Asian Studies Program

Prime Minister of East Timor, Kay Rala Xanana Gusmão, spoke at Georgetown

Mixing top-tier policymakers and high quality scholarship.

“We wanted to bring together top-tier policymakers and high quality scholars on the Hilltop. This has always been Georgetown’s comparative advantage” explains Victor Cha, director of Asian Studies. The Theory and Policy Series on Asia aims to bridge the gap between the conceptual and practical aspects of Asia scholarship and policymaking. First, it provides scholars with cutting edge ideas in their areas of speciality the opportunity to explain their work to the public policy world. Second, the Series provides policymakers a venue in which to discuss the policies they pursue in a thoughtful academic environment, outside the crush of daily time pressures. The Theory/Policy series has been one of the more popular seminar series in Asian Studies at Georgetown among students. It has drawn a great deal of interest from outside the University among the wider Washington policy community who relish the opportunity to hear policymakers speak off-the-record and to have a genuine conversation about the ideas that drive policy in a completely different environment from the press briefing room. Past speakers in this series have included the senior Asia advisor at the White House, current and former U.S. ambassadors to Asia, the Secretary-General to ASEAN, and negotiators for the Six Party talks.