State Department program brings foreign policy scholars to UD

Every summer, some of the world's most promising mid-career foreign policy scholars come to the University of Delaware to learn from foreign policy experts as part of the Study of the U.S. Institute on Foreign Policymaking (SUSI), sponsored by the U.S. State Department. But the learning is a two-way street, and the knowledge gained is often shared far beyond the UD campus.

Case in point: SUSI scholar Lucas Lima, a Brazilian professor of international law, joined forces with UD professor M. A. Muqtedar Khan to write a July 16 opinion piece for The Diplomat online magazine. As Lima explained it, one afternoon the scholars engaged in a free-ranging discussion on BRICS, the intergovernmental organization consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Long after the presentation was over, Lima and Khan, who serves as the academic director of SUSI, continued the conversation. Soon the verbal exchange became words on paper, resulting in the opinion piece in which Lucas and Khan opined that while BRICS are unhappy with the systemic bias against the Global South, they seek to reform, not replace, the current global order.

The program's 18 participants hailed this year from Indonesia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Iraq, Georgia, India, Papua New Guinea, Israel and other nations. During the immersive, six-week visit, they met with foreign policy heavy hitters like U.S Sen. Chris Coons; toured the Goddard Space Center, the U.N, the U.S. Capitol and Gettysburg; and visited more than half dozen universities, including Yale, Princeton, Drexel and the University of Pennsylvania. The scholars experienced small-town Americana by way of Newark's July 4 "Liberty Day" celebration. They dined with Delaware Lt. Gov. Bethay Hall Long at Khan's suburban home. They visited rural Gettysburg and also walked the corridors of power in D.C.