Stanford University

New Scholars Corner video: Identity Politics

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Scholars Corner is an ongoing SPICE initiative to share FSI’s cutting-edge social science research with high school and college classrooms nationwide and international schools abroad.

This week we released “The Rise and Implications of Identity Politics,” the latest installment in our ongoing Scholars Corner series. Each Scholars Corner episode features a short video discussion with a scholar at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) at Stanford University sharing his or her latest research.

This Scholars Corner video features New York Times bestselling author Francis Fukuyama discussing the recent rise of identity politics, both in the United States and around the world. “In the 20th century we had a politics that was organized around an economic axis, primarily. You had a left that worried about inequality…and you had a right that was in favor of the greatest amount of freedom,” summarizes Fukuyama. “[N]ow we are seeing a shift in many countries away from this focus on economic issues to a polarization based on identity.”

According to Fukuyama, this shift in politics is reflected in such domestic social movements as Black Lives Matter and #MeToo, as well as in international movements like the Catalan independence movement, white nationalism, and even the Islamic State.

The rise of identity politics may have troubling implications for modern democracies. “In the United States, for example, the Republican party increasingly has become a party of white people, and the Democratic party has become increasingly a party of minorities and women. In general, I think the problem for a democracy is that you’ve got these specific identities…[but] you need something more than that. You need an integrative sense of national identity [that’s] open to the existing diversity of the society that allows people to believe that they’re part of the same political community,” says Fukuyama.

“That, I think, is the challenge for modern democracy at the present moment.”

To hear more of Dr. Fukuyama’s analysis, view the video here: “The Rise and Implications of Identity Politics.” For other Scholars Corner episodes, visit our Scholars Corner webpage. Past videos have covered topics such as cybersecurity, immigration and integration, and climate change.

"Identity" hardcover book by Francis Fukuyama "Identity" hardcover book by Francis Fukuyama

Francis Fukuyama is a Senior Fellow at FSI and the Mosbacher Director of the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. This video is based on his recent book Identity: The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment, which was recognized as The Times (UK) Best Books of 2018, Politics, and Financial Times Best Books of 2018.

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Scholars Corner video featuring Francis Fukuyama discussing identity politics
Francis Fukuyama discusses identity politics in SPICE's latest Scholars Corner video.
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Laura Jakli

Encina Hall, C147 616 Jane Stanford Way Stanford, CA 94305-6055
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CDDRL Predoctoral Fellow, 2018-20
Fellow, Program on Democracy and the Internet, 2018-20
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​I am a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows. Starting in 2023, I will be an Assistant Professor at Harvard Business School's Business, Government and the International Economy (BGIE) unit.

My research examines political extremism, destigmatization, and radicalization, focusing on the role of popularity cues in online media. My related research examines a broad range of threats to democratic governance, including authoritarian encroachment, ethnic prejudice in public goods allocation, and misinformation. 

​My dissertation won APSA's Ernst B. Haas Award for the best dissertation on European Politics. I am currently working on my book project, Engineering Extremism, with generous funding from the William F. Milton Fund at Harvard.

My published work has appeared in the American Political Science Review,  Governance,  International Studies Quarterly, Public Administration Review, and the Virginia Journal of International Law, along with an edited volume in Democratization (Oxford University Press). My research has been featured in KQED/NPR, The Washington Post, and VICE News.
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I received my Ph.D. in Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley in 2020. I was a Predoctoral Research Fellow at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University and the Stanford Program on Democracy and the Internet. I hold a B.A. (Magna Cum Laude; Phi Beta Kappa) from Cornell University and an M.A. (with Distinction) from the University of California, Berkeley.

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Anna M. Weichselbraun

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Anna Weichselbraun Headshot PhD

Anna Weichselbraun is a former Nuclear Security Postdoctoral Fellow (2016-2018). She is a research and teaching postdoc at the Department of European Ethnology at the University of Vienna. Her research examines the governance of technologies as well as technologies of governance.

