Podcasts about johns hopkins sais

The Mercantilist Restoration - https://anthonyfatseas.substack.com/p/the-mercantilist-restoration-howInterview recorded - 22nd of May, 2026On this episode of the WTFinance podcast I had the pleasure of welcoming back Professor Vali Nasr. Vali Nasr is a Professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and one of the most authoritative voices on Iran, having advised American policymakers and diplomats on the country for decades. He is also the author of Iran's Grand Strategy: A political history.During our conversation we spoke about the current situation in the Middle East, what has led up to this conflict, Iran's surprising resilience, their grand strategy, potential escalation, reshaping the Middle East and more. I hope you enjoy!0:00 - Introduction3:05 - Lead up to war5:48 - Surprised about escalation8:38 - Iran resilience10:48 - Iran's Grand Strategy13:18 - October 6th impact16:23 - Conflict resolution20:09 - Military escalation24:11 - How have views changed?28:17 - Iranian proxies over?29:47 - US withdrawing from Middle East?34:11 - Guerrilla warfare35:25 - One message to takeaway? Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and Non-Resident Senior Advisor in the Middle East Program at CSIS. He served as the eighth Dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019 and served as Senior Advisor to U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke between 2009 and 2011.Professor Nasr is the author of Iran's Grand Strategy: A Political History, The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat; Forces of Fortune: The Rise of a New Middle Class and How it Will Change Our World; The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam will Shape the Future; Democracy in Iran: History and the Quest for Liberty; Islamic Leviathan, Islam and the Making of State Power; Mawdudi and the Making of Islamic Revivalism; Vanguard of Islamic Revolution: Jama'at-i Islami of Pakistan, and co-author of How Sanctions Work: Iran and the Impact of Economic Warfare; as well as numerous articles in scholarly journals and commentary in Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal. He has advised senior American policymakers, world leaders, and businesses, including the President, Secretary of State, senior members of the Congress, and presidential campaigns. He has written for New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others.Vali Nasr - X - https://x.com/vali_nasrBook - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Irans-Grand-Strategy-Political-History/dp/0691268924/WTFinance -Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/67rpmjG92PNBW0doLyPvfniTunes -https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/wtfinance/id1554934665?uo=4LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/anthony-fatseas-761066103/Twitter - https://twitter.com/AnthonyFatseas

This week I'm sharing the fourth and final installment from the day-long conference convened by the Institute for America, China, and the Future of Global Affairs (ACF) at Johns Hopkins SAIS on April 3rd in Washington — “The China Debate We're Not Having: Politics, Technology, and the Road Ahead.” The first three episodes featured Jessica Chen Weiss's opening remarks and the panels on what China wants, what the United States wants, and tech rivalry and competing visions of the future. This final installment is a fireside conversation between Henry Farrell and Alondra Nelson, followed by Jessica's closing remarks.Once again, my deep thanks to Jessica Chen Weiss, ACF's inaugural faculty director, for organizing this terrific conference and for so generously letting me share this audio with Sinica listeners.Henry Farrell, the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute Professor of International Affairs at SAIS, sits down with Alondra Nelson — Harold F. Linder Professor of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study and former Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy — for what turns out to be the day's most generative reframing of the AI race. Henry begins by asking how it is that ideas once confined to 1980s science fiction — the singularity, AGI, brains-in-vats — have come to anchor mainstream American AI policy discourse. Alondra traces the genealogy back to the “Californian ideology” and the long history of outré thinking in Silicon Valley, but her real point is that something has shifted: U.S. negative sentiment around AI has been climbing and plateauing high since 2022, even as adoption has spread — the opposite of the usual technology-acceptance curve, and the opposite of what's happening in China, Nigeria, or Brazil.From there the conversation opens up into what I found to be its richest vein: the contrast between a Cartesian, disembodied American conception of AI — “we're working on the brains,” as Sam Altman put it when OpenAI shut down its robotics team in 2022 — and a more embodied approach that integrates the cognitive and the physical, which is part of what's powered China's advances in advanced manufacturing and robotics. Alondra is sharp on the costs of the brain-in-a-vat framing: it treats AI as a state of exception in which existing laws and institutions somehow don't apply, and it lets us float aspirational claims (”AI will cure cancer”) that elide all the clunky institutional stewardship actually required to get from aspiration to outcome.She also offers an incisive reading of the Trump administration's AI policy — which, she argues, is misleadingly described as “deregulatory.” Between export controls, the golden share in Intel, immigration restrictions on STEM talent, and the administration's tight stewardship of who wins and who loses in the AI ecosystem, this is industrial policy by another name — and a narrowing of democratic input over decisions of enormous infrastructural consequence.The conversation closes with Henry asking what a small-d democratic successor administration ought to do, and Alondra's answer is bracingly practical: get rid of the state of exception, take the material supply chain of AI seriously (data centers, electricity, critical minerals, communities), let state-level policy generate evidence about what works, and aim for high-watermark aspirations — North Stars, in the spirit of the AI Bill of Rights — rather than pretending the technology itself will deliver our values.Jessica then offers her closing remarks, thanking the panelists, previewing the ACF Insights Series, and putting out the call for new junior fellows at the Institute.Participants:Alondra Nelson, Harold F. Linder Professor of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study; former Director, White House Office of Science and Technology PolicyHenry Farrell, Stavros Niarchos Foundation Agora Institute Professor of International Affairs, Johns Hopkins SAISClosing remarks: Jessica Chen Weiss, David M. Lampton Professor of China Studies and Inaugural Faculty Director, ACFSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Nora Fisher Onar is Associate Professor and Chair of Global Studies at the University of San Francisco. Her research interests include international relations theory, diplomacy, comparative politics / area studies (Turkey/Middle East; Europe; Eurasia), political ideologies, gender, and history/memory. She is also increasingly interested in the impact of technological change on international affairs. She received her doctorate from the University of Oxford and holds master's and undergraduate degrees from Johns Hopkins (SAIS) and Georgetown universities, respectively. She speaks five languages, has traveled to over 80 countries, and lived in eight. Fisher-Onar is the author of Contesting Pluralism(s): Islam, Liberalism and Nationalism in Turkey, with Cambridge University Press, and lead editor of the volume, Istanbul: Living With Difference in a Global City (co-edited with Susan C. Pearce and E. Fuat Keyman). She is also the editor of special issues of major scholarly journals like: the Journal of Common Market Studies; International Affairs, and Global Studies Quarterly, among others. Fisher-Onar speaks often at policy fora like Brookings, Carnegie, and the German Marshall Fund (GMF) where she has served as a Ronald Asmus Fellow, Transatlantic Academy Fellow, and Non-Residential Fellow. She further contributes commentary to platforms like the Washington Post, Foreign Affairs, and OpenDemocracy.

Sanjana Polapragada sits down with President Jakov Milatović of Montenegro, NATO's youngest head of state, for a timely conversation on how Montenegro, as a small state, can exercise influence at a decisive moment for its EU ambitions, economic future, and role in a world shaped by geopolitical tensions and shifting alliances. From Montenegro's push toward EU accession to its new economic growth model, President Milatović offers a candid look at the choices shaping his country's future. The conversation explores economic diplomacy, international trade, and how governments can support those left behind by global change. It also examines the pressures Montenegro faces between East and West, including gray zone warfare and Russian and Chinese influence. At its heart, the episode explores Montenegrin identity: how unity, inclusion, and shared civic values can bind together a multiethnic and multireligious society. Blending geopolitics, governance, and personal insight, this episode offers a compelling look at leadership, resilience, and the role small states can play in shaping a more stable world order. This podcast was produced by the Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Researched and hosted by Sanjana Polapragada; edited by Sanjana Polapragada & Vishal Gogusetti

