To compete and thrive in the 21st century, democracies, and the United States in particular, must develop new national security and economic strategies that address the geopolitics of information. In the 20th century, market capitalist democracies geared infrastructure, energy, trade, and even social policy to protect and advance that era’s key source of power—manufacturing. In this century, democracies must better account for information geopolitics across all dimensions of domestic policy and national strategy.
Professor Brenda Shaffer will discuss energy trade as a tool of foreign policy. In the last three decades, security concerns about supply disruptions have increased significantly due to the rising global consumption of natural gas. The nature of natural gas markets renders such supplies much more susceptible to political considerations than those of oil and coal.
The presentation will analyze the conditions under which states use energy trade to promote foreign policy goals, focusing on natural gas trade. It will discuss use of energy trade as a foreign policy tool by natural gas supplier, consumer, and transit states. The speaker will discuss the interaction between natural gas trade and political relations between trading states.
A supplementary reading may be downloaded here: http://poli.haifa.ac.il/~bshaffer/Shaffer_Natural_Gas_Supply_Stabiity_and_Foreign_Policy.pdf
Please join us! Coffee and tea provided. Everyone is welcome, but admittance will be on a first come–first served basis.