Stanford University

International Relations

FSI researchers strive to understand how countries relate to one another, and what policies are needed to achieve global stability and prosperity. International relations experts focus on the challenging U.S.-Russian relationship, the alliance between the U.S. and Japan and the limitations of America’s counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan.

Foreign aid is also examined by scholars trying to understand whether money earmarked for health improvements reaches those who need it most. And FSI’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center has published on the need for strong South Korean leadership in dealing with its northern neighbor.

FSI researchers also look at the citizens who drive international relations, studying the effects of migration and how borders shape people’s lives. Meanwhile FSI students are very much involved in this area, working with the United Nations in Ethiopia to rethink refugee communities.

Trade is also a key component of international relations, with FSI approaching the topic from a slew of angles and states. The economy of trade is rife for study, with an APARC event on the implications of more open trade policies in Japan, and FSI researchers making sense of who would benefit from a free trade zone between the European Union and the United States.

America's Middle East Purgatory: The Case for Doing Less

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Abstract: President Trump may talk about the Middle East differently than Obama did. But the two seem to share the view that the United States is too involved in the region and should devote fewer resources and less time to it. The reduced appetite for U.S. engagement in the region reflects, not an ideological predilection or an idiosyncrasy of these two presidents, but a deeper change in both regional dynamics and broader U.S. interests. Despite this, the United States exists in a kind of Middle Eastern purgatory—too distracted by regional crises to pivot to other global priorities but not invested enough to move the region in a better direction. This worst-of-both-worlds approach exacts a heavy price. It sows uncertainty among Washington’s Middle Eastern partners, which encourages them to act in risky and aggressive ways. It deepens the American public’s frustration with the region’s endless turmoil, as well as with U.S. efforts to address it. It diverts resources that could otherwise be devoted to confronting a rising China and a revanchist Russia. And all the while, by remaining unclear about the limits of its commitments, the United States risks getting dragged into yet another Middle Eastern conflict. 

 
It is time for Washington to put an end to wishful thinking about its ability to establish order on its own terms or to transform self-interested and shortsighted regional partners into reliable allies—at least without incurring enormous costs and long-term commitments. That means making some ugly choices to craft a strategy that will protect the most important U.S. interests in the region, without sending the United States back into purgatory. Karlin and Wittes will outline the choices before the next U.S. president and their view of a realistic, sustainable strategy for the United States in the Middle East. 
 
Tamara Wittes' Biography: Tamara Cofman Wittes is a senior fellow in the Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings. Wittes served as deputy assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs from November of 2009 to January 2012, coordinating U.S. policy on democracy and human rights in the Middle East during the Arab uprisings. Wittes also oversaw the Middle East Partnership Initiative and served as deputy special coordinator for Middle East transitions.

 

Wittes is a co-host of Rational Security, a weekly podcast on foreign policy and national security issues. She writes on U.S. Middle East policy, regional conflict and conflict resolution, the challenges of global democracy, and the future of Arab governance. Her current research is for a forthcoming book, Our SOBs, on the tangled history of America’s ties to autocratic allies.

 

Wittes joined Brookings in December of 2003. Previously, she served as a Middle East specialist at the U.S. Institute of Peace and director of programs at the Middle East Institute in Washington. She has also taught courses in international relations and security studies at Georgetown University. Wittes was one of the first recipients of the Rabin-Peres Peace Award, established by President Bill Clinton in 1997.

 

Wittes is the author of "Freedom’s Unsteady March: America’s Role in Building Arab Democracy" (Brookings Institution Press, 2008) and the editor of "How Israelis and Palestinians Negotiate: A Cross-Cultural Analysis of the Oslo Peace Process" (USIP, 2005). She holds a bachelor's in Judaic and Near Eastern studies from Oberlin College, and a master's and doctorate in government from Georgetown University. She serves on the board of the National Democratic Institute, as well as the advisory board of the Israel Institute, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and Women in International Security.

