Murphy Seminar in Political Science: "Hard Choices for Europe & Russia - Sanctions Blowback, Political Polarization & the Demands of Strategic Autonomy" with Molly O'Neal

Each semester The Murphy Institute sponsors a series of seminars organized by the Tulane Department of Political Science that provides an opportunity for faculty, researchers, and practitioners to present their latest research and pressing issues related to topics in political economy. Research presented covers all aspects of contemporary politics science, including comparative politics, public policy, international relations, American politics, and normative theory.  

Dr. Molly O’Neal is a former Foreign Service Officer in the U.S. State Department whose career, from 1989 onward, was devoted to the relations of the U.S. with Central and Eastern Europe, Russia and Eurasia. She served in senior positions in the U.S. embassies in Tbilisi, Baku, Tashkent and Moscow, in the Policy Planning staff at the State Department under Secretary James Baker, and as a political advisor at the London headquarters of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. She completed her PhD at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in 2012, specializing in Russian and Eurasian Studies, as well as international political economy, comparative politics and American foreign policy. She has taught at American University, Baylor University and UT Austin. She was a Fulbright Research Scholar and lecturer at Collegium Civitas in Warsaw and was a Fulbright professor at the Center for International Studies at the Technical University of Dresden in 2022. She has been a visiting researcher in the European department of the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik in Berlin. Her research focuses on European politics, the European Union and US policy toward Europe and Eurasia.

She is the author of a book, published by Routledge in 2016, Democracy, Civic Culture and Small Business in Russia’s Regions: Social Processes in Comparative Historical Perspective. She has also authored academic conference papers and published numerous articles in peer-reviewed journals.