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An interview with MEI Faculty Affiliate Asim Khwaja on his work at the Center for International Development's Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD) program with the Saudi Ministry of Labor on labor market policy as well as EPoD's Smart Policy Design and Implementation methodology and implications for the future of informed, iterative policymaking.

In this issue, the Belfer Center is pleased to feature the contributions of Hedi Larbi, the 2015–2016 Kuwait Foundation Visiting Scholar at the Middle East Initiative. During his stay, Larbi led a dynamic study group of students, fellows, and faculty in examining social contracts. In 2014–2015, he served as Minister of Economic Infrastructure and Sustainable Development and as Economic Advisor to the Prime Minister of Tunisia.

Former Prime Minister of Australia Kevin Rudd is a senior fellow with the Belfer Center and the Inaugural Director of the Asia Society Policy Institute. A longtime China scholar, Mr. Rudd headed a major project at the Belfer Center during the past year on alternative futures for U.S.-China relations over the next decade. In April, he released a report titled U.S.-China 21: The Future of U.S.-China Relations Under Xi Jinping. In this Q&A, we ask Mr. Rudd about his report and the future of U.S.-China relations.

A sampling of Belfer Center affiliates who have been honored or otherwise recently featured recently in the news.

In a major two-part op-ed in the Financial Times in January, Larry Summers presents his judgment that in the aftermath of the Great Recession, the U.S. economy appears to be stuck in “secular stagnation.” By “secular stagnation,” he means the coincidence of sluggish output and GDP growth, less than 2% since the start of this century, employment levels below potential, and problematically low real interest rates. To escape what he foresees is likely otherwise to be a long period of very slow growth, he proposes a set of policies to spur demand: ending the trend toward reduced government spending, leveraging low interest rates to make investments building infrastructure, and boosting private spending in the energy sector. (In his New Year’s Day op-ed, “2014: Good Year for a Great War?” in National Interest, Graham Allison noted that there is another option, the one that finally rescued the U.S. from the Great Depression, but cautioned against going there.) For a recent elaboration of Summers’ argument, see http://forum.iop.harvard.edu/content/state-economy.

The Belfer Center launched its annual International Council meeting on April 9 with animated discussions of, among others, U.S. energy politics, the links between economic policy and national security, cybersecurity, and the rise of China. Participants included members of the Center's International Council and Board of Directors as well as faculty and senior fellows.

It’s not the economy, stupid. It’s the public’s perceptions about the economy that will decide the 2012 presidential election....That was the bipartisan analysis shared by veteran Republican political consultant Mike Murphy and a Democratic expert on the economy – no less than Paul Volcker, former chairman of the Federal Reserve and former adviser to President Obama. Teh two sat down and assessed the campaign during a roundtable discussion at the Kennedy School moderated by Belfer Center Director Graham Allison.