RSI Connect: Strategic Significance of the Black Sea Region for Russia
Date: March 18th, 2021 at 15:00 CET / 10:00 EST Platform: Cisco Webex Events
Link to Video Recording
Link to Video Recording Recording Password: nYmTWAY9S33
Format
Each panelist will present for 5-7 minutes followed by guided discussion and 30 minutes of Q&A.
Agenda
- 1500-1540 CET / 1000-1040 EST: Presentations
* Alexander Cooley * AMB (Ret.) William Courtney * Tom de Waal
- 1540-1600 CEST / 1040-1100 EST: Guided Discussion
- 1600-1630 CEST / 1100-1130 EST: Question & Answer Session
Biographies
Panelist: Alexander Cooley
Title: Director Affiliation: Harriman Institute, Columbia University; Clair Tow Professor of Political Science, Barnard College
Alexander Cooley is the Claire Tow Professor of Political Science at Barnard College and Director of Columbia University's Harriman Institute. His research examines how external actors have influenced the development, governance, and sovereignty of the former Soviet states, with a focus on Central Asia and the Caucasus.
He is the author of several books, including Dictators without Borders: Power and Money in Central Asia (2017) and Exit from Hegemony: the Unravelling of the American Global Order (2020). Cooley earned both his MA and Ph.D. from Columbia University.
Panelist: Tom de Waal
Title: Senior Fellow Affiliation: Carnegie Europe
Tom de Waal is a senior fellow with Carnegie Europe, specializing in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus region. He is the author of numerous publications, including The Caucasus: An Introduction (2018) and Black Garden: Armenia and Azerbaijan Through Peace and War (2013).
He has worked extensively as a journalist in Moscow for outlets such as the Moscow Times, the Times of London, and the Economist, specializing in Russian politics and the situation in Chechnya.
Panelist: William Courtney
Title: Adjunct Senior Fellow Affiliation: RAND Corporation
William Courtney is an adjunct senior fellow at the RAND Corporation and executive director of the RAND Business Leaders Forum. He served as a foreign service officer in the U.S. Department of State from 1972 to 1999, including as ambassador to Kazakhstan, Georgia, and the U.S.-Soviet Commission to implement the Threshold Test Ban Treaty.
Courtney graduated from West Virginia University with a B.A. and Brown University with a Ph.D. in economics.