Wilson Center Experts

Francis J. Gavin is the Tom Slick Professor of International Affairs and Director of the Robert S. Strauss Center for International Security and law at the University of Texas at Austin. Gavin's teaching and research interests focus, among many other fields, on U.S. foreign policy, global governance, national security affairs, nuclear strategy and arms control. He was also the director of "The Next Generation Project: U.S. Global Policy and the Future of International Institutions," a multi-year national initiative sponsored by The American Assembly at Columbia University. He holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in Diplomatic History from the University of Pennsylvania, a Master of Studies in Modern European History from Oxford, and a B.A. in Political Science (with honors) from the University of Chicago. Francis Gavin is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Society of Historians of American Foreign Relations. He is currently completing a book manuscript, Nuclear Politics and Policies: From the Cold War through the 21st Century. In the spring of 2009, he was a senior research fellow at the Nobel Institute in Oslo, Norway, participating in the Institute's project to explore the causes and consequences of nuclear proliferation, “The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: Past Experiences and Future Challenges.” Most recently, he contributed the article “Nuclear Nixon” in Nixon in the World: American Foreign Relations, 1969-1977, edited by Fredrik Logevall and Andrew Preston.