Conversations with History is a website that contains video interviews of:

distinguished men and women from all over the world that talk about their lives and their work. Guests include diplomats, statesmen, and soldiers; economists and political analysts; scientists and historians; writers and foreign correspondents; activists and artists. The interviews span the globe and include discussion of political, economic, military, legal, cultural, and social issues shaping our world. At the heart of each interview is a focus on individuals and ideas that make a difference.

It is produced at the Institute of International Studies at UC Berkeley.

Besides the video interviews, it also provides the text versions. So, I find it pretty useful in getting to know the background and the learning experience of the most distinguished scholars of my field of study--IR, IPE, and Economics. For example, I've found Robert O. Keohane, Joseph S. Nye, Kenneth N. Waltz, Samuel P. Huntington, John J. Mearsheimer, etc, in it's interviews.

Before watching the interviews, these names, although showing up numerously in textbooks or papers, were just names for me. But after watching each interview, the theories and the person connect. The implicit meanings and logics of their theories are clearer(for me) than ever. Furthermore, they talk about the tools, virtues, and advices that are beneficial for students that are interested in their field of study.

I find it quite useful. Therefore, I'll try to introduce some of the academics in the following weeks by order of the top 25 IR scholar list I mentioned before. Basically, I'll point out some interesting background or milestones of the scholars, and make some excerpts from the interviews.

I'll start out with Robert O. Keohane.

I was surfing through some blogs and found this interesting list in Roger A. Payne's blog (Under the title Most influential IR scholars) that identifies "the top 25 scholars with the greatest impact on the discipline over the past 20 years".

For the top 10, he included listing of the scholar's most influential IR publication (and date published):

1. Robert O. Keohane (1941), Princeton, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (1984)
2. Kenneth N. Waltz (1924), Emeritus California-Berkeley and Columbia, Theory of International Politics (1979)
3. Alexander Wendt (1958), Ohio State, Social Theory of International Politics (1999).
4. Samuel P. Huntington (1927), Harvard, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1998).
5. John J. Mearsheimer (1947), University of Chicago, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics (2001)
6. Joseph S. Nye (1941), Harvard, coauthor (with Keohane) of Power and Interdependence: world politics in transition (1977).
7. Robert Jervis (1940), Columbia, The Logic of Images in International Relations (1970).
8. Bruce Bueno de Mesquita (1946), New York University and Stanford's Hoover Institution, The War Trap (1981)
9. Bruce M. Russett (1935), Yale, Grasping the Democratic Peace: Principles for a Post-Cold War World (1994).
10. Robert Gilpin (1930), Emeritus Princeton, The Political Economy of International Relations(1987).

Following are the 11~25(with 3 ranking 23):

11. Peter J. Katzenstein (1945), Cornell
12. Stephen D. Krasner (1942), Stanford
13. James N. Rosenau, George Washington
14. John Ruggie (1944), Harvard
15. Michael Doyle (1948), Columbia
16. James D. Fearon, Stanford
17. Immanuel Wallerstein (1930), Yale
18. Robert Cox (1926), Emeritus York (Toronto)
19. Hans J. Morgenthau (1904-1980), Chicago
20. Francis Fukuyama (1952), Johns Hopkins SAIS
21. J. David Singer (1925), Michigan
22. Stephen Walt (1955), Harvard
23. Jack L. Snyder, Columbia
23. Robert Axelrod (1943), Michigan
23. Stanley Hoffman (1928), Harvard

Keohane, Waltz, Wendt, Huntington, Nye, and Gilpin are the names I know of in the top ten list. Of the listed publications, I have only partially read Huntington's "The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order". Right now, I'm reading Gilpin's "Global Political Economy: Understanding the international economic order", and I'm half way through it. It's a great book for students with both political science and economic backgrounds. It guides you through the strengths and weakness of both fields, and suggests an alternative approach which is the studies of International Political Economy(IPE).

Krasner, Rosenau, Cox, Morgenthau, Fukuyama, Walt, Snyder, Axelrod, and Hoffman are the names I know in the following list. In fact, I saw Rosenau last year when he came to NCCU to give a speech, and I even had the chance to ask him a question during the conference. He was an old fellow who could barely walk by himself, but you can still see the glare that flashes in his eyes when talks about his intellectual findings.

I'm specifically interested in Gilpin and Waltz's publications. So here's a book or two to add to my "winter reading list".