Latest Publications
Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century
Polity
From Polity's website: "Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century is the first book to explore fully the politics that shape these security arrangements – from their initial formation through the various challenges that test them and, sometimes, lead to their demise. Across six thematic chapters, Alexander Lanoszka challenges conventional wisdom that has dominated our understanding of how military alliances have operated historically and into the present. Although military alliances today may seem uniquely hobbled by their internal difficulties, Lanoszka argues that they are in fact, by their very nature, prone to dysfunction."
"Alliances are a foundational building block of the international order, but academics and practitioners have slighted the study of alliance management. Alexander Lanoszka provides a remedy with a scintillating tour d’horizon of the promise and perils of alliances in the twenty-first century." Eric S. Edelman, Former Under-Secretary of Defense for Policy
About Me
My name is Alexander Lanoszka. I am an Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science and in the Balsillie School of International Affairs at the University of Waterloo. I am also an Associate Fellow at the UK-based Council on Geostrategy. I am also a member of the Réseau d'Analyse Stratégique. For the 2022-23 Academic Year, I am a Visiting Professor at the College of Europe, Natolin, where I will take up a short residency in the spring of 2023.
I was previously a Lecturer in the Department of International Politics at City, University of London and held postdoctoral fellowships at Dartmouth College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I received my Ph.D. in Politics from Princeton University in 2014.
My research addresses issues in alliance politics, nuclear strategy, and theories of war, and has appeared in International Security, Security Studies, International Affairs, and elsewhere. My books include Atomic Assurance: The Alliance Politics of Nuclear Proliferation (Cornell, 2018) and Military Alliances in the Twenty-First Century (Polity, 2022). I have done work on East Asia but Europe is my primary regional focus, with special emphasis on Central and Northeastern Europe. I have two places that I consider home: Windsor-Detroit and Krakow, Poland.
On this website, you will find information about my books, monographs, and published articles as well as information on my academic research, teaching, and commentary.
LATEST NEWS
LATE SUMMER EVENTS
1 SEPTEMBER 2022
The end of this summer is eventful. I am teaching one course at Waterloo and talks scheduled this month include McGill University, the Embassy of Canada to the United States, and Lakehead University Orillia. The Polish Wprost published an interview with me.
WAR ON THE ROCKS
27 JULY 2022
Michael Hunzeker and I wrote a piece in War on the Rocks that argues in favour of Congress attaching conditions on military sales to Taiwan so that it makes serious head-way in adopting a genuine asymmetric posture. Read the essay here. A CNN briefing mentions it.
CH MILITARY MYTHS
14 JULY 2022
I am delighted to be among highly esteemed colleagues, led by Keir Giles and Mathieu Boulègue, who contributed to Chatham House's new series on misconceptions about Russian military matters. My own essay tackles the strategic importance of the Suwałki Gap.
What I am reading now
This book has been on my reading list for a while and so I have finally found the occasion to read Rory Cormac's Disrupt and Deny. He provides a fascinating account of how the British government has used covert force and intelligence in advancing its foreign policy objectives.
