Jessica Olney joined the Institute of International Studies the Executive Director in January 2026.
Jess brings extensive international experience as a practitioner and researcher on conflict, peacebuilding, human rights, and humanitarian response. She has led studies for and advised various governments, embassies, international NGOs, UN agencies, universities, institutional and private donors, and the International Criminal Court. She is passionate about working with students, and has trained dozens of refugee youth to lead research, advocacy, and humanitarian...
Susan D. Hyde is the Robson Professor of Political Science at University of California, Berkeley, where she was Chair of the Department of Political Science (AY 2021-2024) and is co-director of the Institute of International Studies (2021- ). She studies international...
February 26, 2026 | 12:30 - 2:00 PM | 223 Philosophy Hall
Nearly 80 percent of Myanmar’s territory is now either contested or controlled by anti-junta resistance groups. Aung Kyaw Moe, Deputy Minister of Human Rights for Myanmar’s pro-democracy government-in-exile, will offer an analysis of Myanmar’s rapidly evolving conflict and political landscape, explaining the advance of resistance forces over the past year.
He will discuss the regime’s recent elections, widely considered a sham to entrench junta rule. What does the electoral process mean...
February 5, 2026 | 4:00 - 5:30 PM | 223 Philosophy Hall
Denise Dresser is an academic, public intellectual, columnist, and activist. Her work focuses on Mexican democratization, corruption, the construction of citizenship, and political economy issues from a comparative perspective.
February 12, 2026 | 3:30 - 5:00 PM | 223 Philosophy Hall
Join the UC Berkeley Institute of International Studies, Center for African Studies, and The Charles & Louise Travers Department of Political Science for a book talk with author Chipo Dendere, Associate Professor of Political Science, Africana Studies Department, Wellesley College.
May 2, 2025 | 8:00AM - 5:00PM | Banatao Auditorium
The conference aims to bring together leading scholars and practitioners together to analyze, debate, propose solutions to several contemporary challenges in the Asia-Pacific region, as well as to provide an opportunity for Berkeley students, faculty, alumni, and Bay Area international affairs professionals to engage with leading scholars, practitioners, and journalists regarding issues of contemporary importance.
Clinical Professor of Law and Director, International Human Rights Law Clinic
Law
Laurel Fletcher is Clinical Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley, where she directs the International Human Rights Law Clinic and co-directs The Miller Institute for Global Challenges and the Law. She studies human rights, humanitarian law, international criminal justice, and transitional justice.
Andrew Little is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. He studies authoritarian politics, communication and information manipulation, and conflict, exploring the causes and political consequences of "nonstandard" belief formation with the use of formal models.
Professor Mark Danner is longtime journalist and writer who holds the Class of 1961 Distinguished Chair in Undergraduate Education at the University of California at Berkeley, teaching in both the Graduate School of Journalism and the Department of English. He writes about political violence, war, and American politics, mostly for The New York Review of Books and The New Yorker, and teaches courses in foreign and war reporting and the realist and modernist novel.
Abhay Aneja is a Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. He studies how legal institutions shape social and economic inequality, from domestic and comparative perspectives, with a focus on the law of democracy and criminal justice.
