Thousands of Kenyans protested against a finance bill in June that would have increased taxes on many everyday items. This was proposed in part to help pay off loans from the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, which account for more than 40 percent of the country’s foreign debt. But what is Kenya’s current fiscal climate? And how are these debts impacting gender equality? Learn more in this episode of The Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women (HERO), a podcast from Foreign Policy with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Buffett Institute and the Atlantic Council.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 12 features Diana K. Elhard, a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 11 features Cate Osborne, a fourth-year undergraduate student majoring in history and environmental policy & culture.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 10 features Michelle Lee, a PhD candidate in the Department of Sociology.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 9 features Mia Perkins, a third-year undergraduate studying economics and international studies.

The Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women—a podcast from Foreign Policy with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Buffett Institute and the Atlantic Council—is back for a seventh season covering the banks and institutions shaping global funding—particularly as the world faces an unprecedented amount of governmental debt. In the season premiere, host Reena Ninan speaks with Christine Lagarde, the president of the European Central Bank, and Malado Kaba, the former director of the Gender, Women & Civil Society Department of the African Development Bank.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 8 features Siyuan Feng, a fourth-year MD/PhD candidate in the Feinberg School of Medicine and the Department of Biomedical Engineering.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 7 features Danielle Ortiz, a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science.

Explore the Keyman Modern Turkish Studies Program's newsletter for the 2023–2024 academic year. The Keyman Modern Turkish Studies Program was founded in 2005 at Northwestern University’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 6 features Olivia Schenker, a fourth-year undergraduate majoring in biological sciences and environmental policy and culture.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 5 features Katie Cummins, a fourth-year undergraduate majoring in communication studies and minoring in business institutions and Spanish.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 4 features Talia Ginsberg, a fourth-year undergraduate majoring in global health studies and political science and minoring in data science.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 3 features Diana K. Elhard, a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science.

On October 17, during The Northwestern Security and AI Lab (NSAIL)'s annual Conference on AI and National Security, director V.S. Subrahmanian unveiled new reports generated by the Northwestern Terror Early Warning System (NTEWS), a machine-learning platform that models terrorist behavior to forecast the likelihood and types of attacks that specific terrorist groups will carry out within the next six months. An AI and security expert, Subrahmanian is Walter P. Murphy Professor of Computer Science at Northwestern Engineering and a faculty fellow at the Northwestern Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 2 features Miguel Angel Ovies-Bocanegra, a PhD candidate in the Department of Learning Sciences and a graduate student in the Master’s in Statistics and Data Science Program.

Following former President Donald Trump’s electoral win, the Buffett Institute hosted six Northwestern faculty experts for a post-election panel. They focused on topics ranging from international relations to immigration politics. The panel featured history professor Michael Allen, Pritzker School of Law professor David Dana, global health studies professor Sarah Rodriguez and political science professors Karen Alter, Julie Lee Merseth and William Reno.

Each day of the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)—this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan—a different member of Northwestern University's COP29 delegation, which is supported by the Buffett Institute, is sharing their reflections. Day 1 features Ezra Danzig, a third-year undergraduate studying environmental engineering and environmental policy.

For a fourth year, a delegation of Northwestern University students and faculty supported by the Buffett Institute is among more than 30,000 researchers, policymakers, industry leaders and activists at the world’s largest annual international treaty negotiations and climate summit, the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), this year hosted in Baku, Azerbaijan. Each day, a different Northwestern delegate is blogging about their experiences and reflections. Day 0 features a PhD candidate in the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Northwestern's McCormick School of Engineering.

Learn about key insights from Foreign Policy's antimicrobial resistance outbreak simulation convening government health ministry, NGO and industry leaders across the world—and the co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Antimicrobial Resistance Global Working Group, Professor Mehreen Arshad—to think through how to coordinate efforts across sectors and drive sustainable investment in research to tackle the mounting global crisis of antimicrobial resistance.

“This is more than a physical relocation,” said Deborah Cohen, director of the Buffett Institute and Richard W. Leopold Professor of History in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. “With new communal spaces, student programming, faculty talks and a schedule of public events, we have transformed this space into a hub for students and faculty across the University who are dedicated to understanding and shaping the world.”

V.S. Subrahmanian, Walter P. Murphy Professor of Computer Science at Northwestern University's McCormick School of Engineering and faculty fellow at Northwestern’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs, shares tips for spotting deepfake images.

The Buffett Institute welcomed a series of feminist scholars and social activists in a bilingual panel co-hosted by the Colloquium for Global Iran Studies in October. The event brought together panelists from around the world to speak about women’s rights in Iran, with a dialogue focused on the progression of women’s rights in Iran and globally since Women, Life, Freedom, a movement calling for Kurdish women’s rights following the 2022 Iranian uprisings.

Members of the Buffett Institute's Language Curricula and Gender Global Working Group discuss how world language teaching can promote gender equity and inclusivity by embracing students' multilingual and multicultural identities in a chapter in "Confronting Challenges in English Language Teacher Education (Global Innovations and Opportunities)." Learn about the need for increased professional development to address gender bias in the classroom.

