Join QI for two important panel discussions on 4/28 and 4/30

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** Invite: Leaving Afghanistan & Rethinking Economic Sanctions
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** UPCOMING WEBINARS
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** The Human Rights Impact of Broad-Based Economic Sanctions — Time to Rethink Our Approach
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Date: Wednesday, 4/28/21
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** Time: 1:00-2:00 PM ET
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REGISTER HERE ([link removed])

Over the past three decades, we have seen an explosion in the United States’ use of broad-based economic sanctions. Policymakers on both sides of the aisle view sanctions as an attractive, low-cost foreign policy tool. Sanctions are often seen as an alternative to war and justified on human rights grounds. The economic pain inflicted on the target country is supposed to compel it to cease its human rights abuses. But are broad-based economic sanctions themselves an instrument that violates human rights by increasing the suffering of civilian populations? Growing evidence shows that broad-based economic sanctions have disastrous human rights impacts on the ground, causing starvation, shortages in critical medicines, electricity, and even clean water. Is it time to rethink our usage of broad-based economic sanctions?

Join us on Wednesday, April 28 at 1:00 PM EST for a discussion on human rights and broad-based economic sanctions.

The panel will include QI Non-Resident Fellow Asli Bali, Professor of Law at UCLA; Peter Beinart, Professor of Journalism and Political Science at the Newmark School of Journalism at the City University of New York; and QI Non-Resident Fellow Joshua Landis, Syria expert and Professor of Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma. Trita Parsi, Quincy Institute’s Executive Vice President, will moderate the conversation.


** Ending the Forever War: President Biden's Decision to Withdraw U.S. Troops From Afghanistan

Date: Friday, 4/30/21
Time: 2:00-3:00 PM ET

REGISTER HERE ([link removed])
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The Biden administration’s decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by September 11 or sooner marks a historic pivot away from endless war. President Joe Biden recognized that there is no viable path for U.S. troops to militarily defeat the Taliban. Biden also rejected calls for a “robust U.S. military presence to stand as leverage” in uncertain negotiations. What led Biden to make these determinations and will he be able to keep his word given the challenges ahead?

Join a discussion that delves into the calculations behind President Biden’s monumental decision and the future of U.S. engagement in Afghanistan and the region with Ambassador Richard Olson who served as U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan, and director for Development and Economic Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Dr. Vanda Felbab-Brown, director of the Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors at Brookings, and Dr. Jonathan Schroden, director of the Countering Threats and Challenges Program at the Center for Naval Analyses. The conversation will be moderated by QI’s Adam Weinstein.

The panel will take place on Friday, April 30 at 2 pm ET.


** Join us for discussions featuring:
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Peter Beinart

Peter Beinart is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times and writes The Beinart Notebook at Substack.com. He is a professor of journalism and political science at The Newmark School of Journalism at the City University of New York. He is also editor-at-large of Jewish Currents, a non-resident fellow at the Foundation for Middle East Peace and a CNN political commentator. His work centers on the nexus of domestic and foreign policy and politics. From 1999 to 2006 he was the editor of The New Republic. His books include The Good Fight, The Icarus Syndrome and The Crisis of Zionism. He recently wrote a New York Times op-ed on U.S. sanctions entitled: "America's Other Forever War."

Asli Bâli

Aslı Bâli is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Quincy Institute and Professor of Law at the UCLA School of Law, where she served as the founding Faculty Director of the Promise Institute for Human Rights and the Director of the UCLA Center for Near Eastern Studies. Bâli’s research focuses on two broad areas: public international law—including human rights law and the law of the international security order—and comparative constitutional law, with a focus on the Middle East. She currently serves as co-chair of the Advisory Board for the Middle East Division of Human Rights Watch and as chair of the Task Force on Civil and Human Rights for the Middle East Studies Association. She is the editor of Constitution Writing, Religion and Democracy (2017).

Joshua Landis

Joshua Landis is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Quincy Institute and Sandra Mackey Chair and Professor of Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma in the College of International Studies and Director of the Center for Middle East Studies. He writes and manages SyriaComment.com, a daily newsletter on Syrian politics that attracts some 50,000 page-reads a month. Dr. Landis publishes frequently in policy journals such as Foreign Affairs, Middle East Policy, and Foreign Policy. He is the author of Syria at Independence: Nationalism, the Fight for Leadership, and Failure of Republicanism (2020). He is past President of the Syrian Studies Association.

Trita Parsi (Moderator)

Trita Parsi, PhD, is an award-winning author and the 2010 recipient of the Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order. He is an expert on US-Iranian relations, Iranian foreign politics, and the geopolitics of the Middle East. He has authored three books on US foreign policy in the Middle East, with a particular focus on Iran and Israel. He is the co-founder and former President of the National Iranian American Council. He received his PhD in foreign policy at Johns Hopkins’ School for Advanced International Studies, a Master's Degree in International Relations from Uppsala University, and a Master's Degree in Economics from the Stockholm School of Economics.

Ambassador Richard Olson

Ambassador Richard Olson served as U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan from 2012-15 and U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan (SRAP) from 2015-16. He also served as the coordinating director for Development and Economic Affairs at the U.S. Embassy Kabul, Afghanistan from 2011 to 2012. He served as U.S. Ambassador to the U.A.E. and in diplomatic missions across Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and NATO. Ambassador Olson was awarded the Secretary of State’s Distinguished Service Award, Presidential Distinguished Service Award, Secretary of State’s Award for Public Outreach, State Department’s Superior Honor Award (thrice), and the Secretary of Defense’s Exceptional Civilian Service Award for service in Iraq. He currently serves as a senior advisor at the United States Institute of Peace.

Vanda Felbab-Brown

Dr. Vanda Felbab-Brown is a senior fellow in the Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. She is also the director of the Initiative on Nonstate Armed Actors and co-director of the Africa Security Initiative. She is an expert on nontraditional security threats, including insurgency and illicit economies, and has conducted extensive fieldwork in Afghanistan, South Asia, East Africa, Latin America, and other parts of the world. Last September, she published “The fate of women’s rights in Afghanistan” with Brookings President John R. Allen. She served as a senior advisor to the congressionally-mandated Afghanistan Study Group. She holds a PhD in political science from MIT.

Jonathan Schroden

Dr. Jonathan Schroden is the Director of the Center for Naval Analyses’ Countering Threats and Challenges Program, whose mission is to support U.S. government efforts to understand and counter state and non-state threats. Dr. Schroden has deployed or traveled 13 times to Afghanistan, twice in support of the Commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and once in support of the Commander, Combined Security Transition Command – Afghanistan (CSTC-A). He served as a strategic advisor to the U.S. Central Command and the ISAF in Afghanistan. He also served as a strategic advisor to the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force, Multi-National Force – West in Iraq. He served as a senior advisor to the congressionally-mandated Afghanistan Study Group. He holds a PhD from Cornell University.

Adam Weinstein (Moderator)

Adam Weinstein is a Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute. He previously worked for KPMG’s international trade practice. Adam’s current research focuses on security, trade, and rule of law in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He is a member of the American Pakistan Foundation’s Leadership Council and has presented at various conferences in Pakistan. Prior to consulting, he worked as senior law and policy analyst at the National Iranian American Council where he focused on the securitization of U.S. immigration policy and its effect on immigrant communities. He received a JD from Temple University Beasley School of Law with a concentration in international law and transitional justice. Adam served as a U.S. Marine and deployed to Afghanistan in 2012 as part of a detachment to the 2nd Air Naval Gunfire Liaison Company where he served in Uruzgan Province in support of Australia’s 2nd Commando Regiment.

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