The Institute of World Politics

About the Event:

This event will focus on the continuing challenges and issues facing the world's newest democracy. Hon. Jehan Mechak Deng will also discuss the aspirations and goals of South Sudan in 2017.

About the Speaker:

Hon. Jehan Mechak Deng is currently the state minister for Health and Environment, Eastern Nile for the Republic of South Sudan. She is a seasoned diplomat and an advocate of peace through development programs. Including being a member of the founding board of the South Sudan Women Empowerment Network (SSWEN) advocating for empowerment of women through public forums and workshops, educating and deliberating the country's laws through the transitional constitution of the government of the Republic of South Sudan to ensure women's participation and affirmative action in developing the state's ‘Permanent Constitution'.

ABOUT THIS DISCUSSION

With immigration likely to be one of the cornerstone issues of Donald Trump's presidency the debate over immigration, particularly in regards to national security, is far from resolved. At this event Mr. O'Brien and Mr. Nowrasteh will debate the many important issues concerning immigration to the U.S.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Alex Nowrasteh is an immigration policy analyst at the Cato Institute's Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity. His popular publications have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Washington Post, the Houston Chronicle, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Post, and elsewhere. His academic publications have appeared in the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, the Fletcher Security Review, and Public Choice. He coauthored, with Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, the booklet Open Immigration: Yea and Nay (Encounter Broadsides, 2014). He is a native of Southern California and received a BA in economics from George Mason University and a Master of Science in economic history from the London School of Economics.

Matthew J. O'Brien joined FAIR in 2016 and is responsible for managing FAIR's research activities. In the past he has held a wide variety of positions focusing on immigration issues, in both the government and private sector. Immediately prior to joining FAIR, Matt served as the Chief of the National Security Division (NSD) within the Fraud Detection and National Security Directorate (FDNS) at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). There he was responsible for formulating and implementing procedures to protect the legal immigration system from national security threats. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in French from the Johns Hopkins University and a Juris Doctor from the University Of Maine School Of Law. ​

Dr. Paul Coyer is a Research Professor at IWP, a contributor in the area of foreign policy, with a focus on Eurasia, for Forbes, and is a Contributing Editor for Providence: A Journal of Christianity and American Foreign Policy, published by the Institute for Religion and Democracy. He also serves as an Associate Professor at the École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr, and is a member of the International Institute of Strategic Studies.

Paul D. Miller is the associate director of the Clements Center for National Security at The University of Texas at Austin and an adjunct political scientist at the RAND Corporation. This lecture occurred at The Institute of World Politics on February 15, 2017. Dr. Miller previously held the position of Director for Afghanistan and Pakistan on the National Security Council from 2007 to 2009, worked as an analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency, and served as a military intelligence analyst with the US Army in Afghanistan. He is the author of Armed State Building: Confronting State Failure, 1898-2012.

Dr, Ted Bromund of Heritage Foundation and Dr. Douglas Streusand of the Institute of World Politics discuss alternate policy proposals for U.S. European Policy

This lecture occurred at The Institute of World Politics on February 7, 2017. This lecture was given by Mr. Dan Evans of Storm King Analytics.

The excitement about "Big Data" usually focuses on the access to lots of data -- thousands, or millions, of records. "Big Data" sources are certainly valuable in many situations, but we can cite numerous examples where it doesn't produce insights that are useful.

Our experience tells us that simply pulling in large amounts of data usually doesn't answer the question at hand. There's a fine art to collecting the appropriate data sets to make effective decisions; it requires a combination of both smarts and wisdom--something we call "Smart Data."

Storm King's recent work has focused on network models of Ungoverned Spaces and business intelligence in Frontier and Emerging Markets. Traditional "Big Data" sources tend to be incomplete and inaccurate when it comes to these environments and they don't begin to capture the type of data required to understand the networks of influence in these environments.

In this presentation, we will address the potential pitfalls of "Big Data/Black Box" approach and we will introduce recent case studies on the ungoverned area of Fezzan in Southwestern Libya as well as a Moroccan market entry scenario. Both of these cases illustrate the effectiveness and versatility of our "Smart Data" methodology.

There will be time for Q&A at the end of the presentation.

A former member of the history faculty at West Point, J. P. Clark is an active duty army officer who has served as a strategic advisor to senior civilian and military officials in the Pentagon and British Ministry of Defence.

Bill Gertz is a national security columnist for the Washington Times, and senior editor of the Washington Free Beacon. His column on the Pentagon, Inside the Ring, appears weekly. He currently lives in Annapolis, MD with his wife Debra. Find him online at Gertzfile.com and @BillGertz.

About the lecture:

In this lecture, Dr. Tierney reviewed the background and causes of the attack on Pearl Harbor, its defining tactical and strategic features, and its longer term implications for U.S. national security, both within the context of WWII and beyond.

About the speaker:

Dr. Tierney is a Former Special Assistant and Foreign Affairs Officer, U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (1981-1993). He is a former participant in various national security negotiations for the U.S. Government; a former Executive Director of the Congressional Caucus on National Defense and the National Security Research Group, U.S. House of Representatives; a former Chairman of the Politics Department at Catholic University, and formerly Professor of International Relations, University of Virginia and The Johns Hopkins University. He is currently the Walter Kohler Professor of International Relations at the Institute of World Politics.

Sir Anthony Seldon, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Buckingham, the UK's leading independent university, is the honorary historian for Downing Street. He has written the inside books on the last four Prime Ministers. Today's discussion took place at IWP on the date of the 29th of November.

During the lecture, Sir Anthony discussed which of the 54 Prime Ministers has been the grandest, the brightest, the best orator, the tallest, the shortest, the healthiest, the biggest drinker and the biggest Lothario.

There is disagreement between whether the Jews were treated better in royal or private noble towns. Mr. Watson, a Ph.D. candidate in economics at George Mason University, discussed where peace was best fostered, comparing the two types of towns.

This lecture was presented as part of the Zdzislaw R. Zakrzewski 9th Annual Kosciuszko Chair Conference, on Nov. 12, 2016. The event was sponsored by the Kosciuszko Chair of Polish Studies.