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1. Elite Cues or Social Cues? The Formation of Public Opinion on Foreign Policy

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen and Joshua D. Kertzer
Publication Date:
02-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
In July 2014, a wave of violence erupted in the Middle East, as Israel responded to a barrage of rockets from Gaza by launching airstrikes, and eventually, a ground incursion intent on degrading Hamas’s military capabilities. In Washington, both Democrats and Republicans firmly sided with Israel: the Senate passed a unanimous resolution blaming Hamas for the conflict, and both prominent Democrats and Republicans gave staunch defenses of Israel’s right to defend itself. Although both Democrats and Republicans in Washington were united in their support for Israel, a series of polls conducted at the time found that Democrats and Republicans in the public were not aligned with them: in a Pew poll, for example, 60 percent of Republicans blamed Hamas for the violence, while Democrats were more evenly split, with 29 percent blaming Hamas and 26 percent blaming Israel. A Gallup poll detected a similar pattern: 65 percent of Republicans thought Israel’s actions were justified, but Democrats were more divided, as 31 percent backed the Israeli response, and 47 percent called it unjustified.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Public Opinion, Military Affairs, Political Parties, and Hamas
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, Israel, Palestine, and North America

2. Now That TPP Is off the Table, What's Next for NAFTA?

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
03-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
After President Trump withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement earlier this year, it seemed that NAFTA was next in his crosshairs. But soon President Trump is expected to take a measured approach to the issue of trade and step away—at least temporarily—from his threats to dismantle the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) by signing an executive order calling for a comprehensive study of US trade imbalances. The Trump worldview has consistently blamed foreign trade deficits, especially those with China, for job losses here at home. He has wanted to take down NAFTA to purportedly save American jobs, calling it “the single worst trade deal ever approved in this country.”Much like healthcare, trade networks are complicated, and not all agreements have the same goals. It’s instructive to take a closer look at both TPP and NAFTA, two very different trade agreements, to evaluate how a more protectionist stance might play out. Heavily promoted by the Obama administration, TPP would have allowed the United States to form a trade consortium with eleven Pacific Rim nations (representing 40 percent of the world’s GDP) to secure market access and protections for certain US industries. More than this, the political reason to join TPP was to provide a US-led counterweight to China’s growing dominance in the region’s economy.
Topic:
Regional Cooperation, NAFTA, Trans-Pacific Partnership, and Trade
Political Geography:
United States, China, Canada, Asia, North America, and Mexico

3. Hard Times for Soft Power: A Q&A with Joseph Nye

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
05-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Last December, the Weatherhead Center recognized the upcoming retirement of University Distinguished Service Professor Joseph S. Nye, Jr. by dedicating the 2016 Manshel Lecture on American Foreign Policy to him. One of the most influential foreign affairs scholars of our time, Nye served as Center director from 1989 to 1992—though his roots at the Center trace back to its infancy in 1961, when he was a research assistant to Director Robert Bowie. Nye's accomplishments run deep. He began his distinguished career as a Harvard faculty member at the Kennedy School of Government in 1964, and became the school's dean in 1995. He held security appointments in both the Carter and Clinton administrations, and his thought leadership has influenced heads of state and policy makers around the world. He is perhaps best known for coining the term “soft power,” which describes the ability of states or institutions to attract and persuade others through noncoercive means. The Weatherhead Center sat down with Nye to discuss the fate of soft power in the context of current US foreign affairs—and also asked him to share his memories of early days at the CFIA.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Science and Technology, and Soft Power
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, China, Europe, Asia, and North America

