2026 Lectures

Speakers:Dr. Preston Keat, UBS, Head of Political and Country Risk
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Geopolitics and Markets: Investing in an Uncertain World"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Folks Center for International Business, Columbia World Affairs Council
Preston Keat is a leading global expert on political risks and their economic impacts. Currently head of risk analysis at the world’s largest private bank, UBS, Keat’s insights are sought after by world leaders and key industries. Previously the director of research for the Eurasian Group, Keat is well known for the book he wrote with Ian Bremner, The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge in an Uncertain World. Keat holds a PhD from UCLA in Political Science and is currently a Sonoco Visiting Fellow in International Business in the Darla Moore School of Business.
2025 Lectures

Speakers: Dr. Emily Beaulieu
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Making Punches Count: The Individual Logic of Legislative Brawls"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Dr. Beaulieu will talk about her most recent book, explaining how democratic legislators can be motivated to engage in physical violence, and the consequences of this behavior for democratic representation.

Speakers: Consul General Melanie Moltmann
Title: Palmetto Forum: "U.S.-Germany Relations"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Join us for a discussion on the future of transatlantic relations with Consul General Moltmann while reflecting on German Unity Day (Oct. 3), commemorating German reunification in 1990, and the 25 anniversary of the Columbia’s Sister City partnership with Kaiserslautern.

Speakers: U.S. Ambassador (ret.) James Story, Dr. Carl Dahlman, Dr. Gerry McDermott
Title: Palmetto Forum: "The World Ahead: Understanding New Realities"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Join us for a round-up of recent shifts in global affairs and a discussion of the road ahead. Our experts will analyze newly emerging world trends and share their perspectives on what these changes mean for conventional patterns of trade, diplomacy, and geopolitics.

Speakers: Professor Bill Hauk
Title: Palmetto Forum: "The Economic Impact of Tariffs (Actual or Possible) on South Carolina"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
With shifting trade policies and the potential for new tariffs on the horizon, how might South Carolina’s economy be affected? Join us and Dr. Hauk, a frequently sought after expert by major news outlets, for an insightful discussion on the real and possible impacts of tariffs on industries, jobs, and consumers in the state. Dr. Hauk candidly acknowledges that the direction of this talk will depend on unfolding policy decisions—particularly whether a key reciprocal tariff plan moves forward on April 2nd and remains in place. Stay informed, join the conversation, and explore what these trade dynamics could mean for South Carolina’s economic future.

Speakers: Consul General Rachel Galloway
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Bridging the Atlantic from the United Kingdom to South Carolina”
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Join us for a presentation by Rachel Galloway, His Majesty’s Consul General at the British Consulate-General in Atlanta. Consul General Galloway will discuss her career in diplomacy as it parallels geopolitical trends. With a new Memorandum of Understanding between the UK and SC signed last year to strengthen trade relations, and the opening of a new SC Dept. of Commerce desk serving the UK & Ireland, Consul General Galloway will also address the future relations between our state and the United Kingdom.

Speakers: Professor Chris Yenkey
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Corruption: Ethics Versus Interests"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Corruption is one of the world's most persistent social and economic maladies despite being widely reviled. Anticorruption sentiment is everywhere, but effective solutions are elusive. Professor Yenkey will draw on his research and teaching on corruption to discuss this complex problem, focusing on how attitudes and beliefs in the general public can contribute to pervasive corruption even as the same public suffers from its effects. In true academic fashion, this talk will probably leave you with more questions than answers. Professor Yenkey uses innovative field experiments to capture the microfoundations of public support for corruption. He works with a range of public and private sector organizations to identify and test new interventions that help members of the public decline self-interested benefits available through occasional collusion with public officials.

