Biodefense is an old problem for states and, in the era of COVID-19, a novel priority for US national security. The histories of both biosecurity and US national security strategy may help us to contemplate how, in an era of increasing interconnection and emerging pathogens, effective biodefense might be enacted within today’s framework of US national security policy.

Daniel J. Sargent is an associate professor at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is jointly appointed in the Department of History and the Goldman School of Public Policy. He specializes in U.S. foreign policy and the history of international relations, and his research has explored how states and decision makers adapt to long-term changes in their international environments. He is the author of A Superpower Transformed: The Remaking of American Foreign Relations in the 1970s, and is currently working on Pax Americana: A History of the American World Order, a history of how the United States has strived to constitute and sustain international order. He remains particularly intrigued with how policymakers use historical and grand strategic concepts to inform the work of policymaking.

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ABOUT THE PROGRAM

This talk is part of the History Working Group Seminar Series. A central piece of the History Working Group is the seminar series, which is hosted in partnership with the Hoover Library & Archives. The seminar series was launched in the fall of 2019, and thus far has included six talks from Hoover research fellows, visiting scholars, and Stanford faculty. The seminars provide outside experts with an opportunity to present their research and receive feedback on their work. While the lunch seminars have grown in reputation, they have been purposefully kept small in order to ensure that the discussion retains a good seminar atmosphere.