This week I'm sharing the third installment from the day-long conference convened by the Institute for America, China, and the Future of Global Affairs (ACF) at Johns Hopkins SAIS on April 3rd in Washington — "The China Debate We're Not Having: Politics, Technology, and the Road Ahead." The first two episodes featured Jessica Chen Weiss's opening remarks and the panels on what China wants and what the United States wants. This week's panel — "Tech, Rivalry, and Competing Visions of the Future" — turns to the domain that, more than any other, has come to define how Washington thinks about the U.S.-China relationship: technology, and especially AI. Once again, my deep thanks to Jessica Chen Weiss, ACF's inaugural faculty director, for organizing this terrific conference and for so generously letting me share this audio with Sinica listeners. Moderator Kat Duffy of the Council on Foreign Relations opens by interrogating the very framing of the panel: is "rivalry" actually the right word for what's going on between the U.S. and China in tech? The panelists give a range of answers — from "yes, because both sides believe it is" to Samm Sacks's pithy rejoinder that "rivalry serves specific actors and specific interests." From there the conversation ranges across the FCC's recent move to bar most foreign-made routers, the pitfalls of framing AI competition as a sprint to AGI rather than what Jeff Ding calls a "diffusion marathon," the many internal Chinas that get flattened in DC discourse, the cybersecurity reciprocity problem (Volt Typhoon, Salt Typhoon, and what President Trump tellingly admitted about all of it), and what it would actually mean for the U.S. to compete by being its best self — what one panelist memorably calls "Americamaxxing." There's a lot of substance packed into this hour, and a lot of generative pushback against received DC wisdom. The audience Q&A at the end takes up the role of race and xenophobia in the discourse — a topic that, as one questioner pointedly notes, had been conspicuously absent from the day's earlier discussions. Panelists:— Samm Sacks, Senior Fellow, New America and Yale Law School— Jeff Ding, Assistant Professor of Political Science, George Washington University— Mieke Eoyang, Visiting Professor, Carnegie Mellon University; former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Cyber Policy— Selina Xu, Lead for China and AI Policy, Office of Eric Schmidt Moderator: Kat Duffy, Senior Fellow for Digital and Cyberspace Policy, Council on Foreign RelationsSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week I'm sharing the next installment from the terrific day-long conference convened by the Institute for America, China, and the Future of Global Affairs (ACF) at Johns Hopkins SAIS on April 3rd in Washington — "The China Debate We're Not Having: Politics, Technology, and the Road Ahead." Last week's episode featured Jessica Chen Weiss's opening remarks and the first panel, "What China Wants." This week, I've got the companion panel — "What Does the United States Want?" — which I think pairs beautifully with that first session, and which takes up a question that's arguably harder and more uncomfortable to answer. The panel is moderated by SAIS Dean James Steinberg, who served as Deputy National Security Advisor in the Clinton administration and Deputy Secretary of State under Obama — and who keeps this moving with real sharpness. He's joined by Matt Duss, Executive Vice President at the Center for International Policy, who starts things off with a bracing observation: the United States does not know what it wants. The old foreign policy consensus has shattered, he argues, and neither the Trump administration nor the Democratic establishment has produced a coherent replacement. He locates the most interesting thinking in the progressive wing of the Democratic Party, where he hopes the 2028 primary will force some of these hard questions into the open. Katherine Thompson, a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute who previously served in the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill, brings a military-strategic lens. She makes a sharp case that the new National Defense Strategy, for all its imperfections, at least opens the door to an honest conversation about trade-offs — something Washington has been allergic to. If you're going to prioritize deterrence in the Indo-Pacific, she argues, you have to actually give things up elsewhere, and the Iran situation is making that tension impossible to ignore. Jonas Nahm, the Andrew W. Mellon Associate Professor at SAIS who served in the Biden administration, reframes economic competition with China in refreshingly concrete terms. Rather than abstract great-power framing, he identifies three specific buckets — affordability and energy, technological catch-up, and manufacturing competitiveness — where Chinese capacity could actually help solve American problems, if we had the political imagination to let it. And Leslie Vinjamuri, president and CEO of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, brings striking new polling data showing a 40-percentage-point swing in American favorability toward China since 2024 — now at 53 percent — driven largely by Democrats but with movement among Republicans too. She situates this in the fading of pandemic-era hostility and the absence of sustained anti-China rhetoric from the current administration, and adds an invaluable perspective on how utterly confused America's allies are about what Washington actually expects of them. The conversation ranges across Taiwan and strategic ambiguity, whether allies arming up in the Indo-Pacific helps or hurts, the collapse of U.S. credibility on human rights, the future of dollar dominance, and whether the 2028 election will finally force a reckoning with these questions. It's a rich, candid discussion — and a reminder that the hardest debates in U.S.-China policy may not be about China at all. Panelists:— Matt Duss, Executive Vice President, Center for International Policy— Katherine Thompson, Senior Fellow, Cato Institute— Jonas Nahm, Andrew W. Mellon Associate Professor, Johns Hopkins SAIS— Leslie Vinjamuri, President and CEO, Chicago Council on Global Affairs Moderator: James Steinberg, Dean, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International StudiesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Opening Remarks & Session 1: What China WantsJohns Hopkins SAIS ACF Conference, April 3, 2026This week's episode features audio from a day-long conference hosted by the Institute for America, China, and the Future of Global Affairs (ACF) at Johns Hopkins SAIS, held on April 3rd in Washington, DC. The conference, titled "The China Debate We're Not Having: Politics, Technology, and the Road Ahead," brought together a wide range of scholars, former officials, and analysts to interrogate some of the foundational assumptions underlying US policy toward China — a conversation I found compelling enough to share directly with Sinica listeners, with the full blessing of the organizers.You'll hear two segments in this episode.Opening Remarks — Jessica Chen WeissACF's inaugural faculty director Jessica Chen Weiss opens the conference by framing its central provocation: that much of the prevailing US policy discourse assumes an intrinsically zero-sum competition with China, and that this assumption has not been adequately examined. She argues for a more rigorous, evidence-based conversation — one that takes seriously the possibility that American and Chinese interests are competitive but not necessarily adversarial, and that may even leave room for complementarity in some domains. She previews the day's three thematic sessions — on what China wants, what the United States wants, and the stakes of technological and AI rivalry — and situates the whole enterprise in what she describes as a hinge moment in world history.Session 1: What China WantsModerated by Demetri Sevastopulo of the Financial Times, the first panel takes up the deceptively simple question of what China is actually trying to achieve on the world stage — and whether its ambitions are as expansive as much US policy discourse assumes.Jessica Chen Weiss argues that China's core objectives remain relatively modest and sovereignty-focused: security, development, and legitimacy within an order long dominated by the United States. She pushes back on the idea that China is eager to assume the burdens of global leadership, noting that Chinese interlocutors are acutely aware of the domestic overextension that has constrained American power. Sevastopulo coins — with Weiss's amusement — the term "China-first" to describe Beijing's orientation.Dan Taylor, drawing on his decades in the Defense Intelligence Agency, urges the audience to take Chinese leadership statements seriously rather than projecting worst-case intentions onto them. He notes that Beijing still sees itself as a developing nation with enormous domestic work ahead, and that its articulated goals leave considerable room for interpretation before one arrives at the conclusion that China seeks to displace the United States as global hegemon.Arthur Kroeber adds an economic dimension, tracing how China's export-driven model has generated massive global surpluses — and why the resulting tensions with trading partners are, in his view, a structural problem rather than evidence of strategic malice. He argues that much of what looks like geopolitical aggression is better understood as the consequence of an economic model operating at enormous scale with insufficient domestic demand to absorb its own output.Shao Yuqun, speaking from her perch at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies, offers the most pointed challenge to the panel's relatively sanguine framing. She argues that the United States' own behavior — erratic policy, withdrawal from multilateral commitments, and the disruptions of the Trump era — has itself destabilized the order that American strategists claim to be defending. She is measured but direct, and her presence gives the conversation a texture that too many Washington panels lack.The discussion ranges across China's Iran diplomacy, the prospects for a US-China summit, the question of whether Beijing is exploiting Trump-era tensions to deepen ties with traditional US allies, and — in a lively closing exchange — who the next generation of Chinese leadership looks like (with Kroeber's deadpan answer, "Xi Jinping," getting the biggest laugh of the session).Guests:Jessica Chen Weiss, David M. Lampton Professor of China Studies, Johns Hopkins SAIS; Inaugural Faculty Director, ACFDan Taylor, Adjunct Researcher, Institute for Defense Analyses; Senior Fellow, Johns Hopkins SAIS ACFArthur Kroeber, Founding Partner, Gavekal DragonomicsShao Yuqun, Director, Institute for Taiwan, Hong Kong & Macao Studies, Shanghai Institutes for International StudiesModerator: Demetri Sevastopulo, US-China Correspondent, Financial TimesRemaining sessions from the conference — on what the United States wants, tech rivalry and competing visions of the future, and a fireside chat between Henry Farrell and Alondra Nelson on the AI race reconsidered — will be released over the coming weeks.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week, Zachary and Jeremi interview Atlantic writer and Johns Hopkins professor emeritus Eliot Cohen about his article “One War Two Mistakes” and how to think about the current U.S. war with Iran. Eliot Cohen is a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He is a professor emeritus at Johns Hopkins University, author of the forthcoming book The Strategist: How to Think About War and Politics, and co-host of the Shield of the Republic podcast. Cohen is also the author of The Hollow Crown, Supreme Command, Conquered Into Liberty, The Big Stick, and other works on military history and national-security policy. He created the strategic-studies program at Johns Hopkins SAIS and served as the school's ninth dean. He has also served as the counselor of the Department of State and in other positions in the U.S. Department of Defense and the intelligence community.

“If the regime doesn't lose, it wins.” — Soli ÖzelIt was just past midnight in Istanbul when I reached Soli Özel. The Pentagon had just announced it was deploying 3,000 soldiers — the 82nd Airborne — to the Gulf. Özel — professor of international relations at Kadir Has University, columnist, and one of the most trusted analysts of Middle Eastern politics — is blunt. This might, he warns, be America's Suez moment.In 1956, Britain and France — two spent imperial powers that refused to accept they were spent — were humiliated in Egypt. Trump is a noisier, more corpulent Anthony Eden. The difference between then and now is that the US and Soviet Union were ready to replace the European colonial powers. Today, no great power can take America's place in the region. But its prestige is diminished, its ammunition depleted, and when it called on NATO allies to help open the Strait of Hormuz, nobody volunteered. Russia and China, Özel suggests, are winning on every front without sending any of their crack regiments to the front. It may also be midnight for a declining United States in the Middle East. Five Takeaways•       The Negotiations Were Going America's Way: According to the Omani foreign minister, Iran had accepted conditions firmer than the original JCPOA. The war was a choice, not a necessity. The question is who convinced the president: the Venezuela precedent, which suggested quick regime decapitation, or the Israelis, who wanted not just a deal but the regime's destruction. Nobody told him that Venezuela and Iran have nothing in common.•       If the Iranian Regime Doesn't Lose, It Wins: Iran has escalation control. Its defensive resilience has exceeded every analyst's expectations. It struck the Ras Laffan gas refinery in Qatar — three to five years to repair. It hit radars, data centres, refineries. Nobody thought they could do this. If the regime survives, it emerges emboldened, more autocratic, and the entire Gulf security equation changes permanently.•       This May Be America's Suez Moment: In 1956, Britain and France — two spent imperial powers — were humiliated in Egypt. The difference: the US and Soviet Union were ready to take their place. Today, no great power can replace America in the region. But its prestige is diminished, its ammunition depleted, and when it called on NATO allies to help open the Strait of Hormuz, nobody volunteered.•       The Moral Debate America Isn't Having: The decapitation strategy — assassinating an entire generation of foreign leaders — crossed a red line that should never have been crossed. The American debate is about preparedness, Israeli influence, and whether Trump can find an exit. The moral question is taking the back seat. The rest of the world has noticed.•       Russia Wins. China Waits. Nothing Will Be the Same: Oil prices from the sixties to over a hundred. Russia has more room in Ukraine. China is happy the US can't pivot to Asia and is depleting ammunition reserves meant for a Taiwan scenario. Relations between the Gulf countries, Israel, and the United States will be reconsidered, redefined, and never the same. About the GuestSoli Özel is a professor of international relations at Kadir Has University in Istanbul, a fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy, and a columnist for Habertürk. A member of the European Council on Foreign Relations, he has taught at Johns Hopkins SAIS, UC Santa Cruz, and Yale, and was a Fisher Family Fellow at the Belfer Center at the Harvard Kennedy School. He writes regularly for Project Syndicate.References:•       Episode 2843: The Philadelphia Story — Richard Vague on how America's first bank was created to fund war. The connection between banking, debt, and war hasn't changed.•       Episode 2842: Symbolic Capitalism vs. Symbolic Democracy — this week's TWTW on whether capitalism permits democracy. The Iran war is the test.About Keen On AmericaNobody asks more awkward questions than the Anglo-American writer and filmmaker Andrew Keen. In Keen On America, Andrew brings his pointed Transatlantic wit to making sense of the United States — hosting daily interviews about the history and future of this now venerable Republic. With nearly 2,800 episodes since the show launched on TechCrunch in 2010, Keen On America is the most prolific intellectual interview show in the history of podcasting.WebsiteSubstackYouTubeApple PodcastsSpotify Chapters:

