Nikolas Gvosdev
Nikolas Gvosdev is a professor of national security studies at the U.S. Naval War College, and serves as Senior Fellow, U.S. Global Engagement Program.
Nikolas Gvosdev's Latest Posts
Measuring Morality in Foreign Policy: Joseph Nye’s Criteria
Writing in the winter/spring 2019 issue of the American Oxonian, Joseph Nye wrestles with the question: how do we measure the morality of a President’s foreign policy? He notes, “Americans constantly make moral judgments about presidents and foreign policy, but we are seldom clear about the criteria by which we judge a moral foreign policy.” […]
Revisiting the Ethical Calculus: Which Obligations Take Precedence?
Five years ago, I posed a question which continues to have relevance today. This evening, President Joe Biden is signing executive orders returning the United States to the Paris climate accords and to take other steps to reverse actions taken by his predecessor which were based on an “America First” calculus. Yet, as the new […]
Jon Finer and the Doorstep
Jon Finer, who has been nominated to serve as the deputy national security advisor in the Biden/Harris administration, gave an interview with GlobalBrief in 2020. He was asked about the impact of domestic politics and trends on U.S. foreign policy formulation. Finer’s response is worth perusing: In some ways, the traditional divide between American foreign […]
How Will the Biden Administration Adjudicate a Clash of Values?
Simplistic assessments of U.S. foreign policy like to paint the policy divide BETWEEN values and interests. The reality is that policy often must choose between different and competing values. Last month, we noted the “ethical tensions” emerging between different camps that will most likely comprise the Biden/Harris administration’s national security team. Writing in Politico, Nahal […]
Competing Ethics in the Biden Administration?
Writing in The Atlantic, Thomas Wright outlines three broad “camps” vying for influence over the foreign policy and national security policies of the Biden/Harris administration. There are the “restorationists”–the same term used by the Carnegie Council report for those who seek to return U.S. foreign policy to its broad, pre-2016 parameters; there are the reformers […]
Are the Narratives Going to Matter?
A month ago, on The Doorstep podcast, Nahal Toosi, who is Politico’s foreign affairs reporter, discussed the competing narratives and policy preferences within the “big tent” of the Democratic Party and how, in the event that the Biden/Harris ticket prevailed in the presidential contest, all of this might play out. She observed, former U.S. officials […]
Senator Menendez and the Narratives
Today, Senator Bob Menendez, the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, unveiled a comprehensive report prepared by the Democratic staff of the committee, The Cost of Trump’s Foreign Policy: Damages and Consequences for U.S. and Global Security. As the Senator noted in his letter of transmittal, he “directed members of my staff, Lowell […]
Is Great Power Competition Ethical?
In the aftermath of Ali Wyne’s presentation on great power competition, I have had some people who have asked why the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs would focus on such a subject. After all, rivalry among major powers does not seem to be a template for ethical behavior, and runs the risk of […]
