Information is a key variable in International Relations, underpinning theories of foreign policy, inter-state cooperation, and civil and international conflict. Yet IR scholars have only begun to grapple with the consequences of recent shifts in the global information environment. We argue that information disorder—a media environment with low barriers to content creation, rapid spread of false or misleading material, and algorithmic amplification of sensational and fragmented narratives—will reshape the practice and study of International Relations. We identify three major implications of information disorder on international politics. First, information disorder distorts how citizens access and evaluate political information, creating effects that are particularly destabilizing for democracies. Second, it damages international cooperation by eroding shared focal points and increasing incentives for noncompliance. Finally, information disorder shifts patterns of conflict by intensifying societal cleavages, enabling foreign influence, and eroding democratic advantages in crisis bargaining. We conclude by outlining an agenda for future research.

This study examines the relationship between cannabis and wine consumption, investigating whether these substances function as substitutes or complements. Using data from an online survey of 523 German wine consumers, including 215 cannabis users, we analyze consumption across four wine categories: white, red, rosé/sparkling, and sweet wines. To address potential bias from endogeneity, we employ an IV-Ordered Probit model with endogenous covariates—cannabis user/usage. The findings provide evidence of a complementary relationship: cannabis users report significantly higher wine consumption than non-users across most categories, except red wine. The effect is particularly pronounced for rosé/sparkling and sweet wines. More frequent cannabis use also correlates with increased wine consumption. Motivation-specific analyses reveal nuanced dynamics. Using cannabis for relaxation decreases wine consumption, suggesting substitution, while enhancement motives increase rosé/sparkling consumption. Social motives, however, show negative associations with these wines. Overall, results suggest that the nature of the cannabis–wine relationship depends on user motivations.

While previous studies highlight the role that children’s interest in natural categories predicts their learning of new label-object associations in these categories, the long-term implications of such a relationship – the extent to which children’s interest shapes lexical development – remain unclear. The current study examines whether children’s interests in different natural object categories predict their subsequent interest and the number of words children know in those categories 6 months later. Using data from 67 children tested at 18 and 24 months of age, we found that parents’ estimates of interest in natural object categories at 18 months predicted their reports of their child’s interests at 24 months. Parent interest reports at 18 months also predicted the number of words that children are reported to know in that category at 24 months. Taken together, this study documents the longitudinal relationship between children’s interests, parents’ awareness of their children’s interests, and later vocabulary development.

Why do politicians sometimes deliver passionate speeches and sometimes tedious monologues? Even though the delivery is key to understanding political speech, we know little about when and why political actors choose particular delivery styles. Focusing on legislative speech, we expect legislators to deliver more emphatic speeches when their vote is aligned with the preferences of their constituents. To test this proposition, we develop and apply an automated video analysis model to speech recordings from the US House of Representatives. We match the speech emphasis with district preferences on key bills using data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study. We find that House members who rise in opposition to a bill give more passionate speeches when public preferences are aligned with their vote. The results suggest that political actors are not only mindful of public opinion in what they say but also in how they say it.

This study presents three key steps to enable the Business and Human Rights (BHR) research agenda to promote and advance greater applicability to the emerging challenges in the field. Drawing on research conducted on BHR sources (almost exclusively by Brazilian and Spanish-speaking authors), this article aims to demonstrate the need for further BHR scholarship to simultaneously: (i) identify and remedy epistemic biases through reflexive engagement with a victim-centred scholarship from the Global South that recentres BHR research on the perspective of affected communities; (ii) move from consideration to co-production by grounding BHR theory in practice via participatory methodologies and dialogue between communities, researchers and corporations; and (iii) by aligning with steps one and two, recontextualize Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) research into an integrated Human Rights and Environmental Due Diligence (HREDD) approach that incorporates environmental and climate dimensions and ensure meaningful, victim-centred engagement with affected communities.

The actions of the second Trump administration pose a serious threat to the dominance of the US dollar. Erratic US policies erode global trust in the United States and force states and private actors alike to reconsider their reliance on the dollar. This is reflected across three dimensions of dollar dominance: in trade and payments, as reserve currency and safe asset, and as global investment and funding currency. What distinguishes the current moment from previous predictions of a decline of financial hegemony is that the dollar’s global role is now challenged across all three dimensions simultaneously. Following the Global Financial Crisis, growing uneasiness with US financial power, especially the use of financial sanctions, already created cracks at the margins of the system and prompted a search for alternatives, triggering partial reserve diversification and de-dollarization of trade and payments systems. Under Trump, the undermining of the global economic order, growing fiscal deficits, and continued attacks on the institutional foundations of the administrative state are fundamentally undermining trust in the United States that is fundamental for the dollar’s global role. This signals a rupture in the US-centric global financial system, altering the foundations of the rules-based liberal international order (LIO). However, existing network effects slow down this process and no alternative can yet replace the dollar. The result is a financial interregnum where rising powers seek autonomy and influence without assuming hegemonic responsibility, leading to a more fragmented, multipolar financial order.

