Dear Reader:
In this issue of The Yale Review of International Studies, we’re proud to continue our commitment to providing the best possible platform for outstanding student scholarship on international issues. This is the third year since we have introduced our Intercollegiate Issue, and the pieces within this autumn’s edition of The Issue were selected from a record number of submissions from universities worldwide. We are humbled again by the student interest in The Review, and we sincerely believe that the pieces we have chosen reflect many of the issues our international community faces today.
In this issue, we have included pieces that tackle profound and difficult subjects such as: the fight against gender-based violence in the Congo; the impact of US economic sanctions on Russian public welfare; the achievement of social equality in South Africa through the lens of LGBT rights; feminism and grassroots desertification combat in Rajasthan; Radio Free Europe and the rhetoric of liberation; and the effects of changing US-Iranian relations on US Saudi Relations. Also included in our publication is a comment written by one of our editors on immigrant family detention in the United States.
Our contributors come from Yale, The University of Sydney, Fordham, Duke, American, Colby, and the University of California, Berkeley. The publication of this issue would not have been possible without them, the help of their faculty and friends, and without the unwavering dedication of our new team of Design Editors, Ben Fehrman-Lee and Biba Kosmerl, MFA students at the Yale School of Art.
Working with peers within our intercollegiate community has been nothing short of a great pleasure, and we at The Review are extremely grateful to those who gave us permission to solicit writing at our peer institutions. We hope you enjoy this fall’s edition of The Review – it’s our best yet.
If you are interested in writing for YRIS, please send all submissions to yris@yira.org.
All our best,
The Editors
Editor-in-Chief
Andrew Tran
Executive Editor
Sophia Kecskes
Managing Editors
Lysander Christakis
Stephen Mettler
Senior Editors
Aaron Berman
Miguel Gabriel Goncalves
Erwin Li
Editors
Anna Lu
Elena Vazquez
Graphic Design
Biba Kosmerl
Benjamin Lee
Contributors
Mackenzie Kennedy
Chase Moyle
Elaine Mumford
Matilda Steward
Stephanie Thornton
Elena Vazquez
Luke Zaro
Academic Advisors
Amanda Behm, Associate Director, International Security Studies, Yale University
Beverly Gage, Professor of History, Yale University
Charles Hill, Diplomat-in-Residence and Lecturer in International Studies, Yale University
Jolyon Howorth, Visiting Professor of Political Science, Yale University
Jean Krasno, Distinguished Fellow at International Security Studies, Yale University
Michelle Malvesti, Senior Fellow, Jackson Institute, Yale University
Nuno Monteiro, Associate Professor of Political Science, Yale University
Paul Kennedy, J. Richardson Dilworth Professor of History, Yale University
Ryan Crocker, Kissinger Senior Fellow, Jackson Institute, Yale University
Walter Russell Mead, James Clarke Chace Professor of Foreign Affairs, Bard College