When the Third World Matters
When the Third World Matters

Author: Michael Charles Desch

Publisher:

Published: 1993

Total Pages: 240

ISBN-13:

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The role of third world countries in the grand strategies of great countries has always been uncertain. Having a low GNP, and consequently little real or latent military power, third world nations were considered unimportant from a military point of view. Yet great powers have traditionally been deeply involved in the periphery. Political scientist Michael Desch resolves this paradox, arguing that such areas can be of key importance for a variety of reasons. His discussion of the role third world nations can play in strategic matters is of particular relevance to developments in the post-Cold War world. When the Third World Matters examines U.S. strategy relating to Latin America at four critical points in history: World War I, World War II, the Cuban missile crisis, and the later Cold War. Desch shows how areas that appeared to have no inherent strategic interests nonetheless proved significant, either as a stopping point or entry way to some other, strategically important, area or as a foil to direct a rival power's attention from the main theater of action. The lessons learned from these cases, he argues, are of particular relevance to the making of U.S. post-Cold War strategy elsewhere in the third world - in Africa, the Middle East, or South Asia.

Cult of the Irrelevant
Cult of the Irrelevant

Author: Michael Desch

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2021-09-28

Total Pages: 364

ISBN-13: 069122899X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

How professionalization and scholarly “rigor” made social scientists increasingly irrelevant to US national security policy To mobilize America’s intellectual resources to meet the security challenges of the post–9/11 world, US Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates observed that “we must again embrace eggheads and ideas.” But the gap between national security policymakers and international relations scholars has become a chasm. In Cult of the Irrelevant, Michael Desch traces the history of the relationship between the Beltway and the Ivory Tower from World War I to the present day. Recounting key Golden Age academic strategists such as Thomas Schelling and Walt Rostow, Desch’s narrative shows that social science research became most oriented toward practical problem-solving during times of war and that scholars returned to less relevant work during peacetime. Social science disciplines like political science rewarded work that was methodologically sophisticated over scholarship that engaged with the messy realities of national security policy, and academic culture increasingly turned away from the job of solving real-world problems. In the name of scientific objectivity, academics today frequently engage only in basic research that they hope will somehow trickle down to policymakers. Drawing on the lessons of this history as well as a unique survey of current and former national security policymakers, Desch offers concrete recommendations for scholars who want to shape government work. The result is a rich intellectual history and an essential wake-up call to a field that has lost its way.