From insight to impact: Dean Jeremy Weinstein wants the Kennedy School to embrace and solve complex public problems

Jeremy Weinstein became the newest dean in the 88-year history of the Harvard Kennedy School this past June, arriving from Stanford University, where he was an award-winning scholar and the founding faculty director of the Stanford Impact Labs. The pursuit of deep scholarly curiosity and roll-up-your-sleeves impact has been a theme in his life and career, as well as an approach he intends to accelerate schoolwide at HKS under his leadership. Growing up, Weinstein experienced a family run-in with government policy gone horribly wrong—one that could have inspired a deep cynicism about the role of government in people’s lives. He found inspiration instead and embarked on a career that has encompassed field research on the ground in post-conflict countries including Uganda, Mozambique, and Peru; wide-ranging scholarship in areas including political violence, the political economy of development, migration, and technology’s proper role in society; government service at the National Security Council and as Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations during the Obama administration. He has also been an academic leader who has led major initiatives including the Stanford Impact Labs and the Immigration Policy Lab. His new job marks a return to HKS, where he earned both his master’s and PhD in political economy and government. He joins PolicyCast host Ralph Ranalli to talk about his life experiences, how they shaped him as a scholar and leader, and what he believes the role of the Kennedy School should be in challenging times for academia, the United States, and the world.

Policy Recommendations:

Jeremy Weinstein’s recommendations for restoring trust in public institutions, expertise, and scholarship:

• Reclaim the civic purpose of higher education and prioritize its role in serving democratic institutions and solving societal problems.
• Reconnect to the real-world problems people are experiencing and ensure that the questions being asked and answered by scholars and researchers are ones that can help public institutions make progress.
• Leverage expertise and use science and innovation to tackle pressing challenges including economic insecurity, housing insecurity, food access, access to health care, and geographic disparities in economic development.
• Realign incentives and allocate resources to position higher education institutions as active problem-solving partners, particularly at the state and local level where governors, mayors, and county leaders design policies that directly impact people’s daily lives.
• Demonstrate the value of science, expertise, and policy innovation by producing results people can see and benefit from, and emphasize their value in ensuring that government dollars at all levels are spent efficiently.

Episode Notes:

Jeremy Weinstein is Dean and Don K. Price Professor of Public Policy at Harvard Kennedy School. He is an award-winning researcher and teacher with expertise on civil wars and political violence; ethnic politics; the political economy of development; democracy and accountability; and migration. Before coming to Harvard, he was the Kleinheinz Professor of International Studies at Stanford University, where he led major initiatives, including Stanford Impact Labs and the Immigration Policy Lab, which catalyzed partnerships between researchers and practitioners with the goal of generating innovative policies, programs, and interventions to meaningfully address important social problems.

Weinstein has also held senior roles in the U.S. government at the White House and State Department, most recently as Deputy to the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations during President Obama’s second term. As Deputy, Weinstein was a standing member of the National Security Council Deputies’ Committee—the subcabinet policy committee with primary responsibility for advising the National Security C