David M. Lampton—“Mike”—is one of America's most distinguished scholars of U.S.–China relations, director of China Studies Emeritus at Johns Hopkins SAIS, and the author of landmark works on Chinese politics and foreign policy. He joins me this week to discuss a striking new Foreign Affairs essay he co-authored with the eminent Chinese international relations scholar Wang Jisi of Peking University: “America and China at the Edge of Ruin: A Last Chance to Step Back from the Brink.”Written against the backdrop of President Trump's planned visit to China (and before the outbreak of the U.S.–Israeli war on Iran), the essay is less a routine policy paper than an urgent intervention — two veteran scholars, one American and one Chinese, throwing a rope across a widening chasm. They argue that strategic rivalry has become self-reinforcing, that the greatest danger is no longer deliberate conflict but accidental war driven by miscalculation and escalation dynamics neither side fully controls, and that a rare, narrow window for “a new normalization” may now be opening.We range across the essay's boldest claims — on Taiwan as the unlikely starting point for stabilization, the corrosive logic of securitization, the ghost of the first Cold War, and the looming talent crisis in serious China studies — in a meaty, substantive conversation.3:39 How the Lampton–Wang Jisi collaboration came together6:31 The division of labor and the essay's unified voice9:15 Wang Jisi's cognitive empathy and his unusual depth of American understanding13:57 The essay's emotional register: veteran scholars and the specter of another Cold War16:32 From reassurance to deterrence—and why deterrence keeps getting harder to maintain25:02 Mirror-image threat narratives as self-fulfilling operating systems32:08 Securitization, the “one-way ratchet,” and whether economic interdependence can be rebuilt39:23 Accidental war: what has changed since Hainan 2001 and Belgrade 199944:16 Where the most damaging choices were made—China's Ukraine pivot, U.S. arms-control withdrawals51:29 The window of opportunity: Trump's China visit, the 4th Plenum, and post-Iran recalculation1:01:30 Taiwan as the counterintuitive starting point for stabilization1:10:03 Collapse fantasies, hubris, and the Pearl Harbor danger of “act now or lose the window”1:13:14 The looming China-talent crisis and the future of the fieldPaying It ForwardMike highlights Rosie Levine, executive director of the U.S.–China Education Trust, where she is leading a major new initiative to expand serious American scholarship in China and encourage Chinese institutions to open their doors wider to foreign researchers and students.RecommendationsMike: The Raider by Stephen R. Platt (Knopf, 2025) — a biography of Major Evans Carlson, the swashbuckling Marine officer who trained with Chinese Communist forces in the 1930s, befriended Zhu De, brought the word “gung-ho” into English, and died in 1947 just in time to miss both the PRC's turn away from liberty and McCarthyism's persecution at home.Kaiser: “How China Learned to Love the Classics,” a New Yorker piece by Chang Che on the remarkable renaissance of interest in Greco-Roman philosophy and literature in contemporary China — and what it says about the world we now inhabit. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Send a textHistory tends to remember the loudest voices in the room. But sometimes the person who actually helped prevent disaster is the one sitting in the middle.During the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, the world stood just hours away from nuclear war. Most of us remember the names Kennedy and Khrushchev. What we often forget is the man working behind the scenes at the United Nations, trying to slow things down before the world lost its mind. His name was U Thant.This week on Here's What We Know, we sit down with historian and author Thant Myint-U, who also happens to be U Thant's grandson. His book Peacemaker tells the story of a schoolteacher from a small town in Burma who somehow found himself standing between the superpowers at one of the most dangerous moments in modern history.We talk about the Cold War, the role of the United Nations, and what it was like for a grandson to discover the real scope of his grandfather's life by digging through archives decades later.This episode is a fascinating story about diplomacy, history, and the people who sometimes carry the biggest responsibility. Listen now!In This Episode:The Forgotten Peacemaker Behind the Cuban Missile CrisisGrowing Up With the UN Secretary GeneralWhen Did He Realize His Grandfather Was a Global Leader?Why U Thant Was Left Out of the Cuban Missile Crisis StoryFrom Burmese Schoolteacher to UN Secretary GeneralThe Human Side of a World LeaderTaking Over the UN During the Cold WarPolitical Assassinations and Cold War TensionsThe Golden Age of the United NationsCan the United Nations Still Prevent Global Conflict?The Power and Limits of the UN Security CouncilWhat the UN Was Originally Designed to DoThe Decline of UN Peacekeeping InfluenceWhy the UN Still Matters TodayThe Personality of U Thant: Calm, Pragmatic LeadershipThis episode is sponsored by:Mike Counsil Plumbing & Rooter (Use code “Gary” to get $89 off any service!) License #: 679261Bio:Thant Myint-U is a historian, author, and former United Nations official specializing in the history and politics of Myanmar and Southeast Asia. Educated at Harvard, Johns Hopkins SAIS, and Cambridge, he served on UN peacekeeping missions in Cambodia and the Balkans and later worked at the UN Secretariat in New York on humanitarian and political affairs. He has also advised Myanmar's government on economic reform and peace negotiations and founded the Yangon Heritage Trust to preserve the city's historic architecture.Website: https://www.thantmyintu.com/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/thant-myint-u-340aa99/Connect with Gary:Gary's WebsiteFollow Gary on InstagramGary's TiktokGary's FacebookWatch the episodes on YouTubeAdvertise on the PodcastThank you for listening. Let us know what you think about this episode. Leave us a review!

Who is Mojtaba Khamenei — Iran's new Supreme Leader? Who was the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei?In this episode of the Burn Bag Podcast, A'ndre Gonawela is joined by Vali Nasr, the Majid Khadduri Professor of Middle East Studies and International Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS and one of the leading scholars of Iranian politics and Shia leadership structures.Nasr breaks down the power structure of the Islamic Republic following the assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the rise of his son Mojtaba Khamenei as Iran's new Supreme Leader. The leadership transition comes as the war between the United States, Israel, and Iran continues to escalate, with Tehran threatening to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed and expand attacks across the region.In this conversation, Nasr explains:Who Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was and how he shaped modern IranHow the Supreme Leader actually governs inside the Islamic RepublicThe role of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Iran's power structureWhat Mojtaba Khamenei's leadership means for the regime and the warWho is making wartime decisions inside Iran right nowWhether the conflict represents an existential fight for the Islamic RepublicAs the war intensifies and global energy markets react to tensions in the Strait of Hormuz, this episode provides a clear guide to how Iran's leadership thinks — and what it means for the future of the conflict.

Riley Bryant sits down with Dr. Deborah Wituski, a 20-year veteran of the CIA and an early contributor to the emerging field of private sector intelligence services. In an increasingly globalized economy, what happens when profit motives intersect with national security imperatives? How can traditional intelligence agencies adapt to incorporate these new perspectives coming out of the private sector? Drawing on case studies, policy frameworks, and her own experience, Dr. Wituski tells us about her jump from government to Google, the similarities and differences between public and private sector intelligence work, and what the future of these parallel industries may hold. This podcast was produced by the Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins SAIS.Researched, hosted, and edited by Riley Bryant

Krithiga Narayanan hosts a conversation with Michael Coppedge, co-founder and principal investigator of the Varieties of Democracy Project (V-Dem), one of the world's leading efforts to measure and analyze democratic change. Drawing on V-Dem's latest global data, Coppedge examines how shifts within democratic systems are reshaping the international order and altering global power dynamics. The discussion explores how democratic erosion often unfolds gradually rather than through abrupt breakdowns, why electoral autocracies are becoming more common, and how changes in large and influential democracies, such as India, carry consequences that extend beyond national borders. Together, they assess whether coordination among autocratic leaders is strategic or ad hoc, what the data reveals about early warning signs of democratic decline, and where opportunities for democratic resilience still exist. Produced by the Philip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins SAIS.Researched and hosted by Krithiga Narayanan; edited by Krithiga Narayanan

This episode was recorded on Jan 21, 2026.Wasay Mir hosts a conversation with Trita Parsi, Executive Vice President of the Quincy Institute and one of the most influential voices on US-Iran relations in Washington.A Johns Hopkins SAIS PhD and author of four books on American foreign policy in the Middle East, Parsi unpacks Iran's unfolding domestic crisis in January 2026. Seven months after devastating strikes on Iran's nuclear facilities, mass protests have erupted amid economic collapse and an unprecedented regime crackdown.Together, they explore whether this uprising differs from past movements like the Green Revolution or Mahsa Amini protests, what the collapse of Iran's regional proxy network means for the regime's survival, and whether Gulf states actually want a weakened Iran or fear what comes after.Parsi's personal history as the son of an outspoken academic who faced repression under both the Shah and Ayatollah Khomeini provides unique insight into Iranian authoritarianism.Produced by the Phillip Merrill Center for Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins SAIS.Researched and hosted by Wasay Mir; edited by Vishal Gogusetti

The decision by the U.S. President Donald Trump administration to seize Venezuelan President Nicholás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, to stand trial in the United States reflects the administration's willingness to undertake a muscular intervention in the Western Hemisphere. Delcy Rodríguez, who served as Maduro's vice president since 2018, has taken over as the interim president and seems to be on an uncertain path forward working with Secretary of State Marco Rubio. However, Trump's statement that the United States plans to “run” Venezuela until a permanent, stable transition can be realized raises more questions than it answers, in Venezuela and about U.S. foreign policy at large.  What precisely are the Trump administration's objectives in Venezuela? Was this a law enforcement operation or a serious effort to create a new political reality in Venezuela? Who are the key Venezuelan players the United States needs to engage and what is the role of the Venezuelan military? And what are the administration's intentions toward the Venezuelan oil industry and the role of American companies? Join Aaron David Miller as he engages the International Crisis Group's Phil Gunson, the Baker Institute's Francisco Monaldi, and Johns Hopkins SAIS's Cindy Arnson on these and other issues, on the next Carnegie Connects. 

