Michael Brenes

Jervis Forum Roundtable 17-7 on Benton, They Called it Peace Roundtable Review 17-7 Lauren Benton, They Called it Peace: Worlds of Imperial Violence (Princeton University Press, 2024). ISBN: 9780691248479. 6 October 2025 | PDF: https://issforum.org/to/jrt17-7 |...

Roundtable Review 17-7
Lauren Benton’s They Called it Peace: Worlds of Imperial Violence
“Imperial powers permitted conquest if it prevented global war. Peace often meant war, at least on a liminal scale. The modern world...cannot, escape imperial violence.” –Michael Brenes
wp.me/p2Insd-7vt

On October 2nd, our @cornellbtpi.bsky.social Fellows met with Professor @mbrenes.bsky.social: Co-Director of the Brady-Johnson Program at Yale University @yalepress.bsky.social and Professor Michael Williams: Associate Professor at the Maxwell School at Syracuse University @syracuseup.bsky.social.

Awesome review of The Rivalry Peril in The Nation magazine! Thanks, @jeetheer.bsky.social! ( @mbrenes.bsky.social )

E220 - The Perils of Competition With China w/ Michael Brenes Podcast Episode · American Prestige · 07/29/2025 · 1h 3m

By framing China as an existential threat, this conversation explores how policymakers recycle discredited Cold War myths, fueling militarization, inequality, xenophobia, and global instability.

With @mbrenes.bsky.social on @amprestigepod.bsky.social

The Rivalry Peril How the U.S. policy of competition with China is detrimental to democracy, peace, and prosperity—and how a saner approach is possible   For close to a dec...

Read his book on the subject, which he co-authored with @vanjackson.bsky.social, The Rivalry Peril: yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300...

E220 - The Perils of Competition With China w/ @mbrenes.bsky.social

Michael Brenes returns to the pod, this time to tell us why a rivalry with China might not exactly be in everyone’s best interest.

Link in replies!

This looks like something I absolutely *must* read.

Whenever I (in "provocative European mode") ask US experts/ policymakers *why* US is obsessed with competition with China, the answer is often that it is "just logical", "obvious" etc. Looking forward to reading another perspective.

Many thanks to @profpaulpoast.bsky.social for the shout out! Awesome to have our book on his list. For some reason—I still don’t know why—you can get our book on Amazon for only $7 right now

Opinion | When It Comes to Undermining America, We Have a Winner

I told Tom Edsall in @nytimes.com that Donald Trump is "profiting from the Democrats’ inability to put their house in order… Even if Democrats win the Senate and the House in 2026, Trump is unlikely to let that stop him from continuing his policies.”

What If the Political Pendulum Doesn’t Swing Back? The Cycles of American History foresaw American voter dealignment, and an electronic age that would see voters prioritize personality over party—but it didn’t anticipate Trump.

For the @newrepublic.com, I wrote about the pendulum swinging back to the Democrats (or to the Left), and what history might tell us about our political future.

"Schlesinger’s theory worked in the twentieth century because it presumed that all Americans accepted liberalism or liberal tenets—everyone lived in the shadow of liberalism, even if they tried to avoid or repudiate it...

newrepublic.com/article/1975...

What If the Political Pendulum Doesn’t Swing Back? The Cycles of American History foresaw American voter dealignment, and an electronic age that would see voters prioritize personality over party—but it didn’t anticipate Trump.

For the @newrepublic.com, I wrote about the pendulum swinging back to the Democrats (or to the Left), and what history might tell us about our political future.

We document many such cases like this in The Rivalry Peril

Opinion | Don’t call it ‘Alligator Alcatraz.’ Call it a concentration camp. This facility’s purpose fits the classic model, and its existence points to serious dangers ahead for the country.

I wrote about how the Everglades experiment fits into the history of concentration camps in the US and abroad, and how it will connect a domestic network of camps to an international one. We’re watching the imposition of a global concentration camp network.

Looking forward to seeing friends and colleagues at #SHAFR2025 this week! Join us on Saturday morning for our roundtable on The Global Cold War ✨

The relaunch of the SHAFR Summer Institute in t-minus 20 minutes!! #SHAFRSummerInstitute #SHAFR2025

Update! Oral histories are back online! Thanks @altusip.bsky.social

Any historians/scholars affected by DOGE? I'm in the middle of writing my book on the history of the War on Terror, which relies upon oral histories published by the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP). DOGE killed it, sadly. And now the links to those oral histories are dead. Keep the citations, yes?

Today! Looking forward to discussing Pax Economica with @mbrenes.bsky.social and the Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy

Brady-Johnson Book Series: Marc-William Palen  - Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs The Grand Strategy Program welcomes historian Marc-William Palen for a conversation on his new book. In Pax Economica: Left-Wing Visions of a Free Trade World (Princeton University Press), Palen…

This Wednesday (April 16) at 5 pm EDT: Join the Grand Strategy Program at Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs in welcoming @mwpalen.bsky.social for a discussion of his book Pax Economica. He will be in conversation with @mbrenes.bsky.social.

Learn more:

Brady-Johnson Book Series: Alan McPherson - Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs The Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy continues the Spring 2025 Book Series with a discussion of Alan McPherson’s The Breach: Iran-Contra and the Assault on American Democracy (UNC Press). In th...

I’ll be speaking with the great Alan McPherson tonight about his new book on the Iran-Contra affair and how it shaped American democracy. Come join us if you can!

Book Talk: The Rivalry Peril A discussion of the new book from Van Jackson and Michael Brenes.

Tune in to Quincy Institute webinar today at 3 pm (EST)! We are hosting @vanjackson.bsky.social and @mbrenes.bsky.social to discuss their latest book, "The Rivalry Peril." Register now! quincyinst.org/events/book-...

Did Biden Get China Right? The administration aimed to outcompete China. Four years later, here’s how it measured up.

As Trump decides where to take China policy next—from Taiwan to AI, I took a step back and looked at whether the Biden administration’s strategy to outcompete China succeeded, and at what cost. Here's my deep dive:

foreignpolicy.com/2025/02/06/b...

Book Talk: The Rivalry Peril A discussion of the new book from Van Jackson and Michael Brenes.

I’ll be discussing new book The Rivalry Peril with its authors
@vanjackson.bsky.social and @mbrenes.bsky.social.

Where did Biden go wrong on US–China relations and what now for great power conflict after the Trump 2 rupture?

April 2 Wednesday 3–4pm EDT
quincyinst.org/events/book-...

ICE has ‘disappeared’ 48 New Mexico residents, attorneys say • Source New Mexico “We don’t know what’s happened to these four dozen New Mexicans. They’ve effectively disappeared. They’re gone,” an ACLU attorney said.

ICE is detaining 48 New Mexico residents and not identifying who they are sourcenm.com/2025/03/17/i...

Opinion | The Irrelevance of the Disciplinary Association Organizations like the AHA and MLA fail those who need them most.

Frustrated with the AHA or MLA? You're not alone! So am I. I'm frustrated by the deliberate inaction of scholarly orgs on so many issues, and their willful attempts to tamp down any action from the grassroots, so I wrote about it here. It's time to abandon them -- they're not useful anymore.

We made it on Lawfare, one of my favorite podcasts! Thanks to @tylermcbrien.bsky.social for his excellent questions and generous engagement with our book. Listen to @vanjackson.bsky.social and I talk about why great-power competition is bad, and why it will be remade—and endure—under Trump 2.0.

Like I was saying www.dissentmagazine.org/online_artic...

Congrats to Alan McPherson! An important, timely book on the legacy of Iran-Contra. Side note: we need more scholarship on the 1980s.