The Outlook

Elizabeth Shackelford is the Magro Family Distinguished Fellow in International Affairs for the Spring 2024 term. She served as a career diplomat in the U.S. State Department, with postings in Warsaw, Poland, South Sudan, Somalia, and Washington, D.C. Her outstanding work in South Sudan during the civil war earned her the prestigious Barbara Watson Award for Consular Excellence. She gained international recognition for her principled resignation in protest of the State Department policies of the Trump administration, which sparked important discussions about diplomacy and governance. That led to her book, The Dissent Channel: American Diplomacy in a Dishonest Age, which chronicles the challenges facing US foreign policy in the modern world.

Josh Paul resigned from the State Department in October 2023 due to his disagreement with the Biden Administration's decision to rush lethal military assistance to Israel in the context of its war on Gaza. He had spent over 11 years working as a Director in the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs. He previously worked on security sector reform in both Iraq and the West Bank, with additional roles in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, U.S. Army Staff, and as a Congressional staffer. Josh holds Masters degrees from the Universities of Georgetown and St Andrews, Scotland.

Vivian Salama covers national security for the Wall Street Journal, based in Washington. She has covered U.S. foreign policy and national security issues for nearly two decades, reporting from more than 80 countries. Before moving to Washington, she served as Baghdad bureau chief for the Associated Press, during which time she covered the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria, as well as Iran's growing influence across the region. She also covered the refugee and IDP crisis spurred by the violence, visiting camps across the Middle East. The experience inspired Salama to write a children's book -- The Long Journey Home -- about an innocent Syrian boy who is forced to flee his home because of the war.

Stuart Reid is an executive editor at Foreign Affairs magazine and author of The Lumumba Plot: The Secret History of the CIA and a Cold War Assassination. He has written for publications including The Atlantic, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Bloomberg Businessweek, Politico Magazine, and Slate. Stuart grew up in Ontario and Ohio, and received a bachelor’s degree in Government from Dartmouth College.

Dr. Rose M. Mutiso is the Co-Founder and CEO of The Mawazo Institute, which supports the next generation of female scholars and thought leaders in East Africa, and promotes public engagement with research. She is also the Research Director of the Energy for Growth Hub, a global network connecting research and policymakers to build high-energy systems to power for industry, commerce, and job creation in developing countries. Rose has worked extensively as a researcher and practitioner focused on technology and policy dimensions of energy, environment and innovation globally. Most recently, her work has focused on power sector issues in Africa. She is a Materials Scientist by training with research experience in the fields of nanotechnology and polymer physics. Rose did her undergraduate and doctoral studies at Dartmouth College and the University of Pennsylvania, respectively. She was born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya, where she currently lives, and also splits some of her time in London, UK.

Daniel Fitzgerald Runde is a senior executive and strategist in international development, international trade, investment, global business and organizational change. Runde is the author of the book, "The American Imperative: Reclaiming Global Leadership through Soft Power."

Interview with Micheal Kofman. Michael Kofman is the director of the Russia Studies Program at CNA and an adjunct fellow at the Center for a New American Security. He specializes in the Russian armed forces, military thought, capabilities and strategy. His work is interdisciplinary, integrating defense strategy, military analysis and history. He is also a contributing editor at War on the Rocks, which regularly publishes his articles on the Russia-Ukraine War, Russian strategy, the Russian military, and related subjects in the field of security studies.

World Outlook discusses journalism, Putin’s biography, domestic political implications for Putin due to the successful Ukranian resistance, the theory of Eurasianism in Russian political discourse, the ideological dispositions of Putin, Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, and the ability of international pressure and sanctions in bringing to an end Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with Philip Short, and the positioning of India and China during this invasion. A former foreign correspondent in Moscow, Beijing, and Washington, D.C., for the BBC, the Economist, and the Times of London, Short authored definitive biographies of Mao, Pol Pot, and François Mitterrand. Recently, he has published the biography, Putin, which draws on deep research to reveal the Putin behind the invasion of Ukraine which has dragged Russia back to a dark past. Short spent the 2018-19 academic year with the Dickey Center at Dartmouth College as the Magro Family Distinguished Visitor in International Affairs, while conducting research for Putin.

