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. 

Stanford's new European Security Initiative focuses on changing geopolitical landscape

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The new European Security Initiative at Stanford will examine the long-term policy issues and trends in Europe's changing geopolitical landscape, especially given Russia's growing aggression in the region.

 

First, it was the 2014 annexation of Crimea. Then, it was the intervention in eastern Ukraine. Most recently, airstrikes and naval cruise missiles are hitting targets in Syria.

What, many are wondering, is Russian President Vladimir Putin up to?

Russia's spate of aggressive tactics has thrust Europe into a new era of uncertainty and has raised pertinent policy questions that Stanford scholars have set out to explore more deeply with the launch this fall of a new European Security Initiative (ESI).

The working group of a dozen senior faculty members – whose breadth of expertise in Russian and Eurasian affairs spans multiple administrations – portrays Russia's actions as constituting the greatest challenge to European security and stability since the end of the Cold War. At the same time, Russia's own unstable economy and political landscape complicate the matter; policy changes moving forward will be high-stakes decisions, as Russia and the West step into a period of sustained competition.

Stanford, with its heavyweight lineup, is poised to play a role. The European Security Initiative – formed by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), the Europe Center, the Hoover Institution and other university partners – will serve as the collaborative framework for the policy research.

"Policymakers in Washington have to react immediately to events in the world, making it difficult to develop longer-term strategies for dealing with ongoing challenges," said FSI's director, Michael McFaul. "At Stanford, we have the luxury of being able to think about longer trends and then recommend more enduring strategies to our colleagues in government.

"We also have deep expertise on Russia and Europe, which assigns us a special responsibility to tackle these new challenges to European security."

The initial group of Stanford faculty involved in the initiative includes: McFaul, former U.S. ambassador to Russia and a professor of political science; Condoleezza Rice, former U.S. secretary of state and a professor of political science; international studies Professor Coit Blacker, former special assistant to President Bill Clinton and director for Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian Affairs on the National Security Council; David Holloway, professor of history and of political science, and one of the world's leading authorities on Russia's nuclear weapons program and defense policies; and Kathryn Stoner, an expert on Russia's governance and political economy and a senior fellow at FSI. 

Analyzing Russia's actions

One of the first objectives of the initiative is to understand the nature of the conflicts at hand and develop theories on Russia's domestic and international intentions.

For example, is Putin trying to re-establish Russian dominance over former Soviet states? Is he trying to distract internal constituencies from an array of domestic problems? Depending on the answers, the initiative's faculty members say the United States would have to pursue different policy options.

Working group discussions and a series of public events featuring key figures in U.S.-Russian and European policy will facilitate the Stanford-based dialogue and help broaden the academic discussion among students.

In September, for instance, ESI launched the new academic year with a talk at the Europe Center by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who was at the center of European and global politics as the former secretary-general of NATO.

Other fall quarter ESI events, past and upcoming, include an Oct. 14 talk by Sergey Aleksashenko, a former deputy chairman of the Russian Central Bank; a Nov. 2 visit by Vladimir Milov, the former Russian deputy minister of energy; and a Nov. 9 visit by General Philip M. Breedlove, supreme allied commander, Europe. 

Students, scholarship

In addition, Stanford students are showing a growing interest in Putin's actions and the unfolding refugee crisis in Europe. Applications for new student fellowships on European issues in Brussels this past summer far outstripped the six spaces available. To capitalize on this renewed interest, the initiative will involve students through events, new fellowships and a new seminar.

The initiative aims to rebuild scholarship in an area of academic interest that waned as the Cold War ended.

"At the end of the Cold War, many thought that we no longer needed to study Russia. I myself even stopped teaching courses on Russia and Eastern Europe," McFaul said. "That was a mistake." He noted that Stanford is ideally positioned to seed a new generation of expertise on Russia and Europe.

FSI provided the startup money to create the initiative, but it will be looking for funds to sustain the program.

 

This article was originally published in The Stanford Report on October 28, 2015.

