Council on Foreign Relations

This roundtable meeting was part of the project, Entrepreneurs and Market Linkages in Conflict and Post-Conflict Environments, organized by the Civil Society, Markets, and Democracy Initiative.

Trita Parsi, founder and president of the National Iranian American Council, discusses the course of U.S.-Iran relations and escalating tensions surrounding the nuclear question, as part of CFR's Academic Conference Call series.

Learn more about CFR's resources for the classroom at Educators Home.

Steve Coll, Robert Grenier, and Daniel Markey look at changes in U.S.-Pakistan relations over the past year and make recommendations for moving forward.

Ambassador David Scheffer and former State Department legal adviser John Bellinger discuss how international justice over the last two decades has affected international politics, including the U.S. role in assisting local war crimes prosecutions in Libya and elsewhere.

Leading regional experts Gregory Gause, III and Toby C. Jones assess the stability of Saudi Arabia, its role in the reshaped region, and the future of U.S.-Saudi relations.

Iraqi filmmaker Oday Rasheed discusses his second film, Qarantina, which follows the story of a broken family in Baghdad who takes in a mysterious boarder.

Qarantina is part of the Global Lens 2012 film series and was co-presented with the Global Film Initiative.

Matthew J. Slaughter, CFR's adjunct senior fellow for business and globalization, and William F. Owens, senior fellow at University of Denver's Institute for Public Policy Studies and former governor of Colorado, discuss the CFR-sponsored Independent Task Force on U.S. Trade and Investment Policy, as part of CFR's State and Local Officials Conference Call Series.

Learn more about CFR's State and Local Officials Initiative.

Obiageli Ezekwesili discusses the rise of Africa as a frontier market, the prospects for growth in coming years, the emergence of new players in African economies, and the World Bank's most innovative projects in the region.

The United Nations is facing a growing range of transnational challenges in a time of increasingly scarce resources. Ambassador Joseph Torsella, U.S. representative to the United Nations for management and reform, discusses the U.S. role in working toward a more effective and efficient United Nations.

This session was a meeting of the Civil Society, Democracy, and Countering Radicalism Roundtable series.

Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, professor of theology at Chicago Theological Seminary and editor of Interfaith Just Peacemaking: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Perspectives on the New Paradigm of Peace and War, leads a discussion on Just Peace theory, as part of CFR's Religion and Foreign Policy Conference Call series.

Learn more about CFR's Religion and Foreign Policy Initiative.

David F. Gordon, Mark L. Schneider, and Paul B. Stares discuss their respective organization's assessments of the risks and the most worrisome sources of instability and conflict in 2012.

This special event was held in memory of the late Richard C. Holbrooke, former board director and longtime member of CFR. Panelists discussed the lessons of diplomacy learned from U.S. engagement in Vietnam, Bosnia, and Afghanistan, three areas Ambassador Holbrooke worked on and cared deeply about.

Senator Rob Portman (R-OH) discusses the current state of the U.S. economy and offers his suggestions for fundamental change through export expansion and corporate tax reform.

The Pentagon's strategic review sets the stage for a new era of restraint in U.S. military spending and a focus on priorities in Asia. CFR's Richard K. Betts and Max Boot discuss the challenges facing the U.S. military and the implications for U.S. defense policy.

Maria Otero discusses progress made on implementing recommendations outlined in the Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review toward advancing American "civilian power."

CFR's Scott A. Snyder and Paul B. Stares analyze the effect of the death of Kim Jong-il on North Korea's domestic politics and discuss U.S. policy toward the Korean peninsula.

CFR's Scott Snyder and Paul Stares discuss the death of North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il and its impact on the country's future, regional stability, and U.S. policy.

With the United States formally marking the end of the Iraq war, all U.S. combat troops are scheduled to withdraw by December 31. Listen to former National Security Council official Meghan O'Sullivan and correspondent Ned Parker, who reported from Iraq and has just returned from the region, together with Foreign Affairs Editor Gideon Rose discuss the road ahead for Iraq.

Russia's December 4 parliamentary vote has prompted mass demonstrations over allegations of electoral fraud. The protests also stem from public frustration with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's decision to run again for president in March. CFR senior fellow Stephen Sestanovich says "[E]ven if the [presidential] election doesn't go against [Putin], there's a potential here for changing the atmosphere and rules of Russian politics in a fundamental way." Listen to Sestanovich as he discusses the elections and public demonstrations.