What's Next for Pakistan? Fresh Voices
What’s Next for Pakistan? Fresh Voices
Featuring:
Nicholas Schmidle, Fellow, New American Foundation
Joshua White, Research Fellow, Council on Faith and International Affairs
Moderated by:
Rick Barton and Karin von Hippel, Co-Directors, PCR Project, CSIS
In the aftermath of elections, it is time to take a fresh look at some of Pakistan’s most troubled areas. Join us as we welcome Nicholas Schmidle and Joshua White, both of whom lived in and write on Pakistan. PCR Project Co-Directors Rick Barton and Karin von Hippel will moderate, having just returned from two weeks in-country, traveling from Islamabad to Peshawar, Quetta to Karachi, and holding conversations with political leaders, new government officials, civil society members, and citizens.
Nicholas Schmidle is a fellow at the New America Foundation, and a freelance writer who focuses on the intersection of culture, religion and politics in Asia. He has reported from Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Central Asia and Iran, and his work has been published in The New York Times Magazine, Slate, The New Republic, The Virginia Quarterly Review, The Washington Post and many others. He lived in Pakistan from February 2006 through January 2008, supported by a fellowship from the Institute of Current World Affairs. He left in January under threat of deportation. Previously, he was based in Washington, DC, where he completed a Master’s degree in International Affairs from American University. He is now writing a book about his experience in Pakistan, to be published by Henry Holt.
Joshua T. White is a Research Fellow at the Council on Faith & International Affairs and a graduate student at The Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, where he is concentrating in South Asia Studies and International Economics. His research focuses on Islamic politics and political stability in Pakistan. He spent nearly a year living in Peshawar, Pakistan in 2005/6, and returned in the summer of 2007 as a Visiting Research Associate at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, during which time he conducted fieldwork for a CFIA project on Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP). He has presented his findings in various academic and policy forums, and recently participated in the U.S.-sponsored observer delegation to Pakistan's February 2008 general elections. Mr. White graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa from Williams College with a double major in History and Mathematics. After interning at the U.S. Department of State, he joined the Institute for Global Engagement, where he remains a Graduate Fellow. He has co-authored a chapter in Religion and Security: The New Nexus in International Relations (Roman & Littlefield, 2004); has written for The Nation (Pakistan) and The Review of Faith & International Affairs; and is the author of a forthcoming monograph on the changing dynamics of Islamist politics in Pakistan’s Frontier.
Visit our blog, www.pcrproject.com, for publications, commentary, and more information about work.
