Randall Schweller
Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
Experience
Professor Randall Schweller focuses on theories of world politics, international security, and strategic studies. He is the author of Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power (Princeton University Press, 2006) and Deadly Imbalances: Tripolarity and Hitler's Strategy of World Conquest ; as well as articles in journals such as World Politics , International Studies Quarterly , International Security , American Political Science Review , American Journal of Political Science , Review of International Studies , and Security Studies. He is currently a member of the editorial board of International Security. In 1993, he received a John M. Olin Post-Doctoral Fellowship in National Security at the Center for International Affairs, Harvard University.
Selected Publications:
Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2006).
“Unanswered Threats: A Neoclassical Realist Theory of Underbalancing.” International Security, Vol. 29, No. 2 (Fall 2004), pp. 159-201.
AP Photo
Summer 2011
"After Unipolarity: China's Visions of International Order in an Era of U.S. Decline"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 36
By Randall Schweller, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security and Xiaoyu Pu
Balancing theory suggests that China’s emergence as a global power should signal a transition from unipolarity to a multipolarity, but so far no such power shift has occurred. Nevertheless, given its expanding economy, China is increasingly challenging U.S. hegemony. It remains unclear, however, whether China will strive to replace the United States as the sole global authority, modify the current system to allow for multipolarity, or continue to focus on internal development and enact the change to a Chinese order gradually.
Fall 2004
"Unanswered Threats: A Neoclassical Realist Theory of Underbalancing"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 2, volume 29
By Randall Schweller, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
Underbalancing occurs when states fail to recognize dangerous threats, choose not to react to them, or respond in “paltry and imprudent ways.”
Summer 2002
"Institutionalized Disagreement"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 27
By Robert Jervis, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security, Henry Nau and Randall Schweller, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
Robert Jervis and Henry Nau respond to Randall Schweller's review of John Ikenberry, After Victory: Institutions, Strategic Restraint, and the Rebuilding of Order after Major Wars.
Summer 2001
"The Problem of International Order Revisited: A Review Essay"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 26
By Randall Schweller, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
The author is skeptical, however, of G. John Ikenberry’s key theoretical innovation of “binding institutions” (e.g., NATO and the WTO) to explain how interlocking institutional constraints effectively limit a hegemon’s power.
Summer 2000
"Brother, Can You Spare a Paradigm? (Or Was Anybody Ever a Realist?)"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 25
By Andrew Moravcsik, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program, 1986-1988, Jeffrey W. Legro, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program, 1987-1989, Peter D. Feaver, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program, 1985-1987; Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security, Gunther Hellmann, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program, 1987-1988, Randall Schweller, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security, Jeffrey W. Taliaferro and William Wohlforth, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
In this issue's correspondence section, Peter Feaver, Gunther Hellmann, Randall Schweller, Jeffrey Taliaferro, and William Wohlforth argue against points made in Jeffrey Legro and Andrew Moravcsik's fall 1999 article "Is Anybody Still a Realist?" Legro and Moravcsik respond to their critics.
