Transcripts For CSPAN3 History Public Policy Centers Roundt

To be here this afternoon. Welcome to this panel, history and Public Policy center, sponsored by the National History center. Im nick mueller, president and ceo emeritus of the National World War Ii Museum in new orleans and before that enjoyed a that 32year career at the university of new orleans. I will say more about that after all the panelists are introduced. Were going to take a little bit of a different approach today. Rather than having each panelist stand up and talk about their respective centers and institutes, we are going to have a series of questions i will go over in just a moment and they will each respond in a few moments each. Well weave in the work their centers are doing in the course of their remarks. So im going to introduce very briefly each of the panelists. Perhaps you can raise your hand as i mention your name. For audiences here and i expect to have many more who are not affected by the weather watching us on cspan, so, thank you, cspan, for covering this panel which is being telecast. First, brian vella, is the Dorothy Danforth professor at the Miller Center at the university of virginia, johns hopkins, ph. D. Author of numerous books, associational state in 2015, government out of sight in 2009. The Miller Center is a nonpartisan affiliate of the university of virginia specializing in president ial scholarship, Public Policy and political history striving to apply the lessons of history and civil discourse to the nations most pressing contemporary governance challenge. Avi green, who cannot be with us. He was caught by the snow in boston. Avi, if you are watching, we miss you. He is the executive director of the Scholars Strategy Network and using research to improve Public Policy and strengthen democracy. So, well need to hear more from him in other ways. Rob havers, sitting here, raise a hand, is president of the george c. Marshall foundation in lexington, virginia, a cambridge ph. D. Previously serving as the executive director of the National Churchill museum. The Marshall Foundation is a nonpartisan body dedicated to the perpetuation of the u. S. Secretary of state, general marshall, the man who won the war and won the peace after world war ii. The senate and foundation emphasizes the Leadership Qualities of marshall and his exemplary character through educational programs, archives and Research Libraries and museums. Dane kennedys the elmer lewis kaiser professor of history and International Affairs at George Washington university and author of author of five books and director of the National History center, which is sponsoring this panel today. The National History center is an affiliate of the American Historical Association created in 2002 to reinforce the Critical Role of history and historical knowledge. The role that history and historical knowledge play in public decisionmaking and civic life. The center facilitates historical inquiry and debate and ensures that scholarship and knowledge of professional historians are disseminated to the public effectively. David n. Meyers, to my left, is sadie and ludwick khan chair in jewish history. At ucla. Columbia ph. D. Author of three books, authority in fields of modern jewish intellectual and culture history. He has been a fellow for advanced judaic studies. At katz. University of pennsylvania. He was director of the ucla center, jewish studies. From 04 to 2009 director of the ucla Center Jewish studies. And jason steinhaur, a noted public historian, over 15 years of experience, very diverse experience in museums, archives, government, academia, the library of congress, the New York Historical society, and the museum of jewish heritage as well as rock n roll hall of fame. I like that one. But all of those are important. Lapage Center Brings historical scholarship and perspective to bear on contemporary global affairs. And a leading voice for greater historical consciousness mon citizens and intellectual leaders. For myself, my area was european history at the university of new orleans, ph. D. And masters from university of north carolina. After 32 years as professor, dean, vice chancellor and last post was president of our research and technology park, Steven Ambrose and i, some of you may remember, the late Steven Ambrose, decided that the country needed a National Museum. And so we set about in 1990 to do that. I became chairman, ceo and ultimately the president of the National Museum which got a new mission from congress a few years later. So, we are now the National World War Ii Museum in the city of new orleans, serving members and people from all over the country with almost 700,000 visitors. We will talk more about them. There is also a new institute for the study of war and democracy. Any world war ii media and Education Center which are part of the story about what were going to talk about just here in a moment. So there are mikes up here for the audience as well as for cspan. As i ask questions, well go down the row and get answers from our various presenters of a couple minutes each. Ill play the whip hand and try to keep everybodys answers short so everybody gets a chance to respond. The general approach we are taking today is to look at the broader question of who cares what the historian has to say, after all . How do we stay relevant and become more so perhaps . Most of the centers and institutes that we know of today enjoyed their first appearance in late 19th century as various scholars began to develop research endeavors, Specialized Research endeavors