 

 

Mara Karlin's Biography: Mara Karlin, PhD, is Director of Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). She is also an Associate Professor at SAIS and a nonresident senior fellow at The Brookings Institution. Karlin has served in national security roles for five U.S. secretaries of defense, advising on policies spanning strategic planning, defense budgeting, future wars and the evolving security environment, and regional affairs involving the Middle East, Europe, and Asia. Most recently, she served as the deputy assistant secretary of defense for strategy and force development.  Karlin has been awarded Department of Defense Medals for Meritorious and Outstanding Public Service, among others. She is the author of Building Militaries in Fragile States: Challenges for the United States (University of Pennsylvania Press; 2018).

Tamara Wittes Senior fellow, Center for Middle East Policy Brookings
Mara Karlin Senior fellow,Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence SAIS and Brookings
Seminars
Seminars Co-Sponsored With MEI

North Korea in 2018: Kim’s Summit Diplomacy

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Kim Jong-un showcased a series of summit meetings throughout 2018, including the first-ever meeting of a North Korean leader with a sitting US president. North Korea improved its strained relations with China and South Korea. The country’s denuclearization has yet to be seen, but these events sparked considerable debate about the future.
 
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Asian Survey
Authors
Gi-Wook Shin
Rennie Moon

My Vision for Kaohsiung: Reshaping Party Politics and Public Service in Taiwan’s Democracy

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RSVPs for this event are now closed. This event is open only to the Stanford community; a valid Stanford ID will be required to enter. 

NOTE: THIS EVENT IS CLOSED TO THE MEDIA

Kaohsiung Mayor Han Kuo-yu

Han Kuo-yu was elected Mayor of Kaohsiung, Taiwan, in November 2018, becoming the first member of the Kuomintang (KMT) to hold that office since 1998. He served as a member of the Legislative Yuan from Taipei County from 1993-2002, and later became the general manager of the Taipei Agricultural Products Marketing Corporation. 

Mr. Han graduated from Soochow University (Taipei) with a degree in English literature, and earned a master’s degree in law from National Chengchi University’s Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies.
 
This event is co-sponsored by the Hoover Institution and the Taiwan Democracy and Security Project, part of the U.S.-Asia Security Initiative. 
 
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Philippines Room
616 Serra Mall
Encina Hall, 3rd Floor, Central (C330)
Stanford, CA 94305

Han Kuo-yu Mayor of Kaohsiung, Taiwan

Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War

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Militaries around the world are racing to build robotic systems with increasing autonomy. What will happen when a Predator drone has as much autonomy as a Google car? Should machines be given the power to make life and death decisions in war? Paul Scharre, a former Army Ranger and Pentagon official, will talk on his new book, Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War. Army of None was named one of Bill Gates’ Top 5 Books of 2018. Scharre will explore the technology behind autonomous weapons and the legal, moral, ethical, and strategic dimensions of this evolving technology. Paul Scharre is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security.   

 

Drell Lecture Recording: https://youtu.be/ldvDjU1C4Qs

 

Drell Lecture Transcript: NA

 

Paul's Biography: Paul Scharre is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. He is author of Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War. Mr. Scharre formerly worked in the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) where he played a leading role in establishing policies on emerging weapons technologies. He led the working group that drafted DOD Directive 3000.09, establishing DOD’s policy on autonomy in weapon systems. He is a former infantryman in the Army’s 75th Ranger Regiment and completed multiple tours to Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

Radha's Biography: Radha Iyengar is the head of Product Policy Research at Facebook and an adjunct economist at the RAND Corporation. Previously, she served in senior staff positions at the White House National Security Council, Department of Defense, and Department of Energy. Over the course of her government service, she was instrumental in executive actions on sexual assault and suicide prevention, budget and policy related to nuclear and energy infrastructure security and resilience, and security assistance and counterterrorism efforts in the the Middle East and North Africa. Her research has covered empirical evaluations of policies aimed at reducing violence including criminal violence, sexual assault, terrorist behavior, and sexual and intimate partner violence. 

