Past Grants

Matthew Goodman will explore potential scenarios that could unfold in a trade conflict between the United States and China. He will examine their potential economic impacts and assess responses that U.S policymakers could take. The project’s findings will appear in a report, a series of briefings, and an interactive website.

Hillel Fradkin, Hussain Haqqani, and Eric Brown will edit and publish Current Trends in Islamist Ideology, a journal that analyzes the ideological and politicaldebates within and among transnational Islamist movements.

Valerie Lincy and Gary Milhollin will examine the nuclear and ballistic missile programs of Iran and the evolution of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and the sanctions regime designed to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The project’s findings will be presented on the Iran Watch website andthrough policy briefings.

Laura Quinby and Gal Wettstein will examine how changes in Rhode Island’s public-employee pension policies affected state and local government budgets and employee decisions on whether to work in the public sector. They will analyze the extent to which reforms undertaken by Rhode Island in 2005 and 2009 reduced the costs of public pensions for state and local governments and how employees responded to these changes, including whether younger employees chose to leave government service. The project’s findings will appear in a report and a series of policy briefs.

Alan Taylor, Òscar Jordà, and Moritz Schularick will research and write a book examining the extent to which increased levels of public and private sector debt have led to financial instability and hampered economic growth. They will synthesize findings from their analysis of a dataset that they have built containing information of public and private sector debt in 17 countries over a 145-year period.

Ilan Berman will lead an effort to explore how the United States can partner with leaders from tolerant traditions of Islam to provide a counterweight to the violent radical Islamism of al Qaida and its affiliated movements. He will undertake a net assessment of the current political competition against radical Islam, prepare a series of case studies assessing various models of relatively moderate Islamic governance, and identify the lessons learned from those case studies. The project’s findings will appear in a report.

Kathleen Hicks will develop a playbook for gray-zone conflicts in which powers like China and Russia pursue their objectives with coercive means short of conventional war. She will commission research to identify the potential repertoire of U.S. gray-zone instruments and to develop a concept for their integrated employment. The project’s findings will appear in a report and a series of policy briefings.

Nikolai Sokov and Dmitry Adamsky will examine how Russia might use its military and non-military instruments of power to shape events in Europe and around the world. They will examine Russian military writings and undertake case studies of Russian policies and actions vis-à-vis NATO, Ukraine, and Syria, testing the theory of so-called new generation warfare against Russian practice. The project’s findings will appear in a co-authored monograph.

Christopher Sullivan will research and write a book identifying the conditions under which peaceful political orders emerge in the aftermath of civil conflict. Relying on local archives, he will examine the process of restoring political order in Guatemala, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and South Africa.

Thomas Toch will direct the research and publications program of FutureEd, an organization designed to serve as an intermediary between the education research and policy communities. He will provide periodic summaries of new research on a wide range of education policy topics and commission reports from leading scholars on issues such as the challenges that successful charter school networks have had in creating high-quality high schools or strategies that school leaders can take to reduce the negative impact of teacher absenteeism on student learning.