Articles

In recent years, a concerted effort has been made to build up and delineate a discipline of applied history. But there has been little discussion about what applied history is, how the discipline navigates a range of epistemological problems, and how applied history is distinct from other disciplines that use historical data and attend to matters of policy—particularly political science. This article considers some of these questions with respect to two common methods of applied history: analogy and genealogy.

Atonement is an apology and reparations payments from one state to another for mass atrocities and other human rights abuses. The only case of atonement so far is that of West Germany and Israel in 1952. The West German decision to atone for the Holocaust was neither a moral choice nor the result of U.S. pressure. Instead, both countries saw atonement as politically expedient.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has gone too far with his challenging of Greece's sovereignty and territorial waters, former US Ambassador to Greece Nicholas Burns told the online 31st annual Greek Economic Summit of the American-Hellenic Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday.

Why did Russia’s relations with the West shift from cooperation a few decades ago to a new era of confrontation today? Tracing the causal influence of domestic determinants—individuals (President Vladimir Putin), ideas (Putinism), and institutions (autocracy)—reveals Putin’s significant influence in the making of Russian foreign policy.

President Trump’s grand plan to invite Kosovo’s President Hashim Thaci and Serbia’s Aleksandar Vucic to meet at the White House on June 27 may be falling apart before it begins, after the Kosovo Specialist Chambers announced on Wednesday indictments against Thaci and others on war crimes charges.

Is indiscriminate loyalty what allies want? The First Taiwan Strait Crisis (1954–55) case suggests that allies do not desire U.S. loyalty in all situations. Instead, they want the United States to be a reliable ally, posing no risk of abandonment or entrapment.

Unlike state sponsors, which value proxies primarily for their military utility, nonstate sponsors use proxies mainly for their perceived political value. An analysis of three case studies—al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, the People’s Protection Units in Syria, and Hezbollah in Lebanon—illustrates this argument.

Le piège de Thucydides se met en place quand une puissance émergente vient défier la puissance régnante. Ainsi hier Athènes face à Sparte. Et peut-être demain Pékin face à Washington. Telle est la thèse de Graham Allison, professeur émérite à Harvard et conseiller de plusieurs secrétaires d'État à la Défense, dans son livre devenu un best-seller mondial.

(The Thucydides Trap takes place when an emerging power threatens to displace a ruling one. Long ago, in antiquity, it was Athens against Sparta. But tomorrow, it could be Beijing against Washington. Such is the argument made by Graham Allison, emeritus professor at Harvard and advisor to several Secretaries of Defense, in his best-selling book Destined for War: Can America and China Escape the Thucydides Trap? - This English translation from original French by Christian Gibbons, Belfer Center)