 

Jeremy's Biography: Jeremy is a Professor of Political Science and Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. He is also a non-resident fellow at the Center for Global Development in Washington, D.C. His research focuses on civil wars and political violence; ethnic politics and the political economy of development; and democracy, accountability, and political change. He is the author of Inside Rebellion: The Politics of Insurgent Violence (Cambridge University Press), which received the William Riker Prize for the best book on political economy. He is also the co-author of Coethnicity: Diversity and the Dilemmas of Collective Action (Russell Sage Foundation), which received the Gregory Luebbert Award for the best book in comparative politics. He has published articles in the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Annual Review of Political Science, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Journal of Democracy, World Policy Journal, and the SAIS Review.

 

 

 

 

 

Stanford University CEMEX Auditorium (655 Knight Way, Stanford, CA 94305)

Paul Scharre Senior Fellow and Director, Technology and National Security Program Center for a New American Security
Lectures
Drell Lecture

The Market Model: Comparative Immigration Regimes in 30 Countries Worldwide

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Professor Justin Gest will present an unique study of immigration governance across 30 countries in Europe, North America, Latin America, East Asia, Oceania, and the Middle East. Relying on a database of immigration demographics in the world’s most important immigrant destinations, he will present a taxonomy and an analysis of what drives different approaches to immigration policy over space and time. In an era defined by inequality, populism, and fears of international terrorism, he will show how governments are converging toward a “Market Model” that seeks immigrants for short-term labor with fewer outlets to citizenship— an approach that resembles the increasingly contingent nature of labor markets worldwide.
 
Justin Gest

Justin Gest is an Assistant Professor of Public Policy at George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government. He studies immigration and the politics of demographic change. He is the author of four books: Apart: Alienated and Engaged Muslims in the West (Oxford University Press/Hurst 2010); The New Minority: White Working Class Politics in an Age of Immigration and Inequality (Oxford University Press 2016); The White Working Class: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press 2018); and Crossroads: Comparative Immigration Regimes in a World of Demographic Change (Cambridge University Press 2018). He has authored peer-reviewed articles in journals including Comparative Political Studies, Ethnic and Racial Studies, and the International Migration Review. He has also provided reporting or commentary for BBC, CNN, The Guardian, Los Angeles Times, NPR, The New York Times, Politico, Reuters, Vox, and The Washington Post. Professor Gest received the 2014 Joseph R. Levenson Memorial Teaching Prize, Harvard’s highest award for faculty teaching. In 2013, he received the 2013 Star Family Prize for Student Advising, Harvard’s highest award for student advising. In 2007, he co-founded the Migration Studies Unit at the London School of Economics (LSE).
 
Co-sponsored by the Global Populisms Project
 
Justin Gest Speaker George Mason University
Seminars

Killing the Chicken to Scare the Monkey: Explaining Coercion by China in the South China Sea

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Despite adverse implications for its image, when it comes to territorial disputes, China has been willing to employ coercion. But Beijing is selective regarding the timing, targets, and tools of coercion. Military coercion is rare and the forms and uses of coercion vary. In the face of what China sees as similar threats by different countries, for example, Beijing tends to tailor its responses, country by country, case by case. Dr. Zhang will focus on Chinese coercive behavior in the South China Sea. She will offer a new theory as to when, why, and how China coerces other states.  Leveraging a wealth of newly available primary documents and hundreds of hours of interviews with Chinese officials, she will trace the decision-making processes that result in coercion’s use or non-use.

Where others may view China as repetitively aggressive, Dr. Zhang sees a cautious bully that does not coerce frequently and has tended, as it has gained strength, to use non-kinetic kinds of coercion. She finds that protecting a reputation for resolve and calculating economic costs are critical elements in China’s decision-making regarding the (dis)advantages of coercing its neighbors. Nor is the intended target country necessarily clear. China often coerces one to deter another – “killing the chicken to scare the monkey.” Implications will also drawn from her research that can help in projecting China’s likely future foreign-policy behavior beyond Southeast Asia and in understanding the roles played by coercion in the strategies of states more generally.

