Most wars are not fought for reasons of security or material interests, but instead reflect a nation’s ‘spirit’

Why do nations decide to go to war? Based on the extensive study of inter-state wars since 1648, Richard Ned Lebow outlines his analysis of the motivations which underpin warfare. He finds that contrary to the expectations of most international relations theories, wars fought primarily for reasons of security, or material interests, have been relatively rare. Rather, motivations related to a nation’s ‘spirit’, such as the standing of a country or revenge, have been the principal causes of most wars

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Karl Deutsch and International Relations

In this article, I describe Karl Deutsch’s personal and political background and career and offer an assessment of him as a scholar, teacher, and mentor. </jats:p

Culture and international relations: the culture of international relations

In a response to my critics I further elaborate some of the concepts central to A Cultural Theory of International Relations. I explain why it is a cultural theory, as distinct from a theory of culture; the different levels of reason conceptualised by the Greeks and their utility in moving our thinking beyond the exclusive focus on instrumental rationality of modern social science; and Aristotle's concept of anger and its implications for the behaviour of the weak and the powerful. I justify my case selection and its Western bias, but defend the universality of my theory and its non-hegemonic application to the study of other cultures

Constitutive causality: imagined spaces and political practices

I explore alternate meanings of causation and the generic ways in which constitution can have causal consequences. I address the question of constitutive causality in the context of the debate about the rise of the territorial state. I evaluate claims linking its emergence and success to the prior development of linear perspective. To do this, I compare the spatial revolution that took place in the Renaissance with the one that began in the 19th century

Symbolic and cultural approaches to the origins of World War 1:Introduction

This forum offers a symbolic and cultural approach for understanding the outbreak of World War I that stresses the interactional and symbolic-cultural aspects of German decision makers’ brinkmanship during the July crisis of 1914. Contrary to excessive structuralist accounts, the contributions focus on what actors ‘do’ and ‘feel’ during a crisis. In the German–Austrian case, symbolic interactions during the July crisis were strongly marked by challenges to the ‘face’ of decision makers. The second theme of the Forum is to question the purely ‘material’ nature of those structures traditionally referred to as permissive for World War I. Structures, in fact, are symbolic, too. Like theories on status discrepancy, the Forum stresses the impact of ‘responsibility gaps’. However, the contributors also point to the emotional aspects and internal legitimacy problems caused precisely by those status lags. </jats:p

Lost in transition: a critical analysis of power transition theory

In this paper we identify and critique the key propositions of power transition theory. We find little support for any of power transition theory’s main empirical implications. Contrary to most versions of the theory, we fin d that the European and international systems almost never have been characterized by hegemony. No state has achieved a position that allowed it for any extended period to order the international system to suit its interests at the expense of the other major powers. Power transitions are remarkably rare, they seldom occur as the result of differential rates of economic growth, and have most often occurred peacefully. Power transitions are more often the results of wars, rather than the causes of them. Wars between rising and dominant powers are infrequent and are not waged by either side primarily in the effort to defend or revise the international order in their favor. Finally, we find that war rarely resolves the fundamental conflicts of interest caused by power transitions