Foreign Policy Analytics created a synthesis report with key takeaways from Abortion Access Today: Global Insights and Comparisons, a symposium hosted by Northwestern University's Buffett Institute for Global Affairs in October 2024. The symposium brought together leading strategists, researchers, medical practitioners, and human rights advocates from Colombia, Ireland, Kenya, Poland, and the United States to discuss the factors shaping abortion access globally, drawing on diverse perspectives and sharing lessons from different countries.

The Northwestern Security and Artificial Intelligence Lab (NSAIL), jointly housed by the Buffett Institute and McCormick School of Engineering, hosts their annual Conference on AI & National Security each year to explore new ways to integrate AI into national and global security strategies. In addition to releasing new reports, the conference features a range of presentations showcasing new AI technologies and panel discussions offering insights from leading researchers, security strategists and others.

Reynaldo Morales, a Buffett Faculty Fellow and assistant professor at Northwestern University and a descendant of the Quechua peoples of Peru, teaches about American Indian and indigenous peoples' issues in the median and environmental challenges faced by indigenous communities worldwide. In a statement in 2023, Morales remarked, "Columbus and his men brought a scope of violence reaching the level of genocide that had no precedent in the large American continent before Europeans."

Through the Documenting Carceral Injustice Program, Northwestern students created five short documentaries highlighting injustices within the criminal legal system based on the stories of the men pursuing their bachelor's degree from Northwestern while incarcerated at the Stateville Correctional Center in Illinois. The Documenting Carceral Injustice Program is part of the Northwestern Prison Education Program (NPEP), supported by the Buffett Institute's Epistemic Reparations Global Working Group.

Professor Neha Jain has agreed to serve as Deputy Director of the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs for a four-year term, effective 1 October 2024. A specialist in international law, criminal law and human rights law, Jain is a Professor of Law at the Pritzker School of Law and a Faculty Fellow at the Buffett Institute.

Northwestern’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs highlighted the global trajectory of abortion access at its first fall symposium and welcomed a panel of activists from around the world to discuss abortion rights as an issue of foreign policy. The event, titled “Abortion Access Today: Global Insights & Comparisons,” is part of a broader effort by the institute to host quarterly symposiums on campus.

Our 2024–25 fall quarter Buffett Symposium convened leading strategists, researchers, medical practitioners and human rights advocates from Colombia, Ireland, Kenya, Poland and the U.S. to discuss abortion access around the world. These leaders explored the dynamics behind increased liberalization and ongoing challenges to access, offering insights on movements for and in opposition to safe and legal abortion.

Anne-Marie Slaughter, the former U.S. State Department director of policy planning, spoke about contemporary issues and her hopes and predictions in international law at a Buffett Institute event on October 8. Slaughter is the CEO of New America, a think tank that produces research and policy recommendations related to education, family and economic security and global politics. In 2009, she became the first woman to be appointed to her previous position in the State Department. During her opening remarks, Buffett Institute Director Deborah Cohen called Slaughter an “out-of-the-box thinker” in international relations and law.

Heather Jaber, assistant professor in residence at Northwestern University in Qatar, has been selected for the inaugural Global Humanities Fellowship by Northwestern’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs and the Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities. “This joint fellowship is an exciting initiative that encourages interdisciplinary scholarship, and I look forward to committing my time to this critical scholarship and have a platform to advance it,” said Jaber. “I am especially grateful to advance my research on affect and emotion online and look at how, in the aftermath of great structural changes like revolution and economic collapse, national publics across the MENA channel spectacles of shame online as a way to deal with threatened global belonging.”

On October 8, the Buffett Institute hosted a conversation with Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO of the think and action tank New America and former Director of Policy Planning in the U.S. State Department. In a wide-ranging discussion moderated by Karen J. Alter, Norman Dwight Harris Professor of International Relations at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts & Sciences, Slaughter examined how individuals and countries like the United States promote and undermine international law as a tool to promote human rights, peace and prosperity. She also shared perspectives on what countries, political leaders, thought leaders and individuals can do to promote the vision of peace and justice that international law suggests and promises.

On October 4, the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs hosted a book talk with Paul Gowder, author of The Networked Leviathan (Cambridge University Press, 2024), which argues that countries should adapt the institutional tools developed in political science to democratize major online platforms like Meta and Amazon, exploring how collaboration between governments, companies and ordinary people could combat rising misinformation, scams and hate speech online.

This Insight Brief by Foreign Policy Analytics, produced with support from Northwestern University's Buffett Institute for Global Affairs, explores the politicization of abortion access around the world.

Storer Rowley, senior lecturer at the Northwestern University Medill School, and his Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellow John Sisco discuss how Americans are losing interest in the nation's role in the world in an article for the Chicago Tribune.

Ulaş Erdoğdu, a Buffett Institute Research Fellow, published a piece in the Journal of Global Security Studies. Erdoğdu's paper, by studying the fragmentation of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in 2004, identifies two pathways to rebel fragmentation.

