Thank you, Professor. Mackinder's "Geographical Pivot" is a definite must read. Peter Hopkirk's, "The Great Game" is an excellent accompaniment to Mackinder's piece and a very good study of the 19th century rivalry between the British and Russian empires for mastery and influence in Central Asia.
Your reading list looks very interesting. I’ll need to look for Kindle copies (MAC Tel 2 makes reading printed material sometimes “iffy”.), preferably free since they are likely in the public domain. I’m surprised only the first book of Churchill’s WWII history was on the reading list. All six volumes are worth the time invested. Also worth the time invested: three lengthy videos on Dwarkesh Patel’s YouTube channel; Sarah Paine three lectures with q&a sessions afterwards. Lecture titles are: #1, The War for India; #2, Why Japan Lost; and #3, How Mao Conquered China. The videos run right around two hours each but well worth the time. Dr. Sarah Paine is an instructor at the Naval War College.
If one wants an introduction to Rood’s thinking on geopolitics, I would recommend Crouch and Garrity’s “You Run the Show or the Show Runs You: Capturing Professor Harold W. Rood’s Strategic Thought for a New Generation”. They did a wonderful job of capturing Rood’s voice in addition to his perspective on international relations. I believe the book also provides a reading list of works Rood thought worthwhile.
Quite the opposite. One of the great books on this failure is Philip Tetlock's "Expert Political Judgment," which chronicles a long list of predictive failures, and many of the reasons why. I'll likely do a whole separate post in this some time soon.
Thank you, Professor. Mackinder's "Geographical Pivot" is a definite must read. Peter Hopkirk's, "The Great Game" is an excellent accompaniment to Mackinder's piece and a very good study of the 19th century rivalry between the British and Russian empires for mastery and influence in Central Asia.
Oh yes, Hopkirk is classic. I reread it right after 9/11 when it became clear we were going to have to thump Afghanistan.
Your reading list looks very interesting. I’ll need to look for Kindle copies (MAC Tel 2 makes reading printed material sometimes “iffy”.), preferably free since they are likely in the public domain. I’m surprised only the first book of Churchill’s WWII history was on the reading list. All six volumes are worth the time invested. Also worth the time invested: three lengthy videos on Dwarkesh Patel’s YouTube channel; Sarah Paine three lectures with q&a sessions afterwards. Lecture titles are: #1, The War for India; #2, Why Japan Lost; and #3, How Mao Conquered China. The videos run right around two hours each but well worth the time. Dr. Sarah Paine is an instructor at the Naval War College.
If one wants an introduction to Rood’s thinking on geopolitics, I would recommend Crouch and Garrity’s “You Run the Show or the Show Runs You: Capturing Professor Harold W. Rood’s Strategic Thought for a New Generation”. They did a wonderful job of capturing Rood’s voice in addition to his perspective on international relations. I believe the book also provides a reading list of works Rood thought worthwhile.
Do today's political scientists as a group have much ability to predict major events?
Quite the opposite. One of the great books on this failure is Philip Tetlock's "Expert Political Judgment," which chronicles a long list of predictive failures, and many of the reasons why. I'll likely do a whole separate post in this some time soon.