China's presence in Latin America has expanded rapidly over the past two decades, reshaping the region's economies, politics, and strategic landscape. From major infrastructure projects and digital ecosystems to shifting patterns of trade, finance, and influence, Beijing's role is becoming both more complex and more contested. Guest: Margaret Myers (Managing Director, Institute for America, China, and the Future of Global Affairs, Johns Hopkins SAIS; Senior Advisor, Inter-American Dialogue) Recorded 19th November, 2025

Veja também em youtube.com/@45_graus Francis Fukuyama is one of the world’s most influential political scientists. He is a Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Director of its Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law. He previously taught at Johns Hopkins SAIS and George Mason University, and served in the U.S. Department of State’s Policy Planning Staff. Fukuyama became internationally known with The End of History and the Last Man (1992), both a landmark and controversial book that helped shape the post–Cold War debate on democracy and liberalism. His research spans comparative political development, institutions, governance, state capacity, identity politics, technology, and democratic resilience. _______________ Índice: (0:00) Introdução (5:53) Democratic backsliding, state capacity vs democracy | What’s happening in the US? (14:10) Culture and social capital | Robert Putnam: Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital | Europe vs US (23:59) Why do people support populists even after they fail? | Georgia Meloni, Javier Milei (30:05) How can democracies deal with immigration? (40:54) Are the rise of populism and authoritarianism related phenomena? (44:17) The information revolution. Dangers of AI. The idea of deliberative assemblies (57:23) Yascha Mounk: The Great Experiment: Why Diverse Democracies Fall Apart and How They Can Endure (59:56) Will left-wing populism come back?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week, Kelly talks with Johns Hopkins Professor Francis J. Gavin about his new book, Thinking Historically: A Guide to Statecraft and Strategy (Yale University Press, 2025). The book looks at how history could be utilized to improve policy and enable better decision-making. It argues for a "historical sensibility" as a practical discipline—one that captures the real constraints decision-makers face, complicates easy assumptions, and trains us to see the unexpected by understanding others on their own terms. In doing so, it bridges the gap between historians and practitioners, showing how careful engagement with the past can sharpen statecraft and strategy in the present. Francis J. Gavin is the Giovanni Agnelli Distinguished Professor and the inaugural director of the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Previously, he was the first Frank Stanton Chair in Nuclear Security Policy Studies at MIT. He is a contributing editor at War on the Rocks and has authored or edited eight books. Link to the book: https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300278361/thinking-historically/ The opinions expressed in this conversation are strictly those of the participants and do not represent the views of Georgetown University or any government entity. Produced by Abdalla Nasef and Freddie Mallinson.  Recorded on 03 November, 2025. Diplomatic Immunity, a podcast from the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy at Georgetown University, brings you frank and candid conversations with experts on the issues facing diplomats and national security decision-makers around the world. Funding support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. For more, visit our website, and follow us on Linkedin, Twitter @GUDiplomacy, and Instagram @isd.georgetown

The Hoover History Lab held Thinking Historically: A Guide to Statecraft and Strategy, a book talk with the author, Francis J. Gavin on Thursday, October 02, 2025 from 4:00 p.m. - 6:30 p.m. PT in the Shultz Auditorium, George P. Shultz Building. It seems obvious that we should use history to improve policy. If we have a good understanding of the past, it should enable better decisions in the present, especially in the extraordinarily consequential worlds of statecraft and strategy. But how do we gain that knowledge? How should history be used? Sadly, it is rarely done well, and historians and decision-makers seldom interact. But in this remarkable book, Francis J. Gavin explains the many ways historical knowledge can help us understand and navigate the complex, often confusing world around us. Good historical work convincingly captures the challenges and complexities the decisionmaker faces. At its most useful, history is less a narrowly defined field of study than a practice, a mental awareness, a discernment, and a responsiveness to the past and how it unfolded into our present world—a discipline in the best sense of the word. Gavin demonstrates how a historical sensibility helps us to appreciate the unexpected; complicates our assumptions; makes the unfamiliar familiar and the familiar unfamiliar; and requires us, without entirely suspending moral judgment, to try to understand others on their own terms. This book is a powerful argument for thinking historically as a way for readers to apply wisdom in encountering what is foreign to them. FEATURING Francis J. Gavin is the Giovanni Agnelli Distinguished Professor and the director of the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Previously, he was the first Frank Stanton Chair in Nuclear Security Policy Studies at MIT and the Tom Slick Professor of International Affairs and the Director of the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law at the University of Texas. From 2005 until 2010, he directed The American Assembly's multiyear, national initiative, The Next Generation Project: U.S. Global Policy and the Future of International Institutions. He is the founding Chair of the Board of Editors for the Texas National Security Journal. Gavin's writings include Gold, Dollars, and Power: The Politics of International Monetary Relations, 1958-1971; Nuclear Statecraft: History and Strategy in America's Atomic Age ; and Nuclear Weapons and American Grand Strategy (Brookings Institution Press), which was named a 2020 Choice Outstanding Academic Title. His IISS-Adelphi book, The Taming of Scarcity and the Problems of Plenty: Rethinking International Relations and American Grand Strategy in a New Era was published in 2024. In 2025, he published Wonder and Worry: Contemporary History in an Age of Uncertainty with Stolpe Press, 2025 and Thinking Historically – A Guide to Statecraft and Strategy with Yale University Press. MODERATED BY Stephen Kotkin is director of the Hoover History Lab, Kleinheinz Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, and senior fellow at Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. He has been conducting research in the Hoover Library & Archives for more than three decades.

In this episode, A'ndre Gonawela sits down with John McLaughlin, former Acting Director and Deputy Director of the CIA and now Professor of Practice at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Drawing on over three decades in intelligence leadership and his service as a U.S. Army officer in Vietnam, McLaughlin offers a wide-ranging assessment of the U.S. national security landscape.The conversation begins with the state of the intelligence community under the Trump administration, exploring the risks of politicization, the purge of seasoned officers, and why analytic integrity depends on clearly distinguishing what is known, unknown, and judged with confidence. McLaughlin also responds to recent political controversies, including DNI Tulsi Gabbard's claims about the 2016 election and the enduring debate over Russian interference.Turning to geopolitics, McLaughlin shares his views the War in Ukraine and the Trump administration's handling of Putin's Russia. He also breaks down deterrence with China, including where the U.S. is most deficient in communication, capability, and credibility, and how Washington should approach Taiwan. On the Middle East, he outlines what a realistic U.S. priority stack should be over the next 12 months.

CPH is excited to announce Season 5 of The Past, the Promise, The Presidency. This season will feature brief interviews with historians about their newest books, ranging in topic from religious freedom to technology theft; from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River; from global diplomacy to Texas football.This week's conversation features CPH Assistant Director Ashlyn Hand, who will be giving a book talk on Thursday, September 18th, at 6 pm in SMU's McCord Auditorium (Dallas Hall 306). Dr. Hand is the author of Prioritizing Faith: International Religious Freedom and U.S. Policy Choices (1993-2017), which compares the varied approaches to promoting freedom of conscience abroad during the Clinton, Bush, and Obama administrations. Prioritizing Faith shows how evolving bureaucratic dynamics, agenda-setting processes, and strategic shifts at the presidential level interact and change U.S. policy. Dr. Hand is interviewed by CPH Associate Director Brian Franklin and CPH student research assistant Kennedy Moore. Ashlyn Hand joined SMU's Center for Presidential History in the fall of 2022. She received her Ph.D. from the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin in 2021, where she was a graduate fellow at the Clements Center for National Security. Prior to joining the team at CPH, she was a fellow with the America in the World Consortium, completing a pre-doctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins SAIS (2020-2021) and a postdoctoral fellowship at Duke University (2021-2022). Ashlyn's work has been published in the Journal of Conflict Resolution, the Journal of Church and State and Foreign Policy.Ashlyn is the Assistant Director for Advancement and Partnerships at the Center for Presidential History and is the Program Director for the Article II Society. She is a Lecturer in Political Science, teaching classes on American politics and U.S. foreign policy.Brian Franklin is the Associate Director of the SMU Center for Presidential History and an adjunct Lecturer in the Clements Department of History and the University Honors Program. Dr. Franklin's research focuses on the religious, political, and regional history of the United States in the 18th and 19th centuries. His current manuscript America's Missions explores the role of Protestant mission societies in shaping the early American republic. He teaches courses on Texas History and American History.Kennedy Moore is a junior at SMU, and is double majoring in public policy and music with a minor in public policy and international affairs. Kennedy is a President's Scholar, Pre-law Scholar, and Meadows Scholar. At SMU, Kennedy is involved in Hegi Board Fellows, Meadows Chorale, the Tower Center's premier undergraduate research journal The Dialogue, and works at SMU's Center for Presidential History. Kennedy is interested in educational equity and national defense. She aspires to work for a federal agency to research and create policies to protect our education system and recenter citizens' voices in policy. 

