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Glenn Matsumura |
in december of last year,
I visited India to meet with Stanford alumni, Indian
business leaders and colleagues in higher education.
This was my first time in India, and there is only one
way to put it: the experience was life-changing.
In the face of momentous odds, the people of India maintain
hope for a better life and work enormously hard to improve
their lot and the futures of their children. Moreover,
few other countries have placed so much faith in the
role of education in solving their problems. But India
shares the challenges of many developing nations and
underscores the magnitude of the problems the world
will face in the next generation—poverty, public
health issues, regional conflicts, and religious and
ethnic disputes.
Nonetheless, I returned from India heartened by the
realization that, even in the most difficult conditions,
people are driven by a desire to improve the world for
themselves and future generations. This understanding
was a positive antidote to the cynicism we often confront
in public political discourse and much of the news and
entertainment media in our own country. Like many of
the individuals I met in India, I believe that universities
are one of the most powerful forces for overcoming obstacles
and advancing the human race.
This trip to India was related to a bold project Stanford
is about to undertake. At the Faculty Senate last month,
I announced a new multidisciplinary initiative in international
affairs. Under the leadership of Coit Blacker, director
of the Stanford Institute for International Studies,
and engineering professor Elisabeth Paté-Cornell,
MS ’72, PhD ’78, chair of the faculty advisory
committee for the international initiative, Stanford
will identify issues of global concern and, more important,
provide resources and expertise to explore solutions
to some of the most daunting questions in our world.
As with our initiatives in the envi- ronment and the
biosciences, this effort will require true collaboration
among all seven of Stanford’s schools and scores
of departments and research centers. The world’s
problems do not come at us in the form of academic disciplines—they
come at us as challenges that defy traditional rubrics.
Of course, a number of departments in the School of
Humanities and Sciences will be critical partners in
this endeavor, through the new division of international,
comparative and area studies, led by its faculty director,
Professor Judy Goldstein.
Stanford’s international initiative will focus
on three broad areas:
- Pursuing security in an insecure world—including
such issues as catastrophic terrorism, proliferation
of weapons of mass destruction, ethnic conflicts and
civil wars, and interstate rivalries.
- Reforming and improving governance at all levels—including
existing international and regional institutions no
longer equipped to cope with contemporary demands, the
problem of failing and failed states, the challenges
of democracy and effective governance.
- Advancing human well-being—including economic
development, global health, education, and educational
reform and equity.
Stanford is currently strong in many of these areas.
As Provost John Etchemendy, PhD ’82, said last
year, “Stanford has already become one of the
great international universities, whether you measure
by its faculty, its students, its reputation, or its
impact.” By unifying and strengthening our efforts
in this area, we acknowledge that Stanford has a special
role to play in addressing these issues and to do so
in a collaborative and multidisciplinary fashion. As
educators, it is our responsibility to guide our undergraduate
and graduate students in a way that prepares them to
bring the full range of their intellect and talents
to tackling these vexing issues. As researchers, we
need to marshal the intellectual resources to make solving
these problems possible. We must provide not just new
knowledge, but also the tools to translate the knowledge
into viable solutions. This, in turn, will help prepare
our students to be leaders in a world transformed by
technology, globalization and shifting geopolitical
dynamics.
From its earliest days, our University has been steeped
in the belief that knowledge can—and should—make
a positive and lasting difference. I believe Stanford
is uniquely situated to advance the frontiers of knowledge
and to see that knowledge helps create a better world.
Renowned scientist and futurist Arthur C. Clarke once
said “the only way to discover the limits of the
possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.”
Stanford must—and I believe will—play a
central role in restoring a sense of optimism about
finding solutions to some of the world’s intractable
problems in the next century. The stakes are monumental.
Our passion for learning and understanding must match
the magnitude of the problems we seek to solve. And,
given the scope and complexity of this mission, we will
need the support and assistance of our alumni throughout
the world. |
