ◽  
Mexican State ◽  
Mexico Border ◽  
Mexican Migrant ◽  
Transnational Citizenship

In the context of research on the “thickening” of borders, Specters of Belonging raises the related question: How does transnational citizenship thicken across the political life cycle of Mexican migrants? In addressing this question, this book resembles what any good migration corrido (ballad) does—narrate the thickening of transnational citizenship from beginning, middle, to end. Specifically, Specters of Belonging traces Mexican migrant transnationalism across the migrant political life cycle, beginning with the “political baptism” (i.e., naturalization in the United States) and ending with repatriation to México after death. In doing so, the book illustrates how Mexican migrants enunciate, enact, and embody transnational citizenship in constant dialectical contestation with the state and institutions of citizenship on both sides of the U.S.-México border. Drawing on political ethnographies of citizenship classrooms, the first chapter examines how Mexican migrants enunciate transnational citizenship as they navigate the naturalization process in the United States and grapple with the contradictions of U.S. citizenship and its script of singular political loyalty. The middle chapter deploys transnational ethnography to analyze how Mexican migrants enact transnational citizenship within the clientelistic orbit of the Mexican state, focusing on a group of returned migrant politicians and transnational activists. Last, the final chapter turns to how Mexican migrants embody transnational citizenship by tracing the cross-border practice of repatriating the bodies of deceased Mexican migrants from the United States to their communities of origin in rural México.

The Struggle for Recognition in International Relations

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle Murray
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
International Relations ◽  
The United States ◽  
Great Power ◽  
Power Transition ◽  
Rising Powers ◽  
Peaceful Rise ◽  
Rising Power ◽  
Struggle For Recognition ◽  
Power Transitions

How can established powers manage the peaceful rise of new great powers? With The Struggle for Recognition in International Relations, the author offers a new answer to this perennial question in international relations, arguing that power transitions are principally social phenomena whereby rising powers struggle to obtain recognition of their identity as a great power. At the center of great power identity formation is the acquisition of particular symbolic capabilities—such as battlesheips, aircraft carriers, or nuclear weapons—that are representative of great power status and that allow rising powers to experience their uncertain social status as a brute fact. When a rising power is recognized, this power acquisition is considered legitimate and its status in the international order secured, leading to a peaceful power transition. If a rising power is misrecognized, its assertive foreign policy is perceived to be for revisionist purposes, which must be contained by the established powers. Revisionism—rather than the product of a material power structure that encourages aggression or domestic political struggles—is a social construct that emerges through a rising power’s social interactions with the established powers as it attempts to gain recognition of its identity. The question of peaceful power transition has taken on increased salience in recent years with the emergence of China as an economic and military rival of the United States. Highlighting the social dynamics of power transitions, this book offers a powerful new framework through which to understand the rise of China and how the United States can facilitate its peaceful rise.

scholarly journals Introduction to the Special Issue: Soft Power of Civil Society in International Relations

2012 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 473-476
Author(s):  
TAKASHI INOGUCHI
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Policy Makers

This special issue focuses on the role of civil society in international relations. It highlights the dynamics and impacts of public opinion on international relations (Zaller, 1992). Until recently, it was usual to consider public opinion in terms of its influence on policy makers and in terms of moulding public opinion in the broad frame of the policy makers in one's country. Given that public opinion in the United States was assessed and judged so frequently and diffused so globally, it was natural to frame questions guided by those concepts which pertained to the global and domestic context of the United States.

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