It might seem obvious that the study of history ought to  improve the crafting of public policy. Surely if we understand the past, we should be able to make better decisions in the present—especially in the high-stakes worlds of statecraft and strategy. But that assumption raises deeper questions: How should history be used? What history should be used? How do we gain the kind of historical knowledge that truly shapes decisions? And why is it that historians and policymakers so rarely speak the same language?In his new book Thinking Historically: A Guide to Statecraft and Strategy, my guest Francis J. Gavin argues that a genuinely historical sensibility can illuminate the complex, often confusing realities of the present. Good historical work, he writes, does not offer easy analogies or tidy morals. Instead, it captures the challenges and uncertainties faced by decision-makers, complicates our assumptions, forces us to see the familiar in new ways, and invites us to understand others on their own terms without abandoning moral judgment. Thinking historically, Gavin shows, is a discipline of discernment, curiosity, and humility—qualities as necessary in statecraft as they are in life.Francis J. Gavin is the Giovanni Agnelli Distinguished Professor and director of the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS. He is also the author of Gold, Dollars, and Power; Nuclear Weapons and American Grand Strategy; and The Taming of Scarcity and the Problems of Plenty.Go to www.historicallythinking.org for more

Iran presents one of the most significant foreign policy challenges for America and the West, yet very little is known about what the country's goals really are. Vali Nasr examines Iran's political history in new ways to explain its actions and ambitions on the world stage, showing how, behind the veneer of theocracy and Islamic ideology, today's Iran is pursuing a grand strategy aimed at securing the country internally and asserting its place in the region and the world.Drawing on memoirs, oral histories, and original in-depth interviews with Iranian decision makers, Nasr brings to light facts and events in Iran's political history that have been overlooked until now. He traces the roots of Iran's strategic outlook to its experiences over the past four decades of war with Iraq in the 1980s and the subsequent American containment of Iran, invasion of Iraq in 2003, and posture toward Iran thereafter. Nasr reveals how these experiences have shaped a geopolitical outlook driven by pervasive fear of America and its plans for the Middle East.Challenging the notion that Iran's foreign policy simply reflects its revolutionary values or theocratic government, Iran's Grand Strategy: A Political History (Princeton UP, 2025) provides invaluable new insights into what Iran wants and why, explaining the country's resistance to the United States, its nuclear ambitions, and its pursuit of influence and proxies across the Middle East. Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He served as the eighth Dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019  and served as Senior Advisor to U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke between 2009 and 2011. He has written a number of books on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. He has advised senior American policymakers, world leaders, and businesses, including the President, Secretary of State, senior members of the Congress, and presidential campaigns. He has written for New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others. Professor Nasr serves as the co-director of the SAIS Rethinking Iran Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, sits on the board of a number of academic institutions, has won a number of prominent grants, and holds a chair named after Henry Kissinger at the library of Congress. Sidney Michelini is a post-doctoral researcher working on Ecology, Climate, and Violence at the Peace Research Institute of Frankfurt (PRIF). Book recommendations: The World After Gaza by Pankaj Mishra The Great Transformation: China's Road from Revolution to Reform by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian Super Agers: An Evidence-Based Approach to Longevity Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Iran presents one of the most significant foreign policy challenges for America and the West, yet very little is known about what the country's goals really are. Vali Nasr examines Iran's political history in new ways to explain its actions and ambitions on the world stage, showing how, behind the veneer of theocracy and Islamic ideology, today's Iran is pursuing a grand strategy aimed at securing the country internally and asserting its place in the region and the world.Drawing on memoirs, oral histories, and original in-depth interviews with Iranian decision makers, Nasr brings to light facts and events in Iran's political history that have been overlooked until now. He traces the roots of Iran's strategic outlook to its experiences over the past four decades of war with Iraq in the 1980s and the subsequent American containment of Iran, invasion of Iraq in 2003, and posture toward Iran thereafter. Nasr reveals how these experiences have shaped a geopolitical outlook driven by pervasive fear of America and its plans for the Middle East.Challenging the notion that Iran's foreign policy simply reflects its revolutionary values or theocratic government, Iran's Grand Strategy: A Political History (Princeton UP, 2025) provides invaluable new insights into what Iran wants and why, explaining the country's resistance to the United States, its nuclear ambitions, and its pursuit of influence and proxies across the Middle East. Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He served as the eighth Dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019  and served as Senior Advisor to U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke between 2009 and 2011. He has written a number of books on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. He has advised senior American policymakers, world leaders, and businesses, including the President, Secretary of State, senior members of the Congress, and presidential campaigns. He has written for New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others. Professor Nasr serves as the co-director of the SAIS Rethinking Iran Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, sits on the board of a number of academic institutions, has won a number of prominent grants, and holds a chair named after Henry Kissinger at the library of Congress. Sidney Michelini is a post-doctoral researcher working on Ecology, Climate, and Violence at the Peace Research Institute of Frankfurt (PRIF). Book recommendations: The World After Gaza by Pankaj Mishra The Great Transformation: China's Road from Revolution to Reform by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian Super Agers: An Evidence-Based Approach to Longevity Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Iran presents one of the most significant foreign policy challenges for America and the West, yet very little is known about what the country's goals really are. Vali Nasr examines Iran's political history in new ways to explain its actions and ambitions on the world stage, showing how, behind the veneer of theocracy and Islamic ideology, today's Iran is pursuing a grand strategy aimed at securing the country internally and asserting its place in the region and the world.Drawing on memoirs, oral histories, and original in-depth interviews with Iranian decision makers, Nasr brings to light facts and events in Iran's political history that have been overlooked until now. He traces the roots of Iran's strategic outlook to its experiences over the past four decades of war with Iraq in the 1980s and the subsequent American containment of Iran, invasion of Iraq in 2003, and posture toward Iran thereafter. Nasr reveals how these experiences have shaped a geopolitical outlook driven by pervasive fear of America and its plans for the Middle East.Challenging the notion that Iran's foreign policy simply reflects its revolutionary values or theocratic government, Iran's Grand Strategy: A Political History (Princeton UP, 2025) provides invaluable new insights into what Iran wants and why, explaining the country's resistance to the United States, its nuclear ambitions, and its pursuit of influence and proxies across the Middle East. Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He served as the eighth Dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019  and served as Senior Advisor to U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke between 2009 and 2011. He has written a number of books on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. He has advised senior American policymakers, world leaders, and businesses, including the President, Secretary of State, senior members of the Congress, and presidential campaigns. He has written for New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others. Professor Nasr serves as the co-director of the SAIS Rethinking Iran Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, sits on the board of a number of academic institutions, has won a number of prominent grants, and holds a chair named after Henry Kissinger at the library of Congress. Sidney Michelini is a post-doctoral researcher working on Ecology, Climate, and Violence at the Peace Research Institute of Frankfurt (PRIF). Book recommendations: The World After Gaza by Pankaj Mishra The Great Transformation: China's Road from Revolution to Reform by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian Super Agers: An Evidence-Based Approach to Longevity Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Iran presents one of the most significant foreign policy challenges for America and the West, yet very little is known about what the country's goals really are. Vali Nasr examines Iran's political history in new ways to explain its actions and ambitions on the world stage, showing how, behind the veneer of theocracy and Islamic ideology, today's Iran is pursuing a grand strategy aimed at securing the country internally and asserting its place in the region and the world.Drawing on memoirs, oral histories, and original in-depth interviews with Iranian decision makers, Nasr brings to light facts and events in Iran's political history that have been overlooked until now. He traces the roots of Iran's strategic outlook to its experiences over the past four decades of war with Iraq in the 1980s and the subsequent American containment of Iran, invasion of Iraq in 2003, and posture toward Iran thereafter. Nasr reveals how these experiences have shaped a geopolitical outlook driven by pervasive fear of America and its plans for the Middle East.Challenging the notion that Iran's foreign policy simply reflects its revolutionary values or theocratic government, Iran's Grand Strategy: A Political History (Princeton UP, 2025) provides invaluable new insights into what Iran wants and why, explaining the country's resistance to the United States, its nuclear ambitions, and its pursuit of influence and proxies across the Middle East. Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He served as the eighth Dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019  and served as Senior Advisor to U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke between 2009 and 2011. He has written a number of books on U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. He has advised senior American policymakers, world leaders, and businesses, including the President, Secretary of State, senior members of the Congress, and presidential campaigns. He has written for New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, among others. Professor Nasr serves as the co-director of the SAIS Rethinking Iran Initiative at Johns Hopkins University, sits on the board of a number of academic institutions, has won a number of prominent grants, and holds a chair named after Henry Kissinger at the library of Congress. Sidney Michelini is a post-doctoral researcher working on Ecology, Climate, and Violence at the Peace Research Institute of Frankfurt (PRIF). Book recommendations: The World After Gaza by Pankaj Mishra The Great Transformation: China's Road from Revolution to Reform by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian Super Agers: An Evidence-Based Approach to Longevity

Raimund Löw in conversation with Thomas Carothers, Mitchell Ash and Eva NowotnyDEMOCRACY UNDER THREAT - DONALD TRUMP AND WORLD POLITICS?In the second presidency of Donald Trump an attack against the rule of law in the United States has begun. The White House has challenged or undercut independent institutions of the government, the liberal media and the universities. The United States have greatly reduced its support of democracy on the international level. Vice-president JD Vance and Secretary Marco Rubio have supported parties and politicians from the far right in Europe and elsewhere. How far will the pressure on democracy in the United States under Donald Trump go? How strong is the resistance of the democratic institutions and civil society in the US? What are the consequences for democracy in the world?A discussion between democratization expert Thomas Carothers (Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC), historian Mitchell Ash (University of Vienna) and former Austrian Ambassador to the USA Eva Nowotny, moderated by journalist Raimund Löw Thomas Carothers is a leading authority on comparative democratization and international support for democracy, human rights, governance, the rule of law, and civil society. He is the author or editor of critically acclaimed books and articles in prominent journals, including most recently, Democracies Divided: The Global Challenge of Political Polarization (Brookings Press, 2019, co-edited with Andrew O'Donohue). He has been a visiting faculty member at the Central European University, Nuffield College, Oxford University, and Johns Hopkins SAIS.Mitchell G. Ash is Professor Emeritus of Modern History at the University of Vienna, Austria.  He is a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the European Academy of Sciences and Arts. Ash is author or editor of 20 books and 200 articles and review essays with focus on the social, cultural and political relations of the sciences in the 19th and 20th centuries. Since 2016 he has published commentaries and participated in media discussions on recent American politics, most recently “Die USA auf dem Weg zu einer Demokratur?” (in Der Standard, 29. Jänner 2025. https://www.derstandard.at/story/3000000254882/die-usa-auf-dem-weg-zu-einer-demokratur).Eva Nowotny is Vicepresident of the Kreisky Forum. She had been Austrian Ambassador to France, the United Kingdom and the United States of America. She had served as Foreign Policy Advisor at the Office of the Federal Chancellor and as head of the Directorate-General for Integration and Economic Policy at the Foreign Ministry. Eva Nowotny has chaired the University Board of the University of Vienna.Raimund Löw, journalist and historian, is editor of the podcast Falter Radio. He has been foreign correspondent for Austrian Radio and Television ORF in Washington DC, Beijing, Brussels and Moscow. He is author and coautor of several books on international affairs including Welt in Bewegung (2022), Weltmacht China (2018)