Speakers Dr. Mathieu Deflem
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Israel and October 7: Ethnographic Observations, Here and There"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
This presentation focuses on selected aspects of the manner in which the Hamas terrorist attacks of October 7 have been perceived and interpreted in Israel and in the United States. Findings are based on ethnographic data, including a research stay in Israel in October 2024 on the occasion of the one-year anniversary of the Hamas massacre, as well as observations at home, especially from New York City. Situated in the context of his sociological research on counterterrorism, Dr. Deflem extends the viewpoint to the cultural dimension of the twin evils of terrorism and antisemitism.
2024 Lectures

Speakers: Dr. Christina Ahmadjian Sonoco Visiting Fellow, Darla Moore School of Business. Dr. Carl Dahlman Director, Walker Institute of International and Area Studies. Dr. Gerry McDermott Chair, Sonoco Department of International Business, Darla Moore School of Business.
Title: Palmetto Forum: "Geopolitical Disruption and the U.S. Elections"
Co-sponsors: Darla Moore School of Business, Columbia World Affairs Council
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Join us for a post-election discussion of the global challenges and opportunities that will face the new president and Congress. What will be the new international priorities for the United States? How will the world respond to changes in America's leadership? Our expert panel will give their analyses of what lies ahead.

Speakers: Scott Snyder, President and CEO at the Korea Economic Institute of America; Wonwoo Chung, First Secretary at the Political Section of the Embassy of the Republic of Korea to the United States; Evan Fowler, Economic Officer in the Office of Korean and Mongolian Affairs for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs with the State Department; Carl Dahlman, Director of the Walker Institute of International and Area Studies
Title: "Korea Economic Institute of America Presents: 'The Future of Korea 2024'"
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Korea Economic Institute of America, Columbia World Affairs Council
Join the Walker Institute, in collaboration with the Columbia World Affairs Council, as we host the Korean Economic Institute for a panel discussion featuring representatives from both the U.S. Department of State and the Korean Embassy. This event will provide important context on the strategic relationship between the United States and South Korea, the ongoing tensions on the Korean Peninsula, and the outlook for Korea's economic, political, and cultural influence globally.

Speakers: Mayor Daniel Rickenmann, Mayor of Columbia, SC
Title: "International Opportunity Outlook for Columbia”
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Mayor Daniel Rickenmann is dedicated to fostering Columbia's growth on the global stage by championing economic development and promoting the city’s cultural vibrancy. For far too long, the City of Columbia has been the best kept secret, but now, Mayor Rickenmann is telling the Capital City’s story all around the world. By encouraging local innovation and building strong international partnerships, Mayor Rickenmann is positioning Columbia as a thriving center for business, culture, and a higher quality of life.

Title: "Blue Zones: Where Are They and How Do We Get There?”
Speakers: Mayor Daniel Rickenmann, Mayor of Columbia, SC, Margaret Brown, Vice President at Blue Zones
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Boyd Innovation Center, Columbia World Affairs Council
The City of Columbia and Prisma Health introduced the Blue Zones Initiative with Dan Buettner, highlighting longevity and health traits from Blue Zones. The five recognized Blue Zones around the world include Ikaria, Greece; Okinawa, Japan; Sardinia, Italy; Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica; and Loma Linda, California, USA. Factors contributing to longevity include diet, lifestyle, and strong social connections. Most recently, Singapore has been identified as the sixth Blue Zone. These areas have a high number of centenarians and lower rates of chronic diseases. Our community embraced the initiative, leading to a collaborative effort for Columbia to gain a Blue Zone status. We will hear from Margaret Brown, Vice President at Blue Zones with comments from Mayor Daniel Rickenmann and learn about the 6 Blue Zones around the world and what we can do in Columbia to make our city a Blue Zone Certified City! Could Columbia, South Carolina be the next Blue Zone?

