Brett Carter is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of Southern California, a Hoover Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, and a Faculty Affiliate at Stanford's Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law. He received a Ph.D. from Harvard University, where he was a fellow at the Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies.
Carter studies politics in the world's autocracies. His first book, Propaganda in Autocracies: Institutions, Information, and the Politics of Belief (Cambridge University Press), draws on the largest archive of state propaganda ever assembled — encompassing over eight million newspaper articles in six languages from nearly 60 countries around the world — to show how political institutions shape the propaganda strategies of repressive governments. It received the William Riker Prize for the Best Book in Political Economy, the International Journal of Press/Politics Hazel Gaudet-Erskine Best Book Award, Honorable Mention for the Gregory Luebbert Award for the Best Book in Comparative Politics, and Honorable Mention for the APSA Democracy & Autocracy Section's Best Book Award.
His second book, in progress, shows how politics in Africa’s autocracies changed after the fall of the Berlin Wall and how a new era of geopolitical competition — marked by the rise of China and the resurgence of Russia — is changing them again.
Carter’s other work has appeared in the Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Perspectives on Politics, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, China Quarterly, Journal of Democracy, and Foreign Affairs, among others. His work has been featured by The New York Times, The Economist, The National Interest, and NPR’s Radiolab.
Duncan Green, Oxfam Strategic Adviser and LSE Professor of Practice in International Development, introduces the arguments of his new book, How Change Happens (OUP, October 2016). How Change Happens explores how political and social change takes place, and the role of individuals and organizations in influencing that change. He discusses the challenges that 'systems thinking' creates for traditional aid practices, and how a 'power and systems approach' requires activists, whether in campaigns, companies or governments, to fundamentally rethink the way they understand the world and try to influence it.
He was previously Oxfam’s Head of Research, a Visiting Fellow at Notre Dame University, a Senior Policy Adviser on Trade and Development at the Department for International Development (DFID), a Policy Analyst on trade and globalization at CAFOD, the Catholic aid agency for England and Wales and Head of Research and Engagement at the Just Pensions project on socially responsible investment.
Abstract: Under what conditions could the United States control escalation in a conventional conflict with a nuclear-armed adversary? The possibility that a dispute between the U.S. and a nuclear-armed opponent remains a contingency policy-makers and military planners should consider. There is growing work on the pathways to nuclear escalation during a conventional conflict, but less on how these armed disputes could end. This paper will explore some of the conditions that favor successful escalation management and the conditions that could make escalation control extremely difficult. The paper also assesses possible U.S. responses to nuclear use by an adversary.
About the Speaker: Jasen J. Castillo is an Associate Professor at Texas A&M University’s George H.W. Bush School of Government and Public Service. He came to the Bush School after serving on the staff of the Policy Planning Office in the U.S. Department of Defense from 2005 to 2007. Before then, he worked at the RAND Corporation and the Institute for Defense Analysis. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Chicago. His publications include: Endurance and War: The National Sources of Military Cohesion (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2014); Nuclear Strategies to Deter Conventional Attacks,” in, New Perspectives on Coercion, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming); Flexible Response Revisited: Assessing Pakistan’s Potential Nuclear Strategies, PM-2383 (Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 2007); Striking First: Preemptive and Preventive Attack in U.S. National Security Policy (Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 2004); “Nuclear Terrorism: Why Deterrence Still Matters,” Current History, Vol. 2, No. 668 (2003), Economic Growth and Military Expenditures, MR-112-A, (Santa Monica, CA: The Rand Corporation, 2002). His research focuses on U.S. national security policy, especially military effectiveness and nuclear deterrence.
Encina Hall, 2nd floor
Expected dramatic shifts of foreign policy by leading democracies, including the U.S. and U.K., would shake a future of liberal international order, which has underpinned the stability even after the end of the Cold War. Since Mr. Donald Trump was elected as the 45th President of the U.S., abovementioned discourse is heard everywhere in Europe and Asia today.
It is not clear, if American leadership and military presence would in fact retreat, how American allies behave and whether they can work together to sustain the order. Among others, Japan has been the exceptionally strong believer of such postwar American leadership. It is doubtful that all American allies and friends share same views, having their own historical context with the U.S. and own ideas on order and principles. Hence, naturally they shall differ in losing the confidence on the durability of American leadership.
A new order will be shaped by many factors, but American allies’ perspectives should not be overlooked. Hegemon’s own reluctance for ruling is surely significant. So is other great power’s revisionism, making use of such strategic opportunities. However, American allies has the potential to shape the fate of the order: if they succeed in acting collectively, it shall underpin the global governance for a while, and ensue the order transformation process in rather slow and peaceful pace.
