Philosophy, Politics, Democracy: Selected Essays, released Oct 2009 (by Joshua Cohen): Over the past twenty years, Joshua Cohen has explored the most controversial issues facing the American public: campaign finance and political equality, privacy rights and robust public debate, hate speech and pornography, and the capacity of democracies to address important practical problems. In this highly anticipated volume, Cohen draws on his work in these diverse topics to develop an argument about what he calls, following John Rawls, "democracy's public reason." He rejects the conventional idea that democratic politics is simply a contest for power, and that philosophical argument is disconnected from life. Political philosophy, he insists, is part of politics, and its job is to contribute to the public reasoning about what we ought to do.

When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation: All over the world, democratic reforms have brought power to the people, but under conditions where the people have little opportunity to think about the power that they exercise. In this book, James S. Fishkin combines a new theory of democracy with actual practice and shows how an idea that harks back to ancient Athens can be used to revive our modern democracies. The book outlines deliberative democracy projects conducted by the author with various collaborators in the United States, China, Britain, Denmark, Australia, Italy, Bulgaria, Northern Ireland, and in the entire European Union. These projects have resulted in the massive expansion of wind power in Texas, the building of sewage treatment plants in China, and greater mutual understanding between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. The book is accompanied by a DVD of "Europe in One Room" by Emmy Award-winning documentary makers Paladin Invision. The film recounts one of the most challenging deliberative democracy efforts with a scientific sample from 27 countries speaking 21 languages.

Coethnicity: Diversity and the Dilemmas of Collective Action, released Aug 2009 (edited by James Habyarimana, Macartan Humphreys, Daniel N. Posner, Jeremy M. Weinstein): Ethnically homogenous communities often do a better job than diverse communities of producing public goods such as satisfactory schools and health care, adequate sanitation, and low levels of crime. Coethnicity reports the results of a landmark study that aimed to find out why diversity has this cooperation-undermining effect. The study, conducted in a neighborhood of Kampala, Uganda, notable for both its high levels of diversity and low levels of public goods provision, hones in on the mechanisms that might account for the difficulties diverse societies often face in trying to act collectively. Research on ethnic diversity typically draws on either experimental research or field work. Coethnicity does both. By taking the crucial step from observation to experimentation, this study marks a major breakthrough in the study of ethnic diversity.

Political Liberalization in the Persian Gulf: The countries of the Persian (or Arab) Gulf produce about thirty percent of the planet's oil and keep around fifty-five percent of its reserves underground. The stability of the region's autocratic regimes, therefore, is crucial for those who wish to anchor the world's economic and political future. Yet despite its reputation as a region trapped by tradition, the Persian Gulf has taken slow steps toward political liberalization. The question now is whether this trend is part of an inexorable drive toward democratization or simply a means for autocratic regimes to consolidate and legitimize their rule. In this volume, Joshua Teitelbaum addresses the push toward political liberalization in the Persian Gulf and its implications for the future, tracking eight states as they respond to the challenges of increased wealth and education, a developing middle class, external pressures from international actors, and competing social and political groups.

Promoting Democracy and the Rule of Law: American and European Strategies, released Aug 2009 (edited by Amichai Magen, Thomas Risse, and Michael A. McFaul): European and American experts systematically compare US and EU strategies to promote democracy around the world -- from the Middle East and the Mediterranean, to Latin America, the former Soviet bloc, and Southeast Asia. In doing so, the authors debunk the pernicious myth that there exists a transatlantic divide over democracy promotion.

Democracy and Authoritarianism in the Postcommunist World, ships Dec 2009 (edited by Valerie Bunce, Michael A. McFaul, Kathryn Stoner): This volume brings together a distinguished group of scholars working on Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union to examine in depth three waves of democratic change that took place in eleven different former Communist nations. The essays draw important conclusions about the rise, development, and breakdown of both democracy and dictatorship in each country and together provide a rich comparative perspective on the post-Communist world.

Advancing Democracy Abroad: Why We Should and How We Can, ships Nov 2009 (by Michael A. McFaul): This book offers examples of the tangible benefits of democracy – more accountable government, greater economic prosperity, and better security – and explains how Americans can reap economic and security gains from democratic advance around the world. In the final chapters of this new work, McFaul provides past examples of successful democracy promotion strategies and offers constructive new proposals for supporting democratic development more effectively in the future.

The Stanford University Board of Trustees recently elected Ronald P. Spogli, former U.S. ambassador to Italy and San Marino, to a five-year term beginning in October.

The board, which last met in June, used electronic ballots to conduct the election, which took place in July. Spogli will take his seat at the next meeting, scheduled for Oct. 12-13.

Including Spogli, the board will have 31 members, four fewer than its limit of 35.

"Ron Spogli has a long track record of commitment to and support for Stanford, and we are fortunate to have him join the board," said Leslie Hume, chair of the Board of Trustees. "With a distinguished career in both business and in public service, he brings a global perspective to the board that will serve the university well."

Spogli, who was nominated by former President George W. Bush as U.S. ambassador to Italy, was sworn in as ambassador in August 2005. In 2006, Spogli also became the American ambassador to San Marino—the first person to hold the title in the small mountainous country, which is completely surrounded by Italy. Both terms ended last February.

Spogli is a founding partner of Freeman Spogli & Co., a private equity investment firm he established in 1983 with Bradford M. Freeman in Los Angeles. In 2005, the longtime business partners and friends donated $50 million to Stanford's International Initiative. The initiative was launched to promote collaboration on campus on three themes: pursuing peace and security; improving governance locally, nationally and internationally; and advancing human well-being.

In recognition of their generous gift, the university changed the name of the Stanford Institute for International Studies to the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Currently, Spogli is a member of the institute's advisory board.