Speakers: Dr. Marcel Schäfer, Senior Research Scientist for the South Carolina Fraunhofer USA Alliance, Raphael Antonius Frick, Research Fellow at Fraunhofer SIT | ATHENE
Title: "Revealing the Worldwide Impact of Deep Fakes and AI”
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Dr. Marcel Schäfer, Senior Research Scientist for the South Carolina Fraunhofer USA Alliance, brings a wealth of experience from his tenure at the Fraunhofer Institute for Secure Information Technologies (SIT) in Germany. With a master's degree in mathematics from the University of Wuppertal and a PhD in computer science from the Technical University of Darmstadt, Dr. Schäfer has led numerous projects in cybersecurity and software engineering across the public and private sectors. Since March 2021, he has served as the Senior Program Coordinator for Fraunhofer USA Alliance, overseeing a range of technical projects including smart manufacturing, IoT, Industry 4.0, digitization, predictive maintenance, predictive analytics, and other data-driven and machine-learning-based technologies. From his office in Greenville, Dr. Schäfer looks to expand the Fraunhofer brand throughout South Carolina and the southeast region. His goal is to institutionalize Fraunhofer USA as an established organization in South Carolina and to bring the newest technology "made by Fraunhofer" from the global Fraunhofer network into the South.
Raphael Antonius Frick is a research fellow at Fraunhofer SIT | ATHENE in Darmstadt, specializing in the division of "Media Security & IT-Forensics." He focuses on developing new detection methods for AI-generated and manipulated audiovisual data, along with techniques for identifying disinformation in social media that span multiple modalities.

Speaker: Phillip Chritton, International Attorney and Visiting Fellow at USC Darla Moore School of Business
Title: "China 2024: The Year of the Dragon”
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Phillip Chritton is an international attorney with unique insights on China gained from living and working there for many years. He started teaching English in Beijing in 1984 and later advised multinational companies investing in the Chinese market. He later went on to work for UPS and recently retired as the Deputy General Counsel-International at UPS. He spent over a decade in Singapore, leading the Asia Pacific legal team, and later overseeing the company’s international legal matters.
Phil holds a B.A. in History from Stanford University, an M.A. in Journalism from the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he was a Foreign Language and Area Studies fellow in Chinese, and a J.D. from Columbia Law School, where he was an editor of The Journal of Chinese Law. Outside UPS, Phil has served on the board of The Council of Independent Colleges. He also formerly served on the board of Childspring International, an Atlanta-based organization providing medical surgeries to children in developing countries.

