The Ellison Center at the University of Washington – Details, episodes & analysis

In February 2022, Russian missiles rained on Ukrainian cities and tanks rolled towards Kyiv to end Ukrainian independent statehood. President Zelensky declined a western evacuation offer and rallied the army and citizens to defend Ukraine. What are the roots of this war which has devastated Ukraine, upended the international legal order, and brought back the spectre of nuclear escalation? How is it that these supposedly “brotherly peoples” became each other’s worst nightmare? In Russia and Ukraine: Entangled Histories, Divergent States, Maria Popova and Oxana Shevel explain how over the last thirty years Russia and Ukraine diverged politically ending up on a catastrophic collision course. Russia slid back into authoritarianism and imperialism, while Ukraine consolidated a competitive political system and pro-European identity. As Ukraine built a democratic nation-state, Russia refused to accept it and came to see it as an “anti-Russia” project. After political pressure and economic levers proved ineffective and even counterproductive, Putin went to war to force Ukraine back into the fold of the “Russian world.” Ukraine resisted, determined to pursue European integration as a sovereign state. These irreconcilable goals, rather than geopolitical wrangling between Russia and the West over NATO expansion, are – the authors argue – essential to understanding Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Nargis Kassenova is a senior fellow and director of the Program on Central Asia at the Davis Center. Prior to joining the center, she was an associate professor at the Department of International Relations and Regional Studies of KIMEP University (Almaty, Kazakhstan). She is the former founder and director of the KIMEP Central Asian Studies Center (CASC) and the China and Central Asia Studies Center (CCASC). Kassenova holds a Ph.D. in international cooperation studies from the Graduate School of International Development, Nagoya University (Japan). Her research focuses on Central Asian politics and security, Eurasian geopolitics, China’s Belt and Road Initiative, governance in Central Asia, and the history of state-making in Central Asia.  Temur Umarov is a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center. His research is focused on Central Asian countries’ domestic and foreign policies, as well as China’s relations with Russia and Central Asian neighbors. A native of Uzbekistan, Temur Umarov has degrees in China studies and international relations from the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration, and Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO). He holds an MA in world economics from the University of International Business and Economics (Beijing). He is also an alumnus of the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center’s Young Ambassadors and the Carnegie Endowment’s Central Asian Futures programs. This webinar will be moderated by Scott Radnitz (Director of the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies at the University of Washington).

Scott Montgomery presents his lecture, "EU Economic and Energy Responses to Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine" on Aug. 17, 2022. This lecture was part of the 2021 EU Policy Forum for Educators. More information about the workshop, as well as the visual Presentation Slides accompanying this lecture can be found here: jsis.washington.edu/euwesteurope/ed…cator-workshop/ A complete transcript of the podcast is also available at the above link. Scott L. Montgomery is an author, geoscientist, and affiliate faculty member in the Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington. He writes and lectures on a wide variety of topics related to energy (geopolitics, technology, resources, climate change), American politics, intellectual history, language and communication, and the history of science. He is a frequent contributor to online journals such as The Conversation, Forbes, and Fortune, and his articles and op-eds are regularly featured in many outlets, including Newsweek, Marketwatch, The Huffington Post, and UPI. He also gives public talks and serves on panels related to issues in global energy and their relation to political and economic trends and ideas of sustainability. For more than two decades, Montgomery worked as a geoscientist in the energy industry, writing over 100 scientific papers and 70 monographs on topics related to oil and gas, energy technology, and industry trends. Montgomery is the author of 12 books and is currently pursuing several areas of research, including the role of Enlightenment ideas in present-day American politics, as well as the future of petroleum and its role in geopolitics and climate change. The EU Policy Forum is supported by The UW Jackson School of International Studies’ Erasmus+ funded Jean Monnet Center of Excellence, the Center for West European Studies, the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, and the World Affairs Council. This lecture was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

This March 2015 panel was co-sponsored by the Ellison Center, the East Asia Center, and the Center for Global Studies at the University of Washington's Jackson School of International Studies. Panelists included Dr. Liz Wishnick from Montclair State University, Dr. Mikhail Alekseev from San Diego State University, and Dr. Judith Thornton from the University of Washington,

