Publications

WCFIA Publications

The Weatherhead Center has developed a presence on the Internet that, to a growing readership, is playing a significant role in the projection of Harvard scholarship on international affairs. The site includes: faculty research available through categorical fields of inquiry; searches by author, subject, title or date of publication; Working Papers selected for online distribution based on their relevance to contemporary issues in international affairs; In the News links to op-ed and other pieces written by or about the Center’s faculty associates; and recent books by faculty associates, including editorial summaries. The Center is always adding to the collection of published journal articles available on its site and responding to the interests of Center faculty and other users in making the site an indispensable scholarly tool.

Below are a selection of our most recently uploaded publications.


The West, Plagued by Self-Doubt
by Ferguson, Niall
Publisher: Harvard Gazette
Publication Type: Magazine Article
Niall Ferguson is a little concerned these days. The feeling started years ago, during one of his stints leading a course in Western civilization. “Each time I taught it, I felt I was getting...
Published Date: February 2012 More
Interview with Shinju Fujihira: Japan’s Party Politics and Foreign Policy
by Fujihira, Shinju
Publisher: Asahi Shimbun
Publication Type: Interview
Interview on 02/06/2012 with Shinju Fujihira, Associate Director, Program on U.S.-Japan Relations in the Asahi Shimbun. [PDF: 577 KB]
Published Date: February 2012 More
Regional Multilateralism: The Next Paradigm in Global Affairs
by Mylonas, Harris; Yorulmazlar, Emirhan
Publisher: CNN World
Publication Type: Op-ed
The Cold War and the early post-Cold War periods were relatively easy to define and comprehend. The first was roughly the struggle between two superpowers forming a bipolar system where almost...
Published Date: January 2012 More
Regional Multilateralism: The Next Paradigm in Global Affairs
by Mylonas, Harris
Publisher: CNN.com
Publication Type: Op-ed
The Cold War and the early post-Cold War periods were relatively easy to define and comprehend. The first was roughly the struggle between two superpowers forming a bipolar system where almost every...
Published Date: January 2012 More
The Park Chung Hee Era: The Transformation of South Korea
by Kim, Byung Kook; Vogel, Ezra F.
In 1959 South Korea was mired in poverty. By 1979 it had a powerful industrial economy and a vibrant civil society in the making, which would lead to a democratic breakthrough eight years later. The...
Publication Type: Book
Published Date: April 2011 More

The Line That Defines
by St. John, Rachel
Publisher: Harvard Gazette
Publication Type: Magazine Article
For nearly 2,000 miles, it runs alongside California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. It begins in the east in Brownsville, Texas, and marches west along the Rio Grande, halting at the Pacific, in...
Published Date: October 2011 More
Sovereign Debt Disputes: A Database on Government Coerciveness During Debt Crises
by Enderlein, Henrik; Trebesch, Christoph ; von Daniels, Laura
This paper measures “debt disputes” between governments and foreign private creditors in periods of sovereign debt crises. We construct an index of government coerciveness, consisting of...
Publication Type: Published Paper
Published Date: December 2011 More
Histories of Innocence: Post-War Stories in Peru
by Theidon, Kimberly S.
On November 1, 2006, Peruvian president Alan García announced he would be proposing a new law that would include the death penalty as one sanction for terrorism in the Penal Code. As he argued,...
Publication Type: Book Chapter
Published Date: August 2010 More
Do Primaries Improve Electoral Performance? Clientelism and Intra-Party Conflict in Ghana
by Ichino, Nahomi; Nathan, Noah
We consider the effect of legislative primaries on the electoral performance of political parties in a new democracy. While existing literature suggests that primaries may either hurt a party by...
Publication Type: Working Papers
Published Date: June 2012 More
The Evolving Impact of the Ogallala Aquifer: Agricultural Adaptation to Groundwater and Climate
by Hornbeck, Richard
Agriculture on the American Great Plains has been constrained by historical water scarcity. After World War II, technological improvements made groundwater from the Ogallala aquifer available for...
Publication Type: Working Papers
Published Date: November 2011 More
Understanding Global Trade
by Helpman, Elhanan
Global trade is of vital interest to citizens as well as policymakers, yet it is widely misunderstood. This compact exposition of the market forces underlying international commerce addresses both...
Publication Type: Book
Published Date: April 2011 More

A Linder Hypothesis for Foreign Direct Investment
by Helpman, Elhanan
We study patterns of FDI in a multi-country world economy. First, we present evidence for a broad sample of countries that firms direct FDI disproportionately to markets with income levels similar to...
Publication Type: Working Papers
Published Date: October 2011 More
Fiscal Devaluations
by Gopinath, Gita
We show that even when the exchange rate cannot be devalued, a small set of conventional fiscal instruments can robustly replicate the real allocations attained under a nominal exchange rate...
Publication Type: Working Papers
Published Date: November, 2011 More
Trade Prices and the Global Trade Collapse of 2008–2009
by Gopinath, Gita
We document the behavior of trade prices during the Great Trade Collapse of 2008–2009 using transaction-level data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics. First, we find that differentiated...
Publication Type: Working Papers
Published Date: November, 2011 More
Romney to the Rescue
by Ferguson, Niall
Publisher: The Daily Beast
Publication Type: Op-ed
This column is for Ted Forstmann: financier, fun lover, and philanthropist, who died on Nov. 20. But it’s not just for him. It’s to him. Ted, I’m worried. I wish you were still around to...
Published Date: November 2011 More