INTERNATIONAL FINANCE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
A safer future for every nation.
While the challenges have changed over the decades — from building multilateral institutions to managing ascending nuclear powers to confronting extremist threats and escalating humanitarian crises — SIPA continues to produce the conceptual frameworks, practical policies, and experts that help shape international collaboration for the safety of people everywhere.
The World Comes to SIPA: Leaders in International Security
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Providing guidance to policy makers around the globe
Stephen Biddle, who joined SIPA in 2018 as professor of international and public affairs, is an expert in security studies who specializes in great power conflict and U.S. defense policy. One of the leading scholars of military affairs of his generation, Biddle is the author of the award-winning, seminal book Military Power: Explaining Victory and Defeat in Modern Battle and, in 2021, Nonstate Warfare: The Military Methods of Guerillas, Warlords, and Militias.
Thomas J. Christensen, a leading expert in Chinese foreign policy and international security, joins SIPA as a professor of international and public affairs. He is co-director of the Columbia-Harvard China and the World Program, which has relocated from Princeton University, where Christiansen had been a faculty member since 2003. Christensen’s most recent book, The China Challenge: Shaping the Choices of a Rising Power, was an editors’ choice at the New York Times Book Review and book of the year at Foreign Affairs magazine. Tom Christensen, one of the nation’s leading experts on China and national security.
In 2021 Jean-Marie Guéhenno, former Under-Secretary-General for Peacebuilding, joined SIPA on a two-year appointment to serve as director of the Kent Program, agreeing to serve after the death of the founding director, Professor Edward C. Luck.
Tamar Mitts, assistant professor of international and public affairs, uses data science and machine learning to examine the dynamics of conflict and political violence, as well as the causes and consequences of radicalization and violent extremism. Her current research examines the behavior of Islamic State supporters on social media. Mitts is also a faculty member at Columbia University's interdisciplinary Data Science Institute.
Keren Yarhi-Milo, a leading scholar of decision-making in foreign policy, jointly appointed in SIPA and the Department of Political Science, came to SIPA from Princeton. She serves as the Arnold Saltzman Professor of War and Peace Studies and directs the Saltzman Institute.
Research Scholars bringing real-world expertise in international security:
Gregory Rattray, a leading cybersecurity expert, is he former head of Global Cyber Partnerships at JP Morgan Chase
Richard Nephew, a former NSC and State Department official, is an Iran sanctions expert and energy researcher
Facing the future of contemporary conflict
The Kent Global Leadership Program on Conflict Resolution, seeks to address these very challenges was established in December 2019 to help prepare the next generation of practitioners for the increasingly difficult challenges posed by contemporary conflict. Through training sessions, campus events, a visiting professorship, and fellowships for students, the program seeks to equip the peacemakers of tomorrow with a broad array of skills.
Edward Luck, former Assistant Secretary-General and Special Advisor to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, re-joined SIPA as director of our Conflict Resolution Specialization. Professor Luck suddenly passed away in February 2021.