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The Belfer Center is pleased to support a number of events organized by and/or for students at Harvard Kennedy School and the greater Harvard community. Activities this semester ranged from several defense, diplomacy, and development events to the 14th German American Conference and "Ask Me Anything" conversations with current and former members of the U.S. State Department and other organizations.

Nathaniel L. Moir argues that the Russian invasion of Ukraine in early 2022 evokes a failure to learn the many lessons Bernard Fall sought to convey in critiquing American operations in Vietnam in the 1960s and as France sought to control Indochina in the 1950s. Among his contributions was Fall's demand that policy-makers recognize the primacy of political legitimacy over military force. 

This spring, the Belfer Center organized a new event series called Africa in Focus to examine the many factors driving political transitions and geostrategic relations in Africa. This workshop series aims to kickstart an initiative that recruits more African policymakers and experts to discuss African politics and affairs with the Harvard Kennedy School community. 

Whenever Washington or Moscow unveils a new weapon, ears in the other capital perk up and analysts try to divine how the new system fits into U.S. or Russian military strategy—not least of all, strategy toward its Cold War-era nemesis. But how often do decisions related to national security arise because of institutional forces only tenuously related to states’ strategic planning? More specifically, how do the countries’ respective defense industries influence policy? The Belfer Center’s Russia Matters project asked two scholars—one American, one Russian—to investigate the latter question. Their articles, published in November, reveal fascinating differences (and similarities) in the way this influence is exercised in countries with vastly different political and economic systems.

Every other Tuesday, early in the morning and no matter the weather, you can usually spot 17 National Security Fellows (NSFs) making their way from different parts of Boston to a Belfer Center third-floor conference room in Cambridge. They come from all military services, the Coast Guard, Office of the Secretary of Defense, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and National Reconnaissance Office. Their research at the Center this year covers a broad range of national security issues from governance and corruption in multiethnic societies to defense technology, artificial intelligence, and space capabilities. They are as different as their professional backgrounds suggest, but on these Tuesday mornings they are united by their eagerness to hear directly from one of the most disciplined military thinkers of our times - General Joseph F. Dunford, Jr. (ret.). 

Highlights of recent Belfer Center program and project activities and recognitions.

In addition to hosting a speakers series with renowned historians and scholars discussing lessons from history that are applicable to today's challenges, the Applied History Project is pleased to support an essay contest asking for history-informed essays on "How to Reunite America." 

From trade disputes to digital governance to multilateral institutions in need of reform, the incoming Biden Administration faces a full international economics policy agenda. Rising U.S.-China tensions will exacerbate these policy challenges as the world’s two largest economies compete for economic power and global influence. This fall, the Belfer Center’s Economic Diplomacy Initiative, led by Aditi Kumar, Nicholas Burns, and Lawrence H. Summers, hosted a series of discussions examining the U.S.-China economic relationship.  

A common element in Erika Manouselis’s life is bridges. At the United Nations, she helped Brazil’s Mission strengthen its relationships across distance and difference. At a law firm afterward, she helped immigrants reconnect with loved ones. As the Project Coordinator for the Belfer Center’s Future of Diplomacy Project and Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship, she works to connect policymakers, practitioners, and scholars with students from around the world. And most every day (in the current remote work era) Erika walks across some of the most iconic bridges in Manhattan. It’s a fitting pastime for someone who’s passionate about foreign policy and bringing people together.

We asked Fredrik Logevall, author of JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century (Random House, 2020), why he decided to write a biography of John F. Kennedy, what surprised him in his research, and whether he thinks Kennedy would have won the 2020 presidential election.