Glennys Young presents her lecture, "Russia's War Against Ukraine: Teaching Opportunities and Challenges" on Aug. 17, 2022. This lecture was part of the 2021 EU Policy Forum for Educators. More information about the workshop, as well as the visual Presentation Slides accompanying this lecture can be found here: jsis.washington.edu/euwesteurope/ed…cator-workshop/ A complete transcript of the podcast is also available at the above link. I am a historian of Russia and the Soviet Union. Over the course of my career, I have become increasingly interested in the USSR’s involvement in transnational movements and processes, whether political, social, cultural, or economic. I have also pursued research interests in the history of Communism and world history. In addition to the books mentioned below, I’ve published articles on a number of topics in Soviet social and political history. My first book, Power and the Sacred in Revolutionary Russia: Religious Activists in the Village (Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997), examined the Bolshevik project of cultural transformation through a case study of peasants’ responses to the Soviet anti-religious campaign. In 1999, the book was awarded Honorable Mention for the Hans Rosenhaupt Memorial Book Prize from the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation. In 2011, I published The Communist Experience in the Twentieth Century: A Global History through Sources (Oxford University Press. Through a collection of carefully selected documents, some presented for the first time in English translation, the book seeks to provide an inside look at how people around the world subjectively experienced, and contributed to, global communism. My current book project is entitled The Return: From the Soviet Union to Franco’s Spain in the Cold War, under contract with Oxford University Press, England. The Return reveals the unrecognized political, social, and cultural shockwaves of the Cold War repatriation of Spanish nationals who had been catapulted to the USSR as refugees and exiles in the Spanish Civil War, or as soldiers who fought for the Nazi Wehrmacht in World War II. What makes the Spanish case distinct with respect to numerous others involving post-World War II repatriations from the USSR is that it involved civilians and military personnel, including prisoners of war. As well, the repatriation of Spanish nationals constituted the largest repatriation of civilians from the USSR to a country in Western Europe during the Cold War. Although the repatriation of Spaniards—both Red Army POWs and civilians—began during World War II, albeit in small numbers, the return of the Spaniards became an international issue beginning in the late 1940s, just as the Cold War was heating up. The book focuses on the seven expeditions of repatriates from the USSR to Franco’s Spain in the second half of the 1950s. The EU Policy Forum is supported by The UW Jackson School of International Studies’ Erasmus+ funded Jean Monnet Center of Excellence, the Center for West European Studies, the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, and the World Affairs Council. This lecture was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

Christopher Jones presents his lecture, "What to Do About Russia? Russia, the EU, and the International System" on Aug. 17, 2022. This lecture was part of the 2021 EU Policy Forum for Educators. More information about the workshop, as well as the visual Presentation Slides accompanying this lecture can be found here: jsis.washington.edu/euwesteurope/ed…cator-workshop/ A complete transcript of the podcast is also available at the above link. Chris Jones is an Associate Professor of International Studies at the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies. His teaching focuses on NATO/Warsaw pact relations, post-Cold War security issues, and political economy of the post-Cold War era. The EU Policy Forum is supported by The UW Jackson School of International Studies’ Erasmus+ funded Jean Monnet Center of Excellence, the Center for West European Studies, the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, and the World Affairs Council. This lecture was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

Brendan Mcelmeel presents his lecture, "Russia vs. ‘Gayropa?’ Russian Cultural Politics since the Conservative Turn" on Aug. 17, 2022. This lecture was part of the 2021 EU Policy Forum for Educators. More information about the workshop, as well as the visual Presentation Slides accompanying this lecture can be found here: jsis.washington.edu/euwesteurope/ed…cator-workshop/ A complete transcript of the podcast is also available at the above link. Brendan Mcelmeel is a doctoral candidate at the Department of History, University of Washington. The EU Policy Forum is supported by The UW Jackson School of International Studies’ Erasmus+ funded Jean Monnet Center of Excellence, the Center for West European Studies, the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, and the World Affairs Council. This lecture was co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

Eliot Borenstein is Professor of Russian & Slavic Studies and Senior Academic Convenor for the Global Network at New York University. He gave this talk as part of a lecture series hosted by the Ellison Center at the University of Washington.