In her book The Nuclear Order of Things: Making Safeguards Technical at the IAEA, Anna provides an intimate view of the practices and activities of nuclear safeguards inspectors at the International Atomic Energy Agency, and connects these quotidian practices to the geopolitics of nuclear governance.

Her current project explores problems of Anthropocene governance, that is, the social mechanisms and technological infrastructures by which humans attempt to mitigate the uncertainty emanating from each other and their environments. In 2022-23 she is a USC-Berggruen fellow looking at how experiments in blockchain-based organizational forms can inform new visions of global governance.

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New study links immigrant naturalization to long-term political integration

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One of the key policy debates in Europe centers on how best to integrate immigrants. The issue is particularly salient in Switzerland where immigrants make up almost 25% of the population. New research from scholars at Stanford and the University of Zurich demonstrates that naturalization substantially improves the political integration of immigrants. 

Jens Hainmueller, faculty affiliate of The Europe Center and co-director of the Immigration and Integration Policy Lab, along with his co-authors Dominik Hangartner and Giuseppe Pietrantuono, use an innovative research strategy to show that naturalization serves as a catalyst for integration. 

Between 1970 and 2003 residents decided on naturalization applications in secret ballot referendumsin some Swiss municipalities. The researchers compare immigrants who just barely won a referendum with those that just barely lost, and the resulting natural experiment provides a treatment and control group that are almost identical. 

"In some cases, the difference between them was merely a few votes, which turned 49% into 51%. It was down to luck whether people received Swiss citizenship or not," says Professor Hainmueller. 

And because the researchers were able to survey immigrants 15 years after their naturalization decisions, the study provides one of the first unbiased estimates of the causal impact of naturalization on the long-term integration of immigrants. 

In Switzerland, where immigrants must wait twelve years to apply for citizenship, the study suggests that reducing this waiting period could improve immigrant integration and positively impact Swiss society. 

The full article is located on the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences website.

A recent news article on this research can be found in the October 22, 2015 Stanford Report

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Global Governance: What to Expect from the G20

Montek Singh Ahluwalia is an economist who trained at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. He spent several years at the World Bank before returning to India to serve as the Economic Advisor to the Finance Minister. The Government of India then appointed him to several senior positions, including Secretary of Commerce and Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs at the Ministry of Finance. In 1998, he was appointed as a Member of the Planning Commission and Advisory Council to the Prime Minister of India. In 2001, he became the Director of Independent Evaluation Office at the International Monetary Fund, resigning this position in 2004 to become the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission.

He has written widely about India and the world economy, co-authoring Redistribution with Growth: An Approach to Policy, and editing Macroeconomics and Monetary Policy: Issues for Reforming the Global Financial Architecture with Y.V. Reddy and S.S. Tarapore.

The Payne Distinguished Lectureship is named for Frank and Arthur Payne, brothers who gained an appreciation for global problems through their international business operations. This lectureship, hosted by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, brings speakers with an international reputation for leadership and visionary thinking to Stanford to deliver a major public lecture. 

This event is carried out in partnership with the Stanford Center for International Development (SCID).

A public reception will follow the lecture.

Montek Singh Ahluwalia Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission 2004-2014, Government of India Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission 2004-2014, Government of India
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Frank E. and Arthur W. Payne Lecture Series
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Ukraine-Russia: What Next?

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Due to the high interest in this event, we have moved it to a larger room.  It is now in the Oksenberg Conference Room, Encina Hall, 3rd floor.

 

The February Minsk II agreement introduced a fragile ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, following a year of crisis and conflict between Kyiv and Moscow.  Ukrainian President Poroshenko needs to grapple with a daunting list of critical economic and political reforms.  Russian President Putin, however, appears intent on destabilizing the Ukrainian government and has the means, including military force, to do so.  What can we expect next in the Ukraine-Russia stand-off, and how should the West respond?