Speaker: Jon Olson Senior Vice President & General Counsel, Blackbaud
Title: "Anatomy of a Data Security Incident and Related Legal Aftermath”
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Jon Olson will explain how his South Carolina-based tech company dealt with a ransomware attack and the impact on its international business. Jon Olson joined Blackbaud in September 2008 and is responsible for legal and real estate activities, including negotiating transactions, managing corporate governance activities and legal compliance. He previously worked for Alcatel-Lucent, MCI, Unisys and in private practice. He received his BS from Georgetown University, JD from Dickinson School of Law and MBA from Seton Hall University.
2023 Lectures
Title: “Ukraine’s Reconstruction Has Begun: What it Means for the War"
Speaker: Carl T. Dahlman, Ph.D., director of the Walker Institute of International and Area Studies
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Amid the ongoing destruction of war, Ukrainians are already rebuilding the country’s physical and social infrastructure. Dr. Dahlman will discuss the early signs of reconstruction on the ground in Ukraine and why we need to look past bridges and buildings to understand what this means. Applying lessons from other recent conflicts, he will explain why these early efforts will shape the trajectory of what kind of country Ukraine is likely to be in the future and the role that early reconstruction plays in the conduct of the continuing war. Carl T. Dahlman, Ph.D., serves as the director of the Walker Institute of International and Area Studies. He is a political geographer whose research focuses primarily on the effects of armed conflict on human populations, especially the dynamics of ethnic cleansing, genocide, and forced migration on post-war state-building processes in the former Yugoslavia and Middle East. His fieldwork has been funded by the National Science Foundation and other sources. His publications include a detailed book on post-war Bosnia in addition to over 40 articles and book chapters.
Title: “Why Diplomacy Matters"
Speaker: Ambassador James Story, American Ambassador for the Venezuela Affairs Unit in Bogota, Colombia
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Ambassador James Story is the American Ambassador for the Venezuela Affairs Unit in Bogota, Colombia. Previously, Ambassador Story has served as Consul General in Rio de Janeiro, Director of the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) Office for the Western Hemisphere, Director of the INL Office in Bogota, Colombia, and Senior Civilian Representative in Southeastern Afghanistan. He has received several awards for his work including the Superior and Meritorious Honor Awards, the Warren Christopher Award for Outstanding Achievement in Global Affairs, and the Distinguished Honor Award for the Western Hemisphere Bureau. His lecture will tap into his extensive experience as an international ambassador and explore the importance of diplomatic engagement abroad. He will also discuss the effects of these diplomatic relations on individuals in the United States.
Title: “Transforming Tourism: A journey from unplanned, to sustainable, to regenerative development"
Speaker: Dr. David Cárdenas, associate professor, School of Hospitality and Tourism Management, University of South Carolina
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Dr. Cárdenas is an associate professor at the University of South Carolina in the School of Hospitality and Tourism Management. He also serves as the Interim Vice Provost and Associate Vice President of Global Carolina. Dr. Cárdenas has led several service learning study abroad trips to Ecuador, has extensive experience working on community-based tourism in the United States and Ecuador, and has conducted research related to sustainable development, resident attitudes, and tourism education. His lecture will discuss the evolution of tourism and the relationship between environmental sustainability and economic success within the tourism industry. He will also discuss the SC7, a partnership between two South Carolina-based organizations, Global Eco Adventures and the South Carolina National Heritage Corridor.
Title: "Forecasting Cultural Heritage Protection"
Speaker: Dr. James Bezjian, assistant professor of strategy & entrepreneurship and director of the Business Innovation Lab at The Citadel
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: the Columbia Museum of Art, Columbia World Affairs Council
Walker Institute and Columbia Museum of Art welcomes Dr. James Bezjian for a lecture inspired by the historic artwork in Reverent Ornament: Art from the Islamic World. Bezjian illustrates how initiatives like the Army Monuments Officers program — whose members are considered modern-day “Monuments Men,” a reference to the special task force that protected art and artifacts during World War II — can forecast problems related to cultural heritage before they happen and create contingency plans for those circumstances. In 2021, the Pentagon revived the Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives program in collaboration with the Smithsonian Cultural Rescue Initiative. The mission: “to protect cultural heritage threatened or impacted by disasters and to help U.S. and international communities preserve their identities and history.” CPT James Bezjian, Ph.D., is assistant professor of strategy & entrepreneurship and director of the Business Innovation Lab at The Citadel. Operating as an Army captain, Bezjian works with other academics and military officers to help war-torn communities around the world to preserve their cultural artifacts and histories.
