Mailing address
Littauer 368
Belfer Center for Science & International Affairs
79 John F. Kennedy Street, Mailbox 53
Cambridge, MA, 02138
Graham Allison
Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
Member of the Board
Contact:
Telephone: (617) 496-6099
Fax: (617)-495-8963
Email: graham_allison@harvard.edu
Experience
Director of Harvard's major Center for Science and International Affairs, Graham Allison has for three decades been a leading analyst of U.S. national security and defense policy with a special interest in nuclear weapons, terrorism, and decision-making. As Assistant Secretary of Defense in the first Clinton Administration, Dr. Allison received the Defense Department's highest civilian award, the Defense Medal for Distinguished Public Service, for "reshaping relations with Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan to reduce the former Soviet nuclear arsenal." This resulted in the safe return of more than 12,000 tactical nuclear weapons from the former Soviet republics and the complete elimination of more than 4,000 strategic nuclear warheads previously targeted at the United States and left in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Belarus when the Soviet Union disappeared.
Dr. Allison’s latest book, Nuclear Terrorism: The Ultimate Preventable Catastrophe, is now in its third printing and was selected by the New York Times as one of the "100 most notable books of 2004." It presents a strategy for preventing nuclear terrorism organized under a doctrine of "Three Nos:" no loose nukes; no new nascent nukes; and no new nuclear weapons states. Dr. Allison's seminal book, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis, first published in 1971, and significantly revised and reissued in 1999, ranks among the bestsellers in political science with more than 400,000 copies in print.
As "Founding Dean" of the modern Kennedy School, under his leadership, from 1977 to 1989, a small, undefined program grew twenty-fold to become a major professional school of public policy and government.
Dr. Allison has served as Special Advisor to the Secretary of Defense under President Reagan. He has the sole distinction of having twice been awarded the Department of Defense's highest civilian award, the Distinguished Public Service Medal, first by Secretary Cap Weinberger and second by Secretary Bill Perry. He served as a member of the Defense Policy Board for Secretaries Weinberger, Carlucci, Cheney, Aspin, Perry and Cohen.
Dr. Allison was the organizer of the Commission on America's National Interests (1996 and 2000) that included leading Senators and national security specialists from across the country, including former Senators Sam Nunn and Bob Graham, Senators John McCain and Pat Roberts, Condoleezza Rice, Richard Armitage, and Robert Ellsworth.
Dr. Allison was a founding member of the Trilateral Commission, a Director of the Council on Foreign Relations, and has been a member of public committees and commissions, among them the Baker-Cutler DOE Task Force on Nonproliferation Programs with Russia, the IAEA’s Commission of Eminent Persons, and the Commission on Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism.
Dr. Allison has served as a Director of the Getty Oil Company, Natixis, Loomis Sayles, Hansberger, Taubman Centers, Inc., and Belco Oil and Gas, as well as a member of the Advisory Boards of Chase Bank, Chemical Bank, Hydro-Quebec, and the International Energy Corporation.
Dr. Allison was born and raised in Charlotte, North Carolina. He was educated at Davidson College; Harvard College (B.A., Magna Cum Laude, in History); Oxford University (B.A. and M.A., First Class Honors in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics); and Harvard University (Ph.D. in Political Science).
AP Photo
January 25, 2010
"A Failure to Imagine the Worst"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Foreign Policy
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
"Thinking about risks we face today, we should reflect on the major conclusion of the bipartisan 9/11 Commission established to investigate that catastrophe. The U.S. national security establishment's principal failure prior to Sept. 11, 2001, was, the commission found, a "failure of imagination." Summarized in a single sentence, the question now is: Are we at risk of an equivalent failure to imagine a nuclear 9/11? After the recent attempted terrorist attack on Northwest Airlines Flight 253, this question is more urgent than ever."
