International Security at 25: From One World to Another

Abstract

The modern field of international security studies is roughly half a century old. It emerged after World War II and took hold in the 1950s. The journal International Security has spanned half that period, having now completed twenty-five years of publication. During that time, the world and the field have changed dramatically. We are not in the habit of utilizing the pages of this journal for introspective or self-referential ruminations, but it seems appropriate to mark the passage of a quarter-century with some reflections on the history of the journal, the evolution of the field within which it operates, and the altered world that the field seeks to understand, explain, and perhaps even influence. Here, the aim is simply to sketch suggestive snapshots of then and now, in the hope of conveying the magnitude and character of the changes that a quarter of a century has wrought. This exercise provides the opportunity to revisit some of the issues and articles that have justified and animated the pages of International Security over its first twenty-five years.