Title: 'Nexus of Risks - What Binds Ukraine, Afghanistan and China to U.S. and Global Security”
Speaker: Jim McKinney, former US Army Russian/Central Asian/Eastern European Foreign Area and Intelligence Officer
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Lieutenant Colonel James (Jim) McKinney retired as a US Army Russian/Central Asian/Eastern European Foreign Area and Intelligence Officer with over 32 years of service. Jim worked in strategic, tactical and special operations assignments around the globe. He served as the Senior Defense Official and Defense Attaché to Slovenia, the Deputy Chief of Combating Terrorism for US Indo-Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Operations Center, and as the Security Assistance Officer for US Embassies in Albania and Rep of Georgia, as well as with the CIA, NSA, NRO and other agencies in special mission programs. He retired as a political-military Advisor to the US Army Central Commander in the Middle East, but continued to serve as a defense consultant supporting combat operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan until the recent withdrawal. Jim has a Master’s Degree from the University of Washington in International Studies, and a Bachelor’s Degree from California State University Sacramento in Government. He attended Command and General Staff College, Joint Forces Staff College, and a senior fellow for the George C. Marshall European Center for Security studies.
Title: “Global Inflation: The End is Nigh(?)”
Speaker: Professor Bill Hauk, associate professor in the Department of Economics at the University of South Carolina
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
William R. Hauk, Jr. is an associate professor in the Department of Economics at the Darla Moore School of Business at the University of South Carolina, where he arrived after receiving a Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University in California and a B.S. from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. He regularly teaches International Trade at both the undergraduate and doctoral levels, and Managerial Economics and Global Economics for the MBA programs. He has also been featured in media outlets such as National Public Radio, Voice of America, Bloomberg News, and many local news programs. His research interests focus primarily on issues of political economy and their impact on a country’s international trade preferences and economic growth prospects. Some of his research papers have been published in the Journal of Economic Growth, Economics and Politics and the Quarterly Journal of Political Science.
Title: “Why the walls remain - Northern Ireland from Good Friday to Brexit”
Speaker: Dr. Kara Dempsey, Associate Professor of Geography at Appalachian State University
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Dr. Kara Dempsey is Associate Professor of Geography in the Department of Geography and Planning at Appalachian State University. She is a political and cultural geographer with interests in nationalism, sectarian conflicts and reconciliation, especially conflict and peacebuilding in Ireland, as well as Brexit proceedings in Ireland and the UK. She previously served as Director of Irish Studies program at DePaul University.
2022 Lectures
Title: “Taiwan amid the U.S. - China Rivalry”
Speaker: Professor John Hsieh, Political Science, University of South Carolina
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Professor John Hsieh (Political Science, UofSC), an expert on Taiwan, will bring us up to date on the current situation confronting Taiwan within the context of continuing tensions between the United States and China. He will share his observations amid mounting speculation about mainland China’s designs on the island, particularly in the wake of Xi Jinping’s recent comments and apparent parallels to the Russian war in Ukraine.
Title: "Only Eight Months: Lessons from the SIRIUS-21 Isolation Mission in Moscow"
Speaker: Will Brown, NASA crew member for SIRIUS-21
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
"Imagine being accepted into NASA’s SIRIUS 21 analog mission and trained to perform over 70 experiments related to the psychological and physiological effects of long-term space exploration. The program is meant to simulate a crewed lunar mission and includes several months of training followed by eight months inside a state-of-the-art isolation facility in Moscow, Russia. You pack up your life, move to Moscow, and enter the isolation capsule. Everything goes fine until you lose a crewmate to a gruesome injury in the first month. Then, three months after that, your host country starts a war that threatens the world order. What happens next?" Will Brown (USC '11) lived through this story over the past year. His crew were dubbed by the media as "the last people to know about the war", but that was not the whole story. As he will explain from his personal experience, the SIRIUS 21 mission was a test of personal strength and withstood novel challenges to continued international scientific cooperation.
Title: "The fight for media freedom in Georgia (the case of Mtavari Channel)"
Speaker: Ms. Tamta Muradashvili
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Overshadowed by events in Ukraine, the surrounding region has been struggling with thewider impact of the war on key issues such as sovereignty, democracy, and relations with the west. In Georgia, the attorney Tamta Muradashvilihas been part of the struggle for media freedom,taking a key case to the European Court of HumanRights to push back the rising power of oligarchsand authoritarian politicians.
Title: "Understanding the Russian-Ukrainian Crisis"
