By Megan Goulding
The USC Price School of Public Policy hosted 50 distinguished guests for an intimate reception with General David H. Petraeus on Thursday evening. Held at the home of David and Amy Hochman, who are dedicated supporters and volunteers at the Price School, the reception offered guests a unique opportunity to hear directly from General Petraeus on a wide range of topics related to global security policy.
As he welcomed the guests in attendance, Hochman commented on the relevance and importance of the evening’s conversation. “I think everyone here would agree that there is perhaps no policy issue that is more important today than global conflict and security,” Hochman said. “We have the pleasure of hearing from one of the world’s most distinguished leaders in the field of global security tonight, and it is a privilege to welcome General Petraeus.”
The retired four-star general and former director of the Central Intelligence Agency, who bears the title of Judge Widney Professor at USC, treated guests to an intimate and thoughtful discussion on topics as diverse and wide ranging as the role that the United States should play in preventing and mitigating conflict in the Middle East, America’s national interests in the Syrian conflict, and the threat of Islamist foreign fighters returning to their home countries. The discussion was moderated by Dr. Erroll Southers, Director of Transition and Research Deployment for the USC Center for Risk and Economic Analysis of Terrorism Events (CREATE) and adjunct professor at the Price School.
The General also spoke about the continued momentum behind the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the importance of Iraq’s stability for more broadly securing the Middle East, as well as the shared security challenges confronting both Israel and the United States.
The General entertained questions from many of the evening’s distinguished guests, which included Alan Casden, Chairman and CEO of Casden Properties, Laszlo Kalman, Consul General of Hungary, and Robert Shapiro, Partner at Glaser Weil.
The General concluded the evening by noting the importance of having an interdisciplinary center dedicated to researching security policy and developing effective solutions to mitigate and prevent global conflict. Commenting on the proposed USC Initiative for Global Conflict and Security Policy, Petraeus said that leadership is the most critical component, and that an initiative of that scale will require an exceptional, world-renowned academic who has the ability to harness the collective expertise of the university to create a critical mass around global security policy.
Southers expanded upon the potential of the proposed USC Initiative for Global Conflict and Security Policy. “Harnessing the collective impact and expertise of the USC campus, as well as international partners such as the International Institute of Counter-Terrorism in Herzliya, Israel, the USC Initiative for Global Conflict and Security Policy will advance knowledge on intelligence analysis and conflict resolution policy, and will invest significant resources to expand CREATE’s capacity to design models and interventions to curb some of the most critical security threats of our day,” said Southers. “What we’re hoping to do with the USC Initiative for Global Conflict and Security Policy is an absolute game changer in the field of global security policy.”
The prospect of a university-wide, interdisciplinary research center focused on the most important security issues of our day is indeed lofty goal. But General Petraeus is hopeful about USC’s capacity to do great things in this arena. “This university has the unique ability to get huge ideas right; that is the USC advantage,” said Petraeus.