The Institute of World Politics

This event is part of the Intermarium Lecture Series sponsored by The Institute of World Politics.

About the lecture: This lecture investigates the similarities among three different revolutionary women’s liberation campaigns: the Soviet policy of hujum in Uzbekistan in the 1920s and 1930s, the Chinese Communist Party’s policies on marriage reform from 1921 until 1953, and U. S. policies and rhetoric toward Afghan and Iraqi women during the interventions in the early 2000s. It is widely recognized that women’s liberation, when subordinated to another ideological mission, almost invariably falls short of its objectives. Placing these episodes in comparison helps to demonstrate key aspects of the fateful logic of women’s liberation when pursued as a strategy for revolutionary state-building. This comparison also sheds new light on U.S. operations in the Middle East and suggests that the U.S. effort to build democracy shares with revolutionary communism the normative assumption that the disruption of traditional gender norms is one of the first and most important steps toward building a new regime.

About the speaker: Dr. Emily Finley holds a PhD in Political Theory from The Catholic University of America and is currently a postdoctoral scholar in Political Science at Stanford University. Her research interests include political ideology, international relations, epistemology, religion and politics, and intellectual history.

This event is part of The African Strategic Forum sponsored by The Institute of World Politics.

About the lecture: The tension over GERD has created an impasse for the African Union on how to resolve the conflict between these three countries. Our panelists will analyze the politics in Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia around the timeline for filling the dam. The panelists will also provide insights into the prospects of a peaceful resolution and the economic benefits of this grand project may bring throughout the African continent. What role do the African Union (AU), UN, and other international mediators like the U.S. play in this case?

About the panelist:

Dr. Hani Sewilam is a Professor of Hydrology and Water Resources Management at the RWTH Aachen University in Germany. He is currently the Managing Director of the UNESCO Chair in Hydrological Changes and Water Resources Management at the RWTH Aachen. He is also a professor at the American University in Cairo. Hydrology, water management, desalination and sustainable development are his main areas of specializations. In Germany, his research team focuses on flood risk management and the development of innovative capacity building programme for water professionals. Dealing with water scarcity through desalination, aquaponics, hydroponics, and effective water management is the focus of his other team in Egypt. Another focus of his research is implementing the concept of Water-Energy-Food nexus at local, national and regional levels. Over the last 5 years, Sewilam co-founded an MSc program in “Sustainable Management – Water and Energy” at the RWTH Aachen in Germany and founded another M.Sc. program in “Sustainable Development” at the American University in Cairo. He has contributed significantly to the establishment of the UNESCO Chair in Hydrological Changes and Water Resources Management at the RWTH Aachen. Sewilam is the founder of the first Center for Sustainable Development in Egypt. Sewilam has been raising funds and implementing research and development projects since 2002 with universities and institutions from at least 15 Euro-Mediterranean countries. Sewilam was awarded his PhD with honor from the RWTH Aachen University in the area of water resources management and his MSc from Southampton University in the UK in the area of irrigation management.

Dr. Semu Moges has a B.sc in Hydraulic Engineering, M.sc, and Ph.D. in Water Resources Engineering and over 20 years of extensive experience in teaching, research, and consultancy in the area of hydrological modeling, water resources planning and management, climate change.

Dr. Moges has taught in many Universities in Ethiopia and abroad. He has coordinated and been involved in many regional and national projects and programs related to the Nile basin. He was the national coordinator for the Applied Training Project of the Nile Basin Initiative. He has also been involved in many regional Nile research. He published in broad areas of river basin hydrology and water resources management. He was among the first researchers published on modeling and evaluation of the impact of GERD along with his Ph.D. students. Currently, Dr. Moges works as a consultant Professional Engineer (P.E.) in the USA. He is also affiliated in teaching and research with the University of Connecticut. He is currently pursuing research to understand the long-term interaction between the Water-Energy-Food nexus.

This event is sponsored by the Asia Initiative Lecture Series at The Institute of World Politics.

About the lecture: Hitherto, almost all writings about Beijing’s espionage and influence operations have focused on individual cases that shed little light on the actual nature of China’s organs of state security. Dr. Matthew Brazil will speak about how he and his co-author researched original sources in Chinese and unearthed new insights into Beijing’s most secret operations at home and abroad.

About the Speaker: Matt Brazil is a non-resident Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation. He worked in Asia for over 20 years as a U.S. Army officer, American diplomat, and corporate security manager. He is the co-author of Chinese Communist Espionage: An Intelligence Primer (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, Nov 2019).

More information on the book and this topic may be viewed at https://www.mattbrazil.net/. The author’s compendium of espionage terms in Chinese and photos from the world of Chinese Communist espionage may be seen at https://www.ccpintelterms.com/.

About the lecture: Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, U.S. foreign policy has been built on an assumption of hegemony and a sense of exceptionalism that allows–perhaps demands–that the U.S. can control many , if not most, of the events in the post-Cold War world. This has been the view of both major political parties, albeit from quite different perspectives. What they have either not realized or accepted is that the world is changing so rapidly and thoroughly that this American assumption is no longer valid and assuming it is so is counterproductive and even dangerous. How will the next administration approach foreign policy? Will it be able to come to grips with the new realities of the 21st century?