Nicholas Diakopoulos is a Professor of Communication Studies at the Northwestern School of Communication and Professor of Computer Science (by courtesy) at the McCormick School of Engineering and was a 2023–24 Buffett Faculty Fellow. Learn how he's leveraging computational journalism to explore how generative AI will transform newsrooms.

As summer temperatures reach new highs, the Buffett Institute's Defusing Disasters Global Working Group is measuring how extreme heat and heat vulnerability vary across Chicago.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has generated new threats to national and global security, but a lab jointly housed in the Buffett Institute and McCormick School of Engineering is unleashing AI’s potential to combat them, advance justice-driven social movements and foster greater global peace.

Water problems threaten the well-being and sustainable development of communities worldwide. The Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group is translating data into real-world action to remedy water injustices.

Northwestern alumna Sherry Xue (School of Communication, ’22) serves as Co-Director of the Climate Innovation Challenge (CIC), a program built to foster international collaboration among students seeking to advance climate action. The Buffett Institute connected with Sherry to learn how her role at the CIC builds upon her global learning experiences at Northwestern.

“Recent decades have seen outdoor summer nighttime temperatures increase at twice the rate of outdoor summer daytime temperatures, with human-caused climate change partly to blame,” said Northwestern Professor Daniel Horton, co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Defusing Disasters Global Working Group, which recently partnered with the Illinois Institute of Technology; Elevate, a nonprofit organization; and local and community organizations to research the health dangers of indoor air temperatures during increasingly hot Chicago summers. Learn more about thermal conditions inside various types of Chicago homes.

Professor Kim Marion Suiseeya, team co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Disproportionate Impacts of Environmental Challenges Working Group, co-authored an article on the STRONG Manoomin Collective describing funding received through her Global Working group. The Lakes Letter is a quarterly newsletter published by the International Association for Great Lakes Research (IAGLR).

“Recent decades have seen outdoor summer nighttime temperatures increase at twice the rate of outdoor summer daytime temperatures, with human-caused climate change partly to blame,” said Northwestern University Professor Daniel Horton, co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Defusing Disasters Global Working Group, which recently partnered with the Illinois Institute of Technology; Elevate, a nonprofit organization; and local and community organizations to research the health dangers of indoor air temperatures during increasingly hot Chicago summers.

A new study found more than half of adults surveyed worldwide expect to be seriously harmed by their water within the next two years—an expectation that is associated with perceptions of public corruption, and that can have negative impacts on people’s health, nutrition and psychological and economic well-being—even when the water meets safety standards. Learn more about the findings of this new study co-authored by the co-leads of the Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group, Sera Young and Julius Lucks.

Jacqueline Stevens, professor of political science at Northwestern University and director of the Buffett Institute's Deportation Research Clinic, voices her concerns about calls for mass deportations, sharing that lawful residents could get caught up in a deportation system that's already prone to mistakes in a new Christian Science Monitor piece. “If U.S. citizens are being unlawfully detained and deported, that tells us a lot about how everybody else is being treated," said Professor Stevens.

The Buffett Institute is pleased to welcome Sirojuddin Arif, PhD, as a visiting scholar hosted by Professor Jeffrey Winters, Director of the Buffett Institute’s Equality Development and Globalization Studies (EDGS) program. Arif currently heads the Master’s Program in Political Science at the Indonesian International Islamic University in Jakarta, and will join us through September 2024 to conduct research on the politics of technology learning and industrial upgrading in late-industrializing countries, with a particular emphasis on Indonesia.

In recognition of her impressive scholarship, Amrina Rosyada, an Arryman scholar in the Buffett Institute's Equality Development and Globalization Studies (EDGS) program, recently garnered three prestigious awards for her paper "Who Made Mead? The Native Research Assistant as Intellectual." Rosyada's anthropological work highlights the importance of recognizing local research assistants’ intellectual contributions to the discipline, which have often been overlooked.

A gift from Northwestern Trustee Steven A. Cahillane ’87 and Tracy Tappan Cahillane ’88 is kickstarting the renovation of the Donald P. Jacobs Center into a hub for research, learning and student activity on the Evanston campus. The new facility supports the University’s strategic priorities by expanding Northwestern’s capacity to innovate in the social sciences and global studies. The renovated building will be the new home of the Northwestern Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs.

In a recent spotlight in Northwestern Magazine, the Buffett Institute's Executive Director Deborah Cohen highlights Buffett's newest opportunities for Northwestern students, including the Elliott Scholars Program, which pairs a two-course sequence on global topics with internships abroad so undergraduates can engage deeply in a critical issue in global affairs. Learn how the Institute "connects many different parts of the University to each other and then to a wider public.”

Northwestern University is happy to announce the appointment of Sara Thurston, PhD, as the new Director of the Office of International Student and Scholar Services. Thurston offers more than 25 years of experience supporting international students and scholars.

