Research

Each semester, the Belfer Center proudly hosts warriors and peacemakers, politicians and polymaths, investors and musicians. Rarely do we welcome all these roles in just one person. But Lamont Lecturer Ehud Barak is nothing if not a singular figure. Israel’s former prime minister has enlivened the Center this fall with a JFK Jr. Forum, classroom teaching, and many briefings with faculty, fellows, and students.

An interview with MEI Faculty Affiliate Asim Khwaja on his work at the Center for International Development's Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) program with the Saudi Ministry of Labor on labor market policy as well as EPoD's Smart Policy Design and Implementation methodology and implications for the future of informed, iterative policymaking.

The Summer 2015 issue of the Middle East Initiative Mosaic newsletter features highlights of MEI programs and activities over the 2014-2015 academic year, along with research and analysis of critical global issues by members of our community. This issue includes Crisis of the Arab State, a report by spring 2015 Kuwait Foundation Visiting Scholar Michael C. Hudson's study group, a review of a selection of the 66 events MEI hosted, interviews with students and faculty, and more.

More than 40 Harvard students traveled to the Middle East over the winter break to assess–firsthand–the rehabilitation needs of Syrian refugees in Jordan and alternative energy and environmental challenges and opportunities in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Belfer Center’s Middle East Initiative supported the field visits.

Belfer Center at IDEASpHERE 2014

Incisive questions and ambitious answers marked Harvard Kennedy School’s IDEASpHERE celebration in late spring. Belfer Center thinkers shared their big ideas in more than a dozen sessions, ranging from China's rise to nuclear weapons.

Below is a sampling of notable thoughts from those sessions. For more, including summaries and video highlights, see belfercenter.org/ideasphere2014.

Farah Pandith, America’s first special representative to Muslim communities, joined the Belfer Center this fall as a Fisher Family Fellow with the Future of Diplomacy Project and as a senior fellow with the Middle East Initiative. Jairam Ramesh, a member of Parliament from Andhra Pradesh, India, and a leader in international climate negotiations, joined the Belfer Center this fall as a 2014 Fisher Family Fellow with the Future of Diplomacy Project.

This fall, thanks to edX, the non-profit online education enterprise founded by Harvard and MIT, about 10,000 people from around the world are auditing – for free – an online version of this course, called HKS211.1x. Auditors have access to relevant writings, video lessons from the instructors or special guests, and weekly assignments. They can also engage with fellow students in the discussion forums. Auditors can do as much or as little as they want – on their own time.

The study of citizenship, what it means and what it entails, has always been a topic of considerable debate in international relations and political science. Discussions of citizenship usually occur from the perspective of those who are included within a particular community, yet accelerated changes in global migration flows over the past 60 years have shifted the discussion into new waters. Noora Lori is among those attempting to understand this changing relationship between the state, the citizen, and the migrant.

The invasion of Iraq prompted a deluge of work written on the country from a U.S. perspective, but Nussaibah Younis, a fellow with the Belfer Center's International Security Program, wants people to start considering Iraq as an actor in its own right. While at the  Center, Younis is working on a project that seeks to understand internal Iraqi foreign policymaking dynamics since 2003.

Saudi Arabia’s Prince Turki Al Faisal told a standing-room only audience at Harvard Kennedy School in April that his nation is investing huge sums in solar, wind, and nuclear energy to reduce domestic reliance on its oil reserves. Prince Turki said Saudi Arabia’s security depends on a healthy energy policy that uses oil to earn export revenues rather than for domestic consumption.