Welch, David A. 1960-

PERSONAL:

Born August 22, 1960. Education: Trinity College, University of Toronto, B.A. (with highest distinction), 1983; Harvard University, A.M., 1985, Ph.D., 1990.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Trudeau Centre for Peace & Conflict Studies, 15 King's College Cir., Toronto, Ontario M5S 3H7, Canada. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER:

Political scientist, educator, writer, and editor. University of Toronto at Scarborough, Scarborough, Ontario, Canada, assistant professor, 1990-94, associate professor of political science, 1994-2002; University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, associate professor, 2002-05, George Ignatieff Chair of Peace and Conflict Studies, 2002-07, professor of political science, 2005—. Hooker Distinguished Visiting Scholar, McMaster University, 2006; National Defense Academy, Yokosuka, Japan, visiting professor, 2007. Also Rockefeller Research and Study Center, Bellagio, Italy, resident fellow, 2005; and University of Otago, William Evans Fellow, 2007.

AWARDS, HONORS:

George Kennedy Award for highest standing in philosophy, University of Toronto, 1983; Ambassador Kenneth Taylor Award for highest standing in international relations, University of Toronto, 1983; Governor-General's Medal for highest overall standing, Trinity College, 1983; Harvard Danforth Certificate for Excellence in Teaching, 1986; Edgar S. Furniss Book Award for an Outstanding Contribution to National Security Studies, Mershon Centre, Ohio State University, 1994, for Justice and the Genesis of War; SAC/APUS Undergraduate Teaching Award for Teaching Excellence, 2007; Faculty of Arts and Science Outstanding Teaching Award, University of Toronto, 2008; Inaugural International Studies Association ISSS Best Book Award, 2005-06, for Painful Choices. Also recipient of numerous grants.

WRITINGS:

(With James G. Blight) On the Brink: Americans and Soviets Reexamine the Cuban Missile Crisis, foreword by McGeorge Bundy, Hill & Wang (New York, NY), 1989, 2nd edition, Noonday Press (New York, NY), 1990.

(Editor, with James G. Blight and David Lewis) Cuba between the Superpowers: The Antigua Conference on the Cuban Missile Crisis, Center for Foreign Policy Development, Brown University (Providence, RI), 1992.

Justice and the Genesis of War, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1993.

(With James G. Blight and Bruce J. Allyn) Cuba on the Brink: Castro, the Missile Crisis, and the Soviet Collapse, foreword by Jorge I. Dominguez, Pantheon Books (New York, NY), 1993, revised edition, Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, MA), 2002.

(Editor, with James G. Blight) Intelligence and the Cuban Missile Crisis, Frank Cass (Portland, OR), 1998.

Decisions, Decisions: The Art of Effective Decision Making, Prometheus Books (New York, NY), 2002.

Painful Choices: A Theory of Foreign Policy Change, Princeton University Press (Princeton, NJ), 2005.

(With Don Munton) The Cuban Missile Crisis: A Concise History, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2007.

Contributor to books, including The Oxford Companion to American Military History, Oxford University Press, 1999; The Oxford Companion to Politics of the World, 2nd edition, edited by Joel Krieger, Oxford University Press, 2001; Canada, the United States, and New Challenges to Security, edited by Christopher J. Young, University of Manitoba Programme in Strategic Studies, 1992; Canada among Nations, 1992-1993: A New World Order?, edited by Fen Osler Hampson and Christopher J. Maule, Carleton University Press, 1992; The Essence of Japan's National Security, edited by Bunji Abe, Masato Kimura, Kazumi Mizumoto, David A. Welch, and Noboru Yamaguchi, PHP Kenkyujyo, 1996; Decision-Making on War and Peace: The Cognitive-Rational Debate, edited by Nehemia Geva and Alex Mintz, Lynne Rienner, 1997; Ethics in International Affairs: Theory and Cases, edited by Andrew Valls, Rowman & Littlefield, 2000; Globalization and Conflict, edited by Robert A. Patman, Routledge, 2006.