About the speaker: Dr. Steven E. Meyer received his undergraduate degrees at the University of Wisconsin in political science and mathematics. He received his M.S. degree in Political Science from Fordham University and a PhD in comparative politics at Georgetown University. After a long career at the Central Intelligence Agency as an analyst and manager, specializing in European and Russian affairs, Dr. Meyer taught security studies, American foreign policy, Russian and European politics and environmental security. He has published many articles and contributed to several books. Currently, he is writing a book on Opportunities Lost After the Cold War. He lectures extensively in the U.S. and Europe.

About the book: The Decline of Nations takes an in-depth look at the condition of the contemporary United States and shows why Americans should be deeply concerned. It tackles controversial subjects such as immigration, political correctness, morality, religion and the rise of a new elite class. Author Joseph Johnston provides many historical examples of empires declining, including the Roman and British empires, detailing their trajectory from dominance to failure, and, in the case of Britain, subsequent re-emergence as modern day nation. Johnston delivers riveting lessons on the U.S. government viewed through the lens of excessive centralization and deterioration of the rule of law. He demonstrates the results of weak policies including the surging Progressive movement and the expanding Welfare state. In The Decline of Nations, Johnston asks important questions about diminished military capacity, a broken educational system, and the decline of American arts and culture. He questions the sustainability of the nation’s vast global commitments and shows how those commitments are threatening America’s strength and prosperity. There is no historical guarantee that the United States can sustain its economic and political dominance in the world scene. By knowing the historic patterns of the great nations and empires, there is much to be learned about America’s own destiny.

About the speaker: Joseph F. Johnston, Jr., is a graduate of Princeton University and received a master’s degree in history and a law degree from Harvard University. He practiced law in New York City and Washington, D.C., was a visiting lecturer at the University of Virginia law school and is a member of the American Law Institute. He is the author of The Limits of Government, published by Regnery Gateway. He lives in Alexandria, Virginia.

This event is a part of IWP’s Annual Constitution Day Lecture series.

About the lecture: As we celebrate the Constitution, let us reflect that it took the Civil War to make the Constitution conform to our ultimate founding document, the Declaration of Independence. Beginning with the abolition of slavery, the 13th Amendment required other radical changes as well. The triumph and the tragedy of the 13th Amendment become more vivid, as we Americans today assume the duty of perpetuating the Founders’ and Abraham Lincoln’s achievements and intentions.

About the Speaker: Dr. Ken Masugi is a Senior Fellow of the Claremont Institute and a Senior Contributor to the online journal of American Greatness. He is also a lecturer in Government at the Johns Hopkins University Center for American Government in Washington, DC.

This event is sponsored by The Institute of World Politics’ IAFIE Student Chapter.

About the book: When Joint Special Operations Command deployed Task Force 714 to Iraq in 2003, it faced an adversary unlike any it had previously encountered: al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). AQI’s organization into multiple, independent networks and its application of Information Age technologies allowed it to wage war across a vast landscape. To meet this unique threat, TF 714 developed the intelligence capacity to operate inside those networks, and in the words of commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal, USA (Ret.) “claw the guts out of AQI.”

In Transforming US Intelligence for Irregular War, Richard H. Shultz Jr. provides a broad discussion of the role of intelligence in combatting nonstate militants and revisits this moment of innovation during the Iraq War, showing how the defense and intelligence communities can adapt to new and evolving foes. Shultz tells the story of how TF 714 partnered with US intelligence agencies to dismantle AQI’s secret networks by eliminating many of its key leaders. He also reveals how TF 714 altered its methods and practices of intelligence collection, intelligence analysis, and covert paramilitary operations to suppress AQI’s growing insurgency and, ultimately, destroy its networked infrastructure.TF 714 remains an exemplar of successful organizational learning and adaptation in the midst of modern warfare. By examining its innovations, Shultz makes a compelling case for intelligence leading the way in future campaigns against nonstate armed groups.

About the speaker: Richard H. Shultz, Jr. is the Lee E. Dirks Professor of International Politics at the Fletcher School, Tufts University. He teaches graduate-level courses on various aspects of international security affairs to include: the role of force in international politics; internal conflict and irregular war; special operations strategies for responding to irregular warfare challenges; origins, conduct, and termination of war; intelligence and national security; and crisis management.

At the Fletcher School he also is Director of the International Security Studies Program. The ISSP prepares U.S. and international graduate students for public and private sector careers in national and international security policy. Director responsibilities include management of courses and curriculum; conferences and workshops; senior-level speaker series; the military fellows program; crisis simulation exercises; fundraising.

Currently, he is Senior Fellow at the U.S. Special Operations Command’s Joint Special Operations University.

