Rambo on War; Wisdom on Peace

“Old men start wars. Young men fight them. And everyone in the middle gets killed. War is natural. Peace is accidental. We’re animals.” This piece plays Stallone’s Rambo off the quite different view of war held by Chris Hedges and Jonathan Schell, two authors who believe that that “wisdom is better than weapons of war.”

Neoconservatism

This is the third in a series of articles at the International Relations 101 section of the website, on “understanding international relations and foreign policy decision making.” These articles seek to make this complex, multi-dimensional arena accessible to people outside the halls of power. The series also pulls duty as a necessary backdrop for understanding the wisdom-based alternative approaches to the field that are being developed by The Wisdom Project.

Rami Khouri (interview)

Rami Khouri, a Palestinian-Jordanian, has some wise words for Americans who are trying to come to grips with life in the Middle East. Khouri is a prominent and well-respected journalist and internationally syndicated columnist. He was editor-in-chief of The Jordan Times and is now editor-at-large of the Beirut, Lebanon-based The Daily Star, the largest English language newspaper in the Middle East.

A shorter and differently emphasized version of this interview, “The Christian Message in Lebanon,” appeared in Christianity Today, August 2007.

Wisdom-based foreign relations

Seeing International Relations and Foreign Policy through Different Eyes
Five Norms of Wisdom for Thinking about More Cooperative Relations between the United States and the Muslim Middle East

This article was written to offer political and religious leaders, their advisors, and other specialists, such as at think tanks, some ideas to mull over about wisdom-based foreign policy decision making for U.S. – Middle East relations. I’ve drawn it together from some chapters of the book I’m writing, so the material has not been made very public until now. It is hoped that it will draw visitors and readers comments and perspectives. It’s a bit of a different way of reasoning about constructing international relations.

Bibliography

This is a list of books I have relied on over the years, as of the summer 2010, for my research on international relations and foreign policy and my work on developing wisdom-based approaches to U.S. – Middle East relations. Apologies for not breaking these classifications into smaller ones, but the titles should make their subjects clear. Books on Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan are in “The Middle East.” Books about al Qaeda are in “War or Terrorism.” In due course I hope to find time to list other sources that have been essential, from formal reports, journal articles, interviews, and so on.

Three American Myths

This essay is a result of some pondering during the months leading up to the 2008 U.S. presidential elections, when I was thinking about Christians as presidents and America as a Christian nation.

Obama & McCain

The results of the November 4, 2008 U.S. presidential election will affect a globalised planet like never before. This article looks past the candidates sound-bites to imagine how each one, and his phalanx of advisors, might engage the wider world. The conclusions may surprise you.

A slightly shorter version of this article was first published in Third Way, September 2008.

Memo to the President

MEMORANDUM TO: President Barack Obama
DATE: July 7, 2009
SUBJECT: Your Middle East policy: refuse to be drawn