Reports & Papers

Kyriakos Mitsotakis (Harvard BA ’89), president of the Greek opposition party Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy,) laid out his vision for a tough but achievable strategy to revitalize the Greek economy and strengthen the nation’s ties to the European Union in an October 13 seminar.

His Excellency Gerárd Araud, French Ambassador to the United States, opened the autumn 2016 programming of the Future of Diplomacy Project on September 12, 2016.

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.

The internet is an interconnected series of networks--where it is difficult to determine where private security threats end and public ones begin.  These networks deliver power and water to our households and businesses, enable us to access our bank accounts from almost any city in the world, and transform the way our doctors provide healthcare.  For all of these reasons, we need a safe Internet with a strong network infrastructure.

The Palestinian camps are characteristic of the greatest foreign policy challenges that face us today. They are ungoverned spaces in Lebanon, subject to official discrimination, extremely radicalized, and tied to decades of conflict. However, the United States has almost no official policy or means of engagement with the camps. This paper argues that the United States can and should engage them by introducing USAID projects, expanding exchange and educational programs, and targeted outreach and communications. Most importantly, the United States should adopt a policy of urging the Lebanese government to improve human rights and living conditions for the Palestinians. The significance of a new approach is not only for the camps, but more broadly as we struggle to more effectively counter global instability and terrorism.

Nearly five years after the terrorist attacks of September 11, has the government adequately protected its citizens against terrorism and catastrophic disaster?

While the danger of Catastrophic Terrorism is new and grave, there is much that the United States can do to prevent it and to mitigate its consequences if it occurs. The objective of the Catastrophic Terrorism Study Group is to suggest program and policy changes that can be taken by the United States government in the near term, including the reallocation of agency responsibilities, to prepare the nation better for the emerging threat of Catastrophic Terrorism.