Applied History Project

The mission of Harvard’s Applied History Project is to revitalize applied history by promoting the production and use of historical reasoning to clarify public and private challenges and choices. Founded by Professors Graham Allison and Niall Ferguson in 2016, the Applied History Project builds upon the foundation laid by Professors Ernest May and Richard Neustadt in the 1980s, reflected in their book Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision Makers. 

Advancing its mission, the Project sponsors the Applied History Working Group of faculty members across Harvard University to organize discussions with scholars and practitioners; supports historians and policymakers in producing Applied History; develops courses in Applied History; funds the Ernest May Fellowships in History and Policy for pre- and post-doctoral students; and holds Applied History Events open to the Harvard Community and the public. Harvard’s project is one of the leaders among a rapidly expanding network of universities and think tanks that are furthering the discipline of Applied History by clarifying predicaments and choices to inform better decisions.

The Project gratefully acknowledges the Stanton Foundation's generous support for its Applied History endeavors. 

Quote of the Week 

“The problem with being ‘too busy to read’ is that you learn by experience (or by your men’s experience), i.e. the hard way. By reading history, you learn through others’ experiences, generally a better way to do business, especially in our line of work where the consequences of incompetence are so final for young men.” – General James Mattis, email to a subordinate, 2003 

(More Quotes ») 

Article of the Week 

“What America’s Founders can teach Trump about liberty” – Simon Schama, Financial Times, October 4, 2025.

Relaying the history of opposition to John Adams’ Sedition Acts, which made it illegal to write “false, scandalous, and malicious” material about the US government and president, Schama argues that defending free speech requires pushback from voters and forceful arguments from political leaders. During the election of 1800, James Madison published an influential report on the virtues of free speech, and Adams was voted out of office partly for supporting the Acts. For those concerned about free speech today, Schama recommends rereading “classic texts that linked knowledge with liberty: Locke, Voltaire, Mary Wollstonecraft and John Stuart Mill.”