In 2016, the UN Refugee Agency reported 65.3 million forcibly displaced people around the world, including 21.3 million refugees. That's the highest rate of forcible displacement since the agency began tracking the metric 65 years...
The Social Science Bites podcast describes Scott Atran's research as sitting “at the intersection of violent acts and cognitive science.” Atran, an adjunct research professor at the Ford School, seeks to understand what motivates ‘devoted actors’ to...
Two PhD candidates were recently awarded competitive fellowships for their outstanding academic achievements.Christina Cross wins Ford Foundation's 2017 Dissertation FellowshipChristina Cross, a PhD candidate in public policy and sociology, received...
The Ford School is delighted to announce that Tamar Mitts and Fabiana Silva will join us as assistant professors this fall.Tamar MittsTamar Mitts will earn her PhD in political science from Columbia University in May. She specializes in comparative...
Melvyn Levitsky was featured in an article published in U.S. News and World Report today titled, "Cooperation with Russia in Syria Off the Table for Trump Team." The article focuses on the national security team’s decision not to consider any...
The University of Michigan has been ranked fourth as one of the Peace Corps' 2017 top volunteer-producing schools. U-M was also ranked fourth on the Peace Corps’ list of the top-producing graduate schools.According to a Michigan News article, James...
Melvyn Levitsky was featured in a recent Christian Science Monitor article on whether former Utah governor and Obama-era ambassador to China Jon Huntsman would be an effective choice as the U.S. ambassador to Russia.
The article, titled “Jon...
A recent article published in Science magazine says that the best response to some cyberattacks may be to ignore them. The article points to new research conducted by Robert Axelrod and colleagues, which uses game theory to explore how we should...
Whether a nation should retaliate against a cyber attack is a complicated decision, and a new framework guided by game theory could help policymakers determine the best strategy.
The "Blame Game" was developed in part by Robert Axelrod, a...
A new study by Benjamin Edwards, Alexander Furnas, Stephanie Forrest, and Robert Axelrod, titled “Strategic aspects of cyberattack, attribution and blame” was published on February 27 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of...
The National Academy of Sciences has appointed Joy Rohde to serve on an 18-member committee tasked with carrying out a two-year study sponsored by the Office of the Directorate of National Intelligence (ODNI).
The study, titled “Social and...
Susan M. Collins, the Joan and Sanford Weill Dean of Public Policy at the Ford School and a former president of the Association of Professional Schools of International Affairs (APSIA), has signed a "Commitment to Diversity" statement just released...
Transitional Justice in the Middle East and North Africa, a new Oxford University Press book edited by Chandra Lekha Sriram (University of London), focuses on transitional justice in MENA countries in the wake of the Arab Spring. The book features a...
Engaging with youth involved in or susceptible to violent extremism is key in helping the U.S. government understand—and combat—terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda and the Islamic State, according to a position paper, "Challenges in researching...
After the election of President Donald Trump, many writers have sought to understand how his campaign promises will translate into policy. One such exploration, "Wandering foreign policy leaves world on alert," by Claudia Trevisan from the Brazilian...
This April, Bob Axelrod was invited to attend a closed-door workshop at Oxford University's Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict. The focus: The 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.
One year ago, the U.S. and other powerful nations forged an...
In his November 16 op-ed for The Detroit News, “Trump and Putin: Will the personal relationship matter?”, Melvyn Levitsky asks: “While it would be in both countries’ national interests to try to find areas of cooperation, will [Trump’s and Putin’s]...
“How is incendiary rhetoric like [Philippine President Rodrigo] Duterte’s likely to affect a strong defense partnership and regional security more broadly?” John Ciorciari tackles this question in his September 21 piece in The Conversation, “Is...
“The International Policy Center is pleased to host visiting scholar Tim Maurer, who is conducting cutting-edge research on cybersecurity and writing a book on the roles of non-state actors,” says John Ciorciari, director of the Ford School’s...
We are pleased to announce a new director of the University of Michigan's Science, Technology, and Public Policy (STPP) graduate certificate program and to welcome applications from interested students. Associate Professor Shobita Parthasarathy,...
Stephanie Gusching (BA '18) submits this field report from her internship in San Salvador, El Salvador, where she worked at the U.S. Embassy through the U.S. Department of State Student Internship Program.Review more internship field reports from...
The Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy is delighted to announce that Andrew (Drew) Mann has joined us as a U.S. Department of State Diplomat in Residence.Diplomats in Residence are career Foreign Service officers and specialists who provide...
Evan Charney (BA '18) is submitting this field report from his summer 2016 internship at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy in Washington, DC.This summer I interned as a research assistant at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy...
Susan Waltz and Hossam Abouzahr (MPP ’10) have collaborated on an op-ed, published earlier today in the Atlantic Council’s SyriaSource blog, on “Sanctions as a viable action in a complicated environment.”The House of Representatives, they explain,...
This July—a week after the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) issued what John Ciorciari called “a sweeping repudiation of China’s maritime claims in the South China Sea,” Ciorciari wrote an op-ed for China-US Focus titled, “Reverberations of the...
An article by Bob Axelrod and Larissa Forster (ARTIS Research), "How Historical Analogies in Newspapers of Five Countries Make Sense of Major Events: 9/11, Mumbai and Tahrir Square," has been published by the journal Research in Economics....
“Can War Foster Cooperation?” Michal Bauer, Christopher Blattman, Julie Chytilová, Joseph Henrich, Edward Miguel and Tamar Mitts pose this question in the summer 2016 volume of The Journal of Economic Perspectives.
Introduction
Warfare leaves...
Maha Arshad (MPP '17) submits this internship field report from her summer 2016 service with the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism (START) in College Park, Maryland.Being in the DC area with driven...
In “The inevitable decline of Putin’s Russia,” an article in U.S. News & World Report, Melvyn Levitsky describes the risks of escalating military responses to Vladimir Putin’s land grabs, military incursions, and aggressive rhetoric.“I just don’t...
John Ciorciari, who joined the Ford School as an assistant professor of public policy in 2009, has been promoted to associate professor of public policy with tenure.His promotion was approved at the May 19, 2016 meeting of the University of Michigan...