The Ellison Center for Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies presents "In Focus: Russia's Invasion of Ukraine" on March 7, 2022, a panel discussion with UW faculty and other guest speakers on the unfolding situation in Ukraine. Find resources for supporting Ukraine here: https://jsis.washington.edu/ellisoncenter/news/how-to-help-support-ukraine-suggested-organizations-for-donations/ Opening Remarks: Leela Fernandes, Director and Stanley D. Golub Chair, Jackson School of International Studies Moderator: Scott Radnitz, Herbert J. Ellison Associate Professor of Russian and Eurasian Studies, and Director, Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies UW and Guest Speakers: Glennys Young, Chair, Department of History and Professor, Jackson School of International Studies Laada Bilaniuk, Professor, Department of Anthropology Ambassador John Koenig, Lecturer, Jackson School and former U.S. Deputy Permanent Representative to NATO in Brussels Chris Collison, Senior Program Manager, National Democratic Institute, Washington D.C. Sofiia Fedzhora, Ph.D. student, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and UW Fulbright Ukrainian Language Teaching Assistant (2021-2022) This panel is sponsored by the Ellison Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies, the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, and the Center for West European Studies.

The Ellison Center presents the panel, "Challenges to the Post-Cold War Order: Russia, Ukraine and Kazakhstan" on Feb. 1, 2022. Speakers: Oxana Shevel, Associate Professor - Political Science (Tufts University) Oxana Shevel is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Tufts University where her research and teaching focuses on Ukraine and the post-Soviet region. Her current research projects examine the sources of citizenship policies in the post-Communist states and religious politics in Ukraine. Her research interests also include comparative memory politics and the politics of nationalism and nation-building. She is the author of award-winning Migration, Refugee Policy, and State Building in Postcommunist Europe (Cambridge University Press, 2011), which examines how the politics of national identity and strategies of the UNHCR shape refugee admission policies in the post-Communist region. Shevel’s research appeared in a variety of journals, including Comparative Politics, Current History, East European Politics and Societies, Europe-Asia Studies, Geopolitics, Nationality Papers, Post-Soviet Affairs, Political Science Quarterly, Slavic Review and in edited volumes. She is a member of PONARS Eurasia scholarly network, a country expert on Ukraine for Global Citizenship Observatory (GLOBALCIT), and an associate of the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute and of the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies. She currently serves as President of the American Association for Ukrainian Studies (AAUS) and Vice President of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN). Dmitry Gorenburg, Senior Research Scientist (CNA) Dmitry Gorenburg is an expert on security issues in the former Soviet Union, Russian military reform, Russian foreign policy, and ethnic politics and identity. His recent research topics include decision-making processes in the senior Russian leadership, Russian naval strategy in the Pacific and the Black Sea, and Russian maritime defense doctrine. Gorenburg is author of "Nationalism for the Masses: Minority Ethnic Mobilization in the Russian Federation" (Cambridge University Press, 2003), and has been published in journals such as World Politics and Post-Soviet Affairs. In addition to his role at CNA, he currently serves as editor of Problems of Post-Communism and is an Associate of the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies at Harvard University. (Read more) Carol Williams, Journalist; Former LA Times Moscow Bureau Chief Carol J. Williams is a retired foreign correspondent living near Seattle with her husband and a tuxedo cat. She covered revolution and war for 30-plus years for Associated Press and Los Angeles Times, from USSR/Russia, Eastern Europe, Afghanistan, Iraq and Ukraine. She has been awarded more than a dozen international honors, including a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1994. Retired from mainstream journalism, she curates “World Briefing by CJ Williams” on Twitter @cjwilliamslat, writes foreign affairs commentary for Seattle website www.postalley.org, and speaks on press freedom and foreign policy at events held by civic groups, libraries and her alma mater, University of Washington’s Jackson School of International Studies. Moderator: Scott Radnitz, Ellison Center Director. This panel is hosted by the Ellison Center for Russian, East European, and Central Asian Studies at the University of Washington, Seattle.