Seminar XXI: Foreign Politics, International Relations and the National Interes

Seminar XXI is an educational program for senior military officers, government and NGO officials, and executives in the national security policy community. The program's objective is to provide future leaders of that community with enhanced analytic skills for understanding foreign countries and the relations among them.

Seminar XXI began in 1986 as an experimental program adapted from several graduate-level courses taught at MIT. Over the years it has provided an opportunity for frank and challenging exchanges of ideas between policymakers and university scholars, as well as among the Fellows, who themselves represent a wide range of institutions and organizations in the policy-making community. We are now in our eighteenth year, and have more than 1,000 alumni/ae.

The program explores key policy issues by examining countries and problems critical to American interests through a variety of paradigmatic lenses. At each session, eminent speakers present alternative perspectives from which the given country or problem can be understood. The seminar seeks to provide concrete frameworks for examining how different paradigms suggest fundamentally different, even conflicting, answers to the questions American policymakers must resolve.

Seminar XXI faculty are drawn from leading universities and research institutions in the U.S. and abroad, and represent a variety of intellectual approaches. The objective is to introduce Seminar XXI Fellows to the best minds at work in areas critical to American national security and international relations.

Military participants in Seminar XXI have generally ranged from Lieutenant Colonel to Major General, and Navy Commander through Rear Admiral. Promising Majors and Lieutenant Commanders have occasionally been selected for admission. Government civilians span levels GS-14 through SES, while industry and NGO executives range from Program Managers and Division Directors through Vice Presidents. Individuals from the State Department include senior foreign service officers up to the rank of ambassador. The fundamental criterion of selection, however, is that candidates be individuals who are expected to reach top decision-making levels in the next three-to-five years.

The choice of topics and faculty are made by the Program's Director and its Executive Committee. The Director, Professor Robert Art, a Senior Fellow in MIT's Security Studies Program and Herter Professor of International Relations at Brandeis University, organizes and directs the discussions. MIT Professors Suzanne Berger, Kenneth Oye and Barry Posen-all past Directors of the program-serve on the Executive Committee, along with Stephen Van Evera, Seminar XXI’s Associate Director for Administration, Captain Jake Stewart, U.S. Navy (ret), and Mitzi Wertheim of the Center for Naval Analyses. Tisha Gomes is the program’s executive director.

Seminar XXI is funded through program fees paid by participating organizations. The program has completed its 23rd year and now has more than 1,400 alumni.