Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies

About Us

At the Institute for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies (IERES), our primary mission is to promote and support the study of Europe and Eurasia through courses, research, events, and publications. The Institute's hallmarks are combining academic rigor with policy engagement, promoting interdisciplinary perspectives, and recognizing that Europe, Russia, and Eurasia cannot be understood in isolation from each other or from global trends.

The principal disciplines at IERES are political science, economics, history, languages, literature, film studies, anthropology, sociology, public policy, and geography. IERES leverages its position in a world-class university and its unrivaled location--just steps from the White House, State Department, and World Bank--to draw together students, scholars, policymakers, and culturally important figures from around the globe for activities that advance education, research, and practice.

IERES houses a Master's program in European and Eurasian Studies. Our students hail from all over the globe-- including from European and Eurasian countries themselves--and often combine their studies with internships or even full-time jobs in important Washington institutions. Alumni have gone on to successful careers in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, including academia.

The institute's permanent multidisciplinary faculty travel regularly to their regions of study, publish prize-winning books and articles in leading journals, provide insight to media and policymakers, and sometimes serve in government themselves. IERES also recruits leading practitioners to share their experiences directly with students in the classroom as instructors or guest lecturers.

Leading and emerging researchers from around the world regularly enrich the IERES community. Around 20 Visiting Scholars are typically in residence during a given academic year. Each of the scholars offers a public lecture on the topic of his or her research. The Institute also hosts a variety of leading scholars and decision-makers in its regular speaker series.

IERES also features several internationally prominent program s that bring opportunities for both students and scholars. As of 2010, thanks to a major grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, it houses the Program on New Approaches to Research and Security in Eurasia (PONARS Eurasia), an international network of social scientists that promotes scholarly work and policy engagement on transnational and comparative topics within the Eurasian space. The institute is also home to the GW Cold War Group, which trains the next generation of scholars on the Cold War through a series of programs and international partnerships funded by the Mellon Foundation. Its activities include the five-day Summer Institute on Conducting Archival Research (SICAR).

The Director of IERES is Dr. Peter Rollberg.