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Event Recording:
Understanding the Russian-Ukrainian Crisis Watch the Palmetto Forum recording:
2021 Lectures
Title: "What is Attractive and What is Not? Countries' Battle for Soft Power in the Cyberspace"
Speaker: Judit Trunkos, Faculty Associate, Walker Institute of International and Area Studies
Date: December 2nd, 2021
Location: Virtual event
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Title: "The Making of a Cold War Journalist: Marvin Kalb's Long Letter Home After an Unforgettable Personal Adventure"
Speaker: Marvin Kalb, a non-resident senior fellow with the Foreign Policy Program at Brookings
Location: Virtual event
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
What was it like to be at the center of political tensions in Moscow and tasked with explaining the Soviet Union to the American public? Chosen by legendary broadcaster Edward R. Murrow to become one of what came to be known as the ‘Murrow Boys,’ veteran journalist Marvin Kalb shares his journey from radio newswriter to one of America’s most widely known foreign correspondents. In his newest memoir, “Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War,” Kalb takes readers on a personal journey through some of the darkest moments of the Cold War and the early days of television news. Drawing from his firsthand experiences, Kalb will comment on US-Russia relations and covering diplomacy in changing times, which is increasingly important as technological advances and social media outlets change the way that we deliver information.
Title: "Covid Crisis from an International Perspective: Competing Models, Scars and Silver Linings"
Speaker: Michel Gerebtzoff, Consulate General of Belgium in Atlanta
Location: Virtual event
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Covid has struck at a time of relative weakness of the multilateral institutions and high international political polarization. Absent a solid international coordination mechanism, countries have resorted to widely divergent tactics to confront the pandemic, and a battle of the narratives has developed. Drawing from his first hand experience of China, European Union and international relations, CG Michel Gerebtzoff will comment on the geopolitical impact of the crisis on some of the world's key players.
Title: "Understanding the Conflict in the Eastern Mediterranean"
Speaker: Dr. Ali Demiridas, Contributor to National Interest and other news media
Location: Virtual event
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Greece and Turkey are currently engaged in a dispute over territorial waters that threatens to engulf the region, due to the fact that Greece is a member of the EU, both are members of NATO, and other countries in the region have overlapping commits as well.
Dr. Demirdas is a foreign policy expert on Turkish foreign policy as well as the Middle East. He was a Fulbright scholar before earning his doctorate in political science from the University of South Carolina, USA. He taught Middle East politics at the College of Charleston in South Carolina (2011-2018) His opinion pieces have been published in the Jerusalem Post, the National Interest, Responsible Statecraft, Fair Observer, and Inside Arabia and translated into more than 7 languages. He has appeared on many political talk shows.
Title: "US Intelligence in the Information Age: Are we prepared for the next fight?"
Speaker: Major General Christopher Ballard, U.S. Army Retired, Greenville SC
Location: Virtual event
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
2020 Lectures
Title: “US-Venezuela relations: How we got here and where we are going”
Speaker: Ambassador Jimmy Story Venezuela Affairs Unit, Bogota, Colombia
Co-sponsors: Columbia World Affairs Council
Ambassador Story will describe the days leading to the suspension of operations at the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, Venezuela. In exploring the roots of the political and economic crisis in Venezuela, he will provide an account of the US policy positions and their importance for the region. He will then discuss policy options moving forward and explain the high cost of failure if Venezuela were to slide further into dictatorship.
Title: “The Rise and Challenges of Authoritarian Populism In Europe And The U.S.”
Speaker: Dr. David Sirakov, Director of the Atlantic Academy Rheinland-Pfalz
Location: Virtual event
Title: "Internet voting in national elections: why it is widely used in some European countries and considered an impossibly bad idea in others "
Speaker: Dr. Mihkel Solvak, Professor of electoral behavior, Tartu University, Estonia
Location: Virtual event
Title: "The COVID-19 Pandemic: Separating Fact from Fiction and Certainty from Uncertainty "
Speaker: Dr. Eric Brenner, Medical Epidemiologist, Arnold School of Public Health, University of South Carolina
Location: Virtual event
Title: "The COVID-19 Pandemic: Separating Fact from Fiction and Certainty from Uncertainty "
Speaker: Dr. Eric Brenner, Medical Epidemiologist, Arnold School of Public Health, University of South Carolina
Location: Virtual event
Title: “Putin’s 2024 Problem”
Speaker: Dr. Gordon Smith, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
On January 15, Russian President Vladimir Putin gave his annual address to the Russian Parliament in which he unveiled plans to reform the country’s constitution. Hours later he dismissed the entire cabinet. What is Vladimir Putin up to? Will he push to amend the constitution to enable himself to serve as “President for life?” Will he resign before the end of his fourth term as President expires in 2024? Professor Gordon Smith, who has analyzed Russian political affairs for almost 50 years, will try to make sense of President Putin’s recent extraordinary moves and what they mean for Russia and the world.
