Arthur Waldron

Arthur Waldron has been the Lauder Professor of International Relations in the Department of History since 1997. He works mostly on the history of Asia, China in particular; the problem of nationalism; and the study of war and violence in history. Educated at Harvard (A.B. ’71 summa cum laude valedictorian, Ph.D. ’81) and in Asia where he lived for four years before returning to Harvard. He previously taught at Princeton University, the U.S. Naval War College, and Brown University.

Waldron’s publications include The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth (also in Chinese and Italian); The Modernization of Inner Asia; How the Peace Was Lost: The 1935 Memorandum “Developments Affecting American Policy in the Far East” Prepared for the State Department by John Van Antwerp MacMurray (also in Japanese); From War to Nationalism: China’s Turning Point, 1924-1925 (also in Chinese), and, with Daniel Moran, The People in Arms: Military Myth and National Mobilization since the French Revolution. In addition he has 14 articles in peer reviewed journals, 10 chapters in books, and two edited volumes in Chinese, as well numerous scholarly and popular reviews and journalistic essays.

In government, he served as one of twelve members of the highly-classified Tilelli Commission (2000-2001), which evaluated the China operations of the Central Intelligence Agency. He was also an original member of the congressionally-mandated U.S-China Economic and Security Review Commission (2001-2003). He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and former Director of Asian Studies at the American Enterprise Institute.. A regular traveler, he has visited some fifty countries, in Asia and beyond. He has lectured all over the world, including Europe, Russia (in Russian), Japan, and Australia.