Visit our website and events calendar for a complete listing of spring 2015 activities. Many of our events are captured on video and available to view on YouTube.
Starr Forums
The Center hosted multiple Starr Forums, including: Syria: A Just War?, featuring Barry Posen (Ford International Professor of Political Science and director of MIT's Security Studies Program), Jeanne Guillemin (senior advisor at the MIT Security Studies Program), and Augustus Richard Norton (professor of international relations and anthropology at Boston University), and moderated by John Tirman (executive director and principal research scientist at CIS); The Passion of Chelsea Manning: The Story behind the Wikileaks, with Chase Madar (author and civil rights attorney) and Noam Chomsky (MIT); Japan's Continuing Nuclear Nightmare, featuring Ken Buesseler (senior scientist, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution), Patrick Stackpole, (former chief of staff of U.S. Forces Japan during Operation Tomodachi), and Richard Samuels (Ford International Professor of Political Science and director of CIS), and moderated by Ken Oye (associate professor of political science and engineering systems); and The "Snowden Affair": Intelligence and Privacy in a Wired World, Susan Chira (assistant managing editor, New York Times), Chas Freeman (retired career diplomat, ambassador, and assistant secretary of defense), Joel Brenner (former senior counsel at the National Security Agency), and moderated by Admiral William Fallon (former head of CENTCOM).
MISTI's Global Teaching Labs
As part of its Global Teaching Labs, MISTI will be sending more than 80 students to Israel, Mexico, Korea, Spain, Italy, and Germany. Originally launched as the pilot program Highlights for High Schools, this experiential teaching program attracts top students looking to share MIT's unique approach to science and engineering education. Select students are matched with foreign high school hosts throughout the country for three weeks in January. At each location students prepare tailored courses on science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) subjects that complement the school's curriculum and highlight MIT's hands–on approach to education.
SSP Wed Seminars
The Security Studies Program's lunchtime lectures included: Elizabeth Hoffman, San Diego State University, on "America: Empire or Umpire, and at What Cost?"; Robert Litwak, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, on "What to Do About Nuclear 'Outliers' Iran and North Korea"; Chappell Lawson, MIT, on "Borders in an Era of Globalization"; and Caitlin Talmadge, George Washington University on "Should I Stay or Should I Go Now? The Future of US Presence in the Persian Gulf," A full list of SSP Seminars for fall 2013 is available here.
CIS Artist in Residence
In October, the Center hosted Jonathan Alpeyrie as an artist in residence. Mr. Alpeyrie's career as a conflict photographer stretches over a decade and has brought him to more than 25 countries and 9 conflict zones, mostly in East Africa, the South Caucasus, the Middle East and central Asia. In the spring of 2013, while in Syria, he was taken hostage for 81 days by Syrian rebels. His one week residency concluded with a public talk "Syria: The Mainstream Media and Its Role in the War," and a photo exhibit from his work while in Syria.
Myron Weiner Seminar Series on International Migration
This semester, the Center hosted a seminar on "Survival Migration: Failed Governance and the Crisis of Displacement," by Alexander Betts, University Lecturer in Refugee Studies and Forced Migration at the University of Oxford. The Myron Weiner Seminar Series explores factors affecting global population movements and their impact upon sending and receiving countries and relations among them. It was named in honor of Myron Weiner, the late founder of the Inter–University Committee on International Migration and former director of CIS.
The Center Audits Syria's Civil War
In September, Brian Haggerty wrote an Audit on "Debating U.S. Interests in Syria's War." He concluds with four distinct questions in an effort to reframe the discussion. In this ongoing series of essays, the Center tours the horizon of conventional wisdoms that inform U.S. foreign policy, and puts them to the test of data and history.
MISTI Receives NAFSA Award
MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives (MISTI) was recently presented with the 2013 Senator Paul Simon Spotlight Award during International Education Week in Washington, D.C. The award is granted by NAFSA: Association of International Educators to innovative university programs that make a significant contribution to campus internationalization. An article in a NAFSA publication noted that, "MISTI has spawned entrepreneurs, academics, and venture capitalists who work on the global stage with language skills on top of advanced technological prowess."