Faculty Session Overview

Daniel E. Agbiboa is Assistant Professor of African and African American Studies at Harvard University. His research focuses on the relationships between state and nonstate actors and hybrid security governance in contemporary Africa, especially in the context of armed conflicts and city life. His articles have appeared in leading journals, including Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, The Journal of Modern African Studies, African Affairs, African Studies Review, Current History, and the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research. He is the recipient of the Harry Frank Guggenheim Distinguished Scholar Award, and is a fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He is the author of Mobility, Mobilization, and Counter/Insurgency: The Routes of Terror in an African Context (University of Michigan Press), They Eat Our Sweat: Transport Labor, Corruption, and Everyday Survival in Urban Nigeria (Oxford University Press), Transport, Transgression and Politics in African Cities: The Rhythm of Chaos (Routledge), and People, Predicaments and Potentials in Africa (Langaa RPCIG). His research has prompted invitations to consult for the World Bank, the United States Institute of Peace, the African Union, Transparency International, and the Global Center for Pluralism. He is currently leading a major partnership between Howard University National Resource Center for African Studies and George Mason University’s Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution on a US Department of Education Title VI grant (2019-2022) on “Countering Extreme Violence and Making Durable Peace in Africa.”

SCOTT APPLEBY is the Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Global Affairs and Interim Director of the Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion in the Keough School of Global Affairs at Notre Dame. Appleby’s research examines how religious movements and organizations shape and are shaped by national, regional, and global governance dynamics, deadly conflict, international relations, and economic development. His many publications include The Ambivalence of the Sacred: Religion, Violence and Reconciliation; Strong Religion: The Rise of Fundamentalisms Around the World; Catholics in the American Century; and Peacebuilding: Catholic Theology, Ethics and Praxis. He is also the co-editor, with Martin E. Marty, of the five-volume interdisciplinary public policy study known as The Fundamentalism Project.

Robert Art, the Former Director of MIT's Seminar XXI Program, is Herter Professor of International Relations at Brandeis University and a Senior Fellow in the Security Studies Program at MIT's Center for International Studies. He has served as a Consultant to the Secretary of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency, and is currently a Faculty Associate of the National Intelligence Council. Professor Art's books include The TFX Decision: McNamara and the Military; Reorganizing America's Defense, with Samuel P. Huntington and Vincent Davis, eds.; U.S. Foreign Policy: The Search for a New Role with Seyom Brown, eds.; The United States and Coercive Diplomacy, with Patrick Cronin, eds.; Democracy and Counterterrorism, with Louise Richardson, eds.; A Grand Strategy for America; and America’s Grand Strategy and World Politics.

Eva Bellin is the Myra and Robert Kraft Professor of Arab Politics in the Department of Politics and the Crown Center for Middle East Studies at Brandeis University. Bellin is a comparativist whose interests center on issues of democratization and authoritarian persistence, political and economic reform, civil society, religion and politics, and the politics of cultural change. She is the author of Stalled Democracy: Capital, Labor, and the Paradox of State Sponsored Development and co-editor of Building Rule of Law in the Arab World. She has published in a variety of venues including World Politics, Comparative Politics, Political Science Quarterly, Comparative Political Studies, World Development, Foreign Affairs, Middle East Policy, as well as numerous edited books. In 2006-2008 she was named a Carnegie Scholar by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, supporting her research on high courts in the Middle East and Islamic World. She was also named a Fellow at the Princeton Institute for Regional and International Studies, Democracy and Development Program in 2006-2007. Bellin has served on the editorial board of the journal Comparative Politics since 2005. She has conducted field work in Tunisia, Egypt, Israel, and Pakistan.

Joel F. Brenner specializes in cyber and physical security, data protection and privacy, intelligence law, the administration of classified information and facilities, and the regulation of sensitive cross-border transactions. He has represented companies and individuals in a wide variety of transactions and proceedings including sensitive foreign acquisitions involving the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS), the law governing network operations, the liability of foreign governments, export controls, and internal corporate and government investigations. He has years of experience inside and outside government involving national and homeland security. Joel was Senior Counsel at the National Security Agency, advising Agency leadership on the public-private effort to create better security for the Internet. From 2006 until mid-2009, he was the head of U.S. counterintelligence under the Director of National Intelligence and was responsible for integrating the counterintelligence activities of the 17 departments and agencies with intelligence authorities, including the FBI and CIA and elements of the Departments of Defense, Energy, and Homeland Security. From 2002 – 2006, Joel was NSA’s Inspector General, responsible for that agency’s top-secret internal audits and investigations. He has also served as a prosecutor in the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division and has extensive trial and arbitration experience in private practice. In addition to his practice, Joel is a Senior Research Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he divides his time between the Center for International Studies and the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab. At MIT he works on protecting critical infrastructure networks and on intelligence and security issues. He is particularly interested in intelligence collection, privacy, and secrecy as emerging issues in international relations and in the potential for curbing state-sponsored theft of intellectual property. He is a member of the American Bar Association’s Standing Committee on Law & National Security. He has written about intelligence oversight and Presidential authority to suspend or prohibit foreign takeovers of U.S. firms, and is often quoted in the national media on data security, privacy, and intelligence issues. Brenner was awarded the Intelligence Community Achievement Medal in July 2009. Brenner is the author of America the Vulnerable: Inside the New Threat Matrix of Digital Espionage, Crime and Warfare (Penguin Press, 2011), now available in paperback as Glass Houses: Privacy, Secrecy, and Cyber Insecurity in a Transparent World (Penguin Press, 2013).

DANIEL BYMAN is Professor in the School of Foreign Service, with a concurrent appointment in the Department of Government and as the Director of the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University. Byman is also a senior fellow in the Transnational Threats Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He has written extensively on a range of topics related to terrorism, international security, civil and ethnic conflict, and the Middle East. Byman is an editor at Lawfare and served as a member of the Department of State’s International Security Advisory Board. His latest books are:Spreading Hate: The Global Rise of White Supremacist Terrorism;Road Warriors: Foreign Fighters in the Armies of Jihad; andAl Qaeda, The Islamic State.

Fr. Matthew Carnes, S.J., is an associate professor at Georgetown University in the Department of Government and the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, and he currently serves as the Director of the Center for Latin American Studies. His research examines the dynamics of labor and social welfare policy in developing and middle-income countries. A specialist on Latin America, he has conducted extensive field research in Argentina, Peru, Chile, and Bolivia, and he has worked on development projects in Honduras, Mexico, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Ecuador. He is the author of Continuity Despite Change: The Politics of Labor Regulation in Latin America (Stanford University Press, 2014), and numerous journal articles. A distinguished educator, he has received three of Georgetown University’s highest teaching awards, including Georgetown College's Edward B. Bunn, S.J. Award (2017 and 2011), given by graduating seniors of the College; the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service Faculty of the Year Award (2013), given by the SFS Academic Council; and the University-wide Dorothy Brown Award for Outstanding Teaching Achievement (2011). In 2012, he was featured as one of the country's best professors in the Princeton Review's publication, 300 Best Professors. In recent years, he has been a Visiting Fellow at the Kellogg Institute for International Studies at the University of Notre Dame (Spring 2009) and a National Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University (Academic Year 2011-2012).

Victor Cha is Vice Dean and the D.S. Song-KF Professor in Government and International Affairs at Georgetown University.  He is also a Senior Adviser and inaugural holder of the Korea Chair at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C.  He left the White House in 2007 after serving since 2004 as Director for Asian Affairs at the National Security Council (NSC). At the White House, he was responsible primarily for Japan, the Korean peninsula, Australia/New Zealand and Pacific Island nation affairs. Dr. Cha was also the deputy head of delegation for the United States at the Six-Party Talks in Beijing and received two Outstanding Service commendations during his tenure at the NSC. He is the author of five books, including the award-winning Alignment Despite Antagonism: The United States-Korea-Japan Security Triangle (Stanford University Press) (winner of the 2000 Ohira Book Prize) and The Impossible State: North Korea, Past and Future (Harper Collins Ecco, 2012), which was selected by Foreign Affairs as a “Best Book on the Asia-Pacific for 2012.” His latest book is Powerplay: Origins of the American Alliance System in Asia (Princeton University Press, 2016). He is also writing a new book on the impact of US-China competition on U.S. alliances around the world. He has published articles on international relations and East Asia in journals including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, International Security, Political Science Quarterly, Survival, International Studies Quarterly, International Journal of the History of Sport, and Asian Survey. Dr. Cha is a former John M. Olin National Security Fellow at Harvard University, two-time Fulbright Scholar, John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Scholar at Columbia University, and Hoover National Fellow, CISAC Fellow, and William J. Perry Fellow at Stanford University. He is currently a fellow in Human Freedom (non-resident) at the George W. Bush Institute in Dallas, Texas. He is also a Contributor for NBC News and MSNBC.