Chinese overseas development finance is unrecognizable from what it was just a few years ago. After suffering tens of billions of dollars in losses, Chinese lenders have moved to de-risk their lending to countries in Africa, Asia, and across the Global South. Instead of those once massive bilateral loans from the two main policy banks in Beijing, Chinese lending now encompasses a much more diverse array of actors, particularly in Africa. This new approach was on full display last month when Kenya closed a deal with a consortium of Chinese stakeholders to finance the extension of the Standard Gauge Railway from the current terminus in the Rift Valley to the Ugandan border. A third of the cost to build the new railway will be paid for by the Kenyan government, around another third will be comprised of a consortium of Chinese investors, and the rest will be financed with loans from the China Exim Bank. Yunan Chen, a research fellow at ODI Global in London, and Teal Emery, an adjunct lecturer at Johns Hopkins SAIS in Washington, D.C., join Eric & Cobus to discuss their new report, which breaks down the latest trends in Chinese development finance, and to explain why the deal in Kenya should serve as a case study for other African borrowers. Show Notes: ODI Global: Greener on the other side? — Mapping China's overseas co-financing and financial innovation by Yunnan Chen and Teal Emery ODI Global: China's creditor diversification in Africa: impacts and challenges of infrastructure debt-financing by Chinese commercial creditors by Yunnan Chen and Tianyi Wu South China Morning Post: After delay, new Chinese funding plan will help extend railway to Uganda, Kenya says by Jevans Nyabiage JOIN THE DISCUSSION: X: @ChinaGSProject | @eric_olander | @stadenesque Facebook: www.facebook.com/ChinaAfricaProject YouTube: www.youtube.com/@ChinaGlobalSouth Now on Bluesky! Follow CGSP at @chinagsproject.bsky.social FOLLOW CGSP IN FRENCH AND ARABIC: Français: www.projetafriquechine.com | @AfrikChine Arabic: عربي: www.alsin-alsharqalawsat.com | @SinSharqAwsat JOIN US ON PATREON! Become a CGSP Patreon member and get all sorts of cool stuff, including our Week in Review report, an invitation to join monthly Zoom calls with Eric & Cobus, and even an awesome new CGSP Podcast mug! www.patreon.com/chinaglobalsouth

About the Lecture: In this book presentation, Finkel uncovers the deep roots of the Russo-Ukrainian War. Following the rise of Russian nationalism in the nineteenth century, dominating Ukraine became the cornerstone of Russian policy. The Russian Empire, USSR and Putin's Russia had long used violence to successfully crush Ukrainian efforts to chart a separate path. Today's violence is just a more extreme version of Russia's past efforts. But unlike in the past, the people of Ukraine have overcome their deep internal divisions, and this rise of civic Ukrainian nationalism explains the successful resistance to the invasion. About the Speaker: Eugene Finkel (UW PhD in Political Science) is the Kenneth H. Keller Professor of International Affairs, Johns Hopkins SAIS. Finkel's most recent book is Intent to Destroy: Russia's Two-Hundred-Year Quest to Dominate Ukraine (Basic Books, 2024). He is also the author of Ordinary Jews: Choice and Survival during the Holocaust (Princeton University Press, 2017), and co-author of Reform and Rebellion in Weak States (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and Bread and Autocracy: Food, Politics and Security in Putin's Russia (Oxford University Press, 2023). His articles have appeared in the American Political Science Review, Journal of Politics, Comparative Political Studies, Comparative Politics, and other journals. Finkel also published articles and op-eds in The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, The Spectator and other outlets.

On April 2nd, the U.S. government announced a host of sweeping tariff hikes with every single one of America's trading partners. The aim of the so-called “Liberation Day” tariffs was ostensibly to “rebalance” the global trading system, as some Trump advisors have put it.However, the drastic measure roiled markets and eventually resulted in the President imposing a 90-day pause on most tariffs, with the exception of strategic sectors and imports from China. India, for its part, was slapped with a 26% tariff even as top officials were negotiating a bilateral trade agreement with their American counterparts.While the fate of future tariffs and any side agreements are unknown, the episode raises serious questions about India's global economic strategy. To talk about where India goes from here, Milan is joined on the show this week by Shoumitro Chatterjee. Shoumitro is an Assistant Professor of International Economics at Johns Hopkins-SAIS. His research lies at the intersection of development economics, trade, and macroeconomics, but he has also done seminal work on the role of agriculture in development.Milan and Shoumitro discuss India's surprising export-led success, its underperformance in low-skilled manufacturing, and the country's inward turn post-2017. Plus, the two discuss how India can take advantage of the current global uncertainty and where the politically sensitive agricultural sector fits in.Episode notes:1. Shoumitro Chatterjee, “In Trump's tariff world, India must say: We are open for business,” Indian Express, April 4, 2025.2. Abhishek Anand, Shoumitro Chatterjee, Josh Felman, Arvind Subramanian, and Naveen Thomas, “How quality control orders are crippling India's trade competitiveness,” Business Standard, March 4, 2025.3. Shoumitro Chatterjee and Arvind Subramanian, “India's inward (re)turn: is it warranted? Will it work?” Indian Economic Review 58 (2023): 35-59.4. Shoumitro Chatterjee, Devesh Kapur, Pradyut Sekhsaria, and Arvind Subramanian, “Agricultural Federalism: New Facts, Constitutional Vision,” Economic and Political Weekly 62, no. 36 (2022): 39-48.5. Shoumitro Chatterjee and Arvind Subramanian, “India's Export-Led Growth: Exemplar and Exception,” Ashoka Center for Economic Policy Working Paper No. 01, October 2020.6. Shoumitro Chatterjee and Arvind Subramanian, “To embrace atmanirbharta is to choose to condemn Indian economy to mediocrity,” Indian Express, October 15, 2020.7. Shoumitro Chatterjee and Arvind Subramanian, “Has India Occupied the Export Space Vacated by China? 21st Century Export Performance and Policy Implications,” in Euijin Jung, Arvind Subramanian, and Steven R. Weisman, editors, A Wary Partnership: Future of US-India Economic Relations (Washington, D.C.: Peterson Institute for International Economics, 2020).8. Shoumitro Chatterjee and Devesh Kapur, “Six Puzzles in Indian Agriculture,” India Policy Forum 13, no. 1 (2017): 185-229.

Ömer Taşpınar is a Professor at the National Defense University and Johns Hopkins SAIS in Washington, D.C. He is a scholar, author, and policy expert specializing in Middle East politics, U.S. foreign policy, and Turkish affairs. His research focuses on the intersection of political economy, nationalism, and security in the Middle East, with a particular emphasis on Turkey.In episode 47 of Tahrir Podcast, we discuss his book "What the West is Getting Wrong about the Middle East: Why Islam is Not the Problem" (I.B. Tauris, 2020), where he challenges prevailing Western narratives about the region by highlighting weak states, economic underdevelopment, and authoritarianism—rather than religion—as the primary drivers of instability and extremism. The book delves into the historical and structural factors that have shaped the modern Middle East, arguing that Western policies often misdiagnose the region's problems by overemphasizing Islam's role. Taşpınar explores how economic stagnation, political repression, and weak governance fuel radicalization, while also critiquing Western interventions that have exacerbated these issues. Through a comparative analysis, he provides a nuanced perspective on why sustainable stability in the region requires addressing these root causes rather than relying on simplistic cultural or religious explanations.Episode on YouTube: Omer's book: ⁠ https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/what-the-west-is-getting-wrong-about-the-middle-east-9780755655069/Streaming everywhere! ⁠https://linktr.ee/TahrirPodcast⁠ Reach out! TahrirPodcast@gmail.com Support us on Patreon for as low as $2 per month ($20 per year)! ⁠https://www.patreon.com/TahrirPodcast

This week, a special episode taped live at the University of California, Berkeley — my alma mater — on March 6 and featuring Jessica Chen Weiss of Johns Hopkins SAIS and Ryan Hass of the Brookings Institution, both well-known to people who follow U.S.-China relations. This episode was made possible by the Center for Chinese Studies at UC Berkeley's Institute for Asian Studies, and will be available on video as well — I'll update with the link.5:32 – Looking back on the Biden administration's approach to China12:28 – Attempting to outline the new Trump administration's approach to China20:34 – The view from Beijing of Trump 2.026:54 – The Kindleberger Trap (and other "traps")29:35 – China, the U.S., and the Russo-Ukrainian war, and the idea of a “reverse Kissinger” 34:23 – The problem with framing objectionable Trump policy moves as ceding victories to China 36:51 – How countries in the Western Pacific region are responding to the new administration 38:48 – Taiwan's concerns for Trump's shift on Ukraine41:45 – Predictions for how the Trump administration will handle technology competition with China, and the apparent abandonment of industrial policy 48:14 – What the affirmative vision for U.S.-China policy should look like Paying It Forward:Ryan: Patricia Kim and Jon Czin at BrookingsJessica: Jeffrey Ding at George Washington University and Jonas Nahm at Johns Hopkins SAIS Recommendations:Jessica: The movie Conclave (2024)Ryan: Derek Thompson's piece in The Atlantic, “The Anti-Social Century,” and Robert Cooper's The Ambassadors: Thinking about Diplomacy from Machiavelli to Modern Times Kaiser: The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week, I bring you the first in a series of podcasts in conjunction with the China Research Center at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). The series, titled "Studying China in the Absence of Access: Rediscovering a Lost Art," ran from September to November 2021, and featured four eminent "Pekingologists," or specialists in Chinese elite politics: Joseph Fewsmith, Thomas Fingar, Alice Miller, and Fred Teiwes. The talks were later published in a volume you can download here. The series is introduced by Andrew Mertha, George and Sadie Hyman, Professor of China Studies and director of the SAIS China Research Center, and each lecture includes a moderated discussion with Andy. After this series, I'll also be sharing with you a second series of lectures titled "Studying China from Elsewhere," which will include talks by Maria Repnikova, Mike Lampton, William Hurst, and Maggie Lewis — many of whom Sinica listeners will know from the show.This week's talk is from FrederickTeiwes, truly a legend in the field. The American-born Australian sinologist is best known for his analysis of Chinese Communist Party elite politics. He served as a professor emeritus in Government and International Relations at the University of Sydney until his retirement in 2006. Teiwes has frequently collaborated with Warren Sun, producing seminal works such as The Tragedy of Lin Biao (1996) and China's Road to Disaster: Mao, Central Politicians and Provincial Leaders in the Great Leap Forward, 1955-59 (1999). In this talk, he focuses on forthcoming work on the transition following Mao Zedong's death in 1976.Great thanks to Andy and to Hasta Colman, who first suggested this collaboration when we met in Shanghai recently.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

