Insights

Writing. Convening. Teaching. Training. Modeling. Experimenting. Engaging. Across time zones and international boundaries, members of our community are at work. Our “Insights” gallery is a multimedia guide to intellectual life at the Davis Center.

A former ambassador reflects on the many directions of change in Central Asia, from walking through markets to presidential meetings.

Cristopher Patvakanian ’20 set out to explore whether foreign investors behave differently if they belong to the diaspora of the country in which they are investing.

"The Hungry Steppe," a new book by Sarah Cameron, has influenced the burgeoning public discourse on the famine of 1932–33 in Kazakhstan.

As the world marks the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II, it would be much better not only for the history of Russia but also for the country’s future if Russian leaders were willing to permit—and even encourage—a more even-handed discussion of the Soviet Union’s role in the war.

Soviet containment of a smallpox epidemic in the Kazakh SSR in 1971 was shrouded in secrecy. As modern Central Asia grapples with COVID-19, it is a fitting moment to reveal this history.

Create resilient agreements to withstand crises and unexpected events.

A set of billboards in the Siberian city of Tomsk called on residents to endorse constitutional changes with an unsubtle allusion to Russia's past.

An American and a Soviet soldier embraced shortly after meeting at the Elbe River at Torgau, Germany, on April 25, 1945. Germany's surrender would come weeks later.