Jessica Chen Weiss is the Michael J. Zak Professor for China and Asia-Pacific Studies in the Department of Government at Cornell University. From August 2021 to July 2022, Weiss served as senior advisor to the Secretary's policy planning staff at the U.S. Department of State on a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellow ship for Tenured IR Scholars (IAF-TIRS) while on sabbatical from Cornell. She studies Chinese politics and foreign relations with an emphasis on nationalism and public opinion, focusing on the connection between domestic politics and international relations. Her first book, Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in China's Foreign Relations (Oxford University Press, August 2014), examined how the Chinese Communist Party has managed nationalist, anti-foreign protests, tracing the government's repression and facilitation of grassroots mobilization as a means of conveying reassurance and resolve. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs, International Organization, China Quarterly, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, and the Review of International Political Economy. Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, she received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego.

Richard Clarke is the founder and CEO of Good Harbor Cyber Security Risk Management, and advises leaders in the public and private sectors on all issues of cyber security and crisis management. Clarke served in the White House on the National Security Council under President George H.W. Bush, President Bill Clinton, and President George W. Bush for an unprecedented ten years. As the country’s chief counterterrorism expert, Clarke was tasked with building the National Strategic Stockpile and also led the White House’s response on September 11, 2001. Then, as Special Advisor to the President on Cyber Security, or “Cyber-Czar,” Clarke developed the country’s first National Strategy to Defend Cyberspace. Since leaving government, Clarke has authored or co-authored nine books, including the international bestseller, Against All Enemies, Warnings, and his latest with Robert Knake, The Fifth Domain.

Benjamin J. Cohen is Louis G. Lancaster Professor of International Political Economy at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he has been a member of the Political Science Department since 1991. He previously taught at Princeton University from 1964-1971 and at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University from 1971-1991. His publications have addressed issues of international monetary relations, U.S. foreign economic policy, European monetary integration, developing country debt, and theories of economic imperialism. His most recent publications include The Future of Global Currency: The Euro versus the Dollar; "Toward a New Consensus: From Denial to Acceptance," in Nicola Phillips and Catherine Weaver, eds., International Political Economy: Debating the Past, Present and Future; and "Are IPE Journals Becoming Boring?" in International Studies Quarterly 54:3. He has won numerous awards and in 2000 was named Distinguished Scholar of the year by the International Political Economy Section of the International Studies Association.

Dr. Nancy Connell is a Senior Scientist in the Board on Life Sciences, Division of Earth and Life Sciences, at the US National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM). Trained in microbial geneticist at Harvard, Dr. Connell’s work focuses on advances in life sciences and technology and their application to a number of developments in the areas of biosecurity, biosafety, and biodefense. Her research analyzes novel biotechnologies that impact the implementation of Biological Weapons Convention and the development of global catastrophic biological risks in ecosystems. She has had a long-standing interest in the development of regulatory policies associated with biocontainment work and dual-use research of concern. Dr. Connell is a past member of the Board on Life Sciences, a current member of the Committee on International Security and Arms Control, and a National Associate of NASEM, where she has served on more than 15 NASEM committees. She also served on the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response Biological Agent Containment Working Group. In addition to life sciences research policy, Dr. Connell has considerable experience and interest in pedagogy, with a focus on ethics education and the responsible conduct of research. She has presented at workshops and meetings around the world on the interrelated issues of biocontainment, infectious disease research, research ethics, and the impact of advancing science and technology on the implementation of the Biological Weapons Convention. Dr Connell was Senior Scientist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and a Professor in the Department of Environmental Health and Engineering at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health from 2018-2021. From 1992-2018, Dr. Connell was at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School (NJMS) and the Rutgers Biomedical Health Sciences, finishing her long career there as Professor in the Division of Infectious Disease and Director of Research in in the Department of Medicine. Dr. Connell was continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, industry, and other sources from 1992 to 2018.

RICHARD DANZIG is a former Secretary of the Navy, whose primary activities in recent years have been as a consultant to the US Department of Defense and intelligence agencies. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, a Trustee of the RAND Corporation, and a Director of European investment firm, Saffron Hill Ventures. Danzig previously served as a member of President’s Intelligence Advisory Board, the Secretary of Defense’s Defense Policy Board, the Homeland Security Secretary’s Advisory Council, and the Aspen Strategy Group. He is the author of two books and numerous articles, includingDriving in the Dark: Ten Propositions about Prediction and U.S. National Security.

John Deutch is an emeritus Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he served as Chairman of the Department of Chemistry, Dean of Science and Provost. Deutch’s research focuses on energy technology and he has participated in numerous interdisciplinary studies on energy issues including the MIT studies on the Future of Nuclear Energy, the Future of Coal, and the Future of Natural Gas. He has published over 140 technical publications in physical chemistry, as well as numerous publications on technology, energy, international security, and public policy issues. Some of his recent publications are The Crisis in Energy Policy; and “Is Innovation China’s Next Great Leap Forward?” in Issues in Science and Technology.

James Dobbins is the Director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at RAND. His areas of expertise include: Iraq, Afghanistan, the Balkans, Europe, U.S. Foreign Relations, NATO, and trends and issues in international security. Dr. Dobbins is a veteran diplomat who has held senior White House and State Department positions under four presidents, and most recently served as the Bush Administration's special envoy for Afghanistan. His publications include: After the Taliban: Nation Building in Afghanistan; The Effect of Terrorist Attacks in Spain on Transatlantic Cooperation in the War on Terror; Stabilization and Reconstruction Civilian Management Act of 2004; The UN’s Role in Nation-Building: from the Congo to Iraq; The Beginner’s Guide to Nation-Building; Occupying Iraq: A History of the Coalition Provisional Authority; and After the Taliban.

DAN DREZNER is a Distinguished Professor of International Politics at the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He is the codirector of Fletcher’s Russia and Eurasia program. Previously, he taught at the University of Chicago and the University of Colorado at Boulder, and held positions with Civic Education Project, the RAND Corporation and the U.S. Department of the Treasury. Drezner received fellowships from the Rockefeller Foundation, German Marshall Fund of the United States, Council on Foreign Relations, and Harvard University. Drezner has written seven books, includingThe Ideas Industry and All Politics is Global, and edited three others, includingThe Uses and Abuses of Weaponized Interdependence. He has been a regular columnist and contributing editor forForeign Policy,The National Interest, andThe Washington Post.

Dr. R. David Edelman is Director of Public Policy at the MIT Internet Policy Research Initiative (IPRI), where he holds joint appointments at the Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) and Center for International Studies (CIS); teaches in the Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science; and leads research on the governance of artificial intelligence, the geopolitics of technology, and the national security dimensions of computing. Until 2017, he served as Special Assistant to President Obama for Economic and Technology Policy. In addition to this domestic portfolio, during that time he also represented the National Economic Council (NEC) and Office of Science & Technology Policy (OSTP) at the NSC Deputies Committee a range of national and homeland security matters. Edelman served from 2010-2012 as the nation’s first Director for International Cyber Policy on the White House National Security Council (NSC) staff. He began his career as a civil servant at the State Department’s Office of Cyber Affairs, later acting as the United States' lead negotiator on Internet issues at the United Nations — for which he was awarded State’s Superior Honor Award and twice its Meritorious Honor Award. His insights and analyses have appeared in print in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, WIRED, Fast Company, and Fortune, and broadcast on CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC, MSNBC, and NPR. His latest book, Rethinking Cyber Warfare, will be released by Oxford University Press this year.

