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So far Deepak Maharjan has created 90 blog entries.

Understanding Orban’s Hungary

SOLD OUT!!!

  September 24, 2019

 Dr. Deborah Cornelius

Hungary and the Fidesz regime of Viktor Orban have been much in the news in recent months, with criticism of the increasing centralization of power, control of the free press, and blows to academic freedom. Despite protests against widespread propaganda, increasing government control, limitations on freedom of academic research, during her most recent visit Dr. Cornelius found that much of the population still appear satisfied with the Fidesz government. They often praised the Orban regime and its accomplishments, although with a nonchalant acknowledgement of widespread corruption.

The fall of communism led to wild hopes in Central and Eastern Europe that the inhabitants would be able to join capitalist Western Europe and garner the benefits and standard of living associated with the West. Why has the early wild enthusiasm of 1990 disintegrated into disappointment and resentment? What accounts for the popularity of the Orban regime? Why is the opposition is so weak and fragmented? How have past governments failed the population, beginning with the rapid privatization after 1990? How has the refugee crisis of 2015 raised Orban’s popularity and increased criticism of the European Union? Does Orban represent the forefront of a rising tide of populist leaders in Eastern Europe, or his regime specific to the Hungarian situation?

Deborah S. Cornelius

Deborah S Cornelius is a historian and former professor at Rutgers, the State University. Her field of study is Central and Eastern Europe with a focus on Hungary and the lands of the former Hungarian Kingdom. She received her doctorate from Rutgers University, 1994, after a year of research in Hungary on a Fulbright Research Fellowship. Her MA is from Yale University, 1958 and BA from Connecticut College, 1956. She has taught at Franklin and Marshall College, the International School of Vienna, Austria, the American School,Tangier, Morocco, and Santa Fe Prep School. A leading US authority on Hungary, Cornelius most recently spent five weeks in Budapest studying the present state of the Hungarian regime.

Her publications concerning Hungary and the former kingdom include:  Hungary in World War II: Caught in the Cauldron. Fordham University Press, 2011. Kutyaszorítóban: Magyarország és a II.világ háború. Rubicon-kőnvek. 2015. In Search of the Nation: the New Generation of Hungarian Youth in Czechoslovakia 1925-1934. 1925-1934. Columbia U. Press.1999.

The SFWAF Program will be in the:  The SFCC Board Room (#223) which is in the West Wing (Administration building) of the Santa Fe Community College.
Understanding Orban’s Hungary2019-09-18T22:40:18-07:00

Lecture and Screening of “TRANSIT”

  March 12, 2019

 Dr. Randall Halle

This program is presented through a joint partnership of the Colorado European Union Center of Excellence, the Center for Contemporary Art and the Santa Fe World Affairs Forum

Dr. Randall Halle
Tuesday, March 12, 2019 @ 6 pm 

The Screen
1600 Saint Michaels Drive Santa Fe, NM 87505

Randal HalleDr. Randall Halle, The Klaus W. Jonas Professor of German Film and Cultural Studies and the Director of the Film and Media Studies Program at University of Pittsburgh, presents a lecture and screening of a film that addresses many of the urgent challenges facing societies across the globe.
His books include: The Europeanization of Cinema, German Film after Germany, Queer Readings in Social Philosophy and the co-edited volumes After the Avant-Garde and Light Motives.

