Reports & Papers

On March 21, The Future of Diplomacy Project jointly hosted a public seminar with the Belfer Center's Cyber Security Project titled "A 21st Century State: Anything is Possible." As the speaker for the public event, Prime Minister of Estonia, TaaviRõivas, spoke at length on the role that digital technology has played in the global competitiveness of Estonia's economy and the robustness of his country's governance and public sector services. The Prime Minister spoke to a large audience comprising of Harvard Kennedy School students, national security fellows, and local Estonian start-up entrepreneurs.

In March, the Future of Diplomacy Project hosted a series of seminars touching on traditionally underused but highly effective tools and agents of diplomacy in the fields of journalism, development aid, religion, and information technology.

In a Harvard Kennedy School IDEASpHERE session titled "Challenges to US Global Leadership," Graham Allison, Nicholas Burns, David Gergen, David Ignatius, and Meghan O’Sullivan discussed challenges as well as opportunities facing the United States. Burns moderated the session.

Challenges include the rise of China and the future of the U.S.-China relationship, the crises taking place around the world, and the reputation of the U.S. worldwide. An unexpected opportunity is the increase in available energy sources in the United States.

Speaking on February 11th, 2013, Brazilian Minister of External Relations Antonio de Aguiar Patriota argued that Brazil is at a unique period in the evolution of the South American nation’s foreign policy. “For the first time in Brazil’s history,” he said, “Brazil can engage not only in relations, but in global outreach.”

Former US Ambassador to Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad stressed the importance of domestic factors and regional cooperation in enabling the United States to arrive at a satisfactory end game in Afghanistan.

Ambassador Rao concludes the Future of Diplomacy's South Asia week, hails bilateral US-Indian cooperation on a host of economic and security concerns.