During his opening remarks at the Munich Security Conference in February 2020, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg declared that “[I]n…
The Royal Family of Swaziland Raises Awareness About AIDS
In 1995 the Apartheid era came to an end in South Africa, yet many still found themselves shouldering Apartheid’s tragic…
Pinochet’s Trip to London: How the Arrest of the Chilean Dictator Inspired Unprecedented Global Transparency
In October 1998, the British government arrested former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet at the London Bridge hospital, where he was…
The Times They Are a-Changin’—Labor’s Role in the Foreign Service
The United States underwent great political change following the end of World War II, not only fully abandoning its isolationist…
Do You Hear the People Sing?—Democratic Promotion in Haiti, Mozambique, and Iraq
E Pluribus Unum. The average American will unwittingly encounter these very words on a daily basis and hardly give them…
Justice and Equality: Stories of Progress and Personal Diplomacy in the State Department
As we renew conversations in the United States about what liberty and justice for all truly looks like, we must…
Leveraging a Unique Perspective in Manila Amid Heightened Tensions
Robert H. Stern’s life as a Foreign Service Officer (FSO) took him in many different directions all across the globe.…
The World’s Longest Running Pandemic—Quarantine in Japan
With most of us confined to our homes, jaw-dropping unemployment figures, and over 60,000 deaths worldwide as of April 2020,…
Siberia and Samizdat: Moscow’s Underground During Communism
Long regarded as a monolithic entity where any dissension was ruthlessly suppressed by the KGB, Western audiences often ignored the…
“Dining is the Soul of Diplomacy”
Lord Palmerston, a former British prime minister and three time foreign minister, once famously noted, “Dining is the soul of…