PEOPLE

Barton L. Weller Professor of Development Economics Alice Amsden taught in three South African cities this May with APORDE, the French Foreign Ministry's Organization for Alternative Approaches to Economic Development.

In April, Baktybek (Bakyt) Beshimov, a visiting researcher at CIS, lectured at the Monterey Institute of International Studies on “The Role of Culture, Democracy and the Rule of Law in the Nation Building Experiment in Kyrgyzstan”, and at the Naval Post-Graduate School on “Central Asian Security and the Role of Big Powers.” He also gave a speech in New York organized by the Institute of International Education.

Ph.D. Candidate Nathan Black was selected to be a 2011-2012 Predoctoral Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. He also was awarded a Smith Richardson Foundation World Politics and Statecraft Fellowship for 2011.

Mellon Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies Post-doctoral Fellow and CIS Affiliate Sarah Zukerman Daly gave several recent talks: "State Strategies in Multiethnic Territories: Explaining 'Riotous Variation' in the Former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc," at the Association for the Study of Nationalities Convention, New York, April 14, 2011; "Post-War Reintegration or Recidivism of Ex-Combatants," at the Midwest Political Science Association Annual Meeting, Chicago, March 31, 2011; and "Bankruptcy, Guns or Campaigns: Explaining Armed Organizations' Post-War Trajectories" for the International Politics Seminar, Columbia University, New York, NY, March 2011. She also attended a conference on "Organized Crime and State Capture," in Lima, Peru, and gave a talk to the Colombian Government and Organization of American States on "Ex-Combatant Recidivism," both this spring.

Ph.D. Candidate Kristen Fabbe was hired as an Assistant Professor of Government, Claremont McKenna College, in Claremont, CA. She will take up her position in winter 2012. 
 

Keren Fraiman

During March, Ph.D. Candidate Keren Fraiman presented her paper “Not in Your Backyard: Coercion, Base States, and Violent Non-state Actors” on the panel “When Terror Works: Analyzing the Success and Failure of Terrorist Operations” at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, in Montreal, Quebec. 

Cecil and Ida Green Career Development Associate Professor of Political Science M. Taylor Fravel recently spoke on: "China's Strategy in the South China Sea" at the Center for Naval Analysis, Alexandria, VA, April 2011; "Explaining the Evolution of China's Military Strategy" at MIT, Stanford, and Ohio State this winter; and "Myths about China's Military Modernization and the Potential for US-China Conflict," Tobin Project Workshop on the Prudent Use of Force, December 2010. 

Security Studies Program affiliate Jeanne Guillemin chaired the plenary session on "Biosecurity" at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington, DC, February 20, 2011. Panelists included Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute for Allergies and Infectious Diseases, Rita Colwell, former head of the National Science Foundation, Claire Fraser-Liggett, director of the Institute for Genome Sciences at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and New Jersey U.S. Representative Rush Holt.

Annette M. Kim, Associate Professor in the International Development Group of the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, was the POSCO visiting fellow at the East-West Center in January 2011 during which time she wrote and presented a working paper entitled, "The Ties that Bind: analysis of recent civilian economic activity in North Korea."

Ph.D. Candidate Peter Krause was hired as an Assistant Professor at Boston College starting in fall 2012. In 2011-2012 he will be a Junior Research Fellow at the Crown Center for Middle East Studies at Brandeis University. In March he presented a paper "The Political Effectiveness of Non-State Violence: Paradox, Polarity, and the Pursuit of Power" at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Montreal, Quebec. 

Ph.D. candidate Tara Maller was named a Visiting Scholar at the American Political Science Association Centennial Center in Washington, D.C. 
 

Harlene Miller

Harlene Miller, an Administrative Assistant with the Security Studies Program, received a SHASS Infinite Mile Award in the category of "Unsung Hero." Miller has been with SSP for eleven years and was honored for being a valuable asset to the program, including taking on new challenges on short notice, and offering help and support to faculty, staff and students alike. 

