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| Srl | Item |
| 1 |
ID:
193167
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| Summary/Abstract |
The history of strategic thought is well trodden ground, but has not been approached from a fashion perspective. This article focuses on the issue of engagement among intellectual fashions by examining how events may lead observers to believe that established, long cycle ways of thinking have become partially, if not wholly, inapt, thereby leading to an uncertain and perhaps incomprehensible strategic environment. Newer, revisionist but often short-lived concepts emerge as a consequence, variously complementary to, despite, or in direct repudiation of longer-lived concepts or theories. This dynamic is examined through the interaction between Clausewitzian and competing fashions.
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| 2 |
ID:
193168
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| Summary/Abstract |
The counterinsurgency era that dominated American military discussion post-9/11 has passed. The desire to move on, particularly since the loss of Afghanistan in August 2021, has left unsettled a conversation on counterinsurgency that, both among supporters and detractors, was often dangerously narrow. Too hastily embraced and too rapidly abandoned, counterinsurgency generated false promises and then became the scapegoat for poor strategy. This article examines the counterinsurgency era that was and demonstrates how fad-like engagement with the topic in both military and academic circles subverted the supposed learning process taking place. It argues that the lessons from this engagement are mostly misleading or at least incomplete, but it also notes that there is minimal appetite to look deeper into a topic now deemed toxic. Therein lies significant danger.
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| 3 |
ID:
193166
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| Summary/Abstract |
The relationship between Strategic Studies and the American academy has always been a tenuous one. Tolerated when fully funded, the field quickly lost its place on campus when it failed to attract grant money. Only with the support of philanthropic foundations did it manage to gain a foothold in American universities. What emerges from our investigation is how the field has feasted during times when foundation money was available and suffered periods of famine when these funds were withdrawn. In addition, we show that during and immediately after the Cold War, the political interests of philanthropic foundations were broadly balanced. By contrast, over the last two decades, the field has been increasingly linked to financial support provided by politically right-leaning foundations. This is happening while funding from more centrist and left-leaning foundations has become much less prominent. When looking ahead at the field’s future health, we cannot but help be concerned about the implications of this development.
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| 4 |
ID:
193170
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| Summary/Abstract |
The ‘hybrid warfare’ concept had been coined years earlier, but became fashionable only when it was adopted and adapted by NATO in 2014, after which academic interest suddenly sky-rocketed. Academics often adopted NATO’s understanding of the concept, took for granted its fit for Russian actions, and imported its political assumptions into the academic debate. The fashionability of the term also led to bandwagoning and thus superficial engagement with both the concept and the phenomenon it was applied to. This article outlines this process and its implications for the field of Strategic Studies.
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| 5 |
ID:
193171
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| Summary/Abstract |
Given the size of the community and the constant flow of new issues and potential security challenges, strategic studies can lend itself to surges of interest in particular topics that then fade into irrelevance, speculative investigations that lead nowhere, or intensive research projects that produce banal conclusions. The durability of much of the research may turn out to be short yet there is still enough that is of value, including insights into the behaviour of organisations and states, concepts that help structure thinking on a range of issues, as well as timely and well-judged policy guidance.
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| 6 |
ID:
193169
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| Summary/Abstract |
This article explores the fashion/popularity of the idea that the exercise of cyber power is a form of warfare. Specifically, the article explains the recent decline of the cyber warfare fashion in academia and discusses its implications for strategic studies. To achieve this, we synthesize observations from previous studies with new quantitative and qualitative data. The article contributes to a growing body of literature by tracing and explaining the history of a particular theme within strategic studies.
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