Stanford University

Security

FSI scholars produce research aimed at creating a safer world and examing the consequences of security policies on institutions and society. They look at longstanding issues including nuclear nonproliferation and the conflicts between countries like North and South Korea. But their research also examines new and emerging areas that transcend traditional borders – the drug war in Mexico and expanding terrorism networks. FSI researchers look at the changing methods of warfare with a focus on biosecurity and nuclear risk. They tackle cybersecurity with an eye toward privacy concerns and explore the implications of new actors like hackers.

Along with the changing face of conflict, terrorism and crime, FSI researchers study food security. They tackle the global problems of hunger, poverty and environmental degradation by generating knowledge and policy-relevant solutions. 

Obama advisor, CDDRL Director McFaul to square off against McCain advisor, former CIA Director Jim Woolsey

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On October 14, at a special Commonwealth Club of California event in San Francisco, CDDRL Director Michael McFaul will debate former CIA Director James Woolsey on international security and how it factors into each presidential campaign's plans for the country. McFaul is a foreign policy advisor to Sen. Barack Obama; Woolsey is an advisor to Sen. John McCain.
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America and the World: Presidential Candidate Advisors Speak on International Security

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The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Dependence on expensive foreign oil. Challenging diplomacy with nuclear-armed countries. America's next president needs a strong vision and stronger will to tackle these formidable tasks and those that lie ahead. Which candidate is best equipped to meet these challenges? Our panel of top advisors to the Republican and Democratic presidential nominees will address each candidate's plan to improve our international security. Join us to listen and ask questions of these experts.

Sponsored by The Commonwealth Club of California.

Mark Hopkins Intercontinental Peacock Court
999 California St.
San Francisco, CA

Hon. James Woolsey Annenberg Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University; Former Director of Central Intelligence and the Central Intelligence Agency (1993-1995); Advisor to Senator McCain Speaker

Michael A. McFaul

Encina Hall
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

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Senior Fellow, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies, Department of Political Science
Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution
mcfaul_headshot_2025.jpg PhD

Michael McFaul is the Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies in Political Science, Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and the Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, all at Stanford University. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1995 and served as FSI Director from 2015 to 2025. He is also an international affairs analyst for MSNOW.

McFaul served for five years in the Obama administration, first as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Russian and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council at the White House (2009-2012), and then as U.S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation (2012-2014).

McFaul has authored ten books and edited several others, including, most recently, Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Global Disorder, as well as From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia, (a New York Times bestseller) Advancing Democracy Abroad: Why We Should, How We Can; and Russia’s Unfinished Revolution: Political Change from Gorbachev to Putin.

He is a recipient of numerous awards, including an honorary PhD from Montana State University; the Order for Merits to Lithuania from President Gitanas Nausea of Lithuania; Order of Merit of Third Degree from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford University. In 2015, he was the Distinguished Mingde Faculty Fellow at the Stanford Center at Peking University.

McFaul was born and raised in Montana. He received his B.A. in International Relations and Slavic Languages and his M.A. in Soviet and East European Studies from Stanford University in 1986. As a Rhodes Scholar, he completed his D. Phil. in International Relations at Oxford University in 1991. 

International Working Group on Russian Sanctions

The International Working Group on Russian Sanctions aims to provide expertise and experience to governments and companies around the world by assisting with the formulation of sanctions proposals that will increase the cost to Russia of invading Ukraine, and support democratic Ukraine in the defense of its territorial integrity and national sovereignty.
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Global Populisms

A new project examining the global surge in populist movements and what it means for established democratic rules and institutions.
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Michael A. McFaul Deputy Director, Freeman Spogli Institute For International Studies and Professor of Political Science, Stanford University; Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution; Advisor to Senator Obama Speaker
Dr. Gloria C. Duffy President and CEO, The Commonwealth Club of California; Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense under President Bill Clinton Moderator
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Agricultural Lives of the Poor

This project seeks to summarize, systematize, and make publicly available basic data on the agricultural production and consumption behavior of the global poor. Using existing household survey datasets from developing countries, the project aims to characterize food production and consumption patterns across rural and urban areas, income classes, and food groups. In particular, the project will focus on characterizing the net food consumption/production position of households (i.e.

Biofuels and Food Security in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa: Pathways of impacts and assessments of investments

Biofuel development contributes most effectively to rural income growth when you can have vertical integration. People all along the value chain have to be making money. The emerging connections between agriculture and energy markets are complex, but can be advantageous if handled carefully - Siwa Msangi

Matei Georgescu

School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning
Arizona State University

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Assistant Professor, Arizona State University
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Matei "Matt" Georgescu is a Post-doctoral Scholar in the Center on Food Security and the Environment. His general research focuses on the use of mesoscale numerical modeling to study the interaction(s) between the land and overlying atmosphere.  Human alteration of the earth's surface has changed (and continues to change) the manner in which solar radiation is absorbed by the surface and in turn modifies the fluxes of energy and water back into the atmosphere, with significant implications for weather and climate.

Specifically, he is interested in the regional climatic impact of changing landscapes, due to, for example, altered agricultural practices or urbanization. At Stanford, his main goal will be to quantify how local and regional climate responds to landscape change resulting from increased biofuel production.

Dr. Georgescu completed his Ph.D. at Rutgers University in May, 2008. His current work at Stanford is a direct extension of his work at Rutgers, where he investigated, using a numerical modeling approach, the climatic effect of one of the most rapidly urbanizing areas in the United States - the Greater Phoenix region. A recipient of a NASA Earth System Science Fellowship, his work showed the significant impact of anthropogenic landscape modification, in a semi-arid region, on regional climate.