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Sam Rebo

Encina Hall

616 Serra St., C100

Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 723-9732
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Sam Rebo is a Research and Project Assistant at FSI. He aids FSI Director Michael McFaul with background research for his upcoming book and facilitates FSI's new European Security Initiative.

Sam received his B.A. in International Relations with Honors in International Security from Stanford University. In the past, he has worked at the Moscow Carnegie Center, the French Institute of International Relations in Paris, and Global Integrity in Washington, D.C. His interests include Soccer and the Violin. He claims to make the best grilled cheese sandwich known to man.

Research Assistant and Project Coordinator

McFaul Explains the Myth of Putin's Strategic Genius

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In an opinion piece published on October 23, 2015 in the New York Time, FSI director and senior fellow Michael McFaul shares his latest comentary on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Read Professor McFaul's Op Ed in the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/23/opinion/the-myth-of-putins-strategic-….

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Understanding Russia's New Tsar: a lecture by Steven Lee Myers

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This event is now full.  Please contact khaley@stanford.edu if you would like to be added to the wait list.

Russian President Vladimir Putin is not the cipher he is sometimes thought to be. His early life, his career in intelligence, and his early service in the newly democratic St. Petersburg -- explain the policies now on display at home and increasingly abroad. Putin has evolved as the country has, becoming the most consequential leader of any country in the world. Although he is often portrayed as an enigma or as caricature, it is essential to understand the characteristics, events and goals that motivate him.  

Steven Lee Myers has worked at The New York Times for twenty-six years, seven of them in Russia during the period when Putin consolidated his power. He spent two years as bureau chief in Baghdad, covering the winding down of the American war in Iraq, and now covers national security issues. He lives in Washington, D.C.

 

 

 

Steven Lee Myers Diplomatic Correspondent, Washington Bureau, The New York Times
Lectures
European Security Initiative
European Security Initiative Lecture Series

On Cruelty: Global Reflections from the Age of Revolutions to the War on Citizenship

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This is the second meeting of the workshop series on Civility, Cruelty, Truth. A one-day event hosted by the Stanford Humanities Center, the workshop will explore the genealogies, promises, and limits of civic virtue—at the heart of which is the city, the classical polis, itself— as a universal ideal. European in its moral contours, constituted by a deep fascination with the rule of law, borders, and security, at once coercive and oblique in whom it excludes and includes, how it punishes and protects, the city held out the promise of a humane center for ethical and sovereign life, one upon which anticolonial struggles against European empires too were first conceived and mounted. This workshop will examine the ambiguous foundations and resolutions of that vision in Asia, Europe, and the fatal waters in between; a vision that has come to be marked today by extreme violence and tragic displacements, and which now presses new questions against the very limit of modern political imagination.
 
Faculty Organizer: Aishwary Kumar (Department of History)
Student Assistant: Ahoo Najafian (Department of Religious Studies)
 
Schedule (coming soon)
 

Co-sponsored by the Department of History, Department of Religious Studies, The Europe Center, The France- Stanford Center for interdisciplinary Studies, Program in Global Justice, McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society, Stanford Global Studies, School of Humanities and Sciences, Stanford Humanities Center, Center for South Asia

 

Stanford Humanities Center
424 Santa Teresa St.
 

Conferences

Is Russia (Becoming) a Failed State? A Lecture by Sergey Aleksashenko

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**Reservations for this event is closed**  We are at capacity and cannot accept further reservations.

 

Twenty-four years ago the Soviet Union collapsed. Since then, Russia has been transformed in many dimensions but it is difficult to describe the country today.  According to its Constitution, Russia is a democratic republic and federation, but modern Russia looks more like an absolute monarchy. The Russian economy is dominated by state corporations, the oligarchs of the 90's, and the cronies of the 2000’s. The economy has been in recession for more than a year and hasn’t exhibited any signs of recovery. Is the country stable? Can it face its governance and economic challenges? Can we forecast the medium-term future of the Russian economy? Could the economy collapse?

