"The current struggle over an affirmative message is further compounded by the fact that the negative messaging is taking up all the energy," says Professor of Political Science Grant Reeher. "Everything is about opposing Trump." 

The SoldierStrong scholarship program supports U.S. military veterans wishing to pursue higher education opportunities as civilians upon their return from service abroad. Maxwell graduate students Mitch Forbes and Chris Tonsmeire, both U.S. military veterans, have been named as this year’s SoldierStrong scholars.

Maxwell alumnus Ben Walsh '05 M.P.A. was elected mayor of the City of Syracuse. Walsh is Syracuse's first independent mayor in more than 100 years and the city’s second mayor-elect to ever be unaffiliated with any major political party.

“I think this part of an an escalating war of words between the Saudis and the Iranians, really instigated by Saudi Arabia, but unfortunately [for the Saudis] I don’t think they’re really as strategic as the Iranians are in terms of making these moves of the chessboard of the Middle East,” says Mehrzad Boroujerdi, professor of political science.

Miriam Elman, associate professor of political science, says that "the current hostility to the Balfour Declaration Centennial tells us a lot about why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict remains so intractable. It isn’t really about post-1967 settlements or post-1967 borders, but about a very basic and visceral intolerance to Jewish sovereign legitimacy anywhere in the Jewish people’s ancestral homeland.”

"When you see a piece of misinformation, even when it’s in the context of being corrected and you believe the correction, it can still have lingering effects on your attitudes," says Emily Thorson, assistant professor of political science.

"I would never underestimate the Japanese military," says Robert Murrett, deputy director of the Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism. "In terms of just sheer military proficiency — unit for unit, person for person, they’re the best military in Asia."

"People have always been susceptible to misinformation," Emily Thorson, assistant professor of political science, says. "The real challenge now lies in the immediacy, scope and ease of dissemination we now see with new technologies like social media."

Thomas Keck, Michael O. Sawyer Chair of Constitutional Law and Politics, says that while constitutional conventions could help advance civil rights by allowing organized groups to propose and implement changes to the state constitution, there is a fear that the same issues that plague state legislatures, like corporate cash or politician corruption, could also influence the construction of a new constitution.

"I think the fact that [George] Papadopoulos had a meeting early on or had connections early on with Russian government officials while he was employed by the Trump campaign is pretty damaging," says William C. Banks, director of the Institute for National Security and Counterterrorism.

The Public Policy and International Affairs Program is a seven week summer fellowship that promotes the inclusion of underrepresented groups in public service and advances their leadership roles throughout civic institutions. “This experience reaffirmed my intention to pursue a graduate degree in public affairs. More importantly, I learned how I could combine my passion for public policy and science in graduate school,” says Chizobam Nwagwu ’18, who recently completed the fellowship.

"This is potentially a can of worms, and Mueller has opened that can today," says Bill Smullen, director of the National Security Studies program.

The Maxwell School has appointed new chairs for the departments of anthropology, economics, history, international relations (undergraduate), political science and sociology, as well as an interim chair of social science. 

The Maxwell School's Citizenship and Civic Engagement program was selected by the Association of American Colleges and Universities as one of twenty-two departments from institutions across the country that are providing models for how to make civic learning and democratic engagement an expectation for all students who major in a given discipline.