There's still time to apply! Accepting applications for Fall 2026 with scholarship support available. Apply now!
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There's still time to apply! Accepting applications for Fall 2026 with scholarship support available. Apply now!
In a world struggling with social polarization and conflict, strengthening social cohesion, and building peace, requires learning lessons and carefully crafted approaches. What works to renew trust and foster peace in the wake of polarization and conflict? This timely lunchtime panel features the experiences and insights of leading practitioners who have mediated social differences through community-based approaches in Northern Ireland and in a myriad of other settings around the world.
The conversation will be moderated by Korbel professor Tim Sisk. Following the discussion, we will have an open audience Q&A. This event is open to students, faculty, staff, and DU community members. We hope to see you there!
The Korbel School will host a town hall style event with Tobias Bergner, Director of the German Information Center - Public Diplomacy at the German Embassy. This event will engage with DU and Korbel students, faculty, and staff, as well as interested members of the public about German foreign policy in a town hall style format. Mr. Bergner will begin with brief introductory remarks before opening up to audience Q&A, moderated by Korbel Professor Rachel Epstein. A reception with light bites and refreshments will precede the program.
We invite you to join us for the Anschutz National Security Lecture Series, where we'll host a timely conversation with Michael O'Hanlon of the Brookings Institution. Drawing on insights from his latest book, To Dare Mighty Things: U.S. Defense Strategy Since the Revolution, O’Hanlon will explore the evolution of U.S. defense strategy — from its historical foundations to today’s complex global landscape — and assess what lies ahead for American national security. With a regional lens, the discussion will also highlight Colorado’s contributions to national defense.
Korbel Professor Rachel Epstein will moderate the conversation, which will be followed by audience Q&A. Doors open at 5:15, and programming begins at 5:30.
Dr. O'Hanlon's book is available here: https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300279931/to-dare-mighty-things/
About Michael O'Hanlon
Dr. Michael O’Hanlon is the Philip H. Knight Chair in Defense and Strategy and director of research in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, where he specializes in U.S. defense strategy and budgets, the use of military force, and American national security policy. He is a senior fellow and directs the Strobe Talbott Center on Security, Strategy, and Technology. He co-directs the Africa Security Initiative as well. He is an adjunct professor at Georgetown University and Columbia University and was a member of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board from 2021 to 2025; he was also a member of the external advisory board at the Central Intelligence Agency from 2011-12. His newest book, timed to coincide with the nation’s 250th birthday, is “To Dare Mighty Things: U.S. Defense Strategy Since the Revolution” (Yale Press, 2026). In 2023, O’Hanlon published a book titled “Military History for the Modern Strategist: America’s Major Wars since 1861.” His articles have appeared in Foreign Affairs, The National Interest, Survival, Washington Quarterly, Joint Forces Quarterly, and International Security, among other publications; he has also written hundreds of op-eds in major newspapers. Recent articles include a detailed analysis of the U.S. defense budget, a military assessment of a possible Chinese blockade of Taiwan, and a proposal with Georgetown Professor Lise Howard for a new security architecture for eastern Europe. O’Hanlon has appeared on television or spoken on the radio more than 4,000 times since September 11, 2001.
At the Josef Korbel School of Global and Public Affairs, global challenges are not abstract. They are lived, debated, researched, and translated into action. A shining example of this real-world approach is Korbel’s Sié Chéou-Kang Center for International Security and Diplomacy, a research hub born from a vision that ideas, when supported and connected, can move the world toward greater peace, security, prosperity, and justice.
Thanks to a transformative endowment from the Anna & John J. Sié Foundation, the Sié Center was dedicated in 2009 and named in honor of John Sié's father, Ambassador Sié Chéou-Kang, an extraordinary diplomat, educator, author and playwright, who spent much of his adult life in Europe forging relationships on behalf of China. Inspired by Ambassador Sié Chéou-Kang’s legacy of bridge-building, the Center was designed to bring scholars together across disciplines and perspectives.
This generous gift created more than a physical space; It established a durable intellectual infrastructure designed to support interdisciplinary research and elevate scholarship that bridges security and diplomacy across sectors and borders.
Korbel Distinguished University Professor Deborah Avant became the center’s inaugural director, and under her leadership, the center launched important, policy-relevant initiatives and brought in its first faculty and students. Over time, the Center has evolved through different leadership eras, partnerships, and major grants, including multiple iterations of Carnegie Corporation funding.