A master’s degree student from the University of Hamburg’s Integrated Climate Systems Science (ICSS) program, Shuyue Qu, recently completed a three-month research stay at Northwestern University, becoming the inaugural visiting student researcher in what faculty at both institutions hope evolves into a routine practice propelling science exchange. Qu worked with the Buffett Institute's Shifting Shorelines Global Working Group, which aims to understand and respond to changes in historical and present-day interfaces between land and water.

Sofyan Ansori, a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at Northwestern University's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a 2023–24 Buffett graduate fellow, recently showcased his research on the relationships between humans and fires in Indonesia. His research engages with how Indigenous communities in Central Kalimantan, Indonesia, navigate their thoughts and actions amid recurring fires and the state's desire to enforce anti-fire policies in light of the current climate crisis.

Ian Hurd, professor of international politics at Northwestern University's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and his Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellow Sadie Barlow are shedding light on the laws and politics behind the Olympic Games in a three-part series in the Chicago Tribune. The final article explores how the Games' founding ideals clash with geopolitical realities "especially in times of war, conflict and authoritarian rule."

Ian Hurd, professor of international politics at Northwestern University's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and his Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellow Sadie Barlow are shedding light on the laws and politics behind the Olympic Games in a three-part series in the Chicago Tribune. Their second article explores how the Olympic Games wrestles with whether, and how, to treat men and women athletes differently.

Ian Hurd, professor of international politics at Northwestern University's Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and his Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellow Sadie Barlow are shedding light on the laws and politics behind the Olympic Games in a three-part series in the Chicago Tribune. The series is among the initial outputs of Professor Hurd's “Dilemmas of World Order” project, for which Barlow serves as a research assistant through the new Buffett Undergraduate Research Fellowship Program.

Sofyan Ansori, a 2023–24 Buffett graduate fellow and PhD candidate, co-authored an article describing how major fires in Indonesia have reignited debates over Indigenous fire management roles and failing government fire prevention policies.

Samantha Nissen, Associate Director for Strategic Initiatives on the Buffett Institute’s Research & Programs team, shed light on her experience at the June 2024 Scholars at Risk (SAR) Network Global Congress in Vilnius, Lithuania, where she represented Northwestern University. The SAR Network is a global coalition of colleges, universities and organizations that defend academic freedom and protect scholars around the world who face threats due to their work, beliefs or identity.

Buffett Institute's Climate Crisis + Media Arts Global Working Group member Lakshmi Padmanabhan's essay, published in the Cultural Critique journal, argues that the rise of slow cinema aesthetics, particularly through the long take, is one aesthetic approach within contemporary cinema to mediate the slow violence of environmental degradation.

In response to violence in Israel and Gaza, Northwestern professors launched a recent lecture series to provide foundational knowledge on the region and encourage productive dialogue. This initiative, co-hosted by the Middle Eastern and North African (MENA) Studies Program, the Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies and the Buffett Institute, aimed to foster understanding and model the importance of deep, nuanced discussions on controversial topics.

Journalists can now get free expert analysis of whether an image, audio or video is a deepfake using a new platform created by the Northwestern Security & AI Lab (NSAIL) led by V.S. Subrahmanian, Buffett Faculty Fellow and professor at Northwestern University's McCormick School of Engineering. The Global Online Deepfake Detection System (GODDS) is easy to use, free for verified journalists and provides a validity assessment via email within 24 hours.

Jacqueline Stevens, a political science professor at Northwestern University and the founding director of the Buffett Institute's Deportation Research Clinic, stated that former President and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's deportation plans "would increase the alarming number of U.S. citizens and legal residents now wrongfully deported."

In recognition of his impressive scholarship, Rahardhika Utama, a visiting scholar in the Buffett Institute's Equality Development and Globalization Studies (EDGS) program, has been honored with the 2024 Theda Skocpol Best Dissertation Award by the American Sociological Association. This award acknowledges dissertations that make substantial contributions to the sociology field and is the highest honor a dissertation in comparative and historical sociology can receive in the U.S. Rahardhika's dissertation "Embedded Peasantry and Economic Transformation in the Asian Rubber Belt" is acclaimed for his innovative approach and insights into agrarian economies in Southeast Asia.

Sara Huston, co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Global FamDNA Global Working Group, was invited to The Hague by the International Commission on Missing Persons for a roundtable discussion with government and civil society representatives from Ukraine as well as other experts focused on enhancing Ukraine’s strategic vision to locate tens of thousands of missing persons, including illegally deported children. She moderated a discussion on using advanced technologies, including databases and DNA, to locate and identify large numbers of missing children.

Between 2005 and 2020, the number of children facing simultaneous water and food insecurity in the United States more than doubled. Additionally, Black and Hispanic children were several times more likely than white children to experience food and water insecurity at the same time. This is according to new research by Asher Rosinger, Associate Professor of Biobehavioral Health and Anthropology at Penn State, and Sera Young, Associate Professor of Anthropology at Northwestern University as well as co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group. Learn about the key insights in this press release from Penn State.

New research co-authored by Professor Sera Young, co-lead of the Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group, unveils the extent of children's experiences of water insecurity and food insecurity in the United States. The research also shows that children who were water insecure were more likely to be poor and minoritized, and were 53% more likely to be food insecure than children who were not water insecure.

