Beyond Grand Strategy: Lessons from Menachem Begin

Beyond Grand Strategy: Lessons from Menachem Begin

What can Israel’s past teach diplomatic historians about grand strategy? Join us on 25 March 2020 as Junior Fellow Ari Barbalat, a recent doctoral graduate in political science from UCLA, tackles this question through a comparative study of the diplomacy of Menachem Begin, Israel’s controversial prime minister from 1977 to 1983. What forces turned Begin, once a legendary guerrilla leader and defence hawk, into a peacemaker and Nobel Peace Prize winner? Exploring the limits of “grand strategic” thinking against the realities of co-leadership and the coalitional character of Israel’s foreign policy decision-making, Barbalat offers some provocative answers.

25 March 2020, Larkin Building 200, 15 Devonshire Place, 2-4 pm

Light Refreshments

Ari Barbalat is a doctoral graduate in Political Science from UCLA, and a Junior Fellow of the Bill Graham Centre.