Previously, in Washington, he served as director of research for the National Strategy Information Center from 2004-2012. In 2010 he completed with Roy Godson a major study focused on Adapting America’s Security Paradigm and Security Agenda to meet the challenges posed by 21st Century armed groups and the states that support them. He also completed a study on Armed Groups and Irregular Warfare: Adapting Professional Military Education, a curricular guide for military educational institutions, among other publications and reports.

He has served as a security consultant to various U.S. government departments and agencies concerned with national security affairs. For the last ten years that has included as a senior fellow to the Special Operations Command’s Joint Special Operations University. As a senior fellow, he deploys abroad as a member of military education teams to teach courses on terrorism/counterterrorism, special operations integration, and asymmetric challenges to NATO to foreign military officers. This has included programs taught in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, the UAE, Tunisia, Morocco, Mali, Kenya, Cameroon, each of the Baltic nations, and the NATO School in Germany.

This event is sponsored by The Global Impact Discussion: US-East Asia Lecture Series.

About the book: When Kim Jong Un became the leader of North Korea following his father’s death in 2011, predictions about his imminent fall were rife. North Korea was isolated, poor, unable to feed its people, and clinging to its nuclear program for legitimacy. Surely this twentysomething with a bizarre haircut and no leadership experience would soon be usurped by his elders. Instead, the opposite happened. Now in his midthirties, Kim Jong Un has solidified his grip on his country and brought the United States and the region to the brink of war. Still, we know so little about him—or how he rules.

Enter former CIA analyst Jung Pak, whose brilliant Brookings Institution essay “The Education of Kim Jong Un” cemented her status as the go-to authority on the calculating young leader. From the beginning of Kim’s reign, Pak has been at the forefront of shaping U.S. policy on North Korea and providing strategic assessments for leadership at the highest levels in the government. Now, in this masterly book, she traces and explains Kim’s ascent on the world stage, from his brutal power-consolidating purges to his abrupt pivot toward diplomatic engagement that led to his historic—and still poorly understood—summits with President Trump. She also sheds light on how a top intelligence analyst assesses thorny national security problems: avoiding biases, questioning assumptions, and identifying risks as well as opportunities.

In piecing together Kim’s wholly unique life, Pak argues that his personality, perceptions, and preferences are underestimated by Washington policy wonks, who assume he sees the world as they do. As the North Korean nuclear threat grows, Becoming Kim Jong Un gives readers the first authoritative, behind-the-scenes look at Kim’s character and motivations, creating an insightful biography of the enigmatic man who could rule the hermit kingdom for decades—and has already left an indelible imprint on world history.

About the speaker: Dr. Jung H. Pak is a senior fellow and the SK-Korea Foundation Chair in Korea Studies at the Brookings Institution. Prior to Brookings, she held senior positions at the Central Intelligence Agency and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, where she led the U.S. Intelligence Community’s strategic analysis of North Korea as the Deputy National Intelligence Officer. Dr. Pak is the author of Becoming Kim Jong Un (April 2020), which traces and explains Kim’s ascent to the world stage and draws from her deep knowledge and experience as an intelligence officer. Dr. Pak is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Colgate University, where she served as a trustee from 2009-2015. She received her PhD in United States history from Columbia University and studied in South Korea as a Fulbright scholar.

About the lecture: The lecture focuses on the human atrocities prevalent in North Korea. It begins with a review of how the world has dealt with post-WWII human rights violations through institutional mechanisms such as International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (together known as the International Bill of Human Rights). It will then shift to discuss how the Kim regimes have successfully flew under the radar despite perpetrating some of the worst cases of human rights violations. The 2014 UN Commission of Inquiry (COI) Report identified the situation as amounting to ‘crimes against humanity’. The COI report concluded that the violations unparalleled in breadth, atrocity, and seriousness provided a lawful foundation to prosecute violators, including the Kim leadership. To date, unfortunately, the recommendations have not yet been followed up. The lecture will examine the breadth of the problems at hand and why the peninsular and regional political dynamics have prevented progress.

About the speaker: Jung-Hoon Lee is Dean and Professor of International Relations at the Graduate School of International Studies, Yonsei University. He is formerly ROK government’s Ambassador for Human Rights as well as its inaugural Ambassador-at-Large for North Korean Human Rights.

Full Title: Deal of the Decade: How the United States Should Handle Afghanistan in the Era of the Taliban Peace Talks

About the Lecture: This presentation will start on a brief history of the Taliban, focusing on a post 9/11 world. It will highlight the current Afghanistan environment and the actors involved in the peace talks: the US, the Taliban, and the Afghani Government. The presentation will also cover future possibilities of US-Afghan relations, the different scenarios that may pan out depending on how the Afghani Government and Taliban peace talks go, and the potential ways the US could counter the Taliban now that US troops are leaving Afghanistan, and in so doing strengthening Afghanistan infrastructure.

About the Speaker: Caroline Hickey is from Massachusetts and graduated in 2018 from Knox College in Illinois, where she self-designed her major in Middle Eastern & North African Studies. Caroline is continuing her education at IWP where she is pursuing a Master’s degree in Statecraft and International Affairs and continuing her interest in the Middle East by focusing on Iraq and Afghanistan as well as learning Arabic.