Title: “From Mine to Market: Diamonds and 19th-Century Transatlantic Trade”
Speaker: Dr. Saskia Coenen Snyder, Associate Professor of History, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
2019 Lectures
Title: “Breaking Down the Breakdown of Democracy in Venezuela”
Speaker: Dr. Matthew Wilson, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “Democracy building after authoritarianism - THE CHALLEGES TO LIBERAL DEMOCRACY IN POLAND (and Eastern Europe) 30 years after the 1989 reFolution”
Speaker: Dr. Bohdan Szklarski, Visiting Professor of Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “The Middle East after the Israeli elections”
Speaker: Dr. Josef Olmert, Adjunct Professor of Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Crisis in Hong Kong: How Chinese is Hong Kong"
Speaker: Dr. John Hsieh, Professor of Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “The Cosmology of Brexit”
Speaker: Dr. Robert Cox, Director, Walker Institute of International and Area Studies, Professor of Political Science, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “Avoiding Day Zero – Perspectives on Financing the Global Water and Sanitation Water Infrastructure Transition”
Speaker: Dr. David Fuente, Assistant Professor, School of Earth, Ocean & Environment, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "A Local Battle with Global Implications: The Dispute Over the South China Sea"
Speaker: Professor Joel Samuels, School of Law, University of South Carolina.
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “A global energy transition? The increasing role of renewable energy in the global energy mix”
Speaker: Dr. Connor Harrison, Assistant professor of Department of Geography at the University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
2018 Lectures
Title: "Fascism and the Demise of Democracy"
Speaker: Dr. Donald Puchala, the James F. and Maude B. Byrnes Professor of International Studies Emeritus at the University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Fascist regimes are products of postdemocracy. Fascist parties and their leaders come to power because they win elections in democratic countries. Fascists don’t usurp power through coups or otherwise seize governments; they are elected by huge numbers of voters. Focusing on the Weimar Republic between 1924 and 1933, I shall try to explain exactly how Hitler and the Nazi Party managed to get themselves elected.
Title: “Genocide: The Law and Its Ambiguities”
Speaker: Dr. Anu Chakravarty, Associate professor of political science, USC
Sponsored by: The Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Engage America Series: Oman 2018"
Speaker: Ms. Haura Al Wahaibi- Commercial Attaché of the Sultanate of Oman
Sponsored by: This event is jointly-sponsored by the Columbia World Affairs Council and The Walker Institute .The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth.
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: “Assessing the Future of the Divided Korea”
Speaker: Dr. Gerald McDermott, Professor of Darla Moore School of Business, USC
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "If you thought nukes were scary, try bioterrorism"
Speaker: Dr. Helmut Albrecht, Department of Internal Medicine, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Bollywood to Beijing: Film Exchange in the Asian Century"
Speaker: Dr. Krista Van Fleit- Director, Center for Asian Studies and Islamic World Studies, USC
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
View the event flyer for more information.
Title: "State and Federal Funding of Public Higher Education: Has Public Higher Education become a Private Good?"
Speaker: Dr. Mary Anne Fitzpatrick, Vice President for System Planning, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
2017 Lectures
Title: "The Mighty Shall Hear Their Voices: The Southern Negro Youth Congress & the Making of the Modern Civil Rights Movement"
Speaker: Dr. Bobby J. Donaldson, USC Associate Professor, Department of History
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Trump’s Economic Nationalism & South Carolina’s Economic Globalism"
Speaker: Dr. James Kuhlman, University of South Carolina
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: " The New Populism in Europe"
Speaker: Dr. Christoffer Green-Pedersen, Professor in the Department of Political Science-School of Business and Social Sciences-AARHUS University, Denmark
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Social Media and International Relations"
Speaker: Dr. Augie Grant, Professor-School of Journalism and Mass Communication at USC
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
Title: "Putin's Russia Inside Out"
Speaker: Dr. Stanislav Markus Associate Professor of International Business and Business Partnership Foundation Fellow – Darla Moore School of Business at USC
Sponsored by: Walker Institute and The Palmetto Forum is made possible in part by generous support from South State Wealth
Location: The Palmetto Club, 1231 Sumter Street
2016 Lectures
Title:"MERS, Ebola and Zika, Oh My!"
Speaker: Dr. Helmut Albrecht, Professor and Chair of Clinical Internal Medicine at USC
Title: "Who will win in this WEIRDEST election ever? Guesses and maybe reasons."
Speaker: Donald Fowler, Adjunct Faculty - Department of Political Science at USC
Title: "What Makes Vladimir Putin Tick?"
Speaker: Dr. Gordon B. Smith, Emeritus Faculty - Department of Political Science at USC
Title: "Brexit: The Future of the European Union"
Speaker: Dr. Robert Cox, Director at Walker Institute and Professor with Department of Political Science at USC