 

Sergey Aleksashenko is a Senior Fellow at the Development Center (a Moscow-based think tank) and Nonresident Senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Since graduating Moscow State University in 1986, he has been involved in academia, the public sector, and in business. From 1990-1991 he was appointed to the Commission on Economic reforms of the Government of the USSR as one of the "500 days" plan members. In 1993-1995 he worked as deputy Minister of Finance of Russia in charge of budgetary planning, macroeconomic, and tax policy. From 1995-1998 he was responsible for monetary policy as the first deputy Governor of the Central bank of Russia. From 2000 to 2004 he was the deputy CEO of the Interros Holding where he lead the strategy and business development teams. In 2006-2008 he was the Chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch Russia, the largest financial institution in Moscow, where he greatly increased the bank's scope and presence. Before the financial crisis of 2008, he returned to academia and became the Director of Macroeconomic Research at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow. At the same time, he sat on the boards of Aeroflot, United Grain company, United Aircraft Corporation, and the National Reserve bank. At the end of 2012 he faced political persecution and in September 2013 he left Russia for Washington D.C. where he currently resides. 

Sergey Aleksashenko Former Deputy Chairman of the Russian Central Bank
Lectures
European Security Initiative

The Global Impact of Russia's Political and Economic Situation

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This event is now full, and we are unable to accept any further RSVPs.  Please email khaley@stanford.edu if you would like to be added to a wait list.

 

Russia's aggressive foreign policy is backed by Putin's domestic popularity ratings and his strong grip on Russia's political system. But in reality, how firmly does Putin control Russian politics? Can the ongoing economic crisis in Russia pose challenges to his system and the upcoming federal elections of 2016-2018? What impact will Russian domestic politics play in Russia's international behavior?

 

Vladimir Milov is a Russian opposition politician, publicist, economist & energy expert. He was the Deputy Minister of Energy of Russia (2002), adviser to the Minister of Energy (2001-2002), and head of strategy department at the Federal Energy Commission, the natural monopoly regulator (1999-2001). Milov is the author of major energy reform concepts, including the concept of market restructuring and unbundling of Gazprom, which was banned from implementation by President Vladimir Putin. He is the founder and president of the Institute of Energy Policy, a leading independent Russian energy policy think tank (since 2003). Milov is a columnist of major Russian political and business publications, including Forbes Russia, and a frequent commentator on Russian political and economic affairs in major Western media outlets (The New York Times, The Financial Times, The Washington Post, The Economist, etc.). Since leaving the Russian Government in 2002, Milov has became a vocal public critic of Vladimir Putin’s dirigiste and authoritarian course. Milov is also active in the Russian opposition politics, serving as Chairman of the “Democratic Choice” opposition party (www.en.demvybor.ru), and is also known as co-author of the critical public report on Vladimir Putin’s Presidential legacy called “Putin. The Results”, written together with Boris Nemtsov (several editions published since 2008).

Vladimir Milov former Russian Deputy Minister of Energy Speaker
Lectures
European Security Initiative
European Security Initiative Lecture Series

We Need American Global Leadership - a talk by former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen

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Anders Fogh Rasmussen

 

Anders Fogh Rasmussen has been at the centre of European and global politics for three decades as Secretary General of NATO, Prime Minister of Denmark, Danish Minister of Economic Affairs, and a leading Danish parliamentarian.

In 1998, Mr. Rasmussen became chairman of the Danish Liberal Party and leader of the Danish opposition. In the parliamentary elections 2001, his party won a landslide victory and became the biggest party in the Danish parliament. He formed his first government, and became Prime Minister of a coalition consisting of the Liberal Party and the Conservative People’s Party. His government was re-elected in 2005 and 2007 respectively, and he held the position as Prime Minister until he was elected as future NATO Secretary General at the Strasbourg-Kehl Summit in April 2009.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen took office as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s 12th Secretary General on August 1, 2009 and held that position until September 30, 2014. His tenure marked a fundamental transformation of the Alliance. Mr. Rasmussen oversaw the Alliance’s operational peak with six operations on three continents including Afghanistan, Kosovo and Libya, as well as counter-piracy along the Somali coast, a training mission in Iraq and a counter-terrorism operation in the Mediterranean.