If they fail, it shall not only accelerate the U.S. retrenchment, but invite an emergence of divisive and competitive order. Sahashi shares the findings from the international study project which he leads, and argues the difficulty for US allies to unite themselves and the potential order transformation in the long term.
Ryo Sahashi is Associate Professor of International Politics and Director, Faculty of Law, Kanagawa University, Yokohama, and is leading the newly-launched international joint study “Worldviews on the United States.” From 2014-2015, he served as Visiting Associate Professor, Shorenstein APARC, Stanford University.
This presentation will examine the dynamics and outcomes of three extended efforts at social, economic and governance reform in the Philippines: 1) agrarian reform; 2) liberalization of the telecommunications sector and 3) fiscal and budget reforms.
David Timberman is a political analyst and development practitioner with 30 years of experience analyzing and addressing political, governance and conflict-related challenges, principally in Southeast and South Asia. As a Visiting Scholar at Stanford/APARC he is working on a book on the contemporary Philippine political economy. During 2015-2016 he was a Visiting Professor of Political Science at De La Salle University in Manila. He has lived and worked in the Philippines, Indonesia and Singapore, including experiencing first-hand the democratic transitions in the Philippines (1986-1988) and Indonesia (1998-2001). He has written extensively on political and governance issues in the Philippines and has edited or co-edited multi-author volumes on the Philippines, Cambodia, and economic policy reform in Southeast Asia.
She is the author of numerous books on a variety of subjects including the People’s Republic of China’s exchange rate system, Japan’s macroeconomic policy, IMF policy, and the European debt crisis. Her most recent book (translated title: Unwinding Super-Easy Monetary Policy), published in August 2016, is about the monetary policies of the BOJ, the European Central Bank, and the Federal Reserve System. She regularly appears on CNBC, Bloomberg, Reuters, BBC, and features in many Japanese TV programs and newspapers, commenting on the Japanese economy and monetary policy. URL: http://www.sayurishirai.jp
Her most recent book in English is Mission Incomplete: Reflating Japan’s Economy published by the Asian Development Bank Institute in February 2017. It is a complete analysis of BOJ’s unconventional monetary easing from the late 1990s to the present. Free Download is available at https://www.adb.org/publications/mission-incomplete-reflating-japan-economy.
Abstract: Throughout the Cold War, Japanese leaders and policymakers have generally been careful to reflect the public’s firm opposition to anti-nuclear sentiment. However, the turn of the 21st century has witnessed a remarkable shift in the political debate, with élites alluding to a nuclear option for Japan. This sudden proliferation of nuclear statements among Japanese élites in 2002 has been directly linked by Japan watchers to the breakout of the second North Korean nuclear crisis and the rapid buildup of China’s military capabilities. Is the Japanese perception of this double military threat in Northeast Asia really the main factor that triggered this shift in the nuclear debate? This paper argues that Japanese élites’ behavior rather indicates that the new threats in the regional strategic context is merely used as a pretext to solve a more deep-rooted and long-standing anxiety that stems from Japan’s own unsuccessful quest for a less reactive, and more proactive post-Cold War identity.
About the speaker: Sayuri Romei is a Nuclear Security Predoctoral Fellow at CISAC for 2016-2017 and a doctoral candidate in international relations at Roma Tre University in Rome, Italy. Her dissertation focuses on the evolution of Japanese élites’ nuclear mentality in the postwar era, looking at its ambivalent nuclear history and exploring how the country’s nuclear latency was seen by the United States throughout the Cold War. She holds a BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Sorbonne Nouvelle Paris III, a BA in international relations from the University of Roma La Sapienza, and an MA in international relations from Roma Tre University. Her fellowship at CISAC is sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation.
Encina Hall, 2nd floor
One policy option for countries reliant on natural resources is to share part of the revenues directly with citizens, an idea known as oil to cash. Technological innovation, such as biometric identification and mobile money, now allow direct payments to people on a massive scale. Additional changes in the global marketplace, experiments in India and Kenya, and shifting political views of cash transfers have all affected the potential of cash to boost governance.
In this talk, Karine Walther discusses her new book Sacred Interests: The United States and the Islamic World, 1821-1921. Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as Americans increasingly came into contact with the Islamic world, U.S. diplomatic, cultural, political, and religious beliefs about Islam began to shape their responses to world events. In Sacred Interests, Karine V. Walther excavates the deep history of American Islamophobia, showing how negative perceptions of Islam and Muslims shaped U.S. foreign relations from the Early Republic to the end of World War I.
