Dara Kay Cohen is a Ford Foundation Associate Professor of Public Policy at HKS. Her research spans international relations, including international security, civil war and the dynamics of violence, and gender and conflict. Her first book, Rape During Civil War, received several awards, including the 2017 Theodore J. Lowi First Book Award from the American Political Science Association. Cohen is also the recipient of the 2019 Emerging Scholar Award from the International Security Studies Section (ISSS) of the International Studies Association. Her current project is focused on the intersection of political violence, public opinion, and gender in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

At a time of questions about Europe’s unity, security, and prosperity—and about the commitment of the United States to its relationship with NATO and the European Union—the Belfer Center has launched a new Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship to reinvigorate a continental bond that has anchored global order, provided peace and stability, and fueled economic expansion for seven decades.

Norman Mailer. Leonard Bernstein. T.S. Eliot. Robert Frost. Those are just some of the famous winners of Harvard Signet Society’s prestigious Signet Award. This spring, one of the Belfer Center’s most admired members was added to their ranks: Dorothy Zinberg.

“Honey bots” that counter malicious bots. An app called Sanity Check. Cyber Security Bonds. And technology that breaks the grip of online echo chambers. Those are just some of the ideas that college students from around the country presented Thursday in Cambridge as part of the Defending Digital Democracy Project’s first-ever Information Operations Technical and Policy Hack-a-thon.

Undaunted, a group of young civil servants is working directly with political operatives and state and local officials to fortify campaigns and elections against cyberattacks and information operations: Harvard Kennedy School students affiliated with the Belfer Center’s Defending Digital Democracy Project (D3P).

For Debora Plunkett, joining forces with the Belfer Center’s Defending Digital Democracy project was much more than an academic opportunity—it was her duty as an American. Russian meddling in the 2016 election “hit at the core of me as an American,” she said. “I am offended that anyone would try to limit, distort, or alter the rights of Americans to vote, and so I’m interested in helping to develop and deliver security guidance that will help campaigns better understand and respond to current-day cyber threaats and vulnerabilities.”

As director of the Belfer Center’s Science, Technology, and Globalization Project, Calestous Juma works to better leverage scientific and technological knowledge for poor and vulnerable communities around the world.