Victor Davis Hanson

Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow
Awards and Honors:
Statesmanship Award from the Claremont Institute
(2006)
Biography: 

Victor Davis Hanson is the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution; his focus is classics and military history.

Hanson was a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences, Stanford, California (1992–93), a visiting professor of classics at Stanford University (1991–92), the annual Wayne and Marcia Buske Distinguished Visiting Fellow in History at Hillsdale College (2004–), the Visiting Shifron Professor of Military History at the US Naval Academy (2002–3),and the William Simon Visiting Professor of Public Policy at Pepperdine University (2010).

In 1991 he was awarded an American Philological Association Excellence in Teaching Award. He received the Eric Breindel Award for Excellence in Opinion Journalism (2002), presented the Manhattan's Institute's Wriston Lecture (2004), and was awarded the National Humanities Medal (2007) and the Bradley Prize (2008).

Hanson is the author of hundreds of articles, book reviews, and newspaper editorials on Greek, agrarian, and military history and essays on contemporary culture. He has written or edited twenty-four books, the latest of which is The Case for Trump (Basic Books, 2019). His other books include The Second World Wars (Basic Books, 2017); The Savior Generals: How Five Great Commanders Saved Wars That Were Lost - from Ancient Greece to Iraq (Bloomsbury 2013); The End of Sparta (Bloomsbury, 2011); The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern (Bloomsbury, 2010); Makers of Ancient Strategy: From the Persian Wars to the Fall of Rome (ed.) (Princeton, 2010); The Other Greeks (California, 1998); The Soul of Battle (Free Press, 1999); Carnage and Culture (Doubleday, 2001); Ripples of Battle (Doubleday, 2003); A War Like No Other (Random House, 2005); The Western Way of War (Alfred Knopf, 1989; 2nd paperback ed., University of California Press, 2000); The Wars of the Ancient Greeks (Cassell, 1999; paperback ed., 2001); and Mexifornia: A State of Becoming (Encounter, 2003), as well as two books on family farming, Fields without Dreams (Free Press, 1995) and The Land Was Everything (Free Press, 1998). Currently, he is a syndicated columnist for Tribune Media Services and a weekly columnist for the National Review Online.

Hanson received a BA in classics at the University of California, Santa Cruz (1975), was a fellow at the American School of Classical Studies, Athens (1977–78), and received his PhD in classics from Stanford University (1980).

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Recent Commentary

Analysis and Commentary

A Rather Angry America

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Works and Days
Saturday, August 7, 2010

Unemployment is still high, growth low, deficits huge. States are cutting out everything from streetlights to paving. Public pensions are exploding everywhere...

Analysis and Commentary

More Teachable Moments from Marbella to Martha’s Vineyard

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Corner (National Review Online)
Friday, August 6, 2010

Is not there some old Harry Truman Democrat still around to advise the new Democratic aristocracy to live it down a bit in these tough times...?

Analysis and Commentary

Obama: Not the Great Stone Face

by Victor Davis Hansonvia National Review Online
Friday, August 6, 2010

Obama could still restore his standing with the American people if he copied the Clinton of 1995 and abandoned his unpopular agenda. But he won’t...

Analysis and Commentary

Illogical Immigration

by Victor Davis Hansonvia National Review Online
Thursday, August 5, 2010

Once a law stops being considered quite a law, all sorts of even stranger paradoxes follow...

Analysis and Commentary

The Kerry Yacht as a Teachable Moment

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Corner (National Review Online)
Wednesday, August 4, 2010

By now, almost everything imaginable has been said about Senator Kerry’s docking of his new $7 million yacht in Rhode Island instead of Massachusetts, thus avoiding/postponing some $500,000 in state taxes. Here is some postmortem analysis...

Analysis and Commentary

A Weird Sort of Depression

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Works and Days
Monday, August 2, 2010

Economic statistics paint a pretty grim picture: annual growth coming out of a recession at an anemic 2.4%; unemployment rising at 9.6%; and foreclosures again on the rise...And yet, I don’t sense Dickensian poverty, in that the half-employed somehow through parental support, or cheap Chinese goods, or exemption from income taxes, seem to have plentiful appurtenances and even fairly nice cars. So what’s going on..?

Analysis and Commentary

The Truths We Dare Not Speak About Illegal Immigration

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Works and Days
Friday, July 30, 2010

In the last 48 hours almost everything that can be said about illegal immigration has been said. But I am more interested in a few truths that are never quite spoken...

Analysis and Commentary

Why Are We Beginning to Hate Congress?

by Victor Davis Hansonvia National Review Online
Thursday, July 29, 2010

Our self-absorbed Congress should start to reform, fast...

Analysis and Commentary

Obama’s Real Problem

by Victor Davis Hansonvia National Review Online
Wednesday, July 28, 2010

According to a popular myth, President Obama’s declining poll numbers are a consequence of his failure to be liberal enough...

Analysis and Commentary

Race on the Brain

by Victor Davis Hansonvia Corner (National Review Online)
Wednesday, July 28, 2010

The postmortem of the Sherrod affair will prove it to have been a net negative for the Obama administration...

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