Articles

Domestic politics play a significant role in nuclear decisionmaking under two conditions: when uncertainty over the nature and intensity of a threat is high, and when leaders are incentivized to centralize nuclear policymaking.

Michael C. Horowitz and Shahryar Pasandideh respond to Andrea Gilli and Mauro Gilli’s winter 2018/19 article, “Why China Has Not Caught Up Yet: Military-Technological Superiority and the Limits of Imitation, Reverse Engineering, and Cyber Espionage.”

Several prominent accounts suggest that democratic transitions are more likely to take place when opposition to the incumbent regime is led by certain social groups. The authors further develop the argument that opposition movements dominated by industrial workers or the urban middle classes have both the requisite motivation and capacity to bring about democratization. Their study shows that when further differentiating the groups and accounting for plausible alternative explanations, the relationship between industrial worker campaigns and democratization is very robust, whereas the evidence is mixed for middle-class campaigns.

Nathaniel Moir reviews Democracy in Exile: Hans Speier and the Rise of the Defense Intellectual by Daniel Bessner.  He concludes that the book shows how and why it is important to think carefully about democracy and the role scholars and intellectuals contribute to its survival.

In an article published Oct. 23 in Sciences Advances, "The Science of Contemporary Street Protest: New Efforts in the United States," HKS Professor Erica Chenoweth, UConn Professor Jeremy Pressman, and their colleagues outline the challenges and limitations associated with studying protests scientifically on a large scale.

Since the inauguration of Donald Trump, there has been substantial and ongoing protest against the Administration. Street demonstrations are some of the most visible forms of opposition to the Administration and its policies. This article reviews the two most central methods for studying street protest on a large scale: building comprehensive event databases and conducting field surveys of participants at demonstrations. After discussing the broader development of these methods, this article provides a detailed assessment of recent and ongoing projects studying the current wave of contention.

Nathaniel Moir reviews  Jungle Mission by René Riesen. He writes that Jungle Mission exemplifies applied history.  For armed forces engaging with diverse cultures, this book provides an individual precedent and useful analogies that illuminate contemporary problems where cultural intelligence is critical.

Stephen Herzog reviews Asia's Regional Architecture: Alliances and Institutions in the Pacific Century by Andrew Yeo. He concludes that Yeo has written a book with indisputable value for understanding international cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region. 

The authors highlight why resolving double counting — counting the same emission reduction more than once to achieve climate mitigation targets — is critical for achieving the goals of the Paris Agreement and identify essential ingredients for a robust outcome that ensures environmental effectiveness and facilitates cost-effective mitigation.

The Atlantic published a chapter from Susan Rice's new book Tough Love: My Story of the Things Worth Fighting For. We include here an excerpt from The Atlantic.