This year's Robert G. Wesson Lecture features a talk and discussion with Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian politician, author, historian, and former political prisoner, who will speak about his fight for human rights in Russia. 

Professor Michael McFaul, director of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, will moderate the discussion, followed by a question-and-answer session with the audience.

Robert G. Wesson Lecture Series in International Relations Theory and Practice

The Wesson Lectureship was established at Stanford by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies in 1989. It provides support for a public address at the university by a prominent scholar or practicing professional in the field of international relations. The series is made possible by a gift from the late Robert G. Wesson, a scholar of international affairs, prolific author, and senior research fellow at the Hoover Institution.

In establishing the series, Dr. Wesson stated his hope that the lectures would stimulate increased commitment to the study of international relations in a context that would enable students to understand the importance of developing practical policies within a theoretical and analytical framework. Previous Wesson Lecturers have included such distinguished speakers as McGeorge Bundy, Willi DeClerq, Condoleezza Rice, Mikhail Gorbachev, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, and Mary Robinson.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Vladimir Kara-Murza is a Russian politician, author, historian, and former political prisoner. A close colleague of the slain opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, he has served as deputy leader of the People’s Freedom Party and was a candidate for the Russian Parliament. Leading diplomatic efforts on behalf of the opposition, Kara-Murza played a key role in the adoption of Magnitsky sanctions against top Russian officials by the United States, United Kingdom, European Union, Canada, and Australia. For this work he was twice poisoned and left in a coma; a joint media investigation by Bellingcat, The Insider, and Der Spiegel has identified FSB officers behind the attacks. 

In April 2022 Kara-Murza was arrested in Moscow for his public denunciation of the invasion of Ukraine and of the war crimes committed by Russian forces. Following a closed-door trial at the Moscow City Court, he was sentenced to 25 years for “high treason” and kept in solitary confinement at a maximum-security prison in Siberia. He was released in August 2024 as part of the largest East-West prisoner exchange since the Cold War negotiated by the U.S. and German governments. 

Kara-Murza is a contributing writer at the Washington Post, winning the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for his columns written from prison, and has previously worked for Echo of Moscow, BBC, RTVi, Kommersant, World Affairs, and other media organizations. He has directed three documentary films and is the author or contributor to several books on Russian history and politics. 

Kara-Murza currently serves as vice-president at the Free Russia Foundation, as senior advisor at Human Rights First, and as senior fellow at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights. He was the founding chairman of the Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom and has led successful international efforts to commemorate Nemtsov, including with street designations in Washington D.C. and London. Kara-Murza is a recipient of several awards, including the Council of Europe’s Václav Havel Human Rights Prize, and is an honorary fellow at Trinity Hall, Cambridge. He holds an M.A. (Cantab.) in History from Cambridge. He is married, with three children.

David Brady is the Davies Family Senior Fellow, Emeritus at the Hoover Institution, and the Bowen H. and Janice Arthur McCoy Professor of Political Science in the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

He has published seven books and more than a hundred papers in journals and books.  Among his most recent books are Leadership and Growth (World Bank Publications, 2010) with Michael Spence, Revolving Gridlock: Politics and Policy from Carter to Bush II (Westview Press, 2006), and Red and Blue Nation? Characteristics and Causes of America’s Polarized Politics with Pietro Nivola (Brookings Institution Press, 2007).  His recent articles include “Why Is Health Care Reform So Difficult?” with Daniel Kessler, Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, April 2010; “Putting the Public’s Money Where Its Mouth Is”  with Daniel Kessler, Health Affairs: The Policy Journal of the Health Sphere, August 2009, pages 917–25; “Leadership and Politics: A Perspective from the Growth Commission,” with Michael Spence, Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 25, no. 2 (2009): 205–18; “The 2010 Elections: Why Did Political Science Forecasts Go Awry?” with Morris P. Fiorina and Arjun Wilkins, 2011.

Brady has been on continual appointment at Stanford University since 1986, where he has served as associate dean for Academic Affairs in the Graduate School of Business (GSB) and as vice provost for Distance Learning.  He has twice been a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1987.  He presently holds the Bowen H. and Janice Arthur McCoy Professorship in Ethics at the Business School and was deputy director of the Hoover Institution from 2004-2014.

During his teaching career, he won the Dinkelspiel Award for service to undergraduates, the Richard Lyman Prize for service to alumni, the Bob Davies Award and the Jaedicke Silver Cup from the GSB, and the first Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Award given at Stanford.  He also won the George Brown Teaching Award at Rice University.

Douglas Rivers is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and a professor of political science at Stanford University. He is also the Chief Scientist at YouGov PLC, a global polling firm

Daron Shaw earned his Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to accepting a position at the University of Texas in the fall of 1994, he worked in several political campaigns as a survey research analyst. Professor Shaw also served as a strategist in the 2000 and 2004 presidential election campaigns. His research and teaching interests include American Government, Campaigns and Elections, Political Parties, Public Opinion and Voting Behavior, and Applied Survey Research. He is co-director of the Fox News Poll, co-director of the University of Texas Poll, director of the Texas Lyceum Poll, and associate Principle Investigator for the 2020 and 2024 American National Election Studies. Professor Shaw is also a member of the national decision team for Fox News, and serves on the advisory boards for the MIT Election Data & Science Lab, the Annette Strauss Institute, and the Ulysses S. Grant Institute. Formerly, he served as President George W. Bush’s representative on the National Historical Publications and Records Commission and as one of the academic directors for President Barack Obama’s Commission for Election Administration.

Professor Shaw’s most recent book is Battleground: Electoral College Strategies, Execution and Impact in the Modern Era (Oxford University Press, co-authored with Scott Althaus and Costas Panagopoulos). He has also written The Appearance of Corruption (co-authored with Brian Roberts), The Turnout Myth (co-authored with John Petrocik), Unconventional Wisdom: Facts and Myths about American Voters (co-authored with Karen Kaufmann and John Petrocik) and The Race to 270. In addition, Professor Shaw has published articles in the leading journals in the discipline, including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Journal of Politics, British Journal of Political Science, Public Opinion Quarterly, Political Research Quarterly, Political Behavior, Political Communication, Political Geography, PS: Political Science, Party Politics, Presidential Studies Quarterly, and American Politics Research.

Lynn Vavreck is the Marvin Hoffenberg Professor of American Politics and Public Policy at UCLA, a contributing columnist to The Upshot at The New York Times, and a recipient of the Andrew F. Carnegie Prize in the Humanities and Social Sciences.  She is the author of five books, including the “most ominous” book on the 2016 election: Identity Crisis: The 2016 Presidential Campaign and the Battle for the Meaning of America, and The Gamble: Choice and Chance in the 2012 Presidential Election, described as the “definitive account” of the 2012 election. Political consultants on both sides of the aisle refer to her work on political messaging in The Message Matters as “required reading” for presidential candidates. Her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation and she has served on the advisory boards of both the British and American National Election Studies. At UCLA she teaches courses on campaigns, elections, public opinion, and the 1960s. Professor Vavreck holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of Rochester and held previous appointments at Princeton University, Dartmouth College, and The White House.  A native of Cleveland, Ohio, she remains a loyal Browns fan and is a “known equestrian” – to draw on a phrase from the 2012 presidential campaign.