KEVIN ESVELT is an Associate Professor at the MIT Media Lab, where he leads the Sculpting Evolution Group in advancing biotechnology safely. He was the inventor of asynthetic microbial ecosystem to rapidly evolve useful biomolecules, and subsequently helped pioneer the development of CRISPR, a powerful new method of genome engineering. In 2013, Esvelt was the first to identify the potential for CRISPR “gene drive” systems to alter wild populations of organisms. Esvelt and his colleagues chose to break with scientific tradition by revealing their findings and calling for open discussion and safeguards before building the first CRISPR. His work has been published inNature andScience, covered byThe New York Times andThe Washington Post, and featured on the Netflix special,Unnatural Selection.

Michèle Flournoy is Co-Chair of the Board of Directors of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) and a Senior Adviser at the Boston Consulting Group. She served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy from February 2009 to February 2012. She was the principal adviser to the Secretary of Defense in the formulation of national security and defense policy, oversight of military plans and operations, and in National Security Council deliberations. She led the development of DoD’s new Strategic Guidance and represented the Department in dozens of foreign engagements, in the media and before Congress.

M. Taylor Fravel is the Arthur and Ruth Sloan Professor of Political Science and Director of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Taylor studies international relations, with a focus on international security, China, and East Asia. His books include, Strong Borders, Secure Nation: Cooperation and Conflict in China’s Territorial Disputes, (Princeton University Press, 2008) and Active Defense: China's Military Strategy Since 1949 (Princeton University Press, 2019). His other publications have appeared in International Security, Foreign Affairs, Security Studies, International Studies Review, The China Quarterly, The Washington Quarterly, Journal of Strategic Studies, Armed Forces & Society, Current History, Asian Survey, Asian Security, China Leadership Monitor, and Contemporary Southeast Asia. Taylor is a graduate of Middlebury College and Stanford University, where he received his PhD. He also has graduate degrees from the London School of Economics and Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. In 2016, he was named an Andrew Carnegie Fellow by the Carnegie Corporation. Taylor is a member of the board of directors of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations and serves as the Principal Investigator for the Maritime Awareness Project.

Dr. Francis Fukuyama is Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at the Stanford University Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), resident in FSI's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. Dr. Fukuyama has written widely on issues in development and international politics. His book, The End of History and the Last Man, was published byFree Press in 1992 and has appeared in over twenty foreign editions. His most recent book, Political Order and Political Decay: From the Industrial Revolution to the Globalization of Democracy, was published in September 2014. Other books include America at the Crossroads: Democracy, Power, and the Neoconservative Legacy; Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution; and Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation of Prosperity. He was a member of the Political Science Department of the RAND Corporation, and of the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department of State. He previously taught at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of Johns Hopkins University and at George Mason University's School of Public Policy. He served as a member of the President's Council on Bioethics from 2001-2004. Dr. Fukuyama is chairman of the editorial board of The American Interest, which he helped to found in 2005. He is a senior fellow at the Johns Hopkins SAIS Foreign Policy Institute, and a non-resident fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the Center for Global Development.

Sumit Ganguly is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science, holds the Rabindranath Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations and directs the Center on American and Global Security at Indiana University, Bloomington. A specialist on the international and comparative politics of South Asia he has previously taught at James Madison College of Michigan State University, at Hunter College of the City University of New York, the School of Public and International Affairs at Columbia University and the University of Texas at Austin. In the spring quarter of 2014 he was the Visiting Buffet Professor of International Studies at Northwestern University. He has also been a Fellow and a Guest Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC; and a Visiting Fellow at the Center on International Security and Cooperation as well as the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. In 2010 he was a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Defense Studies and Analysis in New Delhi. Professor Ganguly is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of twenty books on the contemporary domestic and international politics of South Asia. He currently serves on the editorial boards of Asian Security, Current History, The India Review, International Security, Journal of Democracy, The Nonproliferation Review and Pacific Affairs. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations (New York) and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was also an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow at the University of Heidelberg, Germany for 2018-2019. His recent publications include How Rivalries End; Deadly Impasse: India and Pakistan at the Dawn of a New Century; and Ascending India and Its State Capacity. He is currently at work on a book on the origins and evolution of India’s defense policies.

Avery Goldstein is the David M. Knott Professor of Global Politics and International Relations in the Political Science Department, Inaugural Director of the Center for the Study of Contemporary China, and Associate Director of the Christopher H. Browne Center for International Politics at the University of Pennsylvania. His research focuses on international relations, security studies, and Chinese politics. He is the author of Rising to the Challenge: China’s Grand Strategy and International Security (Stanford University Press, 2005), Deterrence and Security in the 21st Century: China, Britain, France and the Enduring Legacy of the Nuclear Revolution (Stanford University Press, 2000), and From Bandwagon to Balance of Power Politics: Structural Constraints and Politics in China, 1949-1978 (Stanford University Press, 1991). Among his other publications are articles in the journals International Security, International Organization, Journal of Strategic Studies, Security Studies, China Quarterly, Asian Survey, Comparative Politics, Orbis, and Polity as well as chapters in a variety of edited volumes. Goldstein is also a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia.

Carol Graham is Leo Pasvolsky Senior Fellow at Brookings, College Park Professor at the University of Maryland, and a Gallup Senior Scientist. She served on a National Academy of Sciences panel on well-being metrics in 2012-13, received Pioneer Awards from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 2017 and 2021, and a Lifetime Distinguished Scholar award from the International Society of Quality of Life Studies (2018). She has served as a Vice President at Brookings, as Special Advisor to the Inter-American Development Bank, Visiting Fellow at the World Bank, and consultant to the IMF. Her most recent books (published in several languages) are: Happiness for All? Unequal Hopes and Lives in Pursuit of the American Dream (Princeton, 2017); The Pursuit of Happiness (Brookings, 2011); and Happiness around the World: The Paradox of Happy Peasants and Miserable Millionaires (Oxford, 2010). She has published articles in journals including Science, Social Science and Medicine, the Journal of Population Economics, Perspectives on Psychological Science, World Bank Research Observer; Health Affairs, Health Economics; the Journal of Development Studies; the Journal of Human Development; and the Journal of Economic Literature; and her work has been reviewed in Science, the New Yorker, and the New York Review of Books, among others, and is senior editor at Behavioral Science and Policy.

Dr. Gigi Gronvall is a Senior Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and an Associate Professor in the Department of Environmental Health and Engineering at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is an immunologist by training. Dr. Gronvall’s work at the Center addresses the role of scientists in health security—how they can contribute to an effective technical response against a biological weapon or a natural epidemic. She is particularly interested in developing policies that will boost the safety and security of biological science activities while allowing beneficial research to flourish. Dr. Gronvall is the author of the book Synthetic Biology: Safety, Security, and Promise, published in fall 2016 (Health Security Press). Dr. Gronvall is also the author of the book Preparing for Bioterrorism: The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation’s Leadership in Biosecurity. Dr. Gronvall is a member of the Threat Reduction Advisory Committee (TRAC), which provides the Secretary of Defense with independent advice and recommendations on reducing the risk to the United States, its military forces, and its allies and partners posed by nuclear, biological, chemical, and conventional threats. In 2014-15, she led a preparatory group that examined the US government response to the Ebola outbreak in West Africa as a case study for DoD’s strategic role in health security and that made recommendations for future DoD actions in response to disease outbreaks. She served as the Science Advisor for the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism from April 2009 until the Commission ended in February 2010. She has testified before Congress about the safety and security of high-containment biological laboratories in the United States and served on several task forces related to laboratory and pathogen security, most recently the National Institutes of Health Blue Ribbon Panel to Review the 2014 Variola Virus Incident on the NIH Campus (2016) and the Committee for Comprehensive Review of DoD Laboratory Procedures, Processes, and Protocols Associated with Inactivating Bacillus anthracis Spores, formed in response to the Dugway anthrax shipments (2015). Dr. Gronvall has investigated and presented policy recommendations on the governance of science to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) in Geneva, Switzerland. Dr. Gronvall is an Associate Editor of the journal Health Security (formerly Biosecurity and Bioterrorism). She is a founding member of the Center, and, prior to joining the faculty, she worked at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Civilian Biodefense Strategies.

