The Institute for the Study of Diplomacy is pleased to announce the release of an important new study, Grand Strategy and Strategic Surprise. The author of the study, Casimir Yost, is a senior fellow in the Institute and former director of the Strategic Futures Group at the National Intelligence Council, as well as the former director of ISD. Professor Yost argues that the United States has “lost the capacity for sustained, government wide strategic assessment and anticipation.” He examines the intersection between strategy, planning, and surprise –with surprise, all too frequently, disrupting the development of strategy. He concludes that while the intelligence community and other agencies of government can contribute to strategic planning, it is the White House that must take the lead. Moreover, he argues that an effective planning capacity, at a time of heightened risk to the United States, should not have to be reconstituted with every new administration. The greatest risk for the United States is during presidential transitions “as the old, experienced, and tired team leaves office and the new, untested, and under-informed team enters office.”

A groundbreaking atmospheric scientist, a brilliant U.S. diplomat and an esteemed businessman and philanthropist will be awarded honorary doctoral degrees at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in May. The recipients are David Fahey, whose research has helped protect the Earth’s ozone layer and climate; Linda Thomas-Greenfield, a former ambassador to Liberia lauded for her international humanitarian work; and Jerome Chazen, a co-founder and former chairman of Liz Claiborne Inc. The honorary degrees, as well as doctoral, MFA and medical professional degrees, will be conferred at the 5:30 p.m. commencement ceremony on Friday, May 11, at the Kohl Center.

The Institute for the Study of Diplomacy (ISD) at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service is pleased to welcome Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield as the Institute’s first Distinguished Resident Fellow in African Studies. Thomas-Greenfield, who has been with ISD as Senior State Department Fellow since spring 2017, takes up her new post effective November 1.

ISD director Barbara Bodine and board members William J. Burns, James Irvin Gadsden and Ellen Laipson sign onto letter supporting bureau of population refugees and migration.

When thinking about the abstract foreign policy framework known as the “liberal international order,” it helps to personalize it by remembering the career of one of its strongest exponents, former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski. Brzezinski, who died Friday, devoted most of his career to explaining and enhancing this idea of a robust, supple, U.S.-led architecture for global security and prosperity.

In late April, ISD Senior Fellow Cas Yost briefed the Aspen Group on global security challenges. A copy of his talk is available here.

Institute for the Study of Diplomacy hosted Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, for a conversation on Africa’s position on the world stage. Thomas-Greenfield highlighted the problems and opportunities facing the continent in the near future as part of the Distinguished Practitioner Speaker Series. She shared her perspective from a 35-year career in the Foreign Service including the Ambassadorship in Liberia and a life that has been intertwined with Africa since her first visit in 1978.

The Institute for the Study of Diplomacy is honored to welcome Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, as Resident Senior State Department Fellow, effective March 13, 2017. Ambassador Thomas-Greenfield comes to ISD with a distinguished Foreign Service career. In addition to heading the Bureau of African Affairs since 2013, she has served as Director General of the Foreign Service and Director of Human Resources, U.S. Ambassador to Liberia, and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration.

In his first two weeks in office, President Donald Trump has signed multiple executive orders, three of which address a range of immigration issues: refugees and visa holders, border security and law enforcement, and sanctuary cities. A range of federal and state government officials, academics, and other experts have questioned the constitutionality of the executive orders, and the travel ban in particular has caused confusion at U.S. airports and protests across the country. SFS faculty and alumni weigh in on the issues presented by the these executive orders.

Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy (ISD) presented Jeffrey Goldberg, Editor-in-Chief of The Atlantic, with the 2016 Edward Weintal Prize for Diplomatic Reporting at a dinner event in Copley Formal Lounge October 20. The event, highlighted by Goldberg’s remarks on the United States and the world the next president will inherit, also included an introduction by Atlantic President Bob Cohn and a conversation between Goldberg and Jim Hoagland, the two-time Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and foreign correspondent for The Washington Post.

EAP alums Marc Grossman '73 and Barbara Bodine '70 built their careers in the U.S. Foreign Service by serving their country during some of the most tumultuous times in global history.

WASHINGTON (April 26, 2016)—Georgetown University today announced that the U.S. Department of State has designated the university as its first Diplomacy Lab partner in the national capital region. A 2013 State Department Office of Global Partnerships initiative, this public-private research program provides students – both undergraduate and graduate – at over 25 participating universities the opportunity to research and propose innovative yet well-grounded solutions to real-world policy challenges on behalf of State Department offices and U.S. embassies.

What's it like behind the scenes to end a 50-year stalemate? In an ISD Distinguished Practitioner talk in April, ISD Rusk Fellow/White House Senior Advisor Bernadette Meehan and National Security Council Director for the Caribbean & Central America Siobhan Sheils spoke with Georgetown students about their experiences working on the U.S. government team negotiating the details of President Obama’s historic visit to Cuba in March 2016.

Dr. Ernest Moniz, U.S. Secretary of Energy, received the 2016 Trainor Award for Distinction in the Conduct of Diplomacy for his role and his team’s role in the P5+1 negotiations on the Iranian nuclear program and the Paris climate talks. The first scientist to receive the prestigious award, Dr. Moniz addressed a large audience of students and faculty at Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service on April 11, 2016, reflecting not only on the Iranian and Paris talks but the Department of Energy’s broad role bringing science to diplomacy on “weapons, windmills, quarks and quagmires.”

