Robert D. English | |
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| Personal details | |
| Education | University of California, Berkeley (B.A.) Princeton University (MPA, PhD) |
Robert David English (born 1958) is an American academic, author, historian, and international relations scholar who specializes in the history and politics of contemporary Eastern Europe, the USSR, andRussia. He is anassociate professor ofInternational Foreign Policy and Defense Analysis at theUniversity of Southern California (USC)School of International Relations.
Born in 1958, he received a B.A. in history from theUniversity of California, Berkeley in 1980. He later received an M.P.A. from theWoodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs atPrinceton University in 1982 and a Ph.D. in politics fromPrinceton University in 1995.[1] As part of his doctorate, English completed a Ph.D. dissertation titled "Russia views the West: the intellectual and political origins ofSoviet new thinking."[2]
He worked in theUS Department of Defense from 1982 to 1986 and the Committee for National Security between 1986 and 1988. He taught as an assistant professor at theBologna Center in theJohns HopkinsSchool of Advanced International Relations (SAIS) before he became assistant professor in theSchool of International Relations at theUniversity of Southern California.[1]
In addition, he has received fellowships from places like theInstitute for Advanced Study; the Princeton Society of Fellows; the U.S.Fund for Peace; theInternational Research & Exchanges Board; and theFord Foundation, where he has a "'Dual Expertise Fellowship' in Soviet/East European and national security affairs."[1]
He wrote parts ofRebirth: A Political History of Europe Since World War II withCyril E. Black, Jonathan E. Helmreich, andA. James McAdams in 1999. In 2000, he co-editedMy Six Years With Gorbachev: Notes from a Diary withJack F. Matlock, Jr. and Elizabeth Tucker, which is the account ofAnatoly S. Chernyaev's time as an aide toMikhail Gorbachev.[1]
His most notable work isRussia and the Idea of the West: Gorbachev, Intellectuals, and the End of theCold War, an intellectual history of the rise to power of Gorbachev and his 'New Thinking' in theUSSR. The book first charts the origins and nature of "Old Thinking," which persisted in the traditionalMarxist-Leninist doctrine of the USSR, and he goes on to chart the changes in society and of intellectual class in thehistory of the USSR underKhrushchev,Brezhnev, and Gorbachev.
He is working on a "book-length study," to be calledOurSerbian Brethren: History, Myth, and the Politics ofRussian National Identity. He is writing the entry forTheKosovo War in the next edition of theOxford Encyclopedia of World Politics. He is also contributing a chapter,The Path(s) not Taken: Contingency and Counterfactual in Analysis of the Cold War's End, in a book to be edited byWilliam C. Wohlforth,Witnesses to the End of the Cold War: Oral History, Analysis, Debates.[1]
In 1996, English won the Harold D. Lasswell Prize from theAmerican Political Science Association (APSA) for the work that he later used in writingRussia and the Idea of the West: Gorbachev, Intellectuals, and the End of the Cold War.
In 2001, he received theMarshall Shulman Prize from theAmerican Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies.