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Boost-Phase Missile Defense Debate Continues

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The article by Daniel Kleppner, Frederick Lamb, and David Mosher (Physics Today, January 2004, page 30) summarizes the results of the excellent American Physical Society study released in July 2003 on boost-phase options for national missile defense. The study represents one of the most authoritative analyses to date on the subject and will enhance the quality of the public debate on missile defense for years to come. However, although I agree with many of the study's conclusions, the overall assessment is somewhat pessimistic, especially with respect to the feasibility of intercepting solid-propellant intercontinental ballistic missiles.

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PESD Annual Meeting

» Annual Meeting 2008 Materials (password protected)

PESD's 2008 Annual Review Meeting, Reconciling Coal and Energy Security, will be held October 29-30, 2008 at Stanford University. The meeting is PESD's annual forum in which to create a wide-ranging conversation around our research and obtain feedback to shape our research agenda going forward.

PESD is a growing international research program that works on the political economy of energy. We study the political, legal, and institutional factors that affect outcomes in global energy markets. Much of our research has been based on field studies in developing countries including China, India, Brazil, South Africa, and Mexico.

At present, PESD is active in four major areas: climate change policy, energy and development, the global coal market, and the role of national oil companies.

The workshop will begin on Wednesday, October 29 at 8:30 am with registration and breakfast followed by a welcome and an overview of PESD's research activities. This year's Annual Meeting will have a concerted focus on carbon markets, regulation, and carbon capture and storage models. There will be a session in the morning that will discuss and explore ways to engage developing countries on climate change. New to this year's meeting will be a reception and poster session at the conclusion of the first day. We also anticipate discussion of areas where PESD can better collaborate with other institutions. The meeting ends at 1pm on Thursday, October 30.

Annual Meeting invitees can access the complete agenda and subsequent presentation files by logging on with your password.

Bechtel Conference Center

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New York Times editor appointed Stanford scholar, adviser

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Philip Taubman, reporter and editor at the New York Times for nearly 30 years and an expert on national security issues, has been appointed as a consulting professor at Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperation and as an adviser to the campus on university affairs issues.

Taubman, who also is a Stanford alum and former Stanford trustee, will work as a scholar within the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies on a book project focusing on nuclear threats. He also will work on special projects as an associate vice president of the university.

"Phil's combined experience as a Stanford parent, alum and trustee, together with his national perspective from his tenure at the New York Times, will be a valuable asset to the campus," said Stanford President John L. Hennessy. "That perspective and experience will help us as we think about the next steps in Stanford's evolution. He also will play a key role in helping us to articulate the value of higher education to the public and to communicate in an increasingly complex, rapidly changing media environment."

Before coming to Stanford this fall, Taubman worked at the New York Times as a reporter and editor for 30 years, specializing in national security issues. At the Times, Taubman served as a Washington correspondent, Moscow bureau chief, deputy editorial page editor, Washington bureau chief and associate editor. Before joining the New York Times, he worked as a correspondent for Time magazine and was sports editor of Esquire. He is author of Secret Empire: Eisenhower, the CIA, and the Hidden Story of America's Space Espionage (Simon & Schuster, 2003).

Taubman received his bachelor's degree in history from Stanford, Class of 1970, and served as editor-in-chief of the Stanford Daily in 1969. He was a member of the Stanford Board of Trustees from 1978 to 1982. Taubman is married to Felicity Barringer, the national environmental correspondent of the New York Times, and a fellow Stanford graduate and editor-in-chief of the Stanford Daily in 1971. Their son, Michael, is a member of the Class of 2003 and received his master's degree from the School of Education in 2005.

Taubman's research at Stanford will focus on the recent "Getting to Zero" nuclear weapons initiative spearheaded by former U.S. Defense Secretary William Perry, co-director of CISAC's Preventive Defense Project; former U.S. Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Shultz; former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn; and Sidney Drell, CISAC founding co-director.

"This will be a seamless segue from a 40-year journalism career," Taubman said. "As a scholar at Stanford, I will be surrounded by some of the world's leading experts on nuclear weapons issues and other related subjects. And the additional assignments are alluring in that I can apply my expertise in dealing with national issues to my interest in being more involved in Stanford activities. It's the perfect combination."

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Jan M. Stupl

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Jan Stupl is an affiliate and a former postdoctoral fellow at CISAC.  He is currently a Research Scientist with SGT, a government contractor, and works in the Mission Design Division at NASA Ames Research Center (Mountain View, CA). In the Mission Design Division, Jan conducts research on novel methods for laser communication and space debris mitigation and supports concept development for space missions.

Before his current position, Jan was a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC) at Stanford University until 2011, investigating technical and policy implications of high power lasers for missile defense and as anti-satellite weapons (ASAT), as well as the proliferation of ballistic missiles. The research on laser ASATs focuses on damage mechanisms, the potential sources and countries of origin of laser ASATs and ways to curb their international proliferation. Before coming to CISAC, Jan was a Research Fellow at the Institute of Peace Research and Security Policy (IFSH) at the University of Hamburg, Germany. His PhD dissertation was a physics-based analysis of future of High Energy Lasers and their application for missile defense and focused on the Airborne Laser missile defense system. This work was jointly supervised by the IFSH, the Institute of Laser and System Technologies at Hamburg University of Technology and the physics department of Hamburg University, where he earned his PhD in 2008. His interest in security policy and international politics was fuelled by an internship at the United Nations in New York in 2003.

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