The Institute for European Studies (IES) promotes learning and research about European societies, languages, and cultures, while contributing to the training of a new generation of global citizens. IES was among the first major U.S. university institutes to combine Eastern and Western European studies more than thirty years ago. Since then, we have updated this perspective by placing European countries and the European Union in a global and comparative context. The undergraduate minor in European Studies is administered by IES.
In the late 1990s, a new private military company (PMC) from South Africa, Executive Outcomes, intervened in Angola and Sierra Leone, where the company's operations ushered in a ceasefire.
