Europe’s “Eastern Crisis” has witnessed the massing of military forces, armed intervention, and the forceful occupation of territory, combined with harsh rhetoric and outright falsehoods that hinder the pursuit of diplomatic solutions. The situation is eerily reminiscent of the 1930s, when another authoritarian state sought to reverse the consequences of what it perceived as an unfair peace settlement and mounted an aggressive campaign that engulfed the world in a disastrous war. An interdisciplinary panel of Russian, Ukrainian, and US experts will help us understand how we got to this point and what can be done.

Panelists

Mark R. Beissinger, Henry W. Putnam Professor of Politics, Princeton University

Bryn Rosenfeld, Assistant Professor, Department of Government, Cornell University

Kateryna Pishchikova, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations, eCampus University

Nicholas Rostow, Visiting Professor of Law, Cornell Law School

Moderator

Matthew Evangelista, President White Professor of History and Political Science, Department of Government, Cornell University

Presented by the Judith Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, with co-sponsorship from the Institute of European Studies at the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, and the Institute of Politics and Global Affairs, Cornell University.

About the Series

The new Einaudi Center Critical Conversations Series brings together world-class regional, historical, and comparative experts to promote deeper understanding of global current events and emerging crises on the world stage. The stakes for our shared future have never been higher—so please join us for these critical conversations.

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This webinar, hosted by the Cornell SC Johnson College of Business, features experts in finance, international policy, and labor economics discussing the unprecedented sanctions being levied at Russia in response to its invasion of Ukraine.

This is a hybrid event. Registration information is below.

Dr. Henry Maar argues for the significance of the often-overlooked Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign to the arms control talks at the end of the Cold War. Launched in 1979 based on the ideas of Randall Forsberg, the Freeze campaign rallied the public for a simple, yet radical proposal: bilaterally halt (or "freeze") the testing, deployment, and production of nuclear weapons between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Freeze campaign soon catapulted into the mainstream of political discussion, garnering bipartisan endorsements from the US Congress. The highest levels of the Reagan White House privately conceded the antinuclear backlash was potentially the most important national security challenge facing the administration. As the Freeze grew in popularity, the administration was left with a choice: reverse its nuclear saber-rattling or continue to face the ire of the public at the ballot box.

About the speaker

Henry Maar is a modern US Historian specializing in the relationship between domestic politics, peace activism, and US foreign relations. He is the author of FREEZE! The Grassroots Movement to Halt the Arms Race and End the Cold War, published by Cornell University Press. He received his Ph.D. in History from UC Santa Barbara in 2015 and was subsequently the Agnese N. Huary post-doctoral fellow at New York University's Center for the Study of the Cold War and the United States. He has previously taught at UC Santa Barbara and Shanghai Jiao Tong University and is currently a lecturer at California State University, Northridge.

Read his recently published article in the Washington Post.

This seminar is part of the spring seminar series with the Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS).

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In accordance with university event guidance, all campus visitors who are 12 years old or older must also present a photo ID, as well as proof of vaccination for COVID-19 or results of a recent negative COVID-19 test. If you are not currently participating in the Cornell campus vaccination/testing program, please bring proof of vaccination or the results of a recent negative test.