AP Photo
January/February 2010
"Nuclear Disorder: Surveying Atomic Threats"
Journal Article, Foreign Affairs, issue 1, volume 89
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
The current global nuclear order is extremely fragile, and the three most urgent challenges to it are North Korea, Iran, and Pakistan. If North Korea and Iran become established nuclear weapons states over the next several years, the nonproliferation regime will have been hollowed out. If Pakistan were to lose control of even one nuclear weapon that was ultimately used by terrorists, that would change the world. It would transform life in cities, shrink what are now regarded as essential civil liberties, and alter conceptions of a viable nuclear order.
Winter 2009-10
"From the Director"
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
President Obama is facing two of the most important foreign policy decisions of his presidency: whether to Americanize the Afghanistan war, and how to stop Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. In thinking about these issues - as with many others lately - I find myself reflecting on my friend Ernest May, Charles Warren Professor of History and a longtime member of the Belfer Center board of directors, who passed away in the spring. Ernie had impeccable judgment about questions like these - not only intellectual acumen, but also a concern about the real world. As my colleague Joe Nye has said, he was an extraordinary model for what the Harvard Kennedy School is all about.
AP Photo
November 4, 2009
"In Afghanistan, Kerry Keeps U.S. Goals Modest"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
"President Obama confronts the most fateful foreign policy decision so far of his administration," says Graham Allison, director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. "Rapidly deteriorating security in Afghanistan, the post-election political crisis in Kabul, highlighted by Abdullah Abdullah's decision to drop out of the runoff vote, and General Stanley McChrystal's request for 44,000 troops rightly spurred Obama to call a timeout for reflection."
AP Photo
July 2, 2009
Obama-Medvedev Russia Summit: Key Things to Watch
Media Feature
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School, William H. Tobey, Senior Fellow, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom; Co-Principal Investigator, Energy Research, Development, Demonstration, and Deployment (ERD3) Policy Project
Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev are meeting in Moscow July 6-8 to discuss a range of key issues, including reductions in nuclear weapons. Three experts from Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center offer their insights and analysis of the issues in play.
AP Photo
June 9, 2009
North Korea's Nuclear Program: Looking Forward
Media Feature
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School, Martin B. Malin, Executive Director, Project on Managing the Atom and Hui Zhang, Research Associate, Project on Managing the Atom
As North Korea threatens additional missile tests following its nuclear test in late May and April rocket launch, nuclear experts at the Belfer Center offer analysis and commentary on North Korea's actions and intentions and what the Obama administration should do now.
AP Photo
June 1, 2009
"A New Red Line For Iran"
Op-Ed, Washington Post
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
"The Iranian nuclear challenge was transformed on President George W. Bush's watch. Events in Iran have advanced faster than the policy community's thinking about the problem. The brute fact is that Iran has crossed a threshold that is painful to acknowledge but impossible to ignore: It has lost its nuclear virginity."
AP Photo
May 28, 2009
"North Korea won't fire nuke ... but could sell one to Osama"
Op-Ed, The Sun
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
"The challenge for President Obama, Prime Minister Brown, members of the UN Security Council and the international community is to convince Kim Jong-il that he faces disastrous consequences."
Belfer Center
Summer 2009
"From the Director"
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School
For a Center committed to advancing policy-relevant knowledge about the most important international challenges, the current avalanche of seemingly insurmountable challenges is a time of great excitement.
AP Photo
May 6, 2009
Case Study: The Rise of China and the Global Economic Crisis
Memorandum
By Graham Allison, Director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs; Douglas Dillon Professor of Government; Faculty Chair, Dubai Initiative, Harvard Kennedy School and Meghan O'Sullivan, Jeane Kirkpatrick Professor of International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School
U.S.-Chinese relations have remained on a fairly consistent trendline over the decades since Beijing started its policy of reform and opening. Chinese leaders have emphasized their commitment to economic growth über alles, characterizing China's emergence as a "peaceful rise," and restraining expansionist political ambitions in the region and beyond. American leaders have sought to entice China into the existing order through the global trading system and other international institutions, while hedging against the country's increasing might.
