News & Announcements

The Homeland Security Project at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs is pleased to announce the creation of a paper series examining current and critical issues in homeland security. The Homeland Security Project seeks a variety of viewpoints, and the paper series is non-partisan. The intended audience for the paper series is broad, including policymakers in Congress and the Executive Branch, the homeland security community, and the general public. This call for papers is open to policy practitioners, scholars, the private sector, and non-governmental organizations.

Excerpt from an October 24th installment of the “Inside the Middle East" Q&A Series, with Hicham Alaoui, Visiting Fellow at Harvard’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and D.Phil. Candidate at Oxford University, on current trends in North African politics including Tunisia’s nascent democracy, North Africa’s unique position in the Middle East region, and the ongoing protests in Morocco’s Rif region.

The Homeland Security Project, an initiative of Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, has announced the appointment of Jeh Johnson, former Secretary of Homeland Security, as the Project’s new non-resident Senior Fellow.

An audio recording of a book talk by Marc Lynch, Professor of Political Science at George Washington University and Director of the Project on Middle East Political Science, on his most recent book The New Arab Wars: Uprisings and Anarchy in the Middle East.

An audio recording of a session of the Herbert C. Kelman Seminar on International Conflict Analysis and Resolution featuring speakers Yavuz Baydar, Turkish journalist and former Joan Shorenstein Fellow (Fall 2014), Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy and Lenore Martin, Associate, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs; Professor of Political Science, Department of Political Science, Emmanuel College.

"Democracy remains a rare commodity in the Middle East as the promise of the Arab Spring has given way to authoritarian retrenchment, democratic breakdown, and civil war. Countries that once seemed promising terrain for democracy now feature clashes between citizens and governments, military domination, and the imprisonment of activists and journalists. Sultan of Oman Associate Professor of International Relations Tarek Masoud helps to explain why the region has taken a turn for the worse."

An audio recording from an MEI panel discussion on Yemen, featuring panelists Fatima Abo Alasrar, Asher Orkaby, Leslie Campbell, and chair Michael C. Hudson.

On May 12, 2015, MEI convened a panel of Yemen experts to discuss Yemen's political and economic history and current dynamics, disentangle the various groups competing for control and influence, and envision potential resolutions to the current crisis.

Audio recordings from MEI's Spring 2015 Study Group Rethinking the Arab State: the Collapse of Legitimacy in Arab Politics, with Professor Michael C. Hudson.

During the Spring 2015 semester, Prof. Hudson hosted a distinguished group of scholars to re-examine the foundational concepts of legitimacy, the state, civil society, religion, and regional stability in the wake of the Arab Uprisings.