Caroline Hartzell is a Professor in the Political Science Department at Gettysburg College. Her specialization is in international political economy with an emphasis on issues of conflict and conflict management, development, and globalization. Professor Hartzell's research focuses on cross-national civil war settlements and the effects institutions, both domestic and international, have on social conflict. She has published numerous journal articles on the effects that power-sharing settlements of civil wars have on the duration and quality of the peace, as well as co-authored and co-edited books on those topics. Professor Hartzell's research has been supported by the U.S. Institute of Peace, where she was a Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow, and grants from the National Science Foundation and Folke Bernadotte Academy to carry out survey research and experiments in Mindanao and Nepal. Hartzell's current research focuses on the effects peace settlements have on citizens' trust in government and citizens' attitudes regarding inclusive peace processes. Professor Hartzell is editor of the journal Conflict Management and Peace Science, the journal of the Peace Science Society (International) and a coordinator of the Citizens in Peace Processes (CIPP) research network.

Kathleen Hicks is senior vice president, Henry A. Kissinger Chair, and director of the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS). She is a frequent writer and lecturer on U.S. foreign policy; national security strategy, forces, and budget; and strategic futures. Dr. Hicks previously served in the Department of Defense as principal deputy under secretary for policy, a Senate-confirmed position with responsibility for assisting in the development and oversight of global and regional defense policy, strategy, and operations. She also served as deputy under secretary of defense for strategy, plans, and forces, leading the development of the 2012 Defense Strategic Guidance and the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review and crafting guidance for future force capabilities, overseas military posture, and contingency and theater campaign plans. Dr. Hicks was a senior fellow at CSIS from 2006 to 2009, leading a variety of national security research projects. From 1993 to 2006, she was a career civil servant in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, rising from Presidential Management Intern to the Senior Executive Service. Dr. Hicks received numerous recognitions for her service in the Department of Defense (DOD), including distinguished awards from three secretaries of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. She also received the 2011 DOD Senior Professional Women’s Association Excellence in Leadership Award. Dr. Hicks was a presidentially appointed commissioner for the National Commission on the Future of the Army. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the Boards of Advisors for the Truman National Security Project and SoldierStrong.

Thomas Homer-Dixon holds the Centre for International Governance Innovation Chair of Global Systems at the Balsillie School of International Affairs in Waterloo, Canada, and is a Professor in the Centre for Environment and Business in the Faculty of Environment, University of Waterloo. Recently, his research has focused on threats to global security in the 21st century and on how societies adapt to complex economic, ecological, and technological change. His books include The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity, and the Renewal of Civilization, which won the 2006 National Business Book Award; The Ingenuity Gap, which won the 2001 Governor General's Non-fiction Award; and Environment, Scarcity, and Violence, which won the Caldwell Prize of the American Political Science Association.

Lise Howard is an Associate Professor in the Department of Government at Georgetown University. She has served as a Jennings Randolph Senior Fellow at the U.S. Institute of Peace, and was the founding director of the Master of Arts Program in Conflict Resolution at Georgetown. Dr. Howard's research and teaching interests span the fields of international relations, comparative politics, and conflict resolution. Her work focuses on civil wars, peacekeeping, U.S. foreign policy, and area studies of the Balkans and sub-Saharan Africa. She has published several articles and book chapters on these topics. Her book, UN Peacekeeping in Civil Wars, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2008, and it won the 2010 Book Award from the Academic Council on the UN System (ACUNS) for the best book on the UN system published in the previous three years. She is currently working on several projects about U.S. foreign policy in ethnic conflict, the use of force in UN peacekeeping operations, and norms of civil war termination.

Manoj Jain, MD MPH is an infectious disease physician, a writer, and a national leader in healthcare quality improvement. He received his engineering, doctorate, and public health degree from Boston University. He did his residency, fellow and executive public health training at Boston City Hospital, New England Medical Center, Tufts University and Harvard School of Public Health, respectively. He has served as a consultant to the World Bank on HIV, and has been interviewed by CNN and National Public Radio. Over the past 15 years Dr. Jain has given over a 150 talks, and published numerous scientific articles, chapters and books. Dr. Jain has conducted research on HIV epidemiology, quality improvement, and spirituality & meditation. Presently, Dr. Jain is an Infectious disease consultant at Baptist Memorial Hospital and Methodist Hospitals in Memphis. He is also a clinical Associate Professor at University of Tennessee, Memphis and Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University in Atlanta.

Josef Joffe is Professor of Practice/International Affairs at Johns Hopkins Center for Global Affairs. His career has been divided between journalism and academia, Europe and the United States. He has taught at SAIS, Harvard, Stanford and Munich University. He was twice Regent Fellow at the University of California and a Visiting Lecturer at Princeton and Darthmouth. He has held research positions at the Woodrow Wilson Center,the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the Institute for International Studies at Stanford. He has serveved as a distinguished Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution since 2004. In Germany, he has served as editorial-page editor at Süddeutsche Zeitung (Munich) and editor of the weekly Die Zeit (Hamburg). Columns, essays and book reviews in: The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Guardian, Financial Times, Time, Newsweek, New Republic, Politico, Atlantic, and the New York Review of Books. In 2020, he co-founded the successor magazine American Purpose. His recent books include Überpower: The imperial Temptation of America; The Myth of American Decline; and The Good Germans: Career of a Moral Superpower.

Terry Karl is Professor of Political Science, William and Gretchen Kimball University Fellow, and Senior Fellow of the Stanford Institute for International Studies. Dr. Karl was educated at Stanford University, where she received her BA, MA and Ph.D. with distinction, and where she returned to teach in 1987. Dr. Karl has published widely on comparative politics and international relations, with special emphasis on the politics of oil-exporting countries, transitions to democracy, problems of inequality, human rights and civil wars, and contemporary Latin American politics. Dr. Karl's many books include: The Paradox of Plenty: Oil Booms and Petro-States; The Limits to Competition (co-authored with members of the Group of Lisbon of the European Commission); Oil and Conflict (with Mary Kaldor); and a monograph on ending impunity, centering on the trial of Romagoza et al versus General Garcia et al, the first successful jury trial of war criminals in the US.

Jonathan Kirshner is Professor of Political Science and International Studies at Boston College, and the Stephen and Barbara Friedman Professor of International Political Economy Emeritus at Cornell University. He is the author of An Unwritten Future: Uncertainty and Realism in World Politics, and co-editor of Downfall of the American Order? Kirshner served as director of Cornell University’s Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies from 2007 to 2015, and previously chaired the Economics and National Security Program at the Olin Institute of Strategic Studies at Harvard. His research and teaching interests focus on international relations, political economy (especially macroeconomics and money), and politics and film. He is the author of numerous books, including American Power after the Financial Crisis, and Hollywood’s Last Golden Age: Politics, Society and the Seventies Film in America. His first book, Currency and Coercion: The Political Economy of International Monetary Power explored how states manipulate international monetary relations to advance security-related goals. Another book, Appeasing Bankers: Financial Caution on the Road to War, won the best book award from the International Security Studies Section of the International Studies Association. From Cornell University, Kirshner is a recipient of the Provost's Award for Distinguished Scholarship, and the Stephen and Margery Russell Distinguished Teaching Award.

Dr. Andrey Kortunov is the Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council. Dr. Kortunov previously served as Deputy Director of the Institute for US and Canadian Studies. He was founder and first president of the Moscow Public Science Foundation. He has taught Russian foreign policy at the University Of Miami and at the Lewis & Clark College in Portland (University of California). In 2011, he was elected Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council non-profit partnership established by order of the President of the Russian Federation. His academic focus is international relations, foreign and domestic policy of Russia and Russian-American relations. Dr. Kortunov is the author of over 120 publications dedicated to the analysis of Soviet/Russian-American relations, global security, and the foreign and domestic policy of the USSR and Russia. His major recent publications include Russia and UN Reforms, and Disintegration of the Soviet Union and US Policies.

JOMO KWAME SUNDARAM is a Senior Adviser at the Khazanah Research Institute, a Fellow at the Academy of Science, Malaysia, an Emeritus Professor at the University of Malaya; and a Visiting Fellow at the Initiative for Policy Dialogue, Columbia University. He has advised several governments in Asia and Africa and served as Assistant Secretary-General, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and Assistant Director-General for Economic and Social Development, Food and Agriculture Organization. Jomo received the 2007 Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought. He has authored or edited over a hundred books and produced academic papers and media articles. He was Founding Director of the Institute of Social Analysis and Founding Chair of International Development Economics Associates.

