Michael E. O’Hanlon Has Counseled ‘Resolute Restraint’ in an Age of Peace. But Has That Age Come to an End?
The Art of War in an Age of Peace U.S. Grand Strategy and Resolute Restraint By Michael E. O’Hanlon Yale University Press Reviewed by Steven Boyd Saum Published last year, Michael E. O’Hanlon’s most recent volume of strategy recommendations for U.S. global engagement has a title that’s been overtaken by events: In this “age of peace,” Russia has launched the largest invasion of another country since World War II. The gist of O’Hanlon’s counsel is “resolute restraint” with “an equal emphasis on both words.” That means avoiding overextension without retrenchment; either would make the world less stable and more...
Why Ukraine Matters: Read, Listen, Understand — A Few Voices from the Peace Corps Community
Five journalists and scholars who have helped bring valuable reporting and perspectives to understanding current events, history, and policy in Ukraine. By NPCA Staff For a better understanding of what’s at stake in Ukraine, here are a few ideas of where to start. Particularly for journalists like Christopher Miller or Terell Starr, who are currently based in Ukraine, use what’s here as a jumping off point: See what they’re reporting day by day — or now, hour-by-hour — on Twitter, and see the sources and connections they follow and recommend. As always, especially amid a conflict where disinformation has played...
The War of Aggression Against Ukraine Must Stop
We in the Peace Corps community stand in solidarity with the people and communities in Ukraine who are now in harm’s way. By Steven Boyd Saum, Jeffrey Janis, and Gretchen Upholt Early this morning, Ukraine — a free and independent nation — became the victim of an unprovoked war of aggression launched by Vladimir Putin, who ordered tens of thousands of Russian troops to invade. Missiles and shells have fallen in cities across the country. Apartment buildings and hospitals have been hit. Civilians have been terrorized and killed, while many thousands huddle in bomb shelters and metro stations. Meanwhile,...
Evacuation: Service cut short by medical crisis, the draft, and COVID-19
Evacuated Peace Corps Volunteers: Then and Now, We Continue to Serve — a conversation convened as part of Peace Corps Connect 2021. Pictured: “Gül” in Turkish, “rose” in English. Margo Jones served as a Volunteer in the village of Asagisayak, then in the city of Bolu. Photo by Ken St. Louis On September 25, 2021, Jodi Hammer hosted a panel of Volunteers who have been evacuated from the countries where they were serving — in the 1960s and in 2020. Hammer was a Volunteer in Ecuador 1994–97 and serves as Career Support Specialist at National Peace Corps Association. Here are edited excerpts...
Peace Corps Response: An anniversary. A pandemic. A historic moment for this program launched a quarter century ago.
Short-term, high-impact. Now marking 25 years since its founding. By Steven Boyd Saum Photo by Christian Farnsworth A quarter century ago, at a midsummer White House Rose Garden ceremony attended by President Bill Clinton and Sargent Shriver, first director of the Peace Corps, a new type of Peace Corps service was announced to the world: Crisis Corps. Short-term, high-impact, it was, as then-Peace Corps Director Mark Gearan explained, “an effort to harness the enormous experience, skills, motivation, and talents that the Peace Corps, including its returned Volunteer ranks, possesses, and bring them to bear in an organized fashion during...
Virtual Volunteering in the Time of COVID-19
The evacuation of Volunteers from around the globe interrupted service everywhere. And while Volunteers have yet to return to the field, last year Peace Corps launched a program for communities and Volunteers to work together — virtually. Six months after Peace Corps evacuated all Volunteers from around the world, 45 returned to service under the aegis of the agency: the inaugural cohort of an 10- to 12-week endeavor christened the Virtual Service Pilot program. They were Volunteers and Response Volunteers and trainees. They partnered with communities in nine countries and areas: Botswana, Colombia, Costa Rica, Eastern Caribbean, Paraguay, Peru, Senegal, South Africa,...
From the Editor: This Time
Peace Corps teaches us a new way to think about time. Pandemic does, too. So what do we do with this? By Steven Boyd Saum ACROSS THE DECADES and countries and communities where tens of thousands of Peace Corps Volunteers have served, there are a few things we share. One: a new grasp of time. Be it seasons or how we count the days, a revised sense of punctuality or the value of hours in terms of money or daylight, be it devoted to sleep or preparing a meal or hiking to the well, be it in the presence of friends or alone with this self you are...
Coming Home: Ukraine
Ukraine | Kevin Lawson Home: Greensboro, North Carolina “When will you come back?” I wake up more and more to this question as the days go by since evacuation. I had been serving as a youth development Volunteer since August 2018. When we were evacuated I left behind the promise to play soccer with Dima, Sasha, and Max. I was in the middle of lesson planning with my English teacher, Olena, and organizing a festival at school with my counterpart. As a youth volunteer, one-on-one connections with students were so important to me. No matter the time or place,...
This is Not a Drill
When times are good, being a country director for Peace Corps may be the best job in foreign affairs. This has not been such a time. As told to Steven Boyd Saum Photo: Vyshyvanka Day, when schoolchildren don the traditional Ukrainian shirt — and here, pose as one. Photo by Kevin Lawson Kim Mansaray | Country Director, Mongolia JANUARY AND NEWS OF THE VIRUS came out in China. Mongolia says we’re not sending kids back to school. Our winter break became endless winter break. Then the virus exploded in China, and Mongolia went on hardcore lockdown — borders and...