For centuries, the Homeric Question has fuelled fierce debate among scholars. The Homeric epics are widely regarded as having their origins in the Late Bronze Age, with oral transmission continuing until a final redaction in the eighth to second century BCE.

The question of whether a single poet wrote both The Iliad and The Odyssey, the time and place in which Homer(s) worked and lived, and the circumstances of the poems’ final composition are still subjects of discussion.

In the present paper, a fairly simple statistical χ2 analysis has been carried out to evaluate the frequency of the keywords related to metals and weapons, which are mainstays of the material culture of this ancient period.

A thorough examination of The Iliad discloses a pronounced predominance of the keyword ‘bronze’, exhibiting a higher frequency in The Iliad than in The Odyssey. On initial observation, the prevalence of dominance appears to be a consequence of the warlike nature of The Iliad. Notwithstanding, a significant dominance endures even when the intrinsic disparities between the two poems are taken into account and suitably adjusted.

This remarkable discrepancy suggests the potential for distinct authorship, editorial involvement, or redaction locations for The Iliad and The Odyssey.

External experts play a crucial role in implementing the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, advising businesses on how to identify, prevent and mitigate risks. Yet their responsibility remains underexplored in relation to judicial remedy. This article addresses this gap by investigating the involvement of external experts in strategic litigation concerning alleged corporate human rights harms. While such litigation primarily seeks remediation and societal change, it also reveals overlooked actors within legal processes. Using the concept of ‘visibilisation’, this study examines three landmark cases to explore how courts understand experts’ legal subjectivity. Findings suggest that this subjectivity encompasses both an evidentiary and functional role in corporate processes, raising important questions regarding accountability. By highlighting their influence on the corporate responsibility to respect human rights and human rights due diligence (HRDD), the article advances understanding of expert responsibility and considers its future in the emerging era of mandatory HRDD.

This article proposes the Function–Behavior–Structure–Failure Modes (FBSFMs), a novel ontological framework for an enhanced representation of system knowledge, to address the integration gap between the system models and design risk analysis activities during the early product development phase. As a theoretical contribution, the FBSFM extends the well-established function–behavior–structure ontology for system design information representation in terms of functions, intended behaviors, and structure, with an ontology schema for the representation of the actual behavior as function failure modes, enriched with linkages to causes and effects across multiple levels of system abstraction. This integrated representation improves design risk analysis by facilitating the traceability between design decisions captured in system models and potential failure scenarios documented in Failure Mode and Effects Analyses (FMEAs). The framework was implemented using formal ontology engineering methods and implemented in Web Ontology Language using Protégé. A real-world automotive case study was conducted in collaboration with practicing engineers and domain experts from a global automotive manufacturer, to demonstrate the framework’s applicability and its ability to support structured failure knowledge representation. The case study illustrates the capability of the ontology to consolidate multisource engineering knowledge, specifically design data derived from system modeling and structured risk artifacts from FMEA, into a coherent, machine-readable repository, supporting enhanced traceability from user goals to potential system failures. The use of ontological reasoning and structured querying facilitates the systematic review and validation of FMEA information against system models, with a positive impact on product development practice.

This article explores digital colonialism in Africa, focusing on how Big Tech and local intermediaries perpetuate data exploitation, infrastructure dependency and algorithmic bias. Applying a Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) lens, it draws parallels between historical colonialism and the modern digital economy, highlighting persistent power imbalances in data control and tech sovereignty. Multinational firms from the Global North extract and monetise African data with little benefit to local communities, reinforcing dependency. Local actors (governments, tech elites and influencers) often enable this through policy gaps and cultural alignment with Western platforms. The article examines the impact on data sovereignty, human rights and economic autonomy, including risks of surveillance and silencing local voices. It calls for policy reforms, investment in African tech ecosystems, digital literacy and robust regional regulation. Ultimately, it advocates for digital justice and self-governance to reclaim Africa’s digital future.

The second Trump administration has disrupted global climate politics, turning the United States away from the clean energy and environmental policies of the Biden administration. Consequently, analytical attention is turning, inside and outside of the United States, to a family of concepts referred to as “Climate Realism” (CR), which favors long-run investments in technology and adaptation over near-term climate mitigation efforts. We critically engage with CR and argue that political science identifies four key features of climate politics that shed light on CR’s strengths and weaknesses, and which will persist even in the second Trump era. Despite CR’s flaws, we contend that its emergence in reaction to the second Trump administration highlights some important dimensions of climate politics that deserve greater attention going forward. We highlight three topics for research: the political and practical strategies of the anti-green coalition; the heterogeneity in viable national economic strategies; and the implications for IR of a turn away from meaningful climate mitigation in powerful nations.