“As it exists today, the Sié Center serves as a dynamic hub to support faculty whose research interests span the spectrum of security and diplomacy – from nuclear strategy and military security to cultural diplomacy, gender and security, conflict studies, and climate governance,” said Ashten Scheller, program manager of the Sié Center. “We want to be responsive to global events as they happen.”
Today, the Sié Center is led by Korbel Professor Rachel Epstein, who continues Sié’s ambition to keep communities informed through pathbreaking faculty research and programming on ongoing global issues, from the recent elections in Bangladesh to nuclear non-proliferation efforts to understanding limits on immigrants' and asylum seekers' legal access in the United States.
“In our programming, we connect faculty research to events unfolding in real time,” Dr. Epstein said. Faculty expertise puts world developments in historical perspective and illuminates the deeper sources of conflict and cooperation across many regional settings.”
The Sié Center brings research to light to ensure scholarship serving the public good reaches the public itself. Through its primary engagement initiatives, the center explores how academics and policymakers can engage ethically and effectively:
Beyond these initiatives, Sié hosts more than two dozen events and programs each year, including new “Policy Pop-Ups” that bring faculty together for informal conversations about pressing global events, giving students direct access to expertise beyond the classroom.
“We want to be a hub for research and also a gathering hub for community,” Scheller shared, an ethos that is visible in how the center supports both faculty and students.
Faculty Support
From its earliest days, the center’s intention was clear: build an interdisciplinary body of research that cuts across silos, enabling faculty within Korbel and across DU departments such as the College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences, along with visiting scholars and practitioners, to collaborate in an ongoing exchange of ideas.
Supporting such research and collaboration means more than administrative coordination. It means working directly with faculty who secure external grants, offering frequent feedback, connecting research opportunities with available funding, and brainstorming programming ideas.
For example, Sié staff coordinate with affiliated faculty like Dr. Hilary Matfess, who leads a team of 14 research assistants as part of a grant on Women’s Mobilization Within Armed Groups During and After War, and support other leading projects on nuclear security, democratic erosion, climate transitions, and global economic restructuring. The center provides the backbone that allows these projects to scale.
Sié’s small staff team has always had an outsized impact. The centralized structure — typically a director and program manager partnership — creates a focused research support unit within the larger school.
“It allows us to specialize more in our program and, in some ways, be more creative with our programming,” Scheller explained. This tight coordination enables faster idea generation, more constructive brainstorming, and targeted administrative support for research projects, she said.
In addition, while high-level research often happens behind the scenes, the Sié Center ensures it does not stay there.
“Because we understand the wide-ranging research outputs of all faculty, we also try to support them in communicating to the public via social media and newsletter announcements to increase their exposure,” Scheller added.
“The Sié Center is also about providing research resources to outstanding students,” said Scheller.
Between 30 and 40 students support affiliated faculty each academic year and do much more than research alone. Assistants develop skills in data collection, literature review curation, analytical writing, and subject-matter mastery, often working one-on-one with faculty in intensive mentorship relationships. Among these research assistants are the highly competitive Sié Fellows, who receive full scholarships that help remove financial barriers and embed students directly in active research.
These unique research experiences and direct line to Sié faculty affiliates have shaped many careers during students’ time at Korbel and after graduation. Here are just a few of many Sié student stories:
Universities produce important research, but that research does not always travel on its own. Centers and institutes create a structure that allows scholarships to thrive, even beyond academia.
“Centers provide increased research support and reduce systemic barriers for our faculty,” Scheller said. “As we are able to focus on our specific faculty’s research and needs, Sié allows resources to be allocated more specifically and efficiently to research clusters.”
Without that structure, research can happen more slowly, more sporadically. A center provides organizational scaffolding around research, bringing visibility to work already underway while helping faculty balance scholarship with public engagement, student mentorship, and grant development.
Beyond faculty initiatives, centers and institutes allow opportunities for greater student engagement “because they centralize research projects into both clear and tangible opportunities within the school,” Scheller added.
At the Sié Center, that structure translates into measurable impact that reframes traditional divides in global affairs and contributes to real-world understanding and experience.
The world of security and diplomacy is not static. Neither is the Sié Center.
“Times have always been tumultuous. But today’s foreign policy landscape moves quickly — and the public wants clarity,” Scheller said. “The Sié Center exists to ensure that when global events unfold, the experts are ready, the research is visible, and the next generation of scholars and practitioners is already engaged in the work.”
In the 2025–2026 academic year, programming highlights the human costs and policy dilemmas of Russia’s war in Ukraine; the restructuring of the global economic order under renewed U.S. tariffs; the power of cultural diplomacy through sports and the arts; and the domestic and international implications of a second Trump presidency, among many other pressing topics.
