Photo of Oriana Skylar Mastro

Oriana Skylar Mastro, PhD

  • Center Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
  • Courtesy Assistant Professor of Political Science

Shorenstein APARC
Stanford University
Encina Hall
Stanford,  CA  94305-6055

Biography

Oriana Skylar Mastro is a Center Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, where her research focuses on Chinese military and security policy, Asia-Pacific security issues, war termination, nuclear dynamics, and coercive diplomacy. She is also the Courtesy Assistant Professor of Political Science at Stanford University and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. She continues to serve in the United States Air Force Reserve, for which she works as an IMA to the Policy and Posture Branch Chief at INDOPACOM J5, Camp Smith, Hawaii.

She has received numerous awards for her military service and contributions to U.S. strategy in Asia, including the 2022 Individual Reservist of the Year Award, 2020 and 2018 Meritorious Service Medal, the 2017 Air Force recognition Ribbon, and the 2016 Individual Reservist of the Year Award. She has won a number of other prestigious awards, including the 2016-2017 Stanton Nuclear Security Fellowship at the Council of Foreign Relations.

She has published widely, including in International Security, Foreign Affairs, the New York Times, International Studies Review, Journal of Strategic Studies, The Washington Quarterly, Survival, and Asian Security. Her book, The Costs of Conversation: Obstacles to Peace Talks in Wartime, (Cornell University Press, 2019), won the 2020 American Political Science Association International Security Section Best Book by an Untenured Faculty Member.

Prior to her appointment at Stanford in August 2020, Mastro was an assistant professor of security studies at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. She holds a B.A. in East Asian Studies from Stanford University and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Politics from Princeton University.

Her publications and commentary can be found at orianaskylarmastro.com and on Twitter @osmastro.

Current research

In The News

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President Sauli Niinistö of Finland participates in a panel of Finnish and Stanford scholars at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.
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As the war in Ukraine continues to reshape security needs in Europe and globally, scholars from the Freeman Spogli Institute agree that Finland can play a unique leadership role in defense and cybersecurity alliances.
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Gi-Wook Shin, Amb. Jung-Seung Shin, and Oriana Skylar Mastro at the Winter Payne Lecture
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Payne Distinguished Fellow Examines South Korea’s Strategic Path Amid U.S.-China Competition

Ambassador Jung-Seung Shin, the Winter 2023 Payne Distinguished Fellow, offered insights into the dynamics of the trilateral U.S.-China-South Korea relationship, the impacts of the great power competition between the United States and China on South Korea, and the prospects for enhanced Korea-U.S. collaboration.
Payne Distinguished Fellow Examines South Korea’s Strategic Path Amid U.S.-China Competition

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