What if every leap into uncertainty brought you closer to defining your true wealth and joy in life?  Discover how one man's journey through 193 countries led to unexpected lessons on resilience and embracing the unknown. In this episode, Larry Sprung speaks with Sam Goodwin, an American entrepreneur, author, and professional speaker known for his remarkable journey of traveling to every country in the world. Sam's story is not only about adventure but also about overcoming significant challenges, including surviving solitary confinement in Syria, and how these experiences have shaped his outlook on life and success. Sam discusses:  The lessons learned from competitive sports and how they translated into his professional life The turning point that led him to aim to visit all 193 countries His harrowing experience of being detained in Syria and the life-altering insights that came from it  The importance of uncertainty and the growth it offers How he coached the North Korean national ice hockey team as part of a cultural exchange And more! Resources: Mitlin Financial   The JOY and Productivity Journal by Lawrence Sprung  Saving Sam: The True Story of an American's Disappearance in Syria and His Family's Extraordinary Fight to Bring Him Home Hardcover – by Sam Goodwin  Connect with Larry Sprung:  LinkedIn: Larry Sprung Instagram: Larry Sprung Facebook: Larry Sprung X (Twitter): Larry Sprung Connect with Sam Goodwin:  LinkedIn: Sam Goodwin Website: Sam Goodwin About our Guest: Sam Goodwin is an American entrepreneur, author, and professional speaker. A former Division I collegiate hockey player, he co-founded a tech company and NGO in Singapore and is one of the few people who has traveled to all 193 countries in the world. As a thought leader on embracing uncertainty, Goodwin delivers keynotes to organizations around the globe, from large corporate conventions to intimate leadership retreats and everything in between. Sam earned a bachelor's from Niagara University, a master's from Wash U in St. Louis, and a doctorate from Johns Hopkins SAIS. Disclosure: Guests on the Mitlin Money Mindset are not affiliated with CWM, LLC, and opinions expressed herein may not be representative of CWM, LLC. CWM, LLC is not responsible for the guest's content linked on this site.  

This event, organised by the LSE Middle East Centre and the Department of International Relations, LSE was a discussion around the book 'How Sanctions Work: Iran and the Impact of Economic Warfare' by Narges Bajoghli, Vali Nasr, Djavad Salehi-Isfahani and Ali Vaez published by Stanford University Press. Sanctions have enormous consequences. Especially when imposed by a country with the economic influence of the United States, sanctions induce clear shockwaves in both the economy and political culture of the targeted state, and in the everyday lives of citizens. But do economic sanctions induce the behavioural changes intended? Do sanctions work in the way they should? Meet the speakers Narges Bajoghli is Assistant Professor of Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins-SAIS, is an award-winning anthropologist, scholar, and filmmaker. Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins-SAIS, and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council's South Asia Center. Sanam Vakil is the director of the Middle East and North Africa Programme at Chatham House. She was previously the Programme's deputy director and senior research fellow, and led project work on Iran and Gulf Arab dynamics. Steffen Hertog is Associate Professor in Comparative Politics at the London School of Economics. He was previously Kuwait Professor at Sciences Po in Paris, lecturer in Middle East political economy at Durham University and a post-doc at Princeton University.

As American voters go to the polls, all indications point to a statistical dead-heat between vice president and Democratic Party nominee Kamala Harris and former Republican president Donald Trump. The outcome will likely turn on tens of thousands of voters in a handful of key swing states. According to leading pollsters and polling aggregators, the race in these states is too close to call.In this hotly contested race, one demographic whose political preferences are much discussed, though less studied, is Indian Americans. A new study, the 2024 Indian American Attitudes Survey (IAAS), tries to fill this gap. The IAAS is a nationally representative online survey conducted by the Carnegie Endowment in conjunction with data and analytics firm YouGov. The report is authored by Sumitra Badrinathan of American University, Devesh Kapur of Johns Hopkins-SAIS, and Grand Tamasha host Milan Vaishnav.This week on the show, Milan speaks with Sumitra and Devesh about the main findings of their new report and what they portend for the election as well as future political trends in the United States.Episode notes:1. Sumitra Badrinathan, Devesh Kapur, and Milan Vaishnav, “Indian Americans at the Ballot Box: Results From the 2024 Indian American Attitudes Survey,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, October 28, 2024.2. VIDEO: “Deciphering the Indian American Vote,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, October 31, 2024.3. Sumitra Badrinathan, Devesh Kapur, and Milan Vaishnav, “How Will Indian Americans Vote? Results From the 2020 Indian American Attitudes Survey,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, October 14, 2020.4. Christopher H. Achen and Larry M. Bartels, Democracy for Realists: Why Elections Do Not Produce Responsive Government (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2016).5. Sara Sadhwani, “Asian American Mobilization: The Effect of Candidates and Districts on Asian American Voting Behavior,” Political Behavior 44 (2022):105–131.6. Devesh Kapur, Nirvikar Singh, and Sanjoy Chakravorty, The Other One Percent: Indians in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 2016).7. “Sumitra Badrinathan and Devesh Kapur Decode the 2020 Indian American Vote,” Grand Tamasha, October 14, 2020.

It may be a scarcity mindset that views plenty as better than a world where nations and people compete over limited, scarce resources.  But Francis Gavin explains that even in a world of plenty, there are vexing international challenges for which the United States is not prepared.   Gavin is the Giovanni Agnelli Distinguished Professor and the inaugural director of the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS. He was the first Frank Stanton Chair in Nuclear Security Policy Studies at MIT and the Tom Slick Professor of International Affairs and the Director of the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and Law at the University of Texas. Gavin has had fellowships at Harvard University, the University of Texas, and at the Noble Institute. From 2005 until 2010, he directed The American Assembly's multiyear, national initiative, The Next Generation Project: U.S. Global Policy and the Future of International Institutions. He currently serves on the CIA Historical Panel and is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Gavin is the Co-Founder, Co-Director and Principal Investigator, with James Steinberg, of the Carnegie International Policy Scholars Consortium and Network (IPSCON), and Founder and Director of the Nuclear Studies Research Initiative (NSRI). He's also the author of a new Adelphi Paper from the International Institute of Strategic Studies: “The Taming of Scarcity and the Problems of Plenty: Rethinking International Relations and American Grand Strategy in a New Era.” See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Frank Gavin, the Giovanni Agnelli Distinguished Professor and inaugural director of the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS and contributor to War in Ukraine: Conflict, Strategy, and the Return of a Fractured World, joins the show to talk about nuclear strategy and the war in Ukraine. ▪️ Times      •      01:36 Introduction      •      01:53 What are nuclear weapons for?     •      04:15 Pervasive but not used     •      09:53 Invasion insurance     •      17:58 Better to be near-nuclear       •      22:26 How might Putin use nuclear weapons?      •      26:04 Learning by doing     •      33:48 “It's all happening at once”     •      41:31 Rattling the saber works       •      48:04 “We will get them back”         •      50:07 History and Strategy Follow along  on Instagram Find a transcript of today's episode on our School of War Substack Follow the link to buy the book - War in Ukraine: Conflict, Strategy, and the Return of a Fractured World

For months, Iran and Israel have seemed to be on the brink of outright war. Although tensions are lower than in April—when the countries exchanged direct attacks—they remain dangerously high. Vali Nasr has tracked these dynamics since long before October 7. He is the Majid Khadduri professor of international affairs and Middle East studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's South Asia Center. He served as the eighth dean of Johns Hopkins SAIS between 2012 and 2019. During the Obama administration, he served as senior adviser to the legendary diplomat Richard Holbrooke. He warns that as long as war rages in Gaza, the Middle East will remain on the verge of exploding. Yet it is not enough for Washington to focus just on ending that war. It must also put in place a regional order that can free the Middle East from these cycles of violence. You can find transcripts and more episodes of The Foreign Affairs Interview at https://www.foreignaffairs.com/podcasts/foreign-affairs-interview.

Jeff Bell is the past CEO of LegalShield, North America's largest legal subscription service for households and small business. Jeff grew this business from a $650m valuation in 2014 to over $2.4b in 2022 when he retired. Presently, Jeff serves as an Operating Partner on the MidOcean Partners Private Equity Investment Team. Prior to LegalShield, Jeff served as the Microsoft Corporate Vice President for Xbox. He is known for launching Halo 3, Gears of War, Rock Band and Netflix on Xbox Live. He spent 5 years at DaimlerChrysler as the Vice President and General Manager of Chrysler and Jeep Divisions. He is credited with development and launch of the the Jeep Rubicon and 4-door Wrangler, as well as the Chrysler 200, among others. Jeff served Ford Motor Company for 12 years, including as Managing Director of Ford Spain. He serves on the Board of his alma mater, Johns Hopkins-SAIS, and has served on the Kenyon College and National Multiple Sclerosis Board of Trustees.    https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffbell801/

To discuss how Washington has viewed China-India ties and the role of the China factor in the U.S.-India partnership, host Tanvi Madan interviews two guests who have served across three presidential administrations: George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump. Lisa Curtis is senior fellow and director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security; Joshua White is professor of practice of international affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS and a nonresident fellow at the Brookings Institution. Show notes and transcript. Listen to Global India on Apple, Spotify, and wherever you listen to podcasts. Learn about other Brookings podcasts from the Brookings Podcast Network.  