Arryman Fellows are Indonesian scholars awarded a one-year grant for pre-doctoral research at the Buffett Institute's Equality Development & Globalization Studies (EDGS) Program. Dr. Yoes Kenawas is a 2014 Arryman Fellow who has successfully defended his doctoral thesis, which sheds light on dynastic politics by examining the intricate web of power, legacy and organizational capabilities within political families. As Indonesia grapples with the ascent of President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's son to the vice presidency, Yoes's work gains newfound relevance. Learn more about his research.

The Arryman Scholars Program at the Buffett Institute's Equality Development & Globalization Studies (EDGS) program aims to make a major contribution to higher education in Indonesia by training new young scholars in the social sciences at Northwestern University. Dr. Wara Urwasi, a Northwestern Arryman Scholar, has successfully defended her dissertation, marking the culmination of years of dedicated research. Learn about Dr. Urwasi’s work, which delves into the intricate relationship between state policies and urban poverty, focusing on state responses to informal settlements.

The Buffett Institute's Equality Development and Globalization Studies (EDGS) program is celebrating two appointments that promise to shape its future at Northwestern and beyond. Laura Hein, the Harold H. and Virginia Anderson Professor of History at Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, and Anto Mohsin, Assistant Professor in Residence in the Liberal Arts Program at Northwestern in Qatar, have joined EDGS Director Jeffrey Winters to broaden and deepen relationships with academic institutions in Southeast and East Asia. Learn more about their new roles in EDGS and scholarly backgrounds.

The Buffett Institute's Disproportionate Impacts of Environmental Challenges Global Working Group is co-leading a project to protect wild rice on tribal lands governed by the Ojibwe Nations with partners from the Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission, Argonne National Lab and others. Called the Strengthening Resilience of Ojibwe Nations Across Generations (STRONG)-Manoomin Collective, this effort funded by the National Science Foundation has brought environmental sensors to Ojibwe communities to monitor the effects of climate change on manoomin, or wild rice. This Buffett Global Working Group also co-developed sensors that respond to tribal needs, such as monitoring contaminants in water that might come from mining operations or pipeline leakages—two primary environmental concerns for Ojibwe Nations. Ultimately, the sensors will support the development of cyber infrastructure that will facilitate Ojibwe Nations’ access to critical environmental data they can use to assert their treaty rights and exercise sovereignty. The Great Lakes Indian Fish and Wildlife Commission reports on the project.

Carmen Hernández, a Student Services Program Administrator for the Buffett Institute's Global Learning Office, shares insights into how to help students understand the value of studying abroad in underrepresented destinations.

Over the last two years, the Buffett Institute has hosted visiting scholars have from various countries, including Afghanistan, Cameroon and Ukraine, through our Threatened, Displaced or At-Risk Scholars Program. As part of the April 29 agreement with demonstrators to deescalate the pro-Palestinian encampment in Deering Meadow on Northwestern's Evanston campus, University administration committed to supporting visiting Palestinian faculty and students through this Buffett Institute program. Learn more in The Daily Northwestern.

Jennifer Lackey is a professor of philosophy, founder and director of the Northwestern Prison Education Program and co-lead of the Epistemic Reparations Global Working Group at the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs. Learn how she leverages each of these roles in her work to tackle carceral injustice in this North by Northwestern feature.

In the final talk of this joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, Maayan Hilel delved into the term "Arab-Jews" as both a cultural and historical identifier, shedding light on the multifaceted social, political and cultural experiences of Arabic-speaking Jews in the Middle East and North Africa from the late nineteenth century until 1948.

In the penultimate talk of this joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, Leena Dallasheh focused on the Palestinian experience after the Nakba (the Catastrophe of 1948) and their early encounters with the Israeli State. It highlighted central themes related to all three parts of post-1948 Palestinian history: Palestinian refugees, Palestinian citizens of Israel and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

At this Buffett Book Talk, Professor Lauren Stokes and "Out of the Darkness" author Professor Frank Trentmann convened for a discussion about Germany, past and present. Throughout the book, Trentmann seeks to answer a central question: How have the Germans changed since 1942, why, and how much? And who are they now?

Evanston's 5th Ward Alderman Bobby Burns is collaborating with the Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group to provide residents with opportunities for at-home water quality testing using novel biosensor technologies. They are seeking residents of 50 homes in Evanston to participate in the first round of the study, which will focus on lead contamination. Along with the lead testing device, study participants will receive $50 in gift cards, a water filter with replacements and additional resources to avoid lead contamination.

Ghazi Hashimi, Clinical Fellow at Northwestern University's Buffett Institute and Pritzker School of Law, co-authored a chapter on “When Extraordinary Circumstances Call for Mutual Aid: The Arrival of Afghan Academics in the U.S.” in the new book "Resilience of Educators in Extraordinary Circumstances: War, Disaster, and Emergencies." The chapter provides insight into his evacuation from Afghanistan and arrival at Northwestern through the establishment of visiting positions for Afghan scholars at risk.

