Miller Center Launches Website Offering Lessons from History for Today’s Issues

Scholars, policymakers and journalists offer lessons from history for a wide range of contemporary national and global issues on a unique website launched Thursday by the University of Virginia’s Miller Center.

The Great Issues website features short videotaped interviews in which experts provide historical insight into some of the nation’s most pressing challenges.

Videos currently posted address topics ranging from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to political polarization to the legacy of the Civil Rights Act. They feature numerous authorities, including Ryan Crocker, former U.S. ambassador to Iraq and Afghanistan, and Risa Goluboff, civil rights historian and U.Va. professor of law. New videos will be added regularly.

The effort is part of the Miller Center’s Great Issues program, which connects the public, media and policy community with historical expertise on today’s policy issues. The program hosts a wide range of scholarly events and conducts in-depth interviews with guests.

“The purpose of Great Issues is best captured in its stated mission: ‘Scholarship in the Public Interest,’” said Guian McKee, an associate professor at the Miller Center, who directs the Great Issues program. “We are trying to bring the best and most engaging scholarship on key public issues to an audience that can put it to effective use.”

Interviews on the Great Issues website are organized in four categories:

• America in the World: War, Statecraft, and Diplomacy
• In the Oval Office: Presidential Decision Making
• Broken Government: Politics and Polarization
• Big Policy: Debating the Future of Technology, Society, and Government

You can follow #GreatIssues on Twitter @Great_Issues or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/greatissues.