Paragraphs

In 2008, when Michael McFaul was asked to leave his perch at Stanford and join an unlikely presidential campaign, he had no idea that he would find himself at the beating heart of one of today’s most contentious and consequential international relationships. As President Barack Obama’s adviser on Russian affairs, McFaul helped craft the United States’ policy known as “reset” that fostered new and unprecedented collaboration between the two countries. And then, as U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2012 to 2014, he had a front-row seat when this fleeting, hopeful moment crumbled with Vladimir Putin’s return to the presidency. This riveting inside account combines history and memoir to tell the full story of U.S.-Russia relations from the fall of the Soviet Union to the new rise of the hostile, paranoid Russian president. From the first days of McFaul’s ambassadorship, the Kremlin actively sought to discredit and undermine him, hassling him with tactics that included dispatching protesters to his front gates, slandering him on state media, and tightly surveilling him, his staff, and his family.

From Cold War to Hot Peace is an essential account of the most consequential global confrontation of our time.

All Publications button
1
Publication Type
Books
Publication Date
Journal Publisher
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Authors
Michael A. McFaul
Paragraphs

A year into the Trump Administration, the health and stability of American democracy remain an open question. At a time when almost four in 10 Americans say they are not satisfied with the way democracy is working in the U.S., there is ample reason to ask how committed the American people are to our democracy. While understanding dissatisfaction with our political system is quite important, knowing the degree to which Americans are open to actual departures from democracy has a deeper, more existential value at a time when populist political leaders and parties have gained significant momentum around the globe. Taking advantage of a battery of questions included in the July 2017 VOTER Survey (Views of the Electorate Research Survey) from the Democracy Fund Voter Study Group, we seek to understand more about these contemporary Americans who are not only questioning democratic norms but also affirmatively endorsing authoritarian alternatives.

Download PDF followtheleader_2018mar13.pdf

 

All Publications button
1
Publication Type
Journal Articles
Publication Date
Authors
Larry Diamond
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs

How NOT to regulate social media: "To say that digital technology has disrupted society is already a cliché. Yet we are only just starting to grasp the radical break we are facing with respect to our legal institutions and norms" writes Eileen Donahoe, Executive Director of the Global Digital Policy Incubator for The American Interest. Read here.

Hero Image
facebook 1905890 1920
All News button
1
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs

"The United States and its liberal democratic allies must develop a new global strategy to counter the power projection of expansive autocracies and to reboot an international campaign to promote democratic values and ideas. But we also need to renew the core of what we are fighting for: the worth of our own democracy," writes Larry Diamond in "How to Reverse the Degradation of Our Politics."

Hero Image
choice 2692575 1920
All News button
1
News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs

"Trump is acting in manner that suggests that he hopes to repeat his 2016 feat of winning the Electoral College but not the popular vote.  What he has said and done to date is consistent with that strategic premise. The key elements of Trump’s agenda: stoke the populist base, split white from nonwhite Democrats and Independents, and take advantage of a favorable political geography.  Since the President’s popularity hovers at or just under 40 percent, a purely Electoral College strategy may at this point be his only option," writes Bruce E. Cain in The American Interest article "Trump’s Re-Election Strategy."

Hero Image
trump 2546104 1920
All News button
1
News Type
Commentary
Date
Paragraphs

"The normal functioning of our check-and-balance system has been dependent on some degree of cooperation between the parties. It has seized up in recent years as the parties have become more polarized and ideological," writes CDDRL Mosbacher Director Francis Fukuyama for The American Interest. Read the article here.

Hero Image
constitution 1486010 1280
All News button
1
News Type
News
Date
Paragraphs

“All of us involved with the Program on American Democracy in Comparative Perspective think the demarcation between American and comparative politics is fuzzy,” Kuo said -- hence the program's name. Even the center’s Americanist faculty members do comparative work, she added, and the “rest of us are comparativists who have long believed that the U.S. should be considered a case in comparative analysis,” says Didi Kuo for www.insidehighered.com. Read the article here.

Hero Image
american flag 2727312 1920
All News button
1
Subscribe to United States