World Outlook senior editor Sri Sathvik Rayala '24 and associate editors Madeleine Shaw '25, Quinn Hall '26, and Anika Mukker '26 discuss propaganda tools of illiberal governments, democratic movements, challenges proponents of liberal democracy face, motivations that drive proponents of democracy to challenge the status quo, the utility of social media for democratic activists in the Global South, the war against truth by illiberal regimes, and more with Garry Kasparov and Evan Mawarire. Kasparov is a world-renowned Chess Champion, founder of the Renew Democracy Initiative, author, and democracy and human rights advocate from Russia. Mawarire is the creator of the #ThisFlag movement, advocate, speaker, and trainer on nonviolent citizen-driven change, democracy development and human rights from Zimbabwe.

World Outlook senior editor Sri Sathvik Rayala '24 and associate editors Madeleine Shaw '25 and Quinn Hall '26 discuss the relations between Russia, India, and China following the invasion of Ukraine, the threat of nuclear proliferation in Eastern Europe, the stability of the European Union, the possibility of off ramps for de-escalation in the Russo-Ukrainian War, the women-led protests in Iran, and the tensions in the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia with Joseph Cirincione. Cirincione is one of America’s foremost national security experts on nuclear non-proliferation who served as Director for Non-Proliferation at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

World Outlook senior editor Sri Sathvik Rayala '24 and associate editors Madeleine Shaw '25 and Adam Tobeck '25 discuss civil conflict in Mali, the 2015 peace accord in Mali, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, population growth, climate change, inequality, migration, the various initiatives performed by the foreign service for Americans and the international community, and more with Ambassador Bisa William—a career diplomat whose tours include France, Mauritius, and Panama and who served as the ambassador to Niger for three years following her appointment by President Obama in 2010.

World Outlook senior editor Sri Sathvik Rayala '24 and associate editors Madeleine Shaw '25 and Adam Tobeck '25 discuss the Russian invasion of Ukraine, refugees and migration, human rights issues, and more with Ambassador Keith Harper, who served as U.S. Permanent Representative to the United Nations Human Rights Council from 2014 to 2017 during the tenure of the Obama Administration.

Annie Pforzheimer, Acting Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Afghanistan (2018-19), and Dr. Tina Dooley-Jones, Mission Director to USAID Afghanistan (2020-2021), joined World Outlook editors Ben Vagle '22 , Charlie Bateman '22, and Sathvik Rayala '24 to discuss topics concerning Afghanistan, including the U.S. withdrawal, the efficacy of U.S. foreign aid in Afghanistan, the fate of Afghan refugees, and the role of women in U.S. foreign policy.

Update on the implications of elections in Italy's Emilia-Romagna region and Trump's "Deal of the Century" in Israel.

For the season finale, The Outlook has a special episode, with a discussion on Professor Rezvani's work on partially independent territories, a segment filled with takes on the Julian Assange extradition from World Outlook members, and a Q/A with Ambassador Rubin. Thank you for a great first season and thank you to the Class of 2020 for putting in so much time and effort into this organization!

World Outlook editors Ben Vagle '22 and Sathvik Rayala '24 discuss American civil discourse with David Mindich, the Chair of the Department of Journalism at Temple University and the author of Tuned Out: Why Americans Under 40 Don't Follow the News.

For the season finale, The Outlook has a special episode, with a discussion on Professor Rezvani's work on partially independent territories, a segment filled with takes on the Julian Assange extradition from World Outlook members, and a Q/A with Ambassador Rubin. Thank you for a great first season and thank you to the Class of 2020 for putting in so much time and effort into this organization!

Update on the implications of elections in Italy's Emilia-Romagna region and Trump's "Deal of the Century" in Israel.