Apologies KOW readers for the light posting over the last few weeks. The first term of 2008-9 begins today. I am always overwhelmed with things to do at this time. Actually I’ve never gotten over boyish enthusiasm for the start of a new school year. I like everything about it. Getting my lecture notes together. Meeting new students. Getting a new pencil case and gray flannel trousers… Anyway, things have been busy. Regular posting will now recommence.
In the meantime, some oldish news:
On September 11 the Royal United Services Institute published a monograph I wrote with Neville Bolt and Jaz Azari on Propaganda of the Deed 2008 in its Whitehall Paper series. Extract from the introduction:
A landmark conference in January 2008 organised by the Insurgency Research Group of King’s College London aimed to re-evaluate POTD’s theoretical heritage in the context of contemporary insurgency and counterinsurgency analysis, and to identify new value added frameworks to advance understanding. This article explores a new definition of Propaganda of the Deed relevant to today’s fast-changing political landscape where social and political agendas are interpreted and shaped by global media, particularly television. It further looks at how an innovative counterinsurgency approach might respond to this new conceptualisation of POTD. The importance of synthesising perspectives from academics and policy-makers derives from the failure of any single discipline to explain POTD adequately. This phenomenon of collective violence remains for some rooted in 19th Century revolutionary theory; for others it is almost completely ignored. Current research reveals an unacceptable knowledge gap in this area. In the long term everyone suffers by this neglect.
Also on September 11 The Independent published this story about our online MA War in the Modern World ‘MA in War Studies: Generals’ knowlege at your command‘:
When Major Rupert Pim packed his bags for a stint as a company commander in Kosovo at the height of British operations in the Balkan state, they contained a lot more than usual Army kit. A third of the weight was taken up by books he needed for the MA he was studying while in the field.
The reading has paid off. This summer, he was among the first cohort of six graduates, many of them military personnel, on show in a lecture theatre rather than the parade ground as they collected an MA in war in the modern world at the Department of War Studies at King’s College, London.
We’ve got 60 new MA students logging on to our course this year from all over the world. We’ve got great students on our course from whom I’m always learning new things. One of our best is Dan Ford, a noted author of military fiction and non-fiction. Over on his blog he is reviewing in installments Philip Bobbitt’s new book Terror and Consent.
This year I’ll be teaching ‘Strategic Dimensions of Contemporary Warfare’ as well as ‘History of Contemporary Warfare 1991-present’ on-line this term. In the residential course I’m doing ‘Evolution of Insurgency’ which I’m teaching with Drs John Mackinlay and Kevin O’Brien. It looks like it will be a really great year.