The screening is Christian Petzold’s “TRANSIT”, an engaging and challenging drama with refugees, fascism, desperation, betrayal, mystery and love. The film adapts Anna Segher’s 1944 novel about German refugee who fled to Marseille at the outbreak of WWII, the invading Nazi forces on their heels. But it moves between the plight of the displaced then and now. Living among refugees from around the world huddled in Marseille, our main character assumes the identity of the dead writer whose transit papers he is carrying. And he falls for, a mysterious woman searching for her husband—the man whose identity he has stolen. (Germany/France, 2018, 101m)

“Extraordinary! Conceptually daring.”
–Variety

“Moody, beguiling, formally bold. Turns history
into an existential maze from

which few seem destined to escape” –The New
York Times

“Urgent and slyly brilliant. Like
a remake of Casablanca as written by Franz Kafka.” –IndieWire

Tuesday, March 12, 2019 @ 6 pm 

The Screen
1600 Saint Michaels Drive Santa Fe, NM 87505

Lecture and Screening of “TRANSIT”2019-05-01T14:20:25-07:00

The intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Next Arms Race

  February 26, 2019

 Cheryl Rofer

 Click here to download: The INF Treaty and the Next Arms Race power point slides

The Trump administration has been threatening to withdraw the United States from the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Agreement by February 2, 2019. Its stated reason is that Russia has developed a missile that violates the treaty. US withdrawal, however, is likely to lead to a new nuclear arms race.

The INF Treaty was signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev in 1987 to end a dangerous arms race that threatened the European continent. The treaty outlawed an entire class of weapon and formed a basis for later arms control agreements.

We do not know what President Donald Trump will actually do with respect to the treaty. This talk will be up to the minute. It will include the historical background of the INF Treaty, its place in the framework of arms control treaties, and how the US’s withdrawal from it can provoke a new arms race, along with the implications of actions taken by the administration during February.

Cheryl Rofer was a chemist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory for 35 years. She now writes scientific and political commentary for the web publications Nuclear Diner and Balloon Juice. She regularly provides background information on nuclear topics to reporters and has been quoted in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Vox. Her work at Los Alamos included projects in fossil fuels, laser development, and the nuclear fuel cycle and has worked on environmental remediation at Los Alamos and in Estonia and Kazakhstan. She is past president of the Los Alamos Committee on Arms Control and International Security and a founding member of SFWAF. She has published in scientific and political science journals and edited a book. She holds an A.B. from Ripon College and an M.S. from the University of California at Berkeley. She has spoken to SFWAF on several previous occasions, most recently on the Iran Nuclear Agreement.

The SFWAF Program will be in the:  The SFCC Board Room (#223) which is in the West Wing (Administration building) of the Santa Fe Community College.
The intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Next Arms Race2019-05-01T14:20:25-07:00

Water as the Common Denominator for Health and Peace

 January 22, 2019

 David Douglas

SOLD OUT!

There is no more serious and solvable global health problem in developing countries than the lack of safe water in hospitals and clinics. The need for safe water in Gaza and the West Bank represents a common goal for Palestinians and Israelis at a time when few other issues bring the sides together.

The Washington D.C.-based advocacy organization, Global Water 2020, where David Douglas is a principal, has become one of the key entities working behind the scenes on these two issues to expand safe water access.

Douglas, a Santa Fe resident, will focus on current steps being taken by governments, UN agencies, NGOs, and donors to extend safe water to tens of thousands of health-care facilities in Africa, Asia and Latin America. He’ll also describe several quiet efforts now underway by Palestinians, Israelis and international donors to improve drinking water and wastewater conditions in Gaza and the West Bank.

David Douglas leads non-profit organizations devoted to global clean drinking water, including the DC-based Global Water 2020 (www.globalwater2020.org) and the Santa-Fe based non-profit organization Waterlines (www.waterlines.org) which has provided funding and technical aid for over 1,000 small-scale drinking water projects in rural villages, schools, churches and clinics in developing countries. From 2005-2010 he headed the time-limited initiative Water Advocates, the US’s first advocacy organization devoted to increasing public and private support for safe drinking water and adequate sanitation worldwide. This past November, at the invitation of the US State Department and the Vatican’s Dicastery for Integral Human Development, Douglas spoke in Rome on the appalling lack of safe water and sanitation in government and faith-based health-care facilities in developing countries.