Recorded live at the Reagan National Defense Forum, Jess and John interview Ambassador Eric Edelman, who serves as Vice Chair of the Commission on the National Defense Strategy. Previously, Edelman served as Undersecretary of Defense for Policy, Ambassador to Turkey and Finland, and lastly, and most importantly, as Jess' professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS.How do policymakers and defense experts feel about the current state of geopolitics? Should the U.S. have anticipated the growing relationships between global repressors? What may 2024 have in store for the U.S. and our allies?Stay tuned for more of the Special Series at RNDF on Confronting the New Alliance of Global Repressors this week on Fault Lines! These are discussions you don't want to miss!Follow our experts on Twitter: @notTVJessJones@JohnCLipseyLike what we're doing here? Be sure to rate, review, and subscribe. And don't forget to follow @masonnatsec on Twitter! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this week's episode of the podcast, Thomas Serres of the University of California, Santa Cruz joins Marc Lynch to discuss his new book, The Suspended Disaster. In his book, he examines the dynamics of the Algerian political system, offering new insights into the last years of Bouteflika's rule and the factors that shaped the emergence of an unexpected social movement. He argues that the Algerian ruling coalition developed a mode of government based on the management of a seemingly never-ending crisis, (Starts at 0:49). Lisel Hintz of Johns Hopkins SAIS also joins Marc Lynch in a conversation about the zoom group that she formed for Syrian and Turkish academics affected by the earthquake. They also discuss Hintz's own research on Turkish pop culture and how you can learn about politics by studying the media. Music for this season's podcast was created by Malika Zarra. You can find more of her work on Instagram and Linktree.

Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Writing About My Job(s): Research Assistant at World Bank / IMF, published by geoffrey on September 16, 2023 on The Effective Altruism Forum. This is actually about two distinct roles at international organizations. If there's one thing you take away from this, it's that Research Assistant roles at policy organizations can vary a lot! I'll abbreviate Research Assistant as RA throughout. My Current Role at World Bank DIME One is a job I currently hold as a RA at World Bank DIME, an impact evaluation and research unit. I assist on a research project whose ideal goal is publication in a top journal. This includes data cleaning, analysis, scripting, checking data quality, running regressions, offering suggestions in analysis calls, figuring out what the Principal Investigators want, and so forth. It's very close to an academic "predoc" Research Assistant role that students do between undergrad / Master's programs and PhDs. The project revolves around development economics and causal inference, with a focus on infrastructure and structural transformation. It's a blend of policy, research, development, impact evaluation and growth-adjacent topics. My Previous Role at International Monetary Fund (IMF) The other is a job I formerly held as a Research Assistant at the International Monetary Fund (IMF). I pilot-tested a software tool for better forecasting and data management. This included quality assurance testing, data migration, data entry, and scripting. My RA role was about as opposite from research as you could get and the tasks I was given was quite unconventional. The day-to-day was closer to that of a Quality Assurance Engineer or Data Engineer. The project revolved around macroeconomics and international finance, with a focus on how to best organize data for scenario planning and technical assistance. It's a blend of public finance, debt sustainability, fiscal policies, natural resource policies, and international macro. Background I currently work at World Bank DIME, an impact evaluation and research unit. I've only been here a few months, starting from July 2023. Before that, I worked at the IMF for about a year. Prior to both roles, I did a Master's degree in International Economics and Finance at Johns Hopkins SAIS, a policy school in Washington DC. Before that, I was a Software Engineer for 4 years and before that I was teaching myself to code after a very unsuccessful post-college job search. I am strongly considering an academic career in economics and may apply to Econ PhDs next year. But I am also considering non-academic roles in development, and also PhDs in other fields like Public Policy, Statistics, and Political Economy. I went into the Master's program after many unsuccessful attempts to switch into development work. I had no exact plan coming in but I chose this program in particular because of: It was a 1-year program, which meant less tuition and less foregone earnings. International Economics sounded close enough to Development Economics that I thought I'd be learning similar stuff. (It's very different! International Economics is more macro and finance. Development Economics is more applied micro and impact evaluation). I saw my program had high placement rates in the IMF I wanted to explore the "working on growth is better than global health" argument a bit more and thought, "What better way than by working on macroeconomics?" At the time, I thought Econ PhDs didn't influence policy much, that they were beyond my abilities, and that I wouldn't really like it. All three turned out to be false once I started taking classes. While I was still interested in macro-finance policy, I found myself being more interested in the development research focus so I pivoted my focus towards that. In the Spring, I applied for a mix of academic and policy predocs...

Iskander Rehman, Ax:son Johnson Fellow at the Kissinger Center at Johns Hopkins SAIS and contributor to New Makers of Modern Strategy, joins the show to talk about French grand strategy during the 16th and 17th century rivalry between the Bourbons and Habsburg Spain.  ▪️ Times      •    02:41 Introduction      •    04:35 A nagging curiosity       •    06:59 Sully at the start      •    13:27 The genesis of a struggle     •    21:19 French internal cohesion      •    26:51 Naval power     •    29:28 Religious factions and Richelieu     •    32:14 The 30 Years War and France     •    36:22 The fruits of disorder     •    41:44 Defender of the faith     •    44:41 Mazarin      •    49:48 Hegemonic France     •    53:56 Rapid-fire lessons Follow along on Instagram

Does the NGO world interest you? And did you know that the job of Fundraiser ranks no. 17 in US News Best Business Jobs?This week on Beyond the Thesis With Papa PhD, I'm talking with Kenna Barrett about a career path that has not yet been covered on the show - Fundraising - and about why it may be a great avenue for you.Reach out to me or to Kenna using the links below if you have any feedback or any questions for us.Also, I'd love to get to know you better. If you have 60 seconds please fill out the listener survey in this link. VIDEO https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3biNCTt_9iU?sub_confirmation=1Kenna Barrett is a fundraising coach based in Silver Spring, MD. Over a 20-year period–thanks to the partnership of many donors, friends, and colleagues–Kenna has raised millions of dollars in all types of organizations, from start-ups to world-class universities. Currently, she serves as the Chief Development Officer of University Libraries for the University of Maryland.Kenna teaches fundraising at Sacred Heart University and has taught at Johns Hopkins SAIS. Kenna is a regular presenter in the fundraising community on topics such as “Making the Ask” for Introverts, the Science of Schmoozing, The Inner Game of Fundraising, and more.But here's the thing: like many of her kin, she fell into her fundraising career quite unexpectedly. She was initially bound for academia. Along the road to becoming a professor, Kenna realized that engaging donors to support a worthwhile mission was a perfect fit for her writing skills, natural curiosity, and changemaking spirit.As a coach, Kenna loves to work with introverts, writers, working parents, career-changers, and anyone else who wants to perfect their pitch–whether to solicit a gift, land a job in philanthropy, or simply level up their professional persona. Thank you, Kenna Barrett If you enjoyed this conversation with Kenna, let him know by clicking the link below and leaving him a message on LinkedIn:Send Kenna Barrett a thank you message on LinkedIn!Click here to share your key take-away from this interview with David! This episode's resources: Kenna Barrett | TwitterKenna Barrett | TEDx TalkPitch Perfect Fundraising | Website Leave a review on Podchaser ! Support the show ! You might also like the following episodes: Inês Moura – The Importance of Voice as an Academic100 K Listens Celebration – With Todd Cochrane, Ashley Ruba and Other FriendsPradeep Kumar Sacitharan – Common Obstacles to Accelerating PhD TalentAshley Ruba – The State of the Post-PhD Job MarketAs always, if you find value in Papa PhD and in the content I bring you every week, click on one of the buttons below and send some of that value back to me by becoming a supporter on Patreon or by buying me a coffee :) Support the show on Patreon ! Or buy me a coffee :)

Since Independence, the Indian state has grappled with a variety of internal security challenges—insurgencies, terrorist attacks, caste and communal violence, riots, and electoral violence. Their toll has claimed more lives than all of India's five external wars combined.Despite this, we know surprisingly little about the institutions of the state tasked with managing internal security. How well has India contained violence and preserved order? How have the approaches and capacity of the State evolved to attain these twin objectives?  And what impact does the State's approach have on civil liberties and the quality of democracy?These are three questions that a new book, Internal Security in India: Violence, Order, and the State, takes up. It's an important new volume co-edited by two of the best-known political scientists working on India—Amit Ahuja of the University of California-Santa Barbara and Devesh Kapur of Johns Hopkins-SAIS.Amit and Devesh join Milan on the podcast this week to discuss their new book and the lessons it holds for law and order in India. The trio discuss the centralization of internal security powers, the surprising decline in public violence, and the explosion in the size of India's paramilitary forces. Plus, the three debate whether violence has moved from the periphery of Indian politics to center stage.Soutik Biswas, “Is India seeing a decline in violence?” BBC News, January 16, 2023. Ajai Shukla, “India's tryst with counterinsurgency,” Business Standard, March 15, 2023.Devesh Kapur, “The worrying rise of militarisation in India's Central Armed Police Forces,” ThePrint, November 29, 2017.Amit Ahuja and Devesh Kapur, “Internal security threats: the 1980s,”Hindustan Times, 2022.   

Jim Steinberg (Dean, Johns Hopkins SAIS and Former US Deputy Secretary of State) joins Hank on the podcast to discuss growing up in Massachusetts and being inspired to pursue public service by the Kennedys, his pivotal shift to foreign policy, and his philosophy of education. They delve into US-China relations, the meeting between Biden and Xi, and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The death of a 22-year-old Iranian woman sparked widespread youth and women-led protests in Iran. In this episode, we will discuss how protests have evolved and how governments around the world have responded. Vali Nasr, Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins SAIS, joins us today to discuss the demonstrations in … Continue reading Young Iranians Go to the Streets