The Evanston RoundTable highlighted a study led by members of the Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group, which will provide at-home tests to check for lead in water to households on Chicago’s Southeast Side and in Evanston.

Deepfakes are emerging as weapons of statecraft, with countries like Russia using them in the Ukraine war to create fake videos of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and senior Ukrainian defense officials telling soldiers to lay down their arms. In this op-ed, Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian and co-authors Daniel Byman and Daniel Linna argue why and how governments should weigh the risks of diminishing their credibility when deciding when, if ever, to use deepfakes.

More than 200 people filled Lutkin Hall to hear Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and journalist Anne Applebaum discuss the ongoing Russo-Ukrainian War and the global rise of autocracies at an event organized by the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs. Read the recap from the Daily Northwestern.

The Group of Nations' Global Briefing Report on COP27 and COP28—the United Nations' annual climate change conference held in 2022 and 2023, respectively—examines universities' role as key solutions providers for climate action in this article examining the insights shared at an official side event hosted by university networks like the U7+ Alliance of World Universities during COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. Northwestern University then served as the Secretariat of the U7+ Alliance, and during its three-year term, the Secretariat was housed at Northwestern Buffett Institute for Global Affairs.

In the fifth talk of our joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, Shay Hazkani provided an overview of the 1948 war that commenced following the United Nations' approval of a partition plan for Mandatory Palestine. Shay Hazkani is an Associate Professor of History and Jewish Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park. He specializes in social and cultural history of Palestine and Israel.

In conversation with Peter Slevin, Professor at Northwestern University's Medill School, Anne Applebaum examined the challenges and opportunities of global political and economic change through the lenses of world history and the contemporary political landscape at an event hosted by the Buffett Institute and Kyiv Mohyla Foundation of America representing the National University Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine.

The Buffett Institute hosted book talk with Buffett Faculty Fellow Özge Samancı, author of the new graphic novel "Evil Eyes Sea," a feminist political mystery set in Istanbul during the 1995 elections. It tells the story of two broke students who witnessed an unusual death on a scuba diving expedition. As the case deepens, they become increasingly entangled with political corruption, religious pressure and possibly murder. Watch the recording.

The Buffett Institute is pleased to announce our cohort of non-residential faculty fellowships for the 2024–25 academic year. These fellowships support Northwestern faculty who are conducting research outside of the contiguous United States.

In the fourth talk of our joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, Nadim Bawalsa examined the emergence of Palestinian political consciousness on the eve of Britain's occupation of Palestine in 1917 and over the course of its 30-year mandate in Palestine. Nadim Bawalsa is a historian of modern Palestine and the author of "Transnational Palestine: Migration and the Right of Return before 1948" (Stanford University Press, 2022), winner of both the 2023 Palestine Book Award and the 2023 Nikki Keddie Book Award.

In a new report, the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF have officially recommended the Water Insecurity Experiences (WISE) Scales for the global monitoring of United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6: Ensure access to water and sanitation for all. The development of the WISE Scales was led by Northwestern University Professor Sera Young, who co-leads the Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group at the Buffett Institute. Current WISE Scales research is supported by the Leverhulme Trust as well as Northwestern University's Buffett Institute and Paula M. Trienens Institute for Sustainability and Energy.

Through the Buffett Institute’s Global Learning Office, Northwestern offers study abroad, research and academic internship opportunities that prepare students for success in today’s interconnected world. The Daily Northwestern spoke with Sara Tully, Director of Buffett's Global Learning Office, about students' options for financing their global learning experiences and initiatives to make study abroad financially accessible for all students.

The final episode of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a Foreign Policy podcast supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, features inspiring stories about girl power. First, we go to Peru, where reporter Jimena Ledgard interviews Wendy Sulca, a former child pop star who is finding a new voice as an advocate. Then, host Reena Ninan speaks with Bogolo Kenewendo, Advisor and Africa Director to the United Nations Climate Change High-Level Champions, about how her childhood shaped her into the political leader she has become.

In the third talk of this joint speaker series, Elizabeth F. Thompson examined how a League of Nations mandate institutionalized an asymmetry of political and economic power between Jews and Arabs that would empower militants over peacemakers over its 25-year history.

Two Northwestern students were named Truman Scholars, an award regarded as the premier graduate scholarship for aspiring public service leaders in the U.S. Both women worked on their Truman policy proposals while studying abroad through the Buffett Institute's Global Learning Office.

The presidents of 46 universities in the U7+ Alliance of World Universities, for which Northwestern served as the first secretariat, formally committed to the 2024 U7+ Statement on Global Access to Higher Education. The statement was delivered to Anna Maria Bernini, Italian Minister of University and Research, on April 11 as a representative of the Italian government who is playing host to the Group of Nations (G7) this year.

The Buffett Institute's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group is kicking off a study to measure the accuracy and usefulness of at-home tests for lead in water while exploring how access to testing influences neighbors’ actions to protect themselves from lead. The group is recruiting 100 households for the study: 50 from Chicago’s Southeast Side and 50 from Evanston.