CHAPPELL LAWSON is an Associate Professor of Political Science at MIT. Lawson’s recent work has focused on homeland security policy, Mexican politics, the effect of candidates’ physical appearance on their electoral success, and political leadership. From September2009 through February 2011, Lawson served in government as Executive Director and Senior Advisor to the Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Lawson was a National Fellow at The Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and a Visiting Research Fellow at the Center for U.S.-Mexico Studies at the University of California, San Diego. His recent publications includeBeyond 9/11: Homeland Security for the 21st Century andMexico’s Democratic Evolution: A Comparative Study of the 2012 Elections.

Dr. Ronan Lee is an Irish-Australian Doctoral Prize Fellow at Loughborough University London’s Institute for Media and Creative Industries where his research focuses on the Rohingya, genocide, hate speech, migration, and Asian politics. Ronan’s book Myanmar’s Rohingya Genocide: Identity, History and Hate Speech was published by Bloomsbury in 2021 and he was awarded the 2021 Early Career Emerging Scholar Prize by the International Association of Genocide Scholars. Ronan has a professional background in politics, media, and public policy. He was formerly a Queensland State Member of Parliament (2001-2009) and served on the frontbench as a Parliamentary Secretary (2006-2008) in portfolios including Justice, Main Roads and Local Government. He has also worked as a senior government advisor, and as an election strategist and campaign manager.

James Lewis is a senior fellow and director of the Technology and Public Policy Program at CSIS, where he focuses on technology, national security, and the international economy. Before joining CSIS, he worked in the federal government as a foreign service officer and as a member of the senior executive service. His assignments involved Asian regional security, military intervention and insurgency, conventional arms negotiations, technology transfer, sanctions, Internet policy, and military space programs. Lewis has authored numerous CSIS publications with the theme of how government policies adjust to technological innovation. They include Building an Information Technology Industry in China: National Strategy, Global Markets; Foreign Influence on Software: Risks and Recourse; Waiting for Sputnik: Basic Research and Strategic Competition; Globalization and National Security; Spectrum Management for the 21st Century; Assessing the Risk of Cyber Terrorism; and Preserving America’s Strength in Satellite Technology.

KEIR LIEBER is a Professor in the School of Foreign Service and Department of Government at Georgetown University. Lieber’s research and teaching interests include nuclear weapons, deterrence, and strategy; technology and the causes of war; U.S. national security policy; and international relations theory. He is co-author ofThe Myth of the Nuclear Revolution: Power Politics in the Atomic Age, author ofWar and the Engineers: The Primacy of Politics over Technology, and editor ofWar, Peace, and International Political Realism. Lieber’s articles have appeared inInternational Security, Security Studies, Foreign Affairs, andThe Atlantic. He has been awarded major fellowships from the Brookings Institution, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Council on Foreign Relations, Earhart Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, and Smith Richardson Foundation.

ERIK LIN-GREENBERG is the Leo Marx Career Development Associate Professor in the History and Culture of Science and Technology in the Department of Political Science at MIT. His research examines how emerging military technology affects conflict dynamics and the regulation and use of force. In his book project, he studies how remote warfighting technologies – like drones – shape crisis escalation. In other ongoing projects, he explores how technology and public opinion influence alliance politics and decisions on the use of force. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in academic and policy outlets includingJournal of Politics, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, The Washington Post, Foreign Affairs, andForeign Policy.

Marc Lynch is Associate Professor of Political Science at George Washington University and the Elliott School of International Affairs. He received his Ph.D. in 1997 from Cornell University and his BA from Duke University in 1990. He works on international politics, with a specialty on the Middle East. His current research interests focus on the relationship between new media technologies and Islamist movements, public diplomacy, and Arab public opinion. He also runs the popular Middle East politics blog, Abu Aardvark. He is the author of State Interests and Public Spheres: The International Politics of Jordan's Identity, and Voices of the New Arab Public: Iraq, al-Jazeera, and Middle East Politics Today. 

Ram Manikkalingam founded and directs the Dialogue Advisory Group (DAG), and teaches politics at the University of Amsterdam. He has extensive experience working on mediation and diplomacy at senior levels in government, civil society and with international organizations. He advised then President Kumaratunga on the ceasefire and reconstruction in peace talks with the Tamil Tigers. He led the Rockefeller Foundation’s work on International Security, where he supported programs to end the recruitment of child soldiers, ban anti-personnel mines and monitor the work of the UN Security Council. At DAG, he led teams that disarmed the Basque separatist armed group ETA, and the Irish Republican dissident armed group INLA, and worked on several efforts to pursue political dialogues in difficult conflict situations. Manikkalingam recently published Tamil Tigers: Dialogue, Terrorism and Nationalism, an eyewitness account and expert exploration of the bloody civil war that engulfed the island of Sri Lanka for nearly three decades.

William McCants is a fellow at Brookings in the Center for Middle East Policy and director of its Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World. He is also adjunct faculty at Johns Hopkins University and has held various government and think tank positions related to Islam, the Middle East, and terrorism. From 2009-2011, McCants served as a U.S. State Department senior adviser for countering violent extremism. He has also held positions as program manager of the Minerva Initiative for the Department of Defense; an analyst at the Institute for Defense Analyses, the Center for Naval Analyses and SAIC; and a fellow at West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center. He is the founder of Jihadica.com, an academic group blog focused on the global jihadi movement. The blog has been featured on the cover of the New York Times, and described by Wired magazine’s Danger Room as “the gold standard in militant studies.” His latest book is Founding Gods, Inventing Nations: Conquest and Culture Myths from Antiquity to Islam.

JOHN MEARSHEIMER is the R. Wendell Harrison Distinguished Service Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. He has written extensively about security issues and international politics. His books includeThe Tragedy of Great Power Politics, which won the Joseph Lepgold Book Prize, andThe Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. Mearsheimer’s latest books areHow States Think: The Rationality of Foreign Policy; andThe Great Delusion: Liberal Dreams and International Realities, which won the 2019 Best Book of the Year Award from the Valdai Discussion Conference. In 2020, he won the James Madison Award, which is given once every three years by the American Political Science Association to “an American political scientist who has made a distinguished scholarly contribution to political science.”

James Millward is Professor of Inter-societal History at the Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, teaching Chinese, Central Asian and world history. He also teaches as invited professor in the Máster Oficial en Estudios de Asia Oriental at the University of Granada, Spain. His specialties include Qing empire; the silk road; Eurasian lutes and music in history; and historical and contemporary Xinjiang. He follows and comments on current issues regarding the Uyghurs and PRC ethnicity policy.  Millward has served on the boards of the Association for Asian Studies (China and Inner Asia Council) and the Central Eurasian Studies Society, and was president of the Central Eurasian Studies Society in 2010. He edits the ''Silk Roads'' series for University of Chicago Press. His publications include The Silk Road: A Very Short Introduction (2013), Eurasian Crossroads: a History of Xinjiang (2007), New Qing Imperial History: the Making of Inner Asian Empire at Qing Chengde (2004), and Beyond the Pass: Economy, Ethnicity and Empire in Qing Central Asia (1998). His most recent album, recorded with the band By & By, is Songs for this Old Heart. His articles and op-eds on contemporary China appear in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Guardian, The Global Times, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Review of Books and other media.

Malik Mufti is a professor of political science at Tufts University. He teaches courses on international relations and the politics of the Middle East, and is a recipient of the Lillian and Joseph Leibner Award for Distinguished Teaching and Advising. He is the author of Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Order in Syria and Iraq (1996), Daring and Caution in Turkish Strategic Culture: Republic at Sea (2009), and The Art of Jihad: Realism in Islamic Political Thought (2019). His recent journal articles include "Democratizing Potential of the 'Arab Spring': Some Early Observations" (Government and Opposition, July 2015); "Turkey at 100: Between Constancy and Change" (International Relations, June 2023); and "Nietzsche, the Muslim Falāsifa, and Leo Strauss's Avicennan Turn" (Review of Politics, Spring 2024). His current project is on the encounter between Islam and America.

