United States of America is a country of great extremes: it has the most freedom in academic thought and yet federal regulations often curtail innovative developments, often influenced by special interest groups; it has the most liberal and the most conservative thinkers; scientists who can prove that global warming is anthropogenic and scientists, who can prove the exact opposite; it has the richest people in the world and the poorest ones, it has politicians, who justify the war in Iraq and those, who consider it a grievous mistake. The ration of U.S. universities per capita is the highest in the world. This contributes towards a fascinating environment in which one searches for “the truth.” Every time that one digs deeper, one discovers more questions than answers. Finally, one concludes that one can prove almost anything, if only one has the arguments. The American educational system teaches one to find the arguments.
American University is one of 13 universities in the consortium of Washington, DC. Such a concentration of universities makes the city the world's “Silicon Valley of academia.” This perception is further reinforced by more then a dozen respectable think tanks, the earliest one being the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Think tanks, universities, lobby groups, World Bank, International Monetary Fund and embassies feature multiple events every day. Sometimes I am frustrated by the choices that I am forced to make, such as: Should I go to listen to the overthrown prince of Iran or to the future president of Russia?
Often people say: “All the global news in Washington is local,” further emphasizing its position as the most powerful city in the world.
American University has a large population of international students and commonly a class configuration has half foreign students, dominated by Asian and Central American countries. Overall professors are quite liberal in their ideas. The university is well equipped with necessary technology enabling the student to get any published book from anywhere in the world within 5 working days.
There is a joke that captures something essential about my department, Foreign Economic Policy: Two politicians set out for a trip in a balloon. For a while the weather is nice, but suddenly a storm starts and the wind brings them to an unknown place with plain fields. After an hour of flying they see a man working in the fields and shout to him, “Where are we?” He answers, “You are in a balloon.” One politician says, “Damn economist.” The other asks, “How do you know he is an economist? Maybe he's just a man working in the fields.” The other answers, “Because, he is right, but it doesn't help us at all.”
My program teaches all the successes and failures of any foreign policy agendas ever undertaken by countries and the role of “damn politicians” in the process. It is very applicable to Ukraine, since the role of politicians who are not professional economist in forming foreign economic policy is really great yet not very effective. Ukraine is very unique and simply copying either the Irish or Chilean experience will not work. However, it is crucial to know and examine them. The faculty is quite international and come from various backgrounds: Wall Street, Department of Treasury, academia, think tanks, etc.
Lectures take on the format of forums, during which students can raise questions, such as the Ricardian theory of comparative advantage. This theory says that countries have different endowments of land, labor and capital, which determine their production efficiency. Developed in 1820, the theory could not foresee a world in which capital, technology, and to a certain extent labor can move between countries and change their factor endowments. Thus, the most basic trade theory of comparative advantage is outdated and needs to be either modified or changed for one, which corresponds to today's world.
My research deals with the influence of multinational corporations (MNCs) on forming and implementing national interests into foreign policy. There is very little information on this topic -- not enough to do high quality scholarly research. The question: “What is the effect of MNCs?” is commonly answered: “It depends…” Initially I was interested in assessing the role of an entity such as Halliburton in triggering war. There are a lot of newspaper articles on this issue, but very little hard evidence to prove a powerful influence of the company in starting the war. Thus, I decided to concentrate on less controversial issues as for example, agriculture and road construction about which I can interview people and learn and study lobby mechanism. In answer to the information deficit, I changed my research focus.
In extra-curriculum activities, I am involved in a project run by Interactivity Foundation, which organizes discussions on public policy affecting property issues. We discuss eminent domain, intellectual property, etc. I find these discussions with Americans very useful, since in the area of property, post- communist Ukraine and long-time capitalist U.S. differ quite a lot.
Together with Robert Zimmerman, a Fulbright professor now in Ukraine, I am working on visit of Ukrainian students to Washington, DC in the summer of 2009. The goal of the visit is to learn how U.S. creates its foreign policy. In preparation for this, we have made contacts with those Congressmen, who are active on issues dealing with Ukraine and organizations, such as US-Ukraine Foundation, Woodrow Wilson Center, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Embassy of Ukraine in the United States, as well as donor organizations and individuals in the Ukrainian-American community. The city has many institutions that could be mobilized to lobby Ukraine's interests. That is why it is so important for us Ukrainians to determine our interests as a nation and as a state, as well as the interests or our corporations and small businesses. The interests of each and every citizen of Ukraine should be incorporated into the national interests. We can achieve goals, only when we know what these interests are.
Fulbright seems to be the best program for scholars. Not only will it shine on your CV, but it also offers a worldwide network of people, who are thinkers. I can't thank Fulbright enough for this life changing experience.
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