Steven Pifer

 

Steven Pifer is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, where his work focuses on arms control, Ukraine and Russia. A retired Foreign Service officer, his more than 25 years with the State Department included assignments as deputy assistant secretary of state with responsibilities for Russia and Ukraine (2001-2004), ambassador to Ukraine (1998-2000), and special assistant to the president and senior director for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia on the National Security Council (1996-1997).

 

Co-sponsored by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and The Europe Center.

Steven Pifer Senior Fellow Speaker the Brookings Institution
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European Security Initiative
European Security Initiative Lecture Series

How Conquest Transformed Northern Europe

This lecture is the first in a new series co-sponsored by The Europe Center and the Stanford Archaeology Center on how modern Europe has been shaped by the concepts, materials and ideology of its past inhabitants.

This first speaker highlights both the ecological and socio-political ramifications of conquest.  Based on work undertaken in Poland, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania, Dr. Aleksander Pluskowski discusses the way that relationships created during one of the most dynamic epochs of European history, the period of crusading, have left a profound legacy for modern Europe.  The process of crusading resulted in massively modified landscapes and catalyzed population reconfiguration at the frontiers of Europe, during the period of Christian expansion.  The archaeo-historical backdrop to these events is presented, along with a discussion of how Europe and the relationship Europe has with non-Christian societies, was permanently altered.

Aleksander Pluskowski's research focuses on frontier societies, colonization and ecological diversity in medieval Europe.  He is primarily concerned with the nuanced relationships between ecology and culture, moving towards a complete integration of environmental and social archaeology, history and art history.  His ultimate aim is to further a holistic understanding of this formative period of European society, contributing to the management of cultural and ecological heritage today.  His other interests include cult praxis in the past and the construction of religious identities.

"How Conquest Transformed Northern Europe"
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Aleksander Pluskowski Lecturer in Archaeology Speaker University of Reading, United Kingdom
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Katherine Jolluck

Department of History
Stanford University
Stanford, CA  94305-2024
 

(650) 723-1884 (650) 725-0597
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Senior Lecturer in History
Senior Fellow of the WSD HANDA Center for Human Rights and International Justice
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Katherine R. Jolluck is Senior Lecturer and Coordinator of the Public History/Public Service Track in the Department of History at Stanford University.  She is also a Senior Fellow at the Center for Human Rights and International Justice.  She has also taught at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the Naval Post-Graduate School in Monterey.  A specialist on the history of twentieth-century Eastern Europe and Russia, she focuses on the topics of women and war, women in communist societies, nationalism, the Soviet Gulag, and human trafficking. Her books include: Exile and Identity: Polish Women in the Soviet Union during WWII, and Gulag Voices: Oral Histories of Soviet Incarceration and Exile (with Jehanne M Gheith). She has also written articles on Poland in World War II, antisemitism, and human trafficking in Europe.  Jolluck serves on the Faculty Steering Committee of the Haas Center for Public Service, offers service-learning courses, and is active in the Bay Area anti-trafficking community.  She is a Steering Committee member of No Traffick Ahead, a multi-county, multi-disciplinary workgroup dedicated to combating human trafficking in all forms.

 

Affiliated Senior Lecturer at The Europe Center
Affiliated Senior Lecturer at the Program on Human Rights
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Europe-Russia Relations: The Impact of EU Expansion

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Please click on the image below to view the video recording of this event.

 

 

Co-sponsored by The Europe Center and the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies.

 

Barnes/McDowell/Cranston Room
Fisher Conference Center at the Arrillaga Alumni Center

Miroslav Lajcak Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Speaker Slovak Republic

Michael A. McFaul

Encina Hall
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

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Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies, Department of Political Science
Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
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Michael McFaul is the Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies in Political Science, Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and the Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, all at Stanford University. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1995 and served as FSI Director from 2015 to 2025. He is also an international affairs analyst for MSNOW.

McFaul served for five years in the Obama administration, first as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Russian and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council at the White House (2009-2012), and then as U.S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation (2012-2014).

