Robert Pape
Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
Experience
Robert A. Pape is Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago specializing in international security affairs. His publications include Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism (Random House 2005); Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Cornell 1996), "Why Economic Sanctions Do Not Work," International Security (1997), "The Determinants of International Moral Action," International Organization (1999); "The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism," American Political Science Review (2003); and "Soft Balancing against the United States," International Security (2005). His commentary on international security policy has appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, New Republic, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, as well as on Nightline, ABC News, CBS News, CNN, Fox News, and National Public Radio. Before coming to Chicago in 1999, he taught international relations at Dartmouth College for five years and air power strategy for the USAF's School of Advanced Airpower Studies for three years. He received his Ph. D. from the University of Chicago in 1988 and graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Pittsburgh in 1982. His current work focuses on the causes of suicide terrorism and the politics of unipolarity.
Spring 2013
"Correspondence: Humanitarian Intervention and the Responsibility to Protect"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 4, volume 37
By Gareth Evans, Ramesh Thakur and Robert Pape, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
Gareth Evans and Ramesh Thakur respond to Robert A. Pape's summer 2012 International Security article, "When Duty Calls: A Pragmatic Standard of Humanitarian Intervention."
AP Photo
Summer 2012
"When Duty Calls: A Pragmatic Standard of Humanitarian Intervention"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 37
By Robert Pape, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
The need to intervene to stop genocide is not controversial, but the international community has made little progress in this regard since the term was coined during World War II. This is partly because the current standard for intervention—genocide—sets the bar too high, while the main alternative—the responsibility to protect—sets the bar too low. A new standard—the pragmatic standard of humanitarian intervention—recommends intervention only when it is possible to disrupt a government-sponsored homicide campaign and create lasting security for the threatened population with minimal risk to the intervening forces. Adherence to such a standard would significantly increase the number of humanitarian interventions without creating unacceptable costs for the intervening states.
Summer 2005
"Soft Balancing against the United States"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 30
By Robert Pape, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
The George W. Bush administration’s national security strategy, which asserts that the United States has the right to attack and conquer sovereign countries that pose no observable threat, and to do so without international support, is one of the most aggressively unilateral U.S. postures ever taken. Recent international relations scholarship has wrongly promoted the view that the United States, as the leader of a unipolar system, can pursue such a policy without fear of serious opposition.
Fall 1998
"Correspondence: Evaluating Economic Sanctions"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 2, volume 23
By David A. Baldwin and Robert Pape, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
David Baldwin of Columbia University takes issue with Robert Pape’s findings in his Fall 1997 article that economic sanctions “do not work.” Pape replies.
Summer 1998
"Why Economic Sanctions Still Do Not Work"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 23
By Robert Pape, Editorial Board Member, Quarterly Journal: International Security
The author responds with a vigorous defense of his original findings from “Why Economic Sanctions Do Not Work,” a highly regarded and influential study that offered qualified optimism about the effectiveness of economic sanctions as a foreign policy tool, which was published in the fall 1997 issue of International Security.