Contributor to periodicals, including Asian Perspective, Ethics and International Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, Intelligence and National Security, International Security, International Journal, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Mershon International Studies Review, Review of International Studies, and Security Studies. Also coeditor, "Ethics and American Foreign Policy" book series, Praeger Publishers, 2005. Board member and managing editor of "Challenges for Japan" book series, University of Toronto Press, 2005—; member of the editorial board of International Theory, 2007—.

SIDELIGHTS:

David A. Welch is a political scientist who has written extensively about Cuban politics and Cuba's international relations. He has also written about American politics and government, including books about foreign policy change and decision making.

In his 1993 book, Justice and the Genesis of War, the author presents his viewpoint that governments or states are often motivated by sincere concern for the perceived demands of justice and not merely by self interest alone. To support his contrarian thesis, the author examines the outbreak of five "Great Power" wars: the Crimean War, the Franco-Prussian War, World War I, World War II, and the Falklands War. Using both philosophical and historical analysis, the author shows how the justice motive played a role in state behavior in all of these wars. Writing in the book's foreword, the author notes: "I hope to show the skeptics are mistaken." The author continues: "National leaders very often do see the world through normative lenses, and very often act in accordance with their perceptions of what is right or just." Justice and the Genesis of War received several favorable reviews. "The book is clearly written, soundly organized, and judiciously argued. The case studies are balanced and concise," wrote David Dessler in the American Political Science Review. Ayse Deniz Ozkan wrote in the Journal of Interdisciplinary History that "Welch makes a welcome contribution to the study of war."

Welch is the author, with James G. Blight and Bruce J. Allyn, of Cuba on the Brink: Castro, the Missile Crisis, and the Soviet Collapse. First published in 1993, the book appeared in a revised edition celebrating the fortieth anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis in 2002. The updated version includes a new afterword in which the authors analyze their previous forecasting mistakes concerning Cuba's place in the new world order. The book also includes a chronology, letters between Castro and Krushchev, and extensive reference material. Writing in the preface to the revised edition, Welch and Blight wrote that the book "presents and analyzes the first series of intense discussions Fidel Castro ever conducted with Americans and Russians on the history and legacy of what we in the West rather interestingly call the Cuban missile crisis." The authors go on to point out that most historical views of the crisis have very little to do with Cuba itself but rather focus on the Soviets and the Americans. They write: "Fidel Castro has a rather different point of view on this. What he and his Cuban compatriots equally interestingly call the October crisis was, in their opinion, very much a Cuban crisis, and the fact that Cuba has largely been left out of the telling of the tale they consider both an insult and an historical travesty. The discussions captured in these pages represent the best existing argument to that effect."

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists contributor Richard Ned Lebow noted the quality of the authors' archival research work. He wrote: "Thanks to their efforts, and those of others who have followed in their footsteps, we now have enough evidence to reconstruct the history of the most dangerous confrontation of the Cold War as seen by all of the major participants," adding later in the review: "Anyone interested in the missile crisis will want to read this book." Kenneth Maxwell wrote in Foreign Affairs: "For what it directly tells us about one of the most dangerous confrontations of the twentieth century, and for what it indirectly tells us about the present, Cuba on the Brink is essential reading for any serious student of international affairs."

In Decisions, Decisions: The Art of Effective Decision Making, the author turns his attention to nine steps to effective decision making. The author emphasizes the importance of self-knowledge and offers advice on assessing strengths and weaknesses. He begins with a discussion of making decisions in the ideal world and then goes on to discuss strategies and rules of thumb in decision making. He writes about money and chance and about how to use good judgment and perception in making choices. A chapter is devoted to moral choices and another to the differences between men and women. The author concludes with a discussion of getting into the habit of making the right decisions. Calling the book "a ‘must read,’" Booklist contributor Mary Whaley also referred to it as "thought-provoking book written for a broad audience in an easy and entertaining manner."