Ph.D. Candidate Reo Matsuzaki will be a Postdoctoral Fellow starting in September 2011, at Stanford University's Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. This April, he presented his paper "Building Colonial Governance in Early Twentieth Century Taiwan and the Philippines: Similar Contexts, Different Outcomes," at Joint Conference of the Association for Asian Studies and the International Convention of Asia Scholars, Honolulu, Hawaii. 

CIS Postdoctoral Fellow Gautum Mukunda accepted a position as an Assistant Professor in the Organizational Behavior Unit of Harvard Business School, starting fall 2011. He was also chosen as a White House Fellows Regional Finalist and received but declined a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellowship.
 

Vipin Narang

Assistant Professor of Political Science Vipin Narangspoke on regional power deterrence at George Washington University (Jan 2011), University of Wisconsin-Madison (Feb 2011), and the University of Virginia (April 2011). He was also a panelist on the "Nuclear Risk Reduction in South Asia after Mumbai" session at the Carnegie International Nuclear Policy Conference (March 2011). 

Thomas Neff, Research Affiliate at CIS, has been advising Japanese authorities on initiatives to help resolve the Fukushima accident (one of his former students is Vice Chairman of the Japan Atomic Energy Commission). One of his comments to Reuters (also referring to CIS) went viral on the internet in March when he called the Japanese disaster "a slow-moving nightmare" resulting in more than a half million citations (Google: "Thomas Neff nightmare"). He continues to advise the Department of Energy on nuclear policy issues. He is architect of the U.S.-Russia Highly Enriched Uranium deal that has resulted, to date, in the destruction of more than 17,000 nuclear weapons, converting them to nuclear fuel that supplies 10 percent of U.S. electricity. 

Ford International Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center's Security Studies Program Barry Posen was quoted extensively in "Stand Alone: the Case for a New Isolationism," Boston Globe, February 6, 2011. He was also quoted extensively, with SSP alumni Daryl Press and Alan Kuperman, in an April 4, 2011 NPR article titled "Can 'Limited' U.S. Engagement in Libya Stay Limited?" On April 12, 2011, he was a panelist at an event "After Libya—Revival of the Age of Intervention?" at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University.

Ph.D. Candidate Miranda Priebe was awarded a Smith Richardson Foundation World Politics and Statecraft Fellowship for 2011.

Associate Professor of Law and Development and Director of the MIT Program on Human Rights and Justice Balakrishnan Rajagopal delivered three lectures: Keynote Lecture at the Toronto Graduate Law Conference, York University, Canada, January 29, 2011; Valerie Gordon Human Rights Lecture, Northeastern University Law School, March 23, 2011; and the Keynote Lecture at the Institute for the Study of Political Economy and Law at the International University College of Turin (IUC), Italy, in May 2011. He was also appointed by the government of Turkey as a member of the International Academic Advisory Group for the UN Conference on Least Developed Countries, and will attend the conference in Ankara in May 2011. During his spring 2011 sabbatical, he is a Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusaleml. 

Ford International Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for International Studies Richard Samuels spoke on the Japanese earthquake and nuclear crisis in a variety of venues in March: a CIS Starr Forum; on CNN.com; and on National Public Radio's nationally syndicated program, "On Point."

CIS Affiliate Carol R. Saivetz has been invited to be a contributing guest editor of a special volume of the journal, Communist and Post-Communist Studies. The issue will deal with contemporary Russian foreign policy. This past year, she chaired a joint CIS/SSP seminar series "Central Asia in Global Affairs." 

Ford International Professor of Political Science Ben Ross Schneider gave talks on: "Hierarchical Capitalism and Business Politics in Latin America," for the Danish Institute for International Studies, in Copenhagen, March 2011; "The Low Skill Trap and Hierarchical Capitalism in Latin America," at Georgetown University, January 2011; and "Labor Markets in Latin America: Informality, Inflexibility, and Other Complementarities," for the Conference on Reviving Political Economy, at the University of Coimbra, October 2010.
 