When he became an ambassador in 2005, Spogli was required to sever all ties with Freeman Spogli & Co. He rejoined the firm in June 2009.

Spogli, who was born in Los Angeles in 1948, earned a bachelor's degree in history from Stanford in 1970. During his junior year, Spogli was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Society, the nation's oldest academic honor society.

As an undergraduate, Spogli traveled to Italy to study at Stanford's Florence campus. After graduating, he spent a year working as an assistant to the directors of the Florence program. Later, he spent more than a year living in Milan, where he was the lead researcher for a project studying the social impact of labor migration from southern Italy to the Italian industrial north.

In 1975, Spogli earned an MBA from Harvard Business School.

In 2002, President Bush appointed Spogli to a three-year term with the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, which establishes worldwide policies and procedures for the Fulbright Program and issues an annual report.

From 2002 to 2005, Spogli also served on the Overseas Studies Program Council, an advisory panel to what is now known as Stanford's Bing Overseas Studies Program.

Spogli has endowed two positions at Stanford: The Gesue and Helen Spogli Professorship in Italian Studies, which was named in honor of his Italian immigrant grandfather, who arrived in America in 1912, settled in Pennsylvania and moved to California in 1941, and his mother; and The Spogli Family Overseas Studies Director position in Florence, Italy.

Spogli served as regional chair of the major gifts committee of the Campaign for Undergraduate Education from 2000 to 2004. The campaign, which ended in 2005, raised more than $1 billion.

Spogli also has served as an active volunteer at many Stanford events. He served as co-chair of the "Think Again" event in Los Angeles and as a member of the steering committee for the "Think Again" event in San Diego. The 12-city tour – a component of the Campaign for Undergraduate Education – was designed to reacquaint alumni with the university and the strides it had made in undergraduate education over the past decade. He also served as co-chair of the Special Gifts Committee for his 35th class reunion.

Notices of the demise of Iran’s Green Revolution are premature. Without question, the tyrannical triumvirate — Ayotallah Ali Khamenei, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Revolutionary Guard — have dealt a crippling blow to the popular movement protesting their electoral coup of June 12.

Thousands of Iranians have been arrested and savagely tortured — from street protesters to election campaign organizers for Mir Hussein Moussavi, the likely victor in that contest. Many are now being forced to “confess” to having been agents of the United States or Britain.

We have seen this play before, not simply in Iran but in other tyrannies that suppressed mass movements for democratic change with massive violence and terror.

But Iran in 2009 is not China in 1989, Burma in 1990 or Belarus in 2006. The crisis in the Islamic Republic has exposed and widened massive cracks within the ruling elite. Such divisions are always a sign of an impending crackup of dictatorship.

Despite the rush to bury Iran’s reformist movement as another lost cause, Iran remains at a possible political tipping point. Democracies around the world have a duty — not simply to themselves, but to their strategic interests — to weigh in. They must not be deterred by threats to shun talks over Iran’s nuclear program.

President Obama has gotten it right by signaling America’s support for peaceful protest, human rights and the rule of law. More explicit language, not to mention action, would only play into the hands of the most cynical and vicious conservative elements in Iran. Moreover, with no diplomatic ties and all but no trade with Iran, there is little more the U.S. could do right now to pressure the regime.

But there are over 100 other democracies in the world. It is time that their voices were heard and their actions felt in Tehran.

Britain shares with the U.S. the handicap of a past history of negative interference in Iran. But Britain has diplomatic and economic ties to the regime, and breaking or suspending those will weaken Ayatollah Khamenei and his reactionary allies.

Moreover, Britain can have a unique kind of impact in Iran: For more than a century, Iranians have believed in the omnipotence of the “British hand” in the affairs of their country. Any indication that Britain is no longer willing to do business with the Islamic regime will hearten the Iranian people and undermine the regime’s aura of invincibility.

Germany, France and Italy are major trading partners with Iran. They have little history of colonial interference in Iranian affairs. Their decision to refuse to recognize the Ahmadinejad regime would have an immense effect. More compelling still would be a similar declaration from the entire Group of 8 at its impending summit.

The smaller and less powerful democracies can also have an impact. It would be preposterous for Iranian hardliners to attribute ulterior strategic motives to actions by the Scandinavian countries or the Netherlands, Ireland, Canada or Slovenia. If a coalition of such countries were to condemn the crackdown, call for a release of political prisoners and demand full respect for human rights — and back up these positions with a downgrading of diplomatic and trade ties — this would send a powerful message to both sides in Iran.

Many democracies around the world, including the above, have diplomatic ties with Iran. It is important that they maintain their embassies in Tehran. But they should now refuse to recognize the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad’s government.

The most powerful coalition of democracies in the world, the 27-member European Union, is now debating whether to withdraw their ambassadors from Tehran in protest over the detention of the British Embassy’s Iranian personnel.

The withdrawal of E.U. ambassadors would send a stunning message to the Iranian hardliners that coups and bloody suppression of peaceful protests carry a heavy price in international standing.

With the simple diplomatic act of denying legitimacy — something nearly all democratic forces in Iran are now asking of the world — the democracies of the world can give a needed boost to the forces of democratic change in Iran and earn the lasting gratitude of a movement that will eventually triumph.

Four scholars from Asia, Africa, and Europe have been chosen to come to Stanford under a new program launched by FSI and the Stanford Humanities Center to engage high-profile international scholars in the intellectual life of the university. The group includes Italian sociologist Diego Gambetta, Thai political scientist Thitinan Pongsudhirak, South African anthropologist Steven Robins, and French historian Anne Simonin.

The residencies are meant to attract high-profile international scholars whose research and writing coincide with the missions of both the Humanities Center and FSI. The visitors will offer informal seminars and public lectures and will be available for consultations with interested faculty and students.