To learn more about, watch a recent interview APARC filmed with Dr. Zhang.

ketian zhang 4x
Ketian Vivian Zhang will be an Assistant Professor of International Security in the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University starting in September 2019. Her book project at Stanford and a forthcoming article in International Security are on the subject of her talk. Beyond its topic, another part of her research agenda explores how the globalized economy and its chains of manufacture and supply affect the foreign-policy behaviors of states. Her 2018 PhD in political science is from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is a proud Badger, having earned her BA in political science and sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Ketian Zhang 2018-2019 Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow on Contemporary Asia
Seminars

Catalonia, popular republicanism, and the crisis of Europe

Catalonia’s bid for independence seems to have involved a major political puzzle for considerable parts of the European public, including academia. In response to the puzzle, there has been a recurrent inclination to perceive Catalan sovereigntism as an additional symptom of the larger malaise which has in recent years entailed the rise of nationalism, populism, and welfare chauvinism all over the Continent. The paper will argue that such views are a blatant misinterpretation of the Catalan process. At the same time, it will hold that the significance of recent political developments in Catalonia goes way beyond the opening of a new round of the conflictual relationship between the Spanish state and an ever contentious periphery.

What is at stake today in Catalonia is not just finding an adequate response to the old question of how to accommodate particular national identities in liberal-democratic states by relying on some version of the minority-rights-cum-territorial- autonomy formula. The issue rather is how to find democratic ways to change the foundations of pre-democratic forms of statehood. Seen against this background, the Catalan process calls for a thorough re-assessment of the meaning of sovereignty in complex polities and thereby bears a great potential for democratic innovation. We are confronting a phenomenon that has little to do with an anachronistic resurgence of nationalism or with a particular version of South European populism. On the contrary, the driving force of Catalan sovereigntism has been and is a popular republicanism with a substantial transformative impact. That this impact is hardly appreciated at the level of the European Union is one of the tragic ironies of what is currently happening between Brussels, Madrid, and Barcelona. To the extent that it stands by the side of the Spanish government in the conflict, thereby prioritizing the Europe of the states vis-à-vis the Europe of the citizens, the Union is ultimately undermining the very normative promises that once sustained its constitution.

Peter Kraus

Peter A. Kraus is a full professor of political science (comparative politics) and the director of the Institute for Canadian Studies at the University of Augsburg (Germany). He has been the chair of ethnic relations at the University of Helsinki, an associate professor of political science at Humboldt University in Berlin, a John F. Kennedy Memorial Fellow at the Center for European Studies at Harvard University, and a visiting professor at the New School for Social Research and at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. He has published widely and in several languages on cultural diversity and identity politics, ethnicity, nationalism, and migration, the dilemmas of European integration, as well as problems of democratization and democratic theory. He is the author of A Union of Diversity: Language, Identity, and Polity-Building in Europe (Cambridge University Press, 2008). His most recent publications include The Catalan Process: Sovereignty, Democracy and Self-Determination in the 21st Century (edited w. J. Vergés, Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis de l’Autogovern, 2017) and The Politics of Multilingualism: Europeanisation, globalization and linguistic governance (edited with F. Grin, Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2018). Kraus has been the Chair of the Research Networking Programme “Responding to Complex Diversity in Europe and Canada” (RECODE, www.recode.info), funded by the European Science Foundation, and a member of the steering committee of the European Commission’s Seventh Framework project “Mobility and Inclusion in Multilingual Europe” (MIME, www.mime-project.org).

Goldman Conference Room (E409)
Encina Hall, East Wing, 4th floor
616 Serra Street
Stanford, CA

Peter A. Kraus Speaker University of Augsburg
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