Democracy
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U.S. efforts to promote democracy in the Middle East have long been paralyzed by the "Islamist dilemma"-a fear that Islamist parties will be the prime beneficiaries of any democratic opening, and prove both hostile to American foreign policy goals internationally and to democratic liberties domestically. This fear is much exaggerated, argues Shadi Hamid of the Project on Middle East Democracy, and the U.S. can establish an acceptable modus vivendi with Islamist democratic movements without compromising either its vital security interests or its commitment to democracy. 

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The Century Foundation
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Shadi Hamid
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In video taken October 14, during a debate with former CIA Director James Woolsey, CDDRL Director Michael A. McFaul attacks the idea that America invaded Iraq solely to promote democracy. McFaul argues that, except in a few rare instances, the United States has never invaded a country unless there was a national security concern.

McFaul and Woolsey also discuss mistakes made in the Iraq War and argue whether or not it was beneficial for either America or Iraq. Woolsey believes a "failure" of the Bush Administration was giving Iraq a "constitution that we [the U.S.] drafted."

The event was sponsored by the Commonwealth Club of California in San Francisco, McFaul debated former CIA Director James Woolsey on international security and how it factors into each presidential campaign's plans for the country. McFaul is a foreign policy advisor to Sen. Barack Obama; Woolsey is an advisor to Sen. John McCain.

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This is a CDDRL seminar within our Democracy in Taiwan Program.

Cliff Tan is Consulting Professor and formerly Visiting Scholar at the Stanford Center for International Development. At SCID, Mr. Tan is writing a book on financial market retrospectives of the Asian financial crisis, how those might or might not differ from well-recorded views of policymakers and academics, and if they differ, whether they offer lessons for the financial market crises of today.  Mr. Tan is also a founding partner in a new charity that will partly invest in global microfinance, and occasionally consults to hedge funds

Prior to SCID, Mr. Tan headed up local markets strategy in fixed income and foreign exchange for Citigroup in Asia. Over 19 years of research on Asia and Japan, Mr. Tan worked as FX/Interest Rate Strategist and co-head of Asian Economics at Warburg Dillon Read (now UBS), Japan/Asia Economist at Wellington Management Company, LLC, and proprietary trading/credit risk economist at Bankers Trust Company. Mr. Tan has been voted a top five currency strategist several times by Asiamoney (including a #1 ranking in 2003) and has also been cited for work as both an economist and strategist by The Asset magazine.

Before entering financial markets, Mr. Tan covered Greater China at the US Federal Reserve Board, was a Lecturer at the University of Hong Kong and was a Visiting Fellow at the Korea Development Institute.

Mr. Tan received M.Phil. and M.A. degrees in Economics from Yale University, an A.M. in East Asian Regional Studies from Harvard University and an A.B. (magna cum laude) in Journalism and East Asian Studies from the University of Southern California.

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Cliff Tan Consulting Professor Speaker Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR)
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Conventional wisdom holds that the United States and the European Union pursue vastly different strategies to promote democracy around the globe. The U.S. is often perceived to rely on coercion, while the EU employs "soft power." This project completed a book demonstrating that American and European strategies to spread democracy display far more similarities than differences. For the first time, leading European and American experts systematically compare U.S.

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Madhu Kishwar is Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi; founder-president of Manushi Sangathan, an organization committed to strengthening democratic rights and women's rights in India; and founder editor of Manushi - A Journal About Women and Society, which has been published continuously since 1978. Her work on issues relating to "Laws, Liberty and Livelihoods" is aimed at evolving a pro-poor agenda of economic reforms in India. Kishwar, the author of numerous books and articles, has lectured extensively in India and abroad, and received many awards for her work. Her two most recent books are Zealous Reformers, Deadly Laws, New Delhi, Sage Publications, 2008; and Deepening Democracy: Challenges of Governance and Globalization in India, New Delhi, Oxford University Press, 2005.

Encina Ground Floor Conference Room

Madhu Kishwar Senior Fellow Speaker The Center for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) in Delhi, co-sponsored by the Stanford Center for South Asia
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The FSI Program on Global Justice and the Iranian Studies Program present A Forum on Akbar Ganji's Road to Democracy in Iran.