Student simulations, data workshops, and spring programming on nuclear proliferation, democratic erosion, genocide, and the global energy transition are already underway.
The center’s priority remains constant even as topics shift, as staff at Sié continue working directly with faculty to support their most impactful research and ensure that expertise informs public conversation.
“By linking faculty research to analysis of developments in world politics, the Sié Center highlights the importance of deep and free inquiry, independent of any given political wind,” said Dr. Epstein. “Our faculty and students remain committed to seeking the truth, no matter how unpopular or controversial it may be.”
The 2026 colloquium will explore current challenges to democracy around the world and international and comparative legal responses that could strengthen equal participation as a broad democratic principle. The colloquium is co-hosted by the Ved Nanda Center for International and Comparative Law, the Sié Chéou-Kang Center for International Security & Diplomacy, and the Denver Journal of International Law and Policy.
View the 2026 Sutton Colloquium Program
Join us for a fascinating fireside chat with Dr. A. Dirk Moses, Anne and Bernard Spitzer Professor of International Relations, City College of New York, and editor of the Journal of Genocide Studies. Following his remarks, Korbel Prof. Marie Berry will moderate a conversation with Dr. Moses and Dr. Simon Maghakyan, University of Oxford Associate and Colorado College Visiting Professor.
Refreshments will be provided.
This event is presented by the Sié Chéou-Kang Center for International Security and Diplomacy in partnership with Armenians of Colorado.
Please join us as we recap an international meeting of experts reflecting on the ethical dilemmas surrounding the scramble for critical minerals to meet the clean energy transition. Building on our own research as well as those of our participants studying China, the US, and European investment in mining in Southeast Asia, Latin America and Africa, we will discuss 1) geopolitical dynamics, material requirements, and different visions of a sustainable future; 2) communities, strategies, and democracy around extractive industry expansion; and 3) opportunities and challenges moving forward.
Speakers: Deborah Avant, Devin Finn, Linda Mendez-Barrientos, and Tricia Olsen. Read their bios here.
Join the Sie Center and the Newman Center for Performing Arts for our spring quarter cultural diplomacy event, featuring Latin Grammy-nominated Colombian singer-songwriter Gregorio Uribe!
Across the globe, feminists are confronting authoritarianism, gender backlash, and violence — and they are winning, even as backlash intensifies.
From Kenya to Latin America to Korea, women organizers are changing laws, shifting public understanding, and building power for a more just future. In a world that often feels like it is on fire, join IGLI for an International Women’s Day (March 9th) webinar to hear these stories of hope, courage, and persistence. Hear from Cathi Choi, Ruth Mumbi, Catalina Martínez Coral, Julia Zulver, and Marie Berry.
The Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative
Since 2016, the Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative (IGLI) has advanced research, education, and programs aimed at strengthening the work of feminist activists fighting for democracy, peace, and human rights around the world. IGLI’s unique contribution lies in building networks and serving as a hub for cutting-edge research and education. Through our convenings, cross-sector collaborations, research, and community programs, we equip activists, students, academics, policymakers, and the broader public to tackle the interconnected crises of our time. By strengthening both movements and their public support, IGLI amplifies emergent solutions that center justice, care, and wellbeing — creating a more connected, effective, and sustainable path to peace for all.
Calling all students!
On Friday, May 8, we're thrilled to welcome Former Ambassador David Young to Korbel for a series of engagements, including an interactive simulation event built specifically to arm students with foreign service and diplomatic skills. Students will participate in a U.S. embassy scenario that grows increasingly complex, mimicking real-life examples of diplomatic maneuvering on foreign soil. Participants will represent various interest groups, with feedback and guidance from Amb. Young.
About Former Ambassador Young:
David Young is a retired U.S. Ambassador, United Methodist minister, university lecturer, and professional leadership and life coach.
For 35 years Young was a career diplomat with the U.S. State Department, serving overseas in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and southeast Asia. He was Ambassador to Malawi (2022-24), Charge d’Affaires (acting chief of mission) in Zambia and South Africa, Deputy Chief of Mission in Nigeria, Public Affairs Officer in Guatemala, human rights officer in Vietnam, and political officer in Panama. He also served at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in New York, and in assignments in Washington, including the crisis management Operations Center and offices working on Sudan, South Sudan, Myanmar, Oman, Bahrain, and international religious freedom. He retired in 2024.
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