and higher educations largely to a scholarly audience. Todays historians face a very, very different environment than that traditional idea of an institute or center at the university and sometimes not at the universities. Because today, were in a world where many of our perspective audiences, people who might consume what we have to say live in an online world. Reflecting 21st Century Technology and communications. We find these traditional models that have grown up over the last century or so now living with a very dynamic crowded public space, where messages emanate from many, many sources and that those sources are amplified now by the powers of digitization. Then the question is, for our panelists, and there will be a couple parts to this first question, is anyone listening . Is anyone listening . Or does anyone care what our centers and institutes are doing, or in my case, a museum . I think we can all agree that we are living in an attentiondeficit society with political divisions and online chatter of enormous proportions compared to what existed 25 years ago, certainly a century ago. The first part of the question for all of you is, how do historians in their centers and institutes represented here break through the noise and provide context and historical insight for Public Policy and other critical public issues . Breaking through the noise is the first part of the question. Who are your target audiences . And are they listening to you . So, rob, lets start with you. Good afternoon, everybody. Pleasure to be here. The george c. Marshall foundation, as nick said, located in lexington, virginia, been there since 1964. Sitting on the post of the Virginia Military institute, general marshall was a graduate of that institution. Prior that, in washington, d. C. , from 1953. We have sat in lexington working on somewhat the internal part of marshalls life. Four volumes of an authorized biography, seven volumes of the edited papers of george c. Marshall completed in 1987 and just in 2016. So, a lot of time and effort, but really, those great scholarly endeavors very emblematic of the world that nick alluded to, the orlando world. How do you engage the young about general marshall, all he did as a general or secretary of state when the first point of entry is perhaps the four very substantial volumes of that authorized biography . How are you breaking through . We are doing it in a number of ways, trying to connect the historical marshall with the present. There are all kinds of questions that arrive at the moment, the role of the United States in particular at the moment, in the modern world. The end perhaps, of that postwar consensus that has been with us since 1945. General marshall is at the core of the heart of that with the Marshall Plan, secretary of state. Through lectures and short videos, through blogs that speak to the big news events, we find that we have growing traction, virtual traction, and that people comment on our blog posts that connect either our paper collections, three dimensional connections with the big events of the modern world and then the next step is to draw them in person to the building. You often have to want to go to lexington, virginia. It is not as far as you might think. I drove from there this morning. You have to make an effort to come and visit us. Lectures in the evening and lunchtime build on that growing virtual presence. Primarily, you are focused on getting people to the Marshall Center and thats your primary way of reaching your audiences. We are trying to get people to come visit us onsite, but were also endeavoring to take these lectures and programs out beyond lexington. Dane . First of all, to you initial question. That has to do with are we reaching an audience and how . I think we all need to sort of recognize and i think we do recognize on some level that there is an innate interest in history in the broader public, right . I mean, this is something that is really foundational to everyone. And you see it in a variety of different ways, this fascination with genealogy, and how people are tracing their roots genetically. The powerful influence that certain History Museums had, such as the one that nick has helped to found in new orleans. So the good news is that historians are speaking in some sense to a receptive audience who recognize that history has some kind of value. One of the challenges, however, that face those of us who work in the academic world, as historians, is how to reach that audience in a way that is compelling to them and yet also reflects the kinds of Specialized Knowledge that we have. And part of this is a matter of frames a use of language and understanding of how history is understood and conceptualized by different groups and different audiences. So, let me turn to the second part of your question which has to do with the National History center itself which i direct. It is located here in washington, d. C. It is an affiliate of the American Historical Association. Our mission is to bring history and historians the broader public and policy conversations. No better place to do that in some sense than washington, d. C. And we focus on particular audiences. Were not trying to reach the sort of general audience that would go to, say, the World War Ii Museum, or people who are interested in genealogy. We are focused first and foremost on capitol hill, the policy community in washington, d. C. And one of the ways we do this is through a congressional briefing series we have run for five or six years now, which identifies topics that are facing