The 1990 U.S. Pledge to the Soviet Union on NATO Expansion: A Conversation with Joshua Shifrinson

I speak with Joshua Itzkowitz Shifrinson, an assistant professor at Texas A&M’s Bush School of Government and Public Service and author of “Deal or No Deal? The End of the Cold War and the U.S. Offer to Limit NATO Expansion," published in the current edition of International Security. We discuss what the United States pledged about NATO expansion to the Soviet Union in 1990, and why the way this is remembered shapes how we perceive of Russian intentions today. Shifrinson also explains why this debate matters for international relations theory, and provides inspiring advice for political science students.