VIPIN NARANG is the Frank Stanton Professor of Nuclear Security and Political Science and member of the Security Studies Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. From March 2022through August 2024, he served as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense and then Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy, a portfolio with oversight over the U.S. Department of Defense’s strategic capabilities, including nuclear, space, missile defense, and cyber policy. For his service, he was awarded the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service. He has published two books:Nuclear Strategy in the Modern Era, which won the 2015 ISA International Security Studies Section Best Book Award; andSeeking the Bomb: Strategies of Nuclear Proliferation. His work has also appeared in a variety of other outlets, includingInternational Security, Journal of Conflict Resolution, The Washington Quarterly, International Organization, Foreign Affairs, The Washington Post, and theNew York Times.

ABRAHAM NEWMAN is a Professor in the School of Foreign Service and in the Government Department at Georgetown University. His research focuses on the ways in which economic interdependence and globalization have transformed international politics. Newman is co-author ofUnderground Empire: How America Weaponized the World Economy (with Henry Farrell). His other publications includeOf Privacy and Power: The Transatlantic Struggle over Freedom and Security, which won the 2019 Chicago-Kent College of Law /Roy C. Palmer Civil Liberties Prize, the 2020 International Studies Association ICOMM Best Book Award, and was named one ofForeign Affairs’ Best Books of 2019; andVoluntary Disruptions: International Soft Law, Finance, and Power (with Elliot Posner).

Manuel Orozco is the Director of the Migration, Remittances, and Development Program at the Inter-American Dialogue. He also serves as a Senior Fellow at Harvard University’s Center for International Development and as a Senior Adviser with the International Fund for Agricultural Development. Orozco has conducted extensive research, policy analysis and advocacy on issues relating to global flows of remittances as well as migration and development worldwide. He is Chair of Central America and the Caribbean at the US Foreign Service Institute and Senior Researcher at the Institute for the Study of International Migration at Georgetown University. Orozco frequently testifies before Congress and has spoken before the United Nations. Orozco has published widely on remittances, Latin America, globalization, democracy, migration, conflict in war torn societies, and minority politics. His books include International Norms and Mobilization for Democracy (2002), Remittances: Global Opportunities for International Person-to-Person Money Transfers (2005), América Latina y el Caribe: Desarrollo, migración y remesas (2012) and Migrant Remittances and Development in the Global Economy (2013).

Roland Paris is University Research Chair in International Security and Governance at the University of Ottawa, founding Director of the Centre for International Policy Studies, and Associate Professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. His research interests are in the fields of international security, international governance and foreign policy. Before joining the University of Ottawa in 2006, he was Director of Research at the Conference Board of Canada, the country's largest think tank; foreign policy advisor in the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Privy Council Office of the Canadian government; Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Colorado-Boulder; and Visiting Researcher at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, D.C. He has won two awards for public service and four awards for teaching. Paris' writings have appeared in leading academic journals including International Security and International Studies Quarterly. His book “At War's End: Building Peace After Civil Conflict” (Cambridge University Press, 2004) won the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving Global Order and the International Studies Association's prize for best book on multilateralism. He has co-edited two other volumes on peacebuilding, and is co-editor of the Security & Governance book series at Routledge. In 2012 Paris was appointed a Global Ethics Fellow by the Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs. He is also a fellow of the Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute, and a member of the board of directors of the World University Service of Canada.

Janos Pasztor is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs and Executive Director of the Carnegie Climate Governance Initiative (C2G). He has over 35 years of work experience in the areas of energy, environment, climate change, and sustainable development. Before taking up his current assignment he was UN assistant secretary-general for climate change in New York under Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. Earlier, he was acting executive director for conservation (2014) and policy and science director (2012-2014) at WWF International. He directed the UNSG’s Climate Change Support Team (2008-2010) and later was executive secretary of the UNSG’s High-level Panel on Global Sustainability (2010-2012). In 2007 he directed the Geneva-based UN Environment Management Group (EMG). During 1993-2006 he worked, and over time held many responsibilities at the Climate Change Secretariat (UNFCCC), initially in Geneva and later in Bonn. His other assignments included: in the Secretariat of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (Earth Summit ’92); Stockholm Environment Institute; United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP); Secretariat of the World Commission on Environment and Development (Brundtland Commission); the Beijer Institute; and the World Council of Churches.

Kenneth Pollack is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he works on Middle Eastern political-military affairs. Dr. Pollack began his career as a Persian Gulf military analyst at the CIA. He then served twice on the National Security Council, first as director for Near East and South Asian affairs and then as director for Persian Gulf affairs. Before joining AEI, Dr. Pollack was a senior fellow of the Brookings Institution for 15 years, where he also served as the director of research and then the director of the Brookings Center for Middle East Policy. Dr. Pollack is the author of 10 books, including most recently, Armies of Sand: The Past, Present, and Future of Arab Military Effectiveness.

Christopher Preble is the Senior Fellow and Director of the Reimagining US Grand Strategy program at the Stimson Center. Prior to joining the Stimson Center, he served as Co-Director of the Atlantic Council’s New American Engagement Initiative. His work focuses on the history of US foreign policy, contemporary US grand strategy and military force posture, alliance relations, and the intersection of trade and national security. Preble is the author of four books, including Peace, War, and Liberty: Understanding U.S. Foreign Policy (Cato Institute, 2019); and The Power Problem: How American Military Dominance Makes Us Less Safe, Less Prosperous, and Less Free (Cornell University Press, 2009). His work has appeared in major publications including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Financial Times, Survival, Foreign Policy, and Foreign Affairs. In addition to his work at the Stimson Center, Preble co-hosts the “Net Assessment” podcast. Preble was vice president for defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute from 2011 to 2020, and director of foreign policy studies from 2003 to 2011. Preble was a commissioned officer in the US Navy, and served aboard the USS Ticonderoga (CG-47) from 1990 to 1993.

Dr. Gerard Prunier is an Independent Consultant on Eastern and Central African affairs and former Director of the French Center for Ethiopian Studies in Addis-Ababa. One of the foremost Africanists in the world today, Prunier is the author of more than two hundred scholarly articles and a dozen books in four languages, including The Rwanda Crisis: History of a Genocide, Darfur: A 21st Century Genocide—which was hailed by Foreign Affairs as “the best available account of the Darfur crisis”—and Africa’s World War: Congo, the Rwandan Genocide, and the Making of Continental Catastrophe, which was awarded a special honorable mention in the Council on Foreign Relations’ 2010 Arthur Ross Book Award competition for the best book published in international relations, the first Africa-focused book ever so honored. Until he reached the mandatory retirement age, Prunier served as a senior researcher at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France’s largest government research organization, and a professor at the University of Paris. From 2001-2006, he was seconded to the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and served as the director of the Centre Français des Études Éthiopiennes in Addis Ababa. Throughout his career, Prunier has not only served as an advisor to the French government, but also consulted for the US State and Defense Departments, various European and African governments, as well as private companies. Prunier also serves on the academic council of the Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa and on the editorial board of the Journal of the Middle East and Africa.

Robert Ross is Professor of Political Science at Boston College and Associate of John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University. He has taught at Columbia University and at the University of Washington and in 1989 was a Guest Scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. In 1994-1995 he was Fulbright Professor at the Chinese Foreign Affairs College, in 2003 he was a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Institute of International Strategic Studies, Qinghua University, Beijing, and in 2014 was Visiting Scholar, School of International Relations, Peking University. In 2009 he was Visiting Scholar, Institute for Strategy, Royal Danish Defence College. From 2009-2014 he has been Adjunct Professor, Institute for Defence Studies, Norwegian Defence University College. Professor Ross's research focuses on Chinese security policy and defense policy, East Asian security, and U.S.-China relations. His recent publications include Chinese Security Policy: Structure, Power, and Politics, China’s Ascent: Power, Security, and the Future of International Politics, and New Directions in the Study of Chinese Foreign Policy. His other major works include Normalization of U.S.-China Relations: An International History; Great Wall and Empty Fortress: China’s Search for Security, Negotiating Cooperation: U.S.-China Relations, 1969-1989, and The Indochina Tangle: China's Vietnam Policy, 1975-1979. Professor Ross has testified before various Senate and House committees and the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee, he advises U.S. government agencies, and he serves on the Academic Advisory Group, U.S.-China Working Group, United States Congress. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the National Committee for U.S.-China Relations. Professor Ross is also a member of the executive committee of the John King Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University. He has served as Senior Advisor of the Security Studies Program, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Senior Advisor to the Institute for American Studies, Shanghai. He is a founding member and former board member of the United States Committee of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia-Pacific and former co-chair of the Committee's task force on Confidence Strategic Building Measures. He is on the editorial board of Security Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, Journal of Cold War Studies, Issues and Studies, Asia Policy, Journal of Chinese Political Science, the Security Studies book series of Shanghai People’s Press, and the Grand Strategy book series of Peking University Press.