McFaul has authored ten books and edited several others, including, most recently, Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Global Disorder, as well as From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia, (a New York Times bestseller) Advancing Democracy Abroad: Why We Should, How We Can; and Russia’s Unfinished Revolution: Political Change from Gorbachev to Putin.

He is a recipient of numerous awards, including an honorary PhD from Montana State University; the Order for Merits to Lithuania from President Gitanas Nausea of Lithuania; Order of Merit of Third Degree from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford University. In 2015, he was the Distinguished Mingde Faculty Fellow at the Stanford Center at Peking University.

McFaul was born and raised in Montana. He received his B.A. in International Relations and Slavic Languages and his M.A. in Soviet and East European Studies from Stanford University in 1986. As a Rhodes Scholar, he completed his D. Phil. in International Relations at Oxford University in 1991. 

International Working Group on Russian Sanctions

The International Working Group on Russian Sanctions aims to provide expertise and experience to governments and companies around the world by assisting with the formulation of sanctions proposals that will increase the cost to Russia of invading Ukraine, and support democratic Ukraine in the defense of its territorial integrity and national sovereignty.
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Global Populisms

A new project examining the global surge in populist movements and what it means for established democratic rules and institutions.
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Professor of Political Science, and Senior Fellow, the Freeman Spogli Institute and the Hoover Institution Speaker Stanford University

Norman M. Naimark

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, C235
Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 723-6927 (650) 725-0597
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Senior Fellow, by courtesy, at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Robert & Florence McDonnell Professor of East European Studies
Professor of History
Professor, by courtesy, of German Studies
Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution
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Norman M. Naimark is the Robert and Florence McDonnell Professor of East European Studies, a Professor of History and (by courtesy) of German Studies, and Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution and (by courtesy) of the Freeman-Spogli Institute for International Studies. Norman formerly served as the Sakurako and William Fisher Family Director of the Stanford Global Studies Division, the Burke Family Director of the Bing Overseas Studies Program, the Convener of the European Forum (predecessor to The Europe Center), Chair of the History Department, and the Director of Stanford’s Center for Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies.

Norman earned his Ph.D. in History from Stanford University in 1972 and before returning to join the faculty in 1988, he was a professor of history at Boston University and a fellow of the Russian Research Center at Harvard. He also held the visiting Catherine Wasserman Davis Chair of Slavic Studies at Wellesley College. He has been awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (1996), the Richard W. Lyman Award for outstanding faculty volunteer service (1995), and the Dean's Teaching Award from Stanford University for 1991-92 and 2002-3.

Norman is interested in modern Eastern European and Russian history and his research focuses on Soviet policies and actions in Europe after World War II and on genocide and ethnic cleansing in the twentieth century. His published monographs on these topics include The History of the "Proletariat": The Emergence of Marxism in the Kingdom of Poland, 1870–1887 (1979, Columbia University Press), Terrorists and Social Democrats: The Russian Revolutionary Movement under Alexander III (1983, Harvard University Press), The Russians in Germany: The History of The Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945–1949 (1995, Harvard University Press), The Establishment of Communist Regimes in Eastern Europe (1998, Westview Press), Fires of Hatred: Ethnic Cleansing In 20th Century Europe (2001, Harvard University Press), Stalin's Genocides (2010, Princeton University Press), and Genocide: A World History (2016, Oxford University Press). Naimark’s latest book, Stalin and the Fate of Europe: The Postwar Struggle for Sovereignty (Harvard 2019), explores seven case studies that illuminate Soviet policy in Europe and European attempts to build new, independent countries after World War II.

 

Affiliated faculty at The Europe Center
Affiliated faculty at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law
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The Sakurako and William Fisher Family Director of the Stanford Global Studies Division and Robert and Florence McDonnell Professor in East European Studies Speaker Stanford University
Kathryn Stoner Faculty Director, Susan Ford Dorsey Program in International Policy Studies and Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute Speaker Stanford University
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