Paula Dobriansky will moderate a seminar featuring Center Associate at the Davis Center for Eurasian and Russian Studies, Craig Kennedy, former President and CEO of the U.S.-Russia Business Council, Daniel Russell, and President of the Center for National Interest, Paul Saunders. The seminar is sponsored by the Belfer Center and Russia Matters and a part of the series "Russia's Past, Present and Future."

The conversation will address: What is the state of Russia's economy today? What has been the effect, if any, of Western sanctions? What market structure can be expected in a post-Putin Russia? What are the future trends of Russia's energy?

This event is on April 1, 2024 from 12:00 - 1:15 PM in the Belfer Center Library (L369). Restricted to Harvard ID holders.

Register here.

Speakers

Craig Kennedy is a historian, energy commentator and ex-international finance professional. He worked for twenty years advising corporate clients worldwide on capital raising and strategic transactions, first with Morgan Stanley, then with Bank of America Merrill Lynch, where he was a Vice Chairman. In the early 1990s, he opened the Moscow office of Cambridge Energy Research Associates.  Prior to that, he taught at Harvard College. He has spoken widely on Russia, finance and energy.

At present, Craig is writing a history of Russia’s oil industry since 1860 and how it has affected the emergence of civil society. He has served as Chairman of Pushkin House, an independent UK cultural foundation, and in other volunteer public service roles.

Craig received a BA, summa cum laude, in Slavic Languages and Literatures from Harvard College, an M Litt in Turkic Languages from Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar, and a PhD in History and Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard University, where he was a Fulbright Scholar. His dissertation examined the emergence of 16th century Muscovy as an ascendant Eurasian power.

Daniel Russell is an independent consultant advising U.S. businesses with international operations. Mr. Russell was the President and CEO of the U.S.-Russia Business Council, the premier Washington-based bilateral trade organization dedicated to commercial relations between the U.S. and Russia (2013-2023). Prior to joining the Council, Mr. Russell was a career member of the U.S. Foreign Service with tours of duty in Washington, DC and abroad as a diplomat.

Mr. Russell served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State responsible for relations with Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, and Belarus and for international security and arms control issues (2010 to 2013), Chief of Staff to the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs (2008 to 2009), Deputy Chief of Mission in Moscow (2005 to 2008) and Deputy Chief of Mission in Almaty, Kazakhstan (2000 to 2003). Mr. Russell also held positions as the State Department's Director of the Office of Russian Affairs and Director of the Office of European Political and Security Affairs, Consul General at the U.S. Consulate in Yekaterinburg, Special Assistant for Europe to the Under Secretary of Political Affairs, and First Secretary at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow.

Mr. Russell holds a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Maine and an M.A. in International Affairs from George Washington University.

Paul J. Saunders is President of the Center for the National Interest and a member of its board of directors. His expertise spans U.S. foreign and security policy, energy security and climate change, U.S.-Russia relations and Russian foreign policy, and U.S. relations with Japan and South Korea.

Saunders is a Senior Advisor at Energy Innovation Reform Project, where he served as President from 2019 to 2024. He has been a member of EIRP’s board of directors since 2013 and served as chairman from 2014 to 2019. At EIRP, Saunders has focused on the collision between great power competition and the energy transition, including such issues as energy security, energy technology competition, and climate policy in a divided world. In this context, he has engaged deeply in energy and climate issues in the Indo-Pacific region, especially U.S. relations with Japan and South Korea. His most recent project at EIRP is an assessment of Russia’s evolving role in the global energy system.

From 2005 to 2019, Saunders was Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer of the Center for the National Interest. In addition to his management role, he directed the Center’s U.S.-Russian Relations Program and led projects on other issues, including energy and climate change and U.S.- Japan relations. He also served as Associate Publisher of the foreign policy magazine The National Interest.

Saunders served in the Bush Administration from 2003 to 2005 as Senior Advisor to the Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs. In that capacity, he worked on a broad range of transnational issues, in particular with respect to Russia, Ukraine, and the former Soviet Union, as well as Iraq, China and India.

Earlier, Saunders served as Director of the Center from 1997 to 2003, and was Assistant Director of the Center from its founding in 1994 until 1997. In 2000, he was a Senior Policy Advisor to the Speaker’s Advisory Group on Russia, established by the Republican Policy Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Saunders has written extensively for major newspapers and journals, and is a frequent commentator in national media. He is the author of Energy Technology in an Era of Great Power Competition, Land Use Requirements of Solar and Wind Power: Understanding a Decade of Academic Research, Toward an Indo-Pacific Clean Energy Framework (with Amelia Gilchrist), Ambitious Mandates, Ambivalent Communities: Land Use Challenges to New York’s Renewable Power Goals, Extended Deterrence in a Changing Asia, Russian Energy and European Security, and Russia and the Greater Middle East: Challenges and Opportunities (with Geoffrey Kemp). He is the editor of various works including A New Direction in U.S.-Russia Relations? America’s Challenges & Opportunities in Dealing with Russia; Costs of a New Cold War: The U.S.-Russia Confrontation over Ukraine and Enduring Rivalry: American and Russian Perspectives on the Former Soviet Space.