RICHARD SAMUELS is Ford International Professor of Political Science at MIT. He has been Director of the Center for International Studies, Head of the MIT Political Science Department, Vice-Chair of the Committee on Japan of the National Research Council, and Chair of the Japan-US Friendship Commission. He has also been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences and was awarded an Imperial decoration, the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star by the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese Prime Minister. Among Samuel’s many publications are the books3.11: Disaster and Change in Japan; andSecuring Japan: Tokyo’s Grand Strategy and the Future of East Asia, which was a finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize for the best book in international affairs in 2007.

Vivien A. Schmidt is Jean Monnet Professor of European Integration, Professor Emerita of International Relations and Political Science, and Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Europe, all at Boston University, where she taught from 1998 to 2023. Prof. Schmidt is currently Visiting Fellow in the Robert Schuman Center at the European University Institute in Florence, Honorary Professor at LUISS Guido Carli University in Rome, and Senior Fellow at the Zoe Institute in Cologne and Brussels.  She received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr College, her Masters and PhD from the University of Chicago, and attended Sciences Po in Paris. Prof. Schmidt’s research focuses on European political economy, institutions, democracy, and political theory—in particular on the importance of ideas and discourse in political analysis (discursive institutionalism). Her recent books include Europe’s Crisis of Legitimacy (2020—recipient of the Best Book Award of the American Political Science Association’s Ideas, Knowledge, Politics section and Honorable Mention from the European Union Studies Association); Resilient Liberalism in Europe’s Political Economy (co-edited, 2013), and Democracy in Europe (2006— named in 2015 by the European Parliament as one of the ‘100 Books on Europe to Remember’). Her awards and fellowships include a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Mentoring Award of the Women in International Political Economy section of the International Studies Association, the Belgian Franqui Interuniversity Chair for foreign scholars, a Rockefeller Bellagio Center Residency, a Jean Monnet Chair awarded by the European Union Commission, and Fulbright Fellowships to France and the UK. Her honors include being decorated as a Chevalier in the French Legion of Honor, inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and granted an honorary doctorate from the Free University of Brussels (ULB). Prof. Schmidt has also been a visiting professor or visiting scholar at the Free University of Berlin, the Free University of Brussels, Sciences Po in Paris, the European University Institute, and Oxford University, among others. She is past head of the European Union Studies Association (EUSA) and sits on a number of advisory boards, including, the Vienna Institute for Peace, the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (Brussels), and previously the Wissenschaft Zentrum Berlin. She has published thirteen books, over 300 scholarly journal articles or chapters in books, and numerous policy briefs and comments, most recently on the Eurozone crisis. Her current work, supported by a Guggenheim fellowship, focuses on the ‘rhetoric of discontent,’ through a transatlantic investigation of the populist revolt against globalization and Europeanization.

ADAM SEGAL is the Ira A. Lipman Chair in Emerging Technology and National Security, and Director of the Digital and Cyberspace Policy Program at the Council on Foreign Relations. From April 2023 to June2024, Segal was a senior advisor in the State Department’s Bureau of Cyberspace and Digital Policy, where he led the development of the U. S. International Cyberspace and Digital Policy. Segal was the project director for the CFR-sponsored Independent Task Force report, Confronting Reality in Cyberspace: Foreign Policy for a Fragmented Internet. He is the author ofAdvantage: How American Innovation Can Overcome the Asian Challenge; Digital Dragon: High-Technology Enterprises in China; andThe Hacked World Order: How Nations Fight, Trade, Maneuver, and Manipulate in the Digital Age, which describes the increasingly contentious geopolitics of cyberspace.

OXANA SHEVEL is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University, and Director of Tufts International Relations Program. She currently serves as Vice-President of the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES) and Vice President of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN). Shevel’s research and teaching focus on the post-Soviet region, especially Ukraine and Russia, and issues such as nation-building and identity politics, citizenship policies, memory politics, church-state relations, and democratization processes in the post-Soviet region. She is co-author ofRussia and Ukraine: Entangled Histories, Diverging States (with Maria Popova). Her first book,Migration, Refugee Policy, and State Building in Postcommunist Europe won the 2012 American Association of Ukrainian Studies book prize.

Michael Singh is managing director of The Washington Institute and a former senior director for Middle East affairs at the National Security Council. At the White House, Mr. Singh was responsible for devising and implementing strategies on a wide range of Middle East issues, from efforts to prevent Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons capability, to the Arab-Israeli peace process, to promoting human rights in the region. He served in the NSC for three years, as senior director for Middle East affairs and as director for Iran and for Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa. Previously, Mr. Singh served as special assistant to secretaries of state Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell and was staff assistant to then ambassador Daniel Kurtzer at the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv. A member of the Harvard International Review's Board of Advisors, Mr. Singh has written extensively on Iran, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and U.S. national security strategy and management. His articles have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, World Affairs, the American Interest, the Economist, Foreign Affairs online, and other publications. He is a regular contributor to ForeignPolicy.com, and appears frequently in national and global media outlets such as Fox News, NBC, CBS, and the BBC.

Paul Staniland is Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago and a nonresident scholar in the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is also the faculty chair of the Committee on International Relations MA program. His research focuses on political violence and international security in South Asia. His first book, Networks of Rebellion: Explaining Insurgent Cohesion and Collapse, was published by Cornell University Press in 2014. His second book, Ordering Violence: Explaining Armed Group-State Relations from Conflict to Cooperation, was published by Cornell in 2021. Both won multiple awards. Staniland is in the early stages of a book project on the consequences of major power competition for the internal politics of “swing” states in South and Southeast Asia since 1945.

Andrew Tabler is the Martin J. Gross Fellow in the Program on Arab Politics at The Washington Institute, where he focuses on Syria and U.S. policy in the Levant. Mr. Tabler achieved unparalleled long-term access to Bashar al-Assad's Syria. During fourteen years of residence in the Middle East, Mr. Tabler served as co-founder and editor-in-chief of Syria Today, Syria's first private-sector English-language magazine; as a consultant on U.S.-Syria relations for the International Crisis Group (2008); and as a fellow of the Institute of Current World Affairs (2005-2007), writing on Syrian, Lebanese, and Middle Eastern affairs. Following his graduate work in Cairo, Egypt, Mr. Tabler held editorships with the Middle East Times and Cairo Times, where he focused on Arab-Israeli peace negotiations, before becoming senior editor and director of editorial for the Oxford Business Group (OBG). In 2001, Mr. Tabler personally oversaw with OBG the first comprehensive English-language report on Syria in more than thirty years. Mr. Tabler has lived, worked and studied extensively in Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Tunisia, and Turkey. Mr. Tabler has interviewed Syrian first lady Asma al-Assad, the late Israeli president Shimon Peres, the late Palestinian president Yasser Arafat, slain Lebanese prime minister Rafiq Hariri, and former Lebanese prime ministers Fouad Siniora and Saad Hariri. His articles and opinion pieces on Middle East affairs and U.S. foreign policy have appeared in the New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, the International Herald Tribune, Newsweek, Foreign Policy, and Foreign Affairs. He has also appeared in interviews with CNN, NBC, CBS, PBS, NPR, and the BBC. Mr. Tabler is author of "Syria's Collapse and How Washington Can Stop It" (Foreign Affairs, July-August 2013) and the 2011 book In the Lion's Den: An Eyewitness Account of Washington's Battle with Syria.

