Registration REQUIRED by 4pm on February 16, 2026 in order to attend this event.
Global democracy was in crisis before Donald Trump returned to the White House, but the dismantling of U.S. foreign aid and other democracy-building “soft power” projects is certain to deepen that crisis. Decades of democracy promotion efforts have now vanished or been greatly diminished In Russia, Eurasia, and Eastern Europe, removing a vital counterweight to Russian disinformation and influence efforts.
This historic change, and its impact on democracy in the region, is examined in detail in the 2026 issue of “Harriman Magazine.” Join magazine authors Timothy Frye and Thomas Kent and editor-in-chief Ann Cooper for a discussion of soft power and democracy promotion in the region – its history and what happens now that it’s been abolished. Moderated by editor Masha Udensiva-Brenner.
Timothy Frye is Marshall D. Shulman Professor of Post-Soviet Foreign Policy and a former director of the Harriman Institute (2009 – 2015). He writes and teaches about the politics of corruption, autocracy, and economic development usually with a focus on Russia and Eurasia. Most recently he coauthored “Workplace Politics: How Politicians and Employers Subvert Elections” (Oxford University Press, 2025).
Thomas Kent is Adjunct Associate Professor of International Affairs. He is a specialist on the geopolitics of information, propaganda, journalistic ethics and press freedom, and consults to governments, NGOs, news organizations and others. He is the former president and CEO of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is senior fellow for strategic communications at the American Foreign Policy Council. He published the books “Striking Back: Overt and Covert Options to Combat Russian Disinformation” (The Jamestown Foundation, 2020), and “How Russia Loses” (Jamestown, 2023).
Ann Cooper is CBS Professor Emerita of Professional Practice in International Journalism at Columbia Journalism School; Editor-in-Chief, Harriman Magazine. She is an award-winning journalist and foreign correspondent with more than 25 years of radio and print reporting experience, including as NPR’s first Moscow bureau chief during the final five years of Soviet communism. She co-authored “Newshawks in Berlin: The Associated Press and Nazi Germany” (Columbia University Press, 2024).
Image: Steve Lodge, son of the late Voice of America Capitol Hill correspondent Robert Lodge, protests budget cuts outside VOA headquarters in Washington, D.C., March 17, 2025 Photo by Andrew Leyden/NurPhoto via AP
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