David Singer

Associate Professor of Political Science David Andrew Singer presented a draft chapter of his manuscript, "Migration and Global Capital," to the Program on International Politics, Economics, and Security (PIPES) seminar at the University of Chicago, and at the Harvard Comparative Politics Seminar, both in April 2011. He also participated in a featured roundtable discussion on "The Future of Global Economic Governance" at the Midwest Political Science Association Annual Meeting, March 2011.


Ph.D. Candidate Joshua Shifrinson was named a 2011-2012 Predoctoral Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. He was awarded three research grants: a Title VIII Research Grant at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars; a Tobin Project National Security Fellowship; and a Graduate Dissertation Research Fellowship from Harvard's Center for European Studies.

Professor of Political Science Edward Steinfeld and CIS affiliate Peter Goodings Swartz have received research funding from the Indiana University Research Center for Chinese Politics and Business' "Initiative on China and Global Governance" for their proposal: "Making Markets both at Home and Abroad: The Evolution of China's Futures Exchange for Copper."

Ph.D. Candidate Caitlin Talmadge presented her paper “Explaining Military Effectiveness: Political Intervention and Iraqi Battlefield Performance, 1980-1988,” in March at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Montreal, Quebec. Also in March she joined a delegation of American academics, former government officials, and think tank scholars to Taiwan, led by former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. 

Professor of Political Economy in the International Development Group at DUSP,Judith Tendler, was honored at a Festschrift celebration co-hosted by the Department of Urban Studies and Planning (DUSP), the Special Program in Urban and Regional Studies (SPURS), and the Political Science Department. Attending the Festschrift event were one hundred faculty, alumni, SPURS Fellows, and others from MIT and all over the world. The all-day session had four panels, with 12 Tendler ex-advisees presenting their current research. Following was a dinner, with guest speaker (Brazilian governor/senator Tasso Jereissati), in addition to lively and humorous toasts and dancing late into the evening.

Ph.D. Candidate Joseph Peter Torigian presented his paper "The Rhetoric of Rise" on the panel "Reassessing Power Transitions," in March at the 2011 Annual Meeting of the International Studies Association, Montreal, Quebec.

Associate Professor of Political Science Lily L. Tsai talked on “Exit as Voice: Regime-Reinforcing Noncompliance in Rural China” at Harvard University’s Harvard-Yenching Institute, in May; the University of Wisconsin-Madison, in May; and Yale University, in January. She also spoke about “Village Solidarity Groups in Rural China,” at the Conference on Civil Society and Nonprofits in China, Harvard University, in January. 

Sarah Jane Vaughan joins CIS as an Administrative Assistant. She coordinates events for the Migration Seminar and the Program on Human Rights and Justice, supports the Wilhelm fellows, and serves as a faculty assistant to Professor Ken Oye. Prior to coming to MIT, she worked in student affairs at Harvard Law School and taught English in South Korea. Sarah Jane received her master's degree in English from Loyola Marymount University, and her bachelor's degree from Kalamazoo College. 

Security Studies Program Research Associate Jim Walsh presented his paper, “The Additional Protocol in the Middle East and North Africa: Explaining Lag in Adoption,” at the DTRA Workshop on Nonproliferation Decision-making in February. Also in February, he gave a talk on North Korea for the Harvard Project on Asian and International Relations Conference; and two talks on Iran at the Tufts EPIIC Conference. In March, he made numerous media appearances on CNN to discuss the Japanese earthquake. 

Ph.D. Candidate David Weinberg received a research grant award from the George C. Marshall Foundation/Baruch Fund for excellence in diplomatic or military history. His research focuses on intentional U.S. efforts to influence internal politics in the Palestinian Authority and Israel. 