The Diplomatic Pouch, the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy’s blog, highlights the intersection of diplomatic history and current affairs, and history’s influence on foreign relations. To borrow from William Faulkner, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” History, and diplomatic history in particular, influence the everyday workings of international affairs. Practitioners who craft policies unhinged from history risk policies unhinged from current realities. The Diplomatic Pouch seeks to connect history to the present in service to the diplomat or foreign policy practitioner – and to spark reasoned debate that places current affairs in broader historical context. The inaugural post in ISD's Diplomatic Pouch looks at the success of the NATO Alliance, 67 years later.

Former Institute for the Study of Diplomacy Fellow for 2011-2012, Brigadier General Diana Holland, became the first woman Commandant of Cadets at the U.S. Military Academy West Point on January 5, 2016. Prior to becoming Commandant of Cadets, Holland was the deputy commanding general of support for the 10th Mountain Division (light), the first female deputy commanding general of a light infantry division. She also led the legendary Black Diamonds – the 30th Engineer Battalion – during its deployment to eastern Afghanistan, the first of her two deployments to Afghanistan.

On January 19, 2016 Ben Rhodes, Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications, delivered the 2016 Oscar Iden Lecture on American Foreign Policy and International Diplomacy. Mr. Rhodes oversees all of President Obama’s national security communications, speechwriting, and global engagement. In addition to channeling the President’s voice, Mr. Rhodes has played a key role in a number of diplomatic achievements, including the nuclear deal with Iran and the diplomatic opening with Myanmar. He was also one of two U.S. officials who conducted secret negotiations with the Cuban government, leading to the restoration of diplomatic ties between the two countries. In this conversation, moderated by ISD Fellow Bernadette Meehan and GU Politics Executive Director Mo Elleithee, Mr. Rhodes discussed his role as one of the President’s closest advisors, his path to the White House, the politics and policy behind this Administration’s national security decisions, and what to expect in the President’s final year in office.

Three experts offered their analysis on the ongoing conflict in Yemen and assessed the prospects for a political solution. On December 4, 2015, the Middle East Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center hosted the event “Yemen between War and Political Solution,” with Mohammad Al-Shami, youth activist, advocacy trainer, and former Leaders for Democracy Fellow at Maxwell School of Syracuse University; Amat Alsoswa, founder of the Yemeni National Women’s Committee, former Human Rights minister, and former UN Assistant Secretary General; and Barbara Bodine, Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy and Director for the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy in The Edmund Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, and former U.S. Ambassador to Yemen. Henri J. Barkey, Director of the Middle East Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center, moderated the event.

On November 3, 2015, Special Envoy to the Colombian Peace Process Bernard Aronson joined Ramon Escobar, ISD Rusk Fellow for a discussion: "Is Colombia's Long War Drawing to an End?" This event was co-sponsored by the Center for Latin American Studies. Aronson helped promote the first successful democratic elections in Nicaragua and an end to the contra war and a negotiated settlement of the war in El Salvador. In addition during Aronson’s tenure: Panama was liberated from the dictatorial rule of General Manuel Noriega; the United States helped Colombia defeat Pablo Escobar and the Medellin cartel; Latin America emerged from both the debt crisis and the lost decade; NAFTA was negotiated; Argentina and Brazil put their nuclear programs under IAEA safeguards; Peru defeated, with U.S. assistance, Sendero Luminoso; and the OAS unanimously adopted the Santiago Declaration committing its member states to the collective defense of democracy.

The American Academy of Diplomacy has released a new report, Diplomacy for the 21st Century: Embedding a Culture of Science and Technology Throughout the Department of State. The report recommends steps that the Department of State should embrace to take full advantage of the leading science and technology (S&T) capabilities of the United States. 

United States Ambassador to Sweden Mark Brzezinski addressed the need for action on climate change, the importance of using new techniques and methods in diplomacy, and the importance of Arctic policy. Mr. Brzezinski was confirmed to this position by the United States Senate on October 18, 2011.

In anticipation of her recent visit to Panama for the Summit of the Americas, ISD's Yahoo! Fellow, Yoani Sanchez, sat down for an interview with Yahoo! Noticias. To watch the interview (in Spanish), click learn more. "La periodista cubana nos habla de su nuevo bebé, Cuba y los retos personales y tecnológicos en este nuevo proyecto." -Yahoo! Noticias

Congressman Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), sworn in on January 6, 2015, is part of a new generation of leaders in Washington, and among the youngest. A decorated former U.S. Marine with four combat tours in Iraq, Rep. Moulton is a graduate of the Harvard Business School and the Kennedy School of Government. Featured in the 2007 award-winning documentary "No End in Sight," he asked of us all at the end, "Is this the best that America can do?" Not content to sit on the sidelines and wait for an answer, Mr. Moulton decided to run for office and do something about it.

January's issue of The Foreign Service Journal features a piece by ISD Director Barbara Bodine on effective ways to teach diplomacy to the next generation. Amb. Bodine asks, "Diplomacy is a collaborative process over time involving a number of players with differing perspectives and strengths. How does a practitioner convey that in a classroom?"

The inaugural Distinguished Practitioners Series was presented by Gen. Wesley K. Clark U.S. Army (ret.) before a group of students and invited guests on the Georgetown campus. General Clark discussed topics from his new book, Don’t Wait For the Next War: A Strategy for American Growth and Global Leadership. As America emerges from more than a ­decade of costly wars, Clark proposed a new strategic vision to address five persistent, ­interrelated, international challenges—­terrorism, cybersecurity, financial instability, the rise of China and global climate change. This event was presented by the Institute in cooperation with the Center for Security Studies.