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IES Luigi Einaudi Distinguished Lecture: The Costs of Magical Realism: Europe, NATO, and Ukraine Face the Trump Challenge

IES Luigi Einaudi Distinguished Lecture

With the Second Trump Administration challenging the basic tenets of transatlantic relations, Europeans must find a way to contain the damage and chart a new path forward. Doing so successfully will require an understanding of the post-Cold War history of Europe, NATO, and Ukraine.  In this lecture, Professor Mary Elise Sarotte, Director of Yale’s Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy, will highlight how this history illuminates the tensions between Europe and the United States today. Drawing on her award-winning book Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate, Sarotte will both illuminate how we got to where we are—and what might happen as American foreign policy enters an era of “magical realism.”

About the speaker

Mary Elise Sarotte is the Brady-Johnson Professor of Grand Strategy with a tenured joint appointment at the Yale School of Management. An expert in the history of international relations, she directs the Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy

Professor Sarotte has held tenured faculty appointments at the University of Cambridge, the University of Southern California, and, most recently, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies or SAIS, where she was the inaugural holder of the Marie-Josée and Henry R. Kravis Distinguished Professorship of Historical Studies.

Start Date: April 28, 2026
Start Time: 5:00 pm
Location: Goldwin Smith Hall