4. What We Think about When We Think of Crime

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
10-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Jean and John Comaroff, professors in the Departments of African and African American Studies and of Anthropology, divide their teaching and research between Harvard and universities in South Africa. Their scholarship has focused on colonialism and the transformation of societies in the postcolonial and late modern worlds. A recent joint effort, The Truth about Crime, documents their “existential engagement” with the interplay of crime, policing, and sovereignty, in response to what they see as a rising global preoccupation. The Comaroffs joined the academic boycott of South Africa in the 1970s and 1980s until the transition of power and formal end of apartheid in 1994. Upon their return to Cape Town, they immediately noticed an overwhelming preoccupation with crime in South Africa. Their desire to unpack this obsession, and what it says about modernity and our relationship to the state, is the subject of their book. Together, the Comaroffs consider the economic, political, and sociological shifts that underlie modern attitudes toward criminality and how these shifts have contributed to the fear of one another, to racial violence, and to public distrust in government. The Weatherhead Center spoke to the Comaroffs from their home in Cape Town, and asked them to tease out some of the complex relationships between crime and policing and how they affect the concept of citizenship.
Topic:
Crime, Politics, Democracy, and Police
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, South Africa, and North America

5. Life and Death on the US-Mexico Border

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Ieva Jusionyte has always been drawn to tensions at the border. As a graduate student, she went right to the heart of the drug and human smuggling nexus of Puerto Iguazu, a town at the tri-border area of Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina, to research how the media reported on crime. While there, she developed a deep interest in the experiences of firefighters and rescue workers, and later, in the US, trained to become a certified emergency medical technician, paramedic, and wildland firefighter. Most recently, she embedded herself at the US-Mexico border for a year, using her technical skills to help first responders on both sides of the divide. She reasoned that firefighters and EMTs would face many of the human consequences of national security policy on a daily basis. In order to fully leverage her insights as an anthropologist, she felt she needed to participate. In Nogales, Arizona, she volunteered as an EMT with the suburban fire department, responding to 911 calls—whether it was for a wildfire or for a critically ill or wounded person. Across the border in Nogales, Mexico, she delivered first aid to injured migrants and deportees on a bench in a soup kitchen, which also served as a humanitarian and legal center. Her forthcoming book, Threshold: Emergency and Rescue on the U.S.-Mexico Border will bring together the experiences of the first responders and residents of the local border communities, to take stock of the real-life impact of US national security measures.
Topic:
Immigration, Culture, Borders, and Local
Political Geography:
United States, North America, and Mexico

6. Cross-National Responses to Discrimination: A Q&A with Michèle Lamont

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Racism and discrimination are daily realities for members of marginalized groups. But what does it look like at the ground level, and how do individuals from various groups and countries respond to such experiences? Drawing on more than 400 in-depth interviews with middle class and working class men and women residing in the multi-ethnic suburbs of New York, Rio, and Tel Aviv, and representing five different racial “groups,” a team of sociologists examine how people deal with and make sense of the various forms of exclusion that are ever present in their lives.
Topic:
Race, Women, Discrimination, and Marginalization
Political Geography:
United States, Middle East, Israel, Brazil, South America, and North America

7. he World That Awaits President-Elect Trump

Author:
Michelle Nicholasen
Publication Date:
11-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
During the 2016 primaries, Donald Trump claimed he had more foreign policy experience than any of the GOP contenders. In fact, he has traveled widely to meet with presidents, prime ministers, financiers, and developers over the past decade as part of his highly profitable business of licensing the Trump name to large real estate developments around the world. On the campaign trail, Trump’s provocative statements about foreign policy have become part of the public record. From pressuring NAFTA members to bombing ISIS, his pledges have caused a stir in the arena of foreign relations. Publicly, candidate Trump threatened to close borders to Mexicans, slap tariffs on Chinese goods, restrict Muslims in the United States, among other vows. Without a record of public service to draw on, it is difficult to know how these declarations might translate into a Trump foreign policy. To understand what lies ahead for the new president, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs asked its Faculty Associates in international relations to comment on the challenges and opportunities that await in five regions of the world: Africa, the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), Latin America, Europe, and China.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Elections, ISIS, and NAFTA
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, China, Europe, Middle East, Asia, Latin America, and North America