Stephen Holmes

Courses

• Colloquium on Law and Security

  The Colloquium will explore a broad array of emerging issues in the rapidly changing field of national security. Today, unchallenged American hegemony is increasingly a feature of the past. U.S. policymakers no longer see transnational terrorism as the central threat to American national security. The nature of how we fight as well as how we cooperate across borders is changing. The aim of the seminar, therefore, is to define and debate the new, complex and evolving threat environment facing the country in the third decade of the twenty-first century. We will look abroad, including at deteriorating relations with an increasingly powerful China and a belligerent Russia, the threat of cyber warfare and “gray zone” tactics, the weakening of America’s traditional alliances and values, and emerging conflicts that threaten international peace and stability. And we will also focus on domestic issues within the United States, including strains on our system of democracy, challenges within our national security bureaucracy, white nationalism and systemic racism, and persistent questions around executive powers and the adequacy of Congressional oversight. Each week we will engage with a presentation by an eminent national security expert—including former government officials, legal academics, international relations experts, journalists, and human rights and civil liberties advocates—as we explore the defining features and dilemmas of today’s national security law and policy. Some of this year’s speakers will include: - Ashley Deeks, UVA national security law professor and former Deputy Legal Advisor to the National Security Council - Kristen Eichensehr, professor at UVA Law and scholar focusing on cybersecurity, foreign relations, international law and national security law - Ryan Hass, director of the John L. Thornton China Center at Brookings and a former U.S. diplomat and national security official on China issues - Julia Ioffe, Puck journalist and a leading writer on U.S.-Russia relations - Ed Luce, columnist and editor at the Financial Times focusing on global insights and major geopolitical challenges - Azadeh Moaveni, NYU journalism professor, expert on Iran and the Middle East, and author of “Guesthouse for Young Widows” - Abraham Newman, political scientist at Georgetown writing on economic interdependence and the way it has transformed geopolitics - Deborah Pearlstein, director of the Program in Law and Public Policy at Princeton University and an expert in constitutional and international law, democracy, and national security - Sarang Shidore, director of the Global South Program at Quincy Institute, focusing on geopolitical risk, grand strategy, and climate security, with a special emphasis on the Global South and Asia

• Illiberalism in Legal and Political Theory Seminar

  This seminar will explore the origins, development, and consequences of nativism, populism, white supremacy, authoritarianism, xenophobia, anti-individualism, racism, hostility to science, conspiracy theories, the demonization of partisan adversaries as inner enemies and other illustrations of illiberal ideas and practices in contemporary politics, culture and law. Readings will range from classic nineteenth-and twentieth-century works to contemporary writings that document the evolution of the illiberal mindset today and suggest potential legal and political responses to what has become a worldwide revolt against liberal models of political and economic life.

• Law and Politics in the Bible Seminar

  This seminar will be organized around a close reading of 1 and 2 Samuel, the story of King David, arguably the greatest work of political theory in the history of Western literature. The seminar will also deal with the political theology of the book of Judges as a background to 1 and 2 Samuel and the covenantal conceptions of law and politics theat emerge from the rest of the biblical tradition. Themes to be discussed will include divine and human law, political and priestly authority, obedience and rebellion, loyalty and betrayal, heroism and human frailty, tribalism and transcendence, kingship and covenant, political authority and idolatry.