On this episode of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a Foreign Policy podcast supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, host Reena Ninan speaks with Julie Mwabe, the team lead at the global advocacy and public policy program at Global Partnership for Education. She leads efforts to mobilize political support at the highest levels for education, including from heads of state. They talk about the state of girls’ education and what the international community can do to close learning gaps, especially following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Buffett Institute hosted a keynote address and reception celebrating Northwestern's Fulbright community and the transformative power of cultural exchange, marking the beginning of Northwestern's Fulbright Week (April 8–12, 2024). We were delighted to have as our keynote speaker Dr. Mary Pattillo, Harold Washington Professor of Sociology and Chair of Black Studies at Northwestern University.

In the second talk of this joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, historian Arie Dubnov delved into the multifaceted history of Zionism, exploring its various ideological strands and historical context from its origins in the late ninteenth century to its impact on contemporary politics in Israel/Palestine.

International journalists Marzio Mian and Alessandro Cosmelli discussed on Friday their recent work reporting along the Volga River in Russia, which produced a cover story for Harper’s Magazine called “Behind the New Iron Curtain.” The event was co-hosted by the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.

In this report on the escalating use of social media by terrorist organizations for the recruitment of "lone wolves"—such as young Muslims in the West who feel alienated by European society—Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian discusses the intricacies of monitoring such activities online, noting the dual threat of being targeted both by terrorists for potential infiltration and by intelligence agencies for suspicious activities.

What do Russians think about the war in Ukraine? How are they reacting to sanctions? In a recent cover story for Harper's Magazine, journalist Marzio Mian and photographer Alessandro Cosmelli tell the surprising story of what they discovered on a trip down the Volga River. The Buffett Institute hosted a conversation with Mian and Cosmelli about contemporary Russia, international reporting and the long shadows of the Cold War, moderated by Ambassador Ian Kelly.

A routine Getty Images caption beside the Princess of Wales’s cancer announcement has fanned disinformation about her. The New York Times spoke with Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian, who ran a copy of the video through a system of 15 algorithms his team at the Northwestern Security & AI Lab (NSAIL) has been developing to detect manipulated videos. They found no evidence that the video is fake.

A new initiative, “Israel & Palestine: Joint Speaker Series Exploring Fundamental History,” is being co-sponsored by the Middle East and North African Studies Program, the Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies and the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs at Northwestern. A series of talks by renowned scholars of the region, seven sessions will be held April 4 to May 29 on the Evanston campus and are open to Northwestern students, faculty and staff.

For the first talk of this joint speaker series exploring fundamental history of Israel and Palestine, Awad Halabi examined how Palestine’s different religious communities were able to engage and interact with one another in the era of Late Ottoman rule in Palestine (c. 1850–1917).

The Buffett Institute hosted book talk with Michael S. Kang and Joanna M. Shepherd, co-authors of the new book "Free to Judge: The Power of Campaign Money in Judicial Elections." Watch the recording.

Homosexuality is illegal in Kenya, as it is in more than half of African countries. But public attitudes have begun to shift. The fourth episode of the latest season of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a Foreign Policy podcast supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, follows the key people driving this change.

Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting grantees Alessandro Cosmelli and Marzio Mian will speak on their project, Volga Blues, to students at the Northwestern Buffett Institute, the University of Michigan’s Wallace House Center for Journalists and Indiana University.

The Water Insecurity Experiences (WISE) Scales measure human experiences with water and provide insights into whether individuals can reliably access sufficient water for domestic uses. To date, nationally representative water insecurity data have been collected in 40 countries, providing insights into who, exactly, is experiencing water insecurity. The Center for International and Strategic Studies published these data in a new report. Current WISE research is made possible by the Leverhulme Foundation as well as the Buffett Institute and Trienens Institute at Northwestern.

Read about the history and impact of the Water Insecurity Experiences (WISE) Scales over the past decade in this new report. Current WISE research is made possible by the Leverhulme Foundation as well as the Buffett Institute and Trienens Institute at Northwestern.

The negative impact of child marriage is widely documented. Child brides suffer domestic violence more often, drop out of school in greater numbers and are more likely to experience poverty. While Indian girls still account for one-third of child brides in the world, the prevalence of child marriage there has declined about 7 percent in the past eight years. The third episode of the latest season of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a Foreign Policy podcast supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, looks at how India has been able to reduce its child marriage rates.

On this year's World Water Day, the Center for Strategic and International Studies hosted a livestream featuring Professor Sera Young, co-lead of Buffett's Making Water Insecurity Visible Global Working Group, on her Water Insecurity Experiences (WISE) Scales, an innovative tool designed to measure universal experiences with water insecurity and inform development action and policy implementation. Current WISE research is made possible by the Leverhulme Foundation and the Buffett Institute. Young will also present highlights from the forthcoming WISE Impact Report during a hybrid event at the Shard in London on Wednesday, March 27 at 10 a.m. CDT.