Caitlin Talmadge is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She also serves as a Senior Non-Resident Fellow in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution; a member of the Defense Policy Board at the U.S. Department of Defense; and a series editor for Cornell Studies in Security Affairs at Cornell University Press. Professor Talmadge’s research and teaching focus on nuclear deterrence and escalation, U.S. military operations and strategy, and security issues in Asia and the Persian Gulf. She is author of The Dictator’s Army: Battlefield Effectiveness in Authoritarian Regimes (Cornell, 2015), which Foreign Affairs named the Best Book in Security for 2016 and which won the 2017 Best Book Award from the International Security Studies Section of the International Studies Association. In addition, she is co-author of U.S. Defense Politics: The Origins of Security Policy (fourth edition, Routledge, 2021), and she is currently writing a book with Professor Brendan Green on nuclear escalation risk in the emerging deterrence environment. Dr. Talmadge has published articles in International Security, Security Studies, The Journal of Conflict Resolution, The Journal of Strategic Studies, Foreign Affairs, The Washington Quarterly, The Non-Proliferation Review, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others. She has also testified before the Congressionally mandated U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, and her commentary on current events has appeared in The Financial Times, The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Economist, Newsweek, and other media outlets such as CNN.

BRIAN TAYLOR is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs at the Maxwell School of Citizenship & Public Affairs at Syracuse University. His primary research interests lie in the realm of Russian politics, and his research focus on the development of the Russian state, with particular attention to state coercive organizations, such as the military and the police. Taylor has also written on Russian elite politics, including the nature of Putinism as a mentality and political system. Additional interests include comparative state-building and civil-military relations. Taylor’s books includeRussian Politics: A Very Short Introduction; The Code of Putinism; andState Building in Putin’s Russia: Policing and Coercion After Communism.

Maya Tudor is a University Lecturer in Government and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford University and a fellow of St Hilda's College. Tudor has worked as a Special Assistant to Chief Economist Joseph Stiglitz at the World Bank, at UNICEF, in the United States Senate, and at the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee, recently ranked the world's top NGO. A dual citizen of Germany and the United States, she has lived and worked in Bangladesh, Germany, France, India, Kenya, Pakistan, the Philippines, the United Kingdom and the United States. Tudor's research investigates the origins of stable, democratic and effective states across the developing world, with a particular emphasis upon South Asia. Her recently published book, The Promise of Power (Cambridge University Press, 2013), was based upon her 2010 dissertation, which won the American Political Science Association's Gabriel Almond Prize for the Best Dissertation in Comparative Politics. The book investigates the origins of India and Pakistan's puzzling regime divergence in the aftermath of colonial independence. She is also the author of a number of articles, most recently Explaining Democracy's Origins in Comparative Politics.

Stephen Van Evera is Ford International Professor in the MIT Political Science Department. He works in several areas of international relations: the causes and prevention of war, US foreign policy, US security policy, US intervention in the Third World, international relations of the Middle East, and international relations theory. He has published books on the causes of war and on social science methodology, and articles on American foreign policy, American defense policy, nationalism and the causes of war, the origins of World War I, and US strategy in the War on Terror. He currently serves as chair of the Tobin Project committee on national security. He is the author of Causes of War: Power and the Roots of Conflict.

Jim Walsh is a Senior Research Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Security Studies Program (SSP). Dr. Walsh’s research and writings focus on international security, and in particular, topics involving nuclear weapons, the Middle East, and East Asia. Dr. Walsh has testified before the United States Senate and House of Representatives on issues of nuclear terrorism, Iran, and North Korea. He is one of a handful of Americans who has traveled to both Iran and North Korea for talks with officials about nuclear issues. His recent publications include, “Laser Enrichment and Proliferation: Assessing Future Risks,” "Testimony before Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Subcommittee on National Security, U.S. House of Representatives" (June 6, 2018),  “Stopping North Korea, Inc.: Sanctions Effectiveness and Unintended Consequences” and “Rivals, Adversaries, and Partners: Iran and Iraq in the Middle East” in Iran and Its Neighbors. He is the international security contributor to the NPR program “Here and Now,” and his comments and analysis have appeared in the New York Times, the New York Review of Books, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, and numerous other national and international media outlets. Before coming to MIT, Dr. Walsh was Executive Director of the Managing the Atom project at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government and a visiting scholar at the Center for Global Security Research at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. He has taught at both Harvard University and MIT.

Barbara F. Walter is the Rohr Professor of International Affairs at the University of California, San Diego. She is the New York Times bestselling author of How Civil Wars Start and How To Stop Them, and other award-winning books on civil wars. Walter is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a frequent guest on CNN, MSNBC, NBC, and an active consultant for the World Bank, the United Nations, the Departments of Defense and State, and the January 6th committee. When not doing research, she writes for the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the New Republic, Time, and Foreign Affairs. In 2012, she founded the blog Political Violence @ a Glance (with Erica Chenoweth) which sometimes beats out the Washington Post's Monkey Cage for Best Blog of the Year. Her real passion, however, is to paint, draw, and do anything involving art.

RICHARD WILCOX is a diplomat and public finance expert currently serving as the UN WFP’s Private Sector Director. In 2022-2023 he was UN Special Advisor and Director of the UN Task Force on Russian food and fertiliser trade facilitation as part of the UN’s Black Sea Grain Initiative which he conceived and helped negotiate in 2022.Previously, he served as the Director-General of the African Union’s African Risk Capacity at the level of Assistant Secretary General and as Special Advisor on Humanitarian Finance to the United Nations World Food Program. He established the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue cyber conflict mediation practice in Geneva and co-founded Digital Equity, a Swiss association supporting governments and the private sector with their digital transformation, including providing AI-enabled hate and harmful speech monitoring to the electoral com-missions of Kenya and Nigeria during their recent elections.

Ambassador Bisa Williams (ret) is co-Founder and Managing Director of Williams Strategy Advisors, LLC (WSA), a problem-solving, business and foreign affairs advisory consulting firm. For the last 2 years, she has also led The Carter Center’s effort as Independent Observer of implementation of the Peace Agreement in Mali.  Before forming WSA, Ambassador Williams was a career member of the Foreign Service of the U.S. Department of State. During her 30+ years in the Foreign Service, she served tours in Guinea (Conakry), Panama, Mauritius, France, the US Mission to the UN (NY), Washington, DC, including two years at the National Security Council of The White House, and Niger. As Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Ambassador Williams led the US delegation to talks in Havana, Cuba, breaking a seven year hiatus of high level direct discussions. Her accomplishments were recognized in LeoGrande/Kornbluh book Back Channel to Cuba. She was appointed by President Barack Obama in 2010 as Ambassador to Niger where she served for 3 years. Following her tour as Ambassador, she was named Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of African Affairs, supporting US economic policy goals in sub-Saharan Africa and bilateral policy in the West Africa region. Ambassador Williams retired from the Foreign Service in 2015.  She speaks French, Spanish, and Portuguese and is the recipient of numerous Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards from the Department of State. She holds a Master of Science degree in National Security Strategy from the National War College of the National Defense University in Washington, DC and a Master of Arts degree in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Los Angeles.

CLINT WORK is a Research Fellow and professor in the Center for Strategy and Military Power within the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University. He previously served as Fellow and Director of Academic Affairs at the Korea Economic Institute of America (KEI), and Fellow at the Henry L. Stimson Center’s 38 North Program. Work has conducted extensive applied research on U.S. national security policy in the Indo-Pacific, with emphasis on Northeast Asia and the Korean Peninsula. He has worked closely with officials throughout the Departments of Defense and State, U.S. Forces Korea (USFK), other U.S. national security-related departments and agencies, and with Congress, as well as South Korean and Japanese current and former officials, scholars and analysts.

EDWARD YOU is the Founder and Principal of EHY Consulting LLC, a firm specializing in the security, policy, and strategic implications of emerging technologies. Through EHY Consulting, he advises industry, academia, and government on the convergence of artificial intelligence, biotechnology, quantum, and other disruptive technologies, helping organizations navigate the risks and opportunities that will define the future innovation landscape. You recently retired after more than two decades of distinguished service in the FBI, where he held leadership positions at the intersection of counterintelligence, biosecurity, and technology protection. Most recently, he served in the FBI’s National Counterintelligence Task Force, supporting a whole-of-government approach to safeguarding emerging and disruptive technologies. You served for 15 years in the Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate. He also completed a Joint Duty Assignment at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, where he served as the National Counterintelligence Officer for Emerging and Disruptive Technologies.