2021 is the second year of the pandemic, and it began, almost immediately, with a violent insurrection at the United States Capitol.  Dr. Evelyn Farkas helps us put the big stories of the last 12 months in context even as we name the top story of 2021.

Dr. Farkas has three decades of experience working on national security and foreign policy in the U.S. executive and legislative branches, the private sector and for international organizations overseas.  In 2019-2020, she ran to represent New York’s 17th Congressional District in the House of Representatives.  She is currently President of Farkas Global Strategies.  She was previously a Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and the Atlantic Council and a National Security Contributor for NBC/MSNBC.   From 2012 to 2015, Farkas served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine, Eurasia, the Balkans, and the Caucasus and conventional arms control.  From 2010 to 2012 she served as Senior Advisor to the Supreme Allied Commander Europe and Special Advisor to the Secretary of Defense for the NATO Summit.  Prior to that, she was Executive Director of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism and senior fellow at the American Security Project.  From 2001 to 2008, she served as a Professional Staff Member of the Senate Armed Services Committee responsible for the Asia-Pacific region, the Western Hemisphere, Special Operations Command and policy issues including combatting terrorism, and export control.  From 1997-2001 Farkas was a professor of international relations at the U.S. Marine Corps Command and Staff College.  She served 1996-97 in Bosnia with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).  She has published numerous journal articles and opinion pieces, in addition to her book, “Fractured States and U.S. Foreign Policy: Iraq, Ethiopia, and Bosnia in the 1990s.”