One way to try to have an influence on South Asia’s nuclear future is to mentor rising talent. Thanks to the Stimson Center’s funders — the Carnegie Corporation, the MacArthur Foundation and the NNSA — we do workshops with this cohort, we’re planning our first open, online course on regional nuclear issues, and my colleague, Julia Thompson, has been overseeing a website, South Asian Voices, to foster civil discourse between Indian and Pakistani bloggers. They own the content; Stimson controls the server and filters out noise pollution. We also offer fellowships for outstanding bloggers so that they can work alongside each other as they get acquainted with Washington. Why should they only be familiar with dysfunction back home?
[Oh, snap! -Ed.]
I recently came across an old email trying to explain why Stimson has chosen this strategy to a colleague at Pakistan’s Strategic Plans Division at Joint Staff Headquarters in Rawalpindi. The SPD used to send Visiting Fellows to Stimson, but have stopped, for reasons that are unclear to me. I am reproducing my email below, verbatim.
Let me explain my teaching methods, and then I’ll circle back again to why Stimson is focusing on younger analysts for our programming initiatives.
I taught for ten years at the University of Virginia, which is close to where I live in Central Virginia. The student body of this school is rather privileged and conservative-leaning. I would occasionally find in my seminars the children of very high-ranking officials who were undermining or dismantling the treaties I had worked to construct. This was a challenge to my teaching philosophy. But I held to my philosophy, which is: do not teach people WHAT to think. Teach them HOW to think analytically. Learning doesn’t happen when you tell people what to think — memorization happens.
I have followed this philosophy with Visiting Fellows, as well. I challenge assumptions, I ask provocative questions, I ask for pros and cons, I ask for a rank ordering of pros and cons, etc. This is what I do as a teacher and a mentor. I tried to do this with you when you were at Stimson. This is how one grows intellectually, and how one’s students grow intellectually. You have the opportunity to help your students grow in this way, too.
Now, I wear an additional hat as co-founder of Stimson. I’ve worked on South Asia and traveled to the region for twenty years, and people ask me for my views. They expect me to have views. Foundations who give Stimson funding expect recommendations along with analysis. I wear this hat when giving talks outside the classroom, when writing op-eds, and in meetings with senior officials and military officers. But even while wearing this hat, I try my best not to lecture and not to be didactic. I try to make my case in ways that encourage a fresh look. I also try to listen more than I talk. I advise each new crop of Stimson interns, just as I used to advise my students, that you can’t learn while talking.
There are very few Visiting Fellowship opportunities in the US for Pakistanis. This is regrettable, but the truth of the matter is that there are precious few positions in our field for American citizens, as well. When given the choice between someone from Pakistan who has already had this opportunity and someone who hasn’t, to me, the choice is clear. My responsibility as a mentor is to widen the circle.
Now, I expect that many of the new people who are given this opportunity from Pakistan will think more like you than like me. As I’ve said, it’s not my job as a mentor to tell them what to think. It’s Stimson’s job to give every one of them a memorable educational experience, to challenge their assumptions, to have opportunities to learn and to meet with people that are unavailable to them in Pakistan, and to prod them to think analytically.
You seem to have survived this experience. They will, too.
Best wishes,
Michael