Experts

Robert Strong

Fast Facts

  • Emeritus professor, Washington and Lee University
  • Fulbright Scholar, University College Dublin (2013-14)
  • Former associate provost, Washington and Lee University
  • Expertise on the presidency, U.S. foreign policy, Jimmy Carter

Areas Of Expertise

  • Foreign Affairs
  • American Defense and Security
  • Governance
  • Elections
  • Political Parties and Movements
  • Politics
  • The Presidency

Robert (Bob) Strong is emeritus professor at Washington and Lee University and was a Fulbright Scholar at University College Dublin for the 2013-14 academic year. In 2005, he was a visiting scholar at the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford University.

Strong earned his PhD at the University of Virginia and before W&L taught at Tulane University and the University College of Wales. 

Strong's research involves national security issues and presidential foreign policy decisions in the modern era. His book publications include Character and Consequence: Foreign Policy Decisions of George H. W. BushWorking in the World: Jimmy Carter and the Making of American Foreign Policy and Decisions and Dilemmas: Case Studies in Presidential Foreign Policy Making Since 1945.   

From 2008 to 2013, Strong served in senior administrative positions at Washington and Lee, first as associate provost and then as interim provost. He has published essays in a variety of journals and national newspapers.  His recent speeches and op-eds can be found here.

 

Robert Strong News Feed

“Some consider him to be the nation’s greatest former president,” wrote Robert A. Strong of the Miller Center, a nonpartisan affiliate of the University of Virginia that focuses on presidential scholarship.
Robert Strong Atlanta Magazine
Jimmy Carter, the 39th president of the United States, who tirelessly championed peacekeeping and humanitarian causes after leaving the Oval Office, died on Sunday. He was 100.
Robert Strong The Chronicle of Philanthropy
In November 1992, George H. W. Bush was a lame duck president with only a few weeks left in his administration. Given his waning presidential power, he did something remarkable: He ordered a large-scale military intervention in Somalia for the purpose of protecting the delivery of humanitarian supplies. He did so against the advice of Dick Cheney, his secretary of defense, and Colin Powell, the chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff. Bush made his decision in the days just after his mother’s passing and just before the Thanksgiving holiday.
Robert Strong Notes from the Miller Center
People trying to understand politics in the United States today often turn to history for precedents and perspective. Are our current divisions like the ones that preceded the American Revolution or the Civil War? Did the dramatic events of the 1960s generate the same kind of social and political forces seen today? Are there lessons from the past that show us how eras of intense political turmoil eventually subside?
Robert Strong The Conversation
Washington’s confidence in the general health of the union was tempered by his worries about dangers that lay ahead – worries that seem startlingly contemporary and relevant 229 years later.
Robert Strong The Conversation
Robert Strong points to Washington's prescient warnings about extreme partisanship
Robert Strong The Conversation