History’s Dead-Hand Grip: Politics, Statecraft, and “Lessons” of the Past

On November 11, 2026, the Clements Center for National Security, the UT-Austin Department of History, the LBJ School of Public Affairs , and the America in the World Consortium will host “History’s Dead-Hand Grip: Politics, Statecraft, and “Lessons” of the Past,” with Joseph Ledford, Clements Center Director of Research; Daniel Sargent, Clements Center Senior National Security Fellow; and Cole Bunzel, Clements Center Assistant Professor. Join us at 12:15 – 1:30 pm in Sid Richardson Hall, (SRH), Room 3.122, The LBJ School of Public Affairs.

Beliefs about history shape the practice of foreign policy, and policymakers often use history badly. Historian Ernest R. May made that case for the United States in his 1973 book Lessons” of the Past. This new book, History’s Dead-Hand Grip, extends his inquiry to states around the world.

Editors Joseph Ledford and Daniel J. Sargent, who work at the intersection of history and policy, have recruited a handful of next-generation scholars to explore the ways that historical narratives, axioms, and analogies shape politics and statecraft around the world. Across eight incisive chapters that span Asia, the Middle East, and North and South America, these scholars uncover how and why the past influences the way states define their interests, interpret threats, and pursue action.

These chapters show how middle powers in South America and Southeast Asia have long been guided by national axioms and how selective historical memory informs a Middle Eastern state’s approach to diplomacy and force. They demonstrate how an East Asian regime has sustained its rule through a curated historical narrative, how a Gulf monarchy has revised its founding story to modernize, and how analogies to earlier technological transitions can illuminate the rise of artificial intelligence. They also examine the enduring impact of the Monroe Doctrine and the dueling modes of historical reasoning that have shaped U.S. foreign policy.

Garage parking is available for a fee at the Manor Garage and the San Jacinto Garage. Parking will not be validated.

Speaker Biographies

Joseph Ledford

Joseph Ledford is an Assistant Professor of Security Studies and Director of Research at the Clements Center for National Security at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Griffin Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. A historian of U.S. foreign relations, his research examines the individuals and institutions responsible for the exercise of American power in the world, particularly in the Western Hemisphere, and the domestic politics of foreign policy, broadly construed. Other interests include the uses and abuses of history in policy-making.

Ledford is the co-editor of History’s Dead-Hand Grip: Politics, Statecraft, and “Lessons” of the Past (2026) and author of a forthcoming book on the Iran-Contra affair and Ronald Reagan’s presidency. In addition to his historical work, Ledford frequently provides analysis and commentary on U.S. foreign policy and national security issues for popular and policy outlets.

Ledford received his PhD in history from the University of California, Berkeley, and held the America in the World Consortium Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Henry A. Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Prior to joining UT-Austin, he was a Hoover Fellow and the Assistant Director of the Hoover History Lab at the Hoover Institution, where he also served as the Vice Chair of the Applied History Working Group.

Daniel Sargent

Daniel J. Sargent is a Clements Center Senior National Security Fellow and Professor of Public Policy and History at the University of California, Berkeley, where he is the Alexander F. and May T. Morrison Professor of American History and Citizenship. A graduate of the University of Cambridge (BA 2001) and Harvard University (PhD 2008), he has held fellowships at Yale University and the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Sargent is the author of A Superpower Transformed: The Remaking of American Foreign Relations in the 1970s (2015) and is presently completing a history of the rise and fall of the American world order that will be published by Princeton University Press. Beginning in July 2026, he serves as associate dean of the Goldman School of Public Policy.

Cole Bunzel

Cole Bunzel is an Assistant Professor at the Clements Center for National Security at The University of Texas at Austin, as well as a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. A historian of the contemporary Middle East, he specializes in the history of Saudi Arabia, Islamic theology and law, and modern Islamic radicalism. He