Painful Choices: A Theory of Foreign Policy Change was published in 2005 and addresses the conditions under which states should make radical changes in foreign policy. Constructing a theory of foreign policy change inspired by organization theory, cognitive and motivational psychology, and prospect theory, the author analyzes the theory in comparative case studies in the areas of security and trade domains. Among the case studies are Japan's conflict with Russia over the Northern Territories and the United States decision to commit a large military force in Vietnam and its ultimate decision to withdraw. "David Welch is to be commended for developing an ambitious theory that recognizes that humans, not factors, make decisions, and that they are affected by history and psychology," wrote Max Paul Friedman in the Political Science Quarterly.

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

BOOKS

Welch, David A., Justice and the Genesis of War, Cambridge University Press (New York, NY), 1993.

Welch, David A., James G. Blight, and Bruce J. Allyn, Cuba on the Brink: Castro, the Missile Crisis, and the Soviet Collapse, foreword by Jorge I. Dominguez, Rowman & Littlefield (Lanham, MA), 2002.

PERIODICALS

American Political Science Review, December 1, 1994, David Dessler, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 1052.

Booklist, November 15, 2001, Mary Whaley, review of Decisions, Decisions: The Art of Effective Decision Making, p. 525.

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, July-August, 1994, Richard Ned Lebow, review of Cuba on the Brink.

Central European History, February 1, 1995, Norman Rich, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 388.

Choice, April 1, 1994, R.V. Barylski, review of Cuba on the Brink, p. 1359; October 1, 1994, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 363; March 1, 2006, M.G. Roskin, review of Painful Choices: A Theory of Foreign Policy Change, p. 1302.

Diplomatic History, September 22, 1994, Robert A. Divine, review of On the Brink: Americans and Soviets Reexamine the Cuban Missile Crisis, p. 551.

Foreign Affairs, March-April, 1994, Kenneth Maxwell, review of Cuba on the Brink; May 1, 1994, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 150.

Historical Journal, September 1, 1994, F.H. Hinsley, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 729.

International Affairs, April 1, 1994, Ian Harris, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 323; July 1, 1999, Zenen E. Santana Delgado, review of Intelligence and the Cuban Missile Crisis, p. 666.

International History Review, December 1, 2006, Barbara Farnham, review of Painful Choices, p. 928.

International Journal, March 22, 1990, review of On the Brink, p. 490.

International Studies Quarterly, October 1, 1994, Patrick Callahan, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 271.

Journal of American History, March 1, 1995, Damien J. Fernandez, review of Cuba on the Brink, p. 1831.

Journal of Interdisciplinary History, September 22, 1990, James G. Hershberg, review of On the Brink, p. 352; January 1, 1996, Ayse Deniz Ozkan, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 476.

Journal of Military History, October 1, 1994, Louis Manzo, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 749.

Journal of the History of Ideas, April 1, 1994, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 358.

Library Journal, April 15, 1989, Thomas A. Karel, review of On the Brink, p. 88.

Political Quarterly, July-September, 1994, A.J.A. Morris, review of Justice and the Genesis of War.

Political Science Quarterly, September 22, 2006, Max Paul Friedman, review of Painful Choices, p. 520.

Publishers Weekly, December 9, 1988, Genevieve Stuttaford, review of On the Brink, p. 54; September 27, 1993, review of Cuba on the Brink, p. 53.

Reference & Research Book News, May 1, 2002, review of Decisions, Decisions, p. 8.

SAIS Review, winter-spring, 1995, Thomas Herr, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 197.

Survival, June 22, 1994, Rein Mullerson, review of Justice and the Genesis of War, p. 174.

Virginia Quarterly Review, September 22, 1989, review of On the Brink, p. 134.

ONLINE

University of Toronto Computing in the Humanities and Social Sciences Web site,http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/ (April 22, 2008), faculty profile of author.