congress currently and trying to give at least staffers and occasionally congressmen, themselves, who attend these briefings, some sense of the Historical Context for these issues and how an understanding of that historical background can be a benefit in terms of defining and shaping current policy issues. We have a weekly lecture series we do in conjunction with the wilson center, which brings historians to talk about work that they have recently done that has some kind of policy dimension to it. And finally, we also are trying to develop a program which brings some of those techniques in terms of congressional briefings and how theyre done, producing a briefing paper and so on to the classroom. Developing a particular set of techniques for allowing history teachers to better communicate to their students and get their students to more actively engage in the use of history as a vehicle for understanding not just the past but perspective on the present. So you are focusing major effort on the policy briefings to influential the staffers to have a better understanding of history, therefore, a larger impact on the hill in congress than your public lectures and teacher impact. Those are three good areas. David . Sure. Thank you very much. It is a great pleasure to be here. I am here today wearing two institutional hats. The first is as the inaugural director of the Luskin Center for historic policy, a new Research Center established at ucla. I am also the president and ceo of the center for jewish history in new york, which has a very substantial public history role as well. I should say that the center, the Luskin Center, arose out of considerable demand from multiple constituencies, from students, faculty colleagues as well as from the general public. That we introduce a greater degree of historical knowledge and perspective into policy. And this is something that we feel we can do at the university, especially in the current moment. I think this is really important to take stock of, nick, the moment we inhabit. Yes, it is a time of attention deficit. Yes, we live in a mediacrazed world in which the news cycle is reduced to seconds, not hours. And yet, at the same time, i sense and certainly, my center is a creation, is a reflection of this, that people want to know, how do we get to where we are . How did we follow this path to where we are . In a certain sense, i think of this moment as the moment of history where people demand a historical accounting to explain the current state of Political Affairs in the United States, something we mentioned just briefly, nick, before the session began. How did the post world war ii order that was such a Stable Foundation for much of the western world seem to unravel so quickly . How did we achieve the current state or descend into a state of income inequality to the extent we have. It seems to me that many people are seeking deeper and more profound answers to these central questions that are very much a function of the moment. It isnt necessarily the case that this questioning means that as they famously said minerva has spread its wings and we have reached an end of history but it is certainly a moment in which there is a demand for your historical texture and perspective. I think it is no accident that this gathering takes place with new and old centers devoted to the intersection of history and policy. So, what we try to do is operate both within the university and beyond. One of the things that we aim to do at the Luskin Center is to modify the culture of the academy to make students and faculty more receptive to historically informed work that addresses questions of contemporary relevance. To make that a legitimate and regular form of historical inquiry and discourse. So this is one of the things that we aim to do within the university that we expect will radiate out. From that, our plans are to produce historically informed policy papers that reach actual decisionmakers at the local, regional and National Levels. Thats exciting. Just chime in here too that to reinforce what you say about that, there is a thirst for history out there. The National World War Ii Museum is some evidence of that. We are now approaching 6 million visitors since we were founded 17 years ago. This is sport of a supply side museum. We werent it wasnt demanddriven. It wasnt like the nation was clamoring for a dday museum or a World War Ii Museum. Some 17,000 visitors come to new orleans, 85 from out of state. Half of those who come say the only reason theyre coming is to see this museum. There is a thirst for great history, welltold, wellpresented. Just a brag point, were ranked number two by trip adviser, the largest travel database in the world and number two in the United States and the world. Who is the other company . Metropolitan museum of arts is number one and most of the smithsonian and other museums are behind us right now. You know, what goes up comes down. The good news is, people are interested in history. We have conferences and they have 500, 600 people. They come from 8 00 in the morning. These are not mostly historians, theyre enthusiasts who want good history. From 8 00 until 6 00 in the evening with breaks to talk with authors and sign books. They are there because we are making history relevant and interesting to them. We are thinking about outreach and how to get the word out. We founded a new entity for the study of war and democracy, which has 12 historians in it, half of them with ph. D. S, developing content and overseeing our exhibits and conferences and a world war ii media