Ganji is an Iranian journalist and dissident who was imprisoned in Tehran from 2000 to 2006 and whose writings are currently banned in Iran. He has won numerous prestigious awards in Europe and North America. His 56-day hunger strike turned him into a figure of international fame, with many heads of states and hundreds of the world's most renowned public intellectuals demanding his safety and freedom. Ganji first gained prominence in Iran as an investigative journalist when he helped uncover a government conspiracy to murder Iranian intellectuals. In response, the regime put him in prison for six years. Behind bars, Ganji continued to write and produced his famous Republican Manifesto where he argued in favor of a secular liberal democracy for Iran. In April 2008, Ganji's first English language  book appeared from Boston Review Books/MIT Press: The Road to Democracy in Iran, with an introduction by Joshua Cohen and Abbas Milani. 

Ganji will speak in Farsi with consecutive translation in English, and will be joined on the panel by Abbas Milani, director of the Hamid & Christina Moghadam Program in Iranian Studies at Stanford University, and Martha Nussbaum, Ernst Freud Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago. Program on Global Justice Director Joshua Cohen will moderate the discussion.

Bechtel Conference Center

Program on Global Justice
Encina Hall West, Room 404
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305

(650) 723-0256
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Marta Sutton Weeks Professor of Ethics in Society, and Professor of Political Science, Philosophy, and Law
cohen.jpg MA, PhD

Joshua Cohen is a professor of law, political science, and philosophy at Stanford University, where he also teaches at the d.school and helps to coordinate the Program on Liberation Technology. A political theorist trained in philosophy, Cohen has written extensively on issues of democratic theory—particularly deliberative democracy and the implications for personal liberty, freedom of expression, and campaign finance—and global justice. Cohen is author of On Democracy (1983, with Joel Rogers); Associations and Democracy (1995, with Joel Rogers); Philosophy, Politics, Democracy (2010); The Arc of the Moral Universe and Other Essays (2011); and Rousseau: A Free Community of Equals (2011). Since 1991, he has been editor of Boston Review, a bi-monthly magazine of political, cultural, and literary ideas. Cohen is currently a member of the faculty of Apple University.

CDDRL Affiliated Faculty
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Joshua Cohen Director, Program on Global Justice Moderator Stanford University

615 Crothers Way,
Encina Commons, Room 128A
Stanford University
Stanford, CA 94305

(650) 721-4052
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Research Fellow, Hoover Institution
abbas_milani_photo_by_babak_payami.jpg PhD

Abbas Milani is the Hamid and Christina Moghadam Director of Iranian Studies at Stanford University and a visiting professor in the department of political science. In addition, Dr. Milani is a research fellow and co-director of the Iran Democracy Project at the Hoover Institution.

Prior to coming to Stanford, Milani was a professor of history and political science and chair of the department at Notre Dame de Namur University and a research fellow at the Institute of International Studies at the University of California at Berkeley. Milani was an assistant professor in the faculty of law and political science at Tehran University and a member of the board of directors of Tehran University's Center for International Studies from 1979 to 1987. He was a research fellow at the Iranian Center for Social Research from 1977 to 1978 and an assistant professor at the National University of Iran from 1975 to 1977.

Dr. Milani is the author of Eminent Persians: Men and Women Who Made Modern Iran, 1941-1979, (Syracuse University Press, Syracuse, NY, 2 volumes, November, 2008); King of Shadows: Essays on Iran's Encounter with Modernity, Persian text published in the U.S. (Ketab Corp., Spring 2005); Lost Wisdom: Rethinking Persian Modernity in Iran, (Mage 2004); The Persian Sphinx: Amir Abbas Hoveyda and the Riddle of the Iranian Revolution (Mage, 2000); Modernity and Its Foes in Iran (Gardon Press, 1998); Tales of Two Cities: A Persian Memoir (Mage 1996); On Democracy and Socialism, a collection of articles coauthored with Faramarz Tabrizi (Pars Press, 1987); and Malraux and the Tragic Vision (Agah Press, 1982). Milani has also translated numerous books and articles into Persian and English.

Milani received his BA in political science and economics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1970 and his PhD in political science from the University of Hawaii in 1974.

Hamid and Christina Moghadam Director of Iranian Studies
Co-director of the Iran Democracy Project
CDDRL Affiliated Scholar
Date Label
Abbas Milani Director, Hamid & Christina Moghadam Program in Iranian Studies Panelist Stanford University
Martha Nussbaum Ernst Freud Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics Panelist University of Chicago
Akbar Ganji Iranian dissident journalist and author Keynote Speaker
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