Family planning is one of the most economically important strategies for women and girls. Access to contraceptives can help women and girls get an education and participate in the workforce. Furthermore, it could reduce maternal deaths by as much as three-quarters, according to the United Nations Population Fund. But nearly 10 percent of women of childbearing age around the world have unmet contraceptive needs and teenage girls report less access to contraceptives than other age groups. The second episode of the latest season of the Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a Foreign Policy podcast supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, looks at the most effective ways to increase family planning services.

Aman Shaikh, a graduate student in the Master of Engineering Management program at the McCormick School of Engineering, traveled to Dubai for the United Nations' annual climate change conference COP28 through the support of the Buffett Institute. He recounts how attending COP28 helped him better understand technology's role in addressing climate change, and the role engineers can play in climate action.

Deborah Cohen, the Richard W. Leopold Professor of History in Northwestern’s Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, has been named executive director of the Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs. A scholar of European and global history, Cohen has served as interim director of the Buffett Institute since January.

Will the lure of deepfakes prove irresistible to democratic governments? What questions should governments ask — and who in government should be asking them — when a deepfake is being considered? Two Northwestern professors, Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian and Daniel Linna, co-authored a new report examining several hypothetical scenarios in which democratic governments might consider using deepfakes to advance their foreign policy objectives and the potential harms this use might pose to democracy. Subrahmanian co-leads and Linna is a member of Buffett’s AI and Social Movements Global Working Group.

This episode of the Lawfare Podcast delves into how democracies should think about using deepfakes with Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian, Daniel Byman and Daniel Linna, co-authors of a new Center for Strategic and International Studies report examining two critical points: the questions that a government agency should address before deploying a deepfake, and the governance mechanisms that should be in place to assess its risks and benefits.

Buffett Faculty Fellow V.S. Subrahmanian is the lead author of a new report examining hypothetical cases in which deepfakes might be used by democratic governments. Along with co-authors Daniel Byman and Daniel Linna, Subrahmanian argues that deepfakes should not be used without a clearly articulated set of guardrails that consider both the benefits and the risks of a proposed government-run deepfake-enabled operation. Subrahmanian co-leads and Linna is a member of Buffett’s AI and Social Movements Global Working Group.

The Hidden Economics of Remarkable Women, a podcast from Foreign Policy with support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Buffett Institute, is back with an all-new season. This time, all our stories are about something that has been getting a lot of media attention lately: Girls. What do they really need to succeed right now? And how can we work with them to get there? For this first episode, we focus on an often hidden aspect of girls’ economic lives that has a significant impact: period products.

The Buffett Institute for Global Affairs hosted a lecture by the former President of the International Criminal Court Judge Chile Eboe-Osuji at the Pritzker School of Law on Thursday, February 29. In his lecture, he argued that peace as a fundamental human right could help achieve global peace. Read about the insights he shared in the Daily Northwestern.

The Buffett Institute and Pritzker School of Law hosted a lecture from Judge Chile Eboe-Osuji, former President of the International Criminal Court from 2018 to 2021. During the lecture, Judge Eboe-Osuji shared insights from his work to foster a more just and peaceful world through international accountability for human rights violations.

The Buffett Institute hosted a book talk with Anto Mohsin, Buffett Faculty Fellow and Assistant Professor in Residence at Northwestern in Qatar as well as the author of the new book Electrifying Indonesia: Technology and Social Justice in National Development, which tells the story of the entanglement of politics and technology during Indonesia’s rapid post-World War II development.

Led by Northwestern Buffett's Defusing Disasters Global Working group, the Heat Watch Chicago mapping study results show how extreme heat disproportionately impacts vulnerable communities. The group is working with the city to develop a heat vulnerability index to target resources to the areas that are the hottest and most vulnerable to extreme weather.

The Buffett Institute hosted a discussion exploring global futures of education with Bryan McKinley Jones Brayboy (Lumbee), Dean at the Northwestern School of Education and Social Policy, and Noah Sobe, Professor at Loyola University Chicago and former Senior Project Officer at UNESCO's Future of Learning and Innovation team. Watch the recording.

Jennifer Lackey has received the 2024 Daniel I. Linzer Award for Faculty Excellence in Diversity and Equity for her dedication and commitment to the Northwestern Prison Education program. Lackey also co-leads the Epistemic Reparations Global Working Group at the Buffett Institute.

Professor Laura Brueck of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences Department of Asian Languages and Cultures received Northwestern’s 2024 Provost Award for Exemplary Service for her leadership as co-founder of the Race, Caste and Colorism Global Working Group at the Buffett Institute.

For a third year, Northwestern Buffett supported a delegation of 12 faculty and graduate students to attend the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change 28th Conference of Parties (COP28), the world’s largest annual international climate summit. Read delegates' reflections on the challenges and promise of global climate action.

Northwestern Buffett's Office of International Student and Scholar Services (OISS) helps international students and scholars as well as faculty and staff navigate the many complexities associated with student and employment-based visa classifications within the Northwestern community. Learn about enrollment trends and statistics on members of Northwestern's international community who receive visa sponsorship through OISS in their 2022–23 annual report.