Our Experts in the News
What Comes Next? A Lesson from Saigon
August 20, 2021
Rather than marking the eclipse of American power, withdrawal from Vietnam coincided with its spectacular increase.
Michael C. Desch is the Packey J. Dee Professor of International Affairs and Director of the Notre Dame International Security Center.
The Real Source of America’s Rising Rage
August 02, 2021
A mountain of evidence suggests that the American predilection for conspiracy theories is neither new nor growing. Joseph Uscinski and Joseph Parent, preeminent scholars of conspiracy theories, confirmed this with some original research based on letters to the editors of the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune between 1890 and 2010. Their conclusion: Belief in conspiracy theories has been stable since about 1960.
USA Today
Fact check: Claims that VP Kamala Harris refused to salute the military are missing context
March 27, 2021
Michael Desch, a professor of political science and the director of the Notre Dame International Security Center, told USA TODAY that until President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, "it was not common for the president, or other Cabinet officials, but especially the president, to return hand salutes."
Could China's Belt and Road Lead to Its Undoing?
March 14, 2021
Connectivity is politically neutral; it only accelerates and amplifies underlying trends. The same roads Rome built to conquer the world allowed the world to sack Rome.
Joseph M. Parent is Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame,and Co-Director of the Hans J. Morgenthau Program on Grand Strategy. He is the author of Uniting States: Voluntary Union in World Politics, and coauthor of Twilight of the Titans: Great Power Decline and Retrenchment.
What We Are Reading Today: Promoting Peace with Information by Dan Lindley
February 28, 2021
The more adversaries understand each other’s intentions and capabilities, the thinking goes, the less likely they are to be led to war by miscalculations and unwarranted fears. But how is transparency provided, how does it actually work, and how effective is it in preserving or restoring peace? In Promoting Peace with Information, Dan Lindley provides the first scholarly answer to these important questions, says a review on the Princeton University Press website.
The Wall Street Journal
An American Belt and Road Initiative?
February 17, 2021
China is funding massive projects all over the world, and gaining influence. The U.S. can do the same.
Jim Webb is the Distinguished Fellow at Notre Dame’s International Security Center. He served as Navy secretary (1987-88) and a Democratic U.S. senator from Virginia (2007-13).
None of the Above Podcast: Militarizing Public Health? (ft. Eugene Gholz)
December 08, 2020
Multiple promising vaccines for the coronavirus are nearing FDA approval, and the United States is gearing up for widespread vaccination. While the beginning of the end of the coronavirus crisis is in sight, the effect of the virus on international politics remains less clear. This week, the Eurasia Group Foundation’s Mark Hannah is joined by defense procurement and national security expert Dr. Eugene Gholz. They discuss what role the military should (and shouldn’t) play in distributing the vaccine and the complicated history of the Defense Production Act. They also explore the geopolitical impact of the coronavirus on the U.S.-China relationship, and its implications for a more restrained U.S. foreign policy.
FactChecking Trump’s Fox News Interview
September 02, 2020
Trump recently approved plans to reduce the number of troops in Germany by 9,500 (from about 34,500), but not all of them will be coming home. According to Joseph Parent, a professor of international relations at the University of Notre Dame, roughly half of them are being redeployed within Europe, and the other half would return to the U.S. — “but that has not yet been approved.”