He developed a new Strategic Concept, which sets the Alliance’s core priorities for the future. In the midst of the most serious economic crisis in recent time, he launched “Smart Defence” to help nations make more efficient use of their resources through more multinational cooperation. And in response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine, he initiated a “Readiness Action Plan” adopted by Heads of State at a historic summit in Wales to strengthen the collective defence to an unprecedented level since the end of the Cold War. A reformer who made the Alliance leaner and more efficient, Mr. Rasmussen also extended and strengthened NATO’s partnerships with nations around the world, making it the hub of a network of international security partnerships.

Upon leaving NATO, Mr. Rasmussen founded Rasmussen Global, which provides geopolitical and strategic consulting services and advises clients on a wide range of issues such as international security, transatlantic relations, the European Union, and emerging markets.

Born in 1953, Mr. Rasmussen earned an M.Sc. in Economics from the University of Aarhus in 1978.

 

Anders Fogh Rasmussen Founder and Chairman of Rasmussen Global and former Secretary-General of NATO Speaker
Seminars
European Security Initiative
European Security Initiative Lecture Series

French ambassador talks terrorism, climate change

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France is grappling with rising terrorism and the climate change problem, French Ambassador Gérard Araud said during a talk sponsored by The Europe Center.

"We had been expecting a terrorist attack for some time," said Araud, referencing the January massacre in Paris in which two shooters who identified themselves as Islamic terrorists killed 12 people at the Charlie Hebdo newspaper offices and wounded several others. "The attack in Paris was like our 9/11."

He said that France is undertaking both educational and law enforcement efforts aimed at taming the spread of radicalized Islamic youth in the country – but there is no easy solution.

For example, it is almost impossible to monitor all the potential suspects, shut down offensive websites only to see them pop up shortly thereafter, and even track youth coming and going from Islamic campaigns in places like Syria and Iraq.

"Everything," Araud said, "depends on the balance between civil liberties and law enforcement. We're trying to adjust to this new threat."

More than a hundred people turned out for Araud's talk, which was held in the Koret-Taube Conference Center. The event, held May 1, was billed as the "State of the France-U.S. Relationship and Priorities for 2015."

Araud was appointed Ambassador of France to the United States in 2014. He has held positions within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development. During his career, Araud became an expert on the Middle East and security issues, and was the French negotiator on the Iranian nuclear issue from 2003 to 2006.

He spoke about the problem of increasing anti-Semitism in France.

"It's totally unacceptable," he said. On the educational front, French schools routinely teach students about the horrors of the Holocaust and some even make field trips to places like Auschwitz, one of the Nazi concentration camps where Jewish people were exterminated during World War II.

One upcoming topic of global interest, Araud said, is the United Nations climate change conference scheduled to start Nov. 30 in Paris.

He described it as perhaps a "last chance" attempt at an effective global agreement on the issue, and sounded upbeat about the possibility of success. "Things are much more positive than in 2009" when similar talks in Copenhagen failed to spark worldwide unity.

The reasons, he said, are that more countries are acknowledging the impact of carbon emissions and that China has expressed a desire to cooperate. But much depends on the talks in Paris, both their tone and substance.

"Top down approval certainly won't work," Araud said, noting that the conference needs to produce a consistent and credible message of action on climate change that appeals to many countries.

He noted Stanford's new energy system aims to cut campus greenhouse gas emissions by 68 percent and fossil fuel by 65 percent. "It's quite positive," he said.

Michael McFaul, director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, introduced Araud and described the bilateral relationship between the United States and France as "central to everything that we do."

McFaul pointed out that Araud played a key role in the writing of the economic sanctions that eventually brought Iran to the nuclear negotiations table.

When he started his speech, Araud said it was his first visit to Stanford. "Thank you for the weather," he smiled.

 

Clifton B. Parker is a writer for the Stanford News Service.

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