Principal Research Scientist Cindy Williams prepared a policy analysis for the German Ministry of Defense, March 2011, "Von der Wehrpflichtigen- zur Freiwilligenarmee: Erkentnisse aus verbündeten Staaten," with Bjoern H. Seibert. She also presented her paper "Regional Representation in the U.S. Military," at the conference "Defense and Its Realms," sponsored by ENSTA Bretagne, France, and the University of Western Brittany, Brest, France, April 15, 2011. 

PUBLISHED

Alice Amsden in Is the World Trade Organization Attractive Enough for Emerging Economies?

Barton L. Weller Professor of Development Economics Alice Amsden, "Growth Identification and Facilitation: The Role of the State in the Dynamic of Structural Change," Development Policy Review, March 29, 2011 (debate with the Chief Economist of the World Bank, Justin Lin).

_______ "The WTO: A Sweet or Sour Chinese Banquet?," in Zdanek Drabek (ed.), Is the World Trade Organization Attractive Enough for Emerging Economies? Critical Essays on the Multilateral Trading System, (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010.) 

Visiting researcher at CIS, Baktybek (Bakyt) Beshimov, 1992-2008: A New Phase in the History of the Ferghana Valley,in S. Frederick Starr (ed.) Ferghana Valley: The Heart of Central Asia (New York: M.E. Sharpe, 2011) (with Pulat Shozimov and Murat Bakhadyrov). 

Mellon Foundation/American Council of Learned Societies Post-doctoral Fellow and CIS Affiliate Sarah Zukerman Daly, "The Roots of Coercion and Insurgency: Exploiting the Counterfactual Case," Conflict, Security & Development, Vol. 11, No. 2, May 2011.

_______"Reintegration of Ex-Combatants" in Lavinia Stan and Nadya Nedelsky (eds.), Encyclopedia of Transitional Justice, (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011.) 

Cecil and Ida Green Career Development Associate Professor of Political Science, M. Taylor Fravel, "International Relations Theory and China's Rise: Assessing China's Potential for Territorial Expansion," International Studies Review, Vol. 12, No. 4 (December 2010). 

Ph.D. Candidate Benjamin Friedman, "Managing Fear: The Politics of Homeland Security," Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 126, No. 1 (Spring 2011). 

_______"When Intervention Is Easy" Philadelphia Inquirer, April 8, 2011 (with Emeritus Professor of Political Science, Harvey Sapolsky). 

_______“New Republicans, Same Old Militarism,” Philadelphia Inquirer, January 24, 2011. 

_______"Overwrought on START,” National Interest (Online), December 1, 2010 (with Principal Research Scientist, Owen Cote, Jr.).   

Ph.D. Candidate Lu Gao, “Achievements and Challenges: 30 Years of Housing Reforms in the People’s Republic of China,” Asian Development Bank Working Paper Series, No. 198, April 2010. 

Associate Professor in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning Annette Kim, "Real Rights to the City: Cases of Property Rights Changes Towards Equity in Eastern Asia," Urban Studies, 48(3): 459-69, 2011.

_______"Talking Back: The Role of Narratives in Vietnam's Recent Land Compensation Changes," Urban Studies, 48(3): 493-508, 2011.  

Joshua Shifronson and Miranda Priebe inInternational Security

Ford International Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for International Studies Richard Samuels, "Japan's Black Swan," Foreign Policy Magazine, March 16, 2011 (with Robert Madsen).

Ph.D. Candidates Joshua Shifrinson and Miranda Priebe, "A Crude Threat: The Limits of an Iranian Missile Campaign Against Saudi Arabian Oil," International Security Vol. 36, No. 1 (Summer 2011).

Ph.D. Candidate Tara Maller, "Diplomacy Derailed: The Consequences of Diplomatic Sanctions," Washington Quarterly, Volume 33, No. 3.

Associate Professor of Political Science Lily L. Tsai, "Friends or Foes? Nonstate Public Goods Providers and Local State Authorities in Nondemocratic and Transitional Systems," Studies in Comparative International Development, Vol. 46, No. 1 (Spring 2011).