Douglas practiced environmental law and wrote extensively in the 1980’s and 1990’s on global drinking water issues. He is the author of “Wilderness Sojourn: Notes in the Desert Silence,” “Letters of Faith: Memoirs of an Appalachian Conversion,” and co-author with his wife, Deborah, of “Pilgrims in the Kingdom: Travels in Christian Britain.”  He and Deborah live in Santa Fe and have two grown daughters and five grandchildren.

The SFWAF Program will be in the:  The SFCC Board Room (#223) which is in the West Wing (Administration building) of the Santa Fe Community College.
Water as the Common Denominator for Health and Peace2019-05-01T14:20:25-07:00

Foreign Policy Begins at Home: Public Opinion and National Security in a Democracy

November 29, 2018

 Ted McNamara

Throughout our history, the degree of our success in foreign affairs depends on our strength and unity at home and public understanding and support of our foreign policies.
Q: what did this last election do in this regard?

Ted-McNamara

Ambassador McNamara is the President of the Diplomacy Center Foundation, a not-for-profit partner of the Department of State, building the nation’s first ever museum and educational center devoted to American diplomacy.

He retired in 1997 as Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs, but returned in 2001 to be Senior Advisor to the Secretary on terrorism and homeland security. He previously served as Ambassador to Colombia, Special Assistant to the President, Ambassador at Large for Counter Terrorism, Special Negotiator for Panama, and other senior positions. From 1998 to 2001 he was President and CEO of the Americas Society and Council of the Americas in New York.

He was Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment, reporting to the President, Congress, and Director of National Intelligence (2006-09). He is also Adjunct Professor in the Elliot School of International Affairs at the George Washington University.

A career diplomat with postings in Colombia, Russia, Congo, and France, he has written extensively on Latin America, terrorism, arms control, non-proliferation and regional security. He is the recipient of numerous distinguished service awards and has appeared on the PBS Newshour, CNN, NPR, BBC, VOA and other national and international news media.

The SFWAF Program will be in the:  The SFCC Board Room (#223) which is in the West Wing (Administration building) of the Santa Fe Community College.
Foreign Policy Begins at Home: Public Opinion and National Security in a Democracy2019-05-01T14:20:25-07:00

The US and China: A Fragile Relationship Under Stress

November 1, 2018

 Henry (Hank) A. Levine

In late September, the US-Chinese relationship took a turn for the worse in economic and national security terms. What happened? What is the state of play and what does this mean for US companies and other American businesses in terms of trade with our single largest trading partner? What is the state of the Chinese economy? Are the Trump administration’s tariff wars justified? Are they effective? Or has the relationship between these two giants soured so much that economic disagreements also affect national security and other interests?

Henry (Hank) A. LevineHank Levine is a Senior Advisor with the Albright Stonebridge Group — a strategic advisory firm in Washington, DC. As a senior member of the firm’s multimillion-dollar China practice Mr. Levine helps international firms deepen their interactions with government and non-government entities in China and resolve business issues.

Before entering the private sector Mr. Levine spent 25 years as a Foreign Service Officer with the US Department of State. In this capacity he served twice in the State Department’s Office of China Affairs, twice at the US Embassy in Beijing, and as US Consul General in Shanghai. Following his tour in Shanghai he served for three years as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Asia at the US Department of Commerce. In that capacity he was the senior China advisor to two secretaries of Commerce and lead negotiator for the annual US-China Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade.

Mr. Levine is a member of the National Committee on US China Relations and a member of the Advisory Council of the US-China Education Trust, where he previously served as Executive Director. Mr. Levine has a B.A. in Political Science from Bucknell University. He did graduate work in international affairs at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He is a graduate, with distinction, from the US National War College. He is fluent in Chinese (Mandarin).

Time: 12-2 pm

Location:

The Hotel Santa Fe (#Kiva C),
1501 Paseo de Peralta
Santa Fe, NM 87501

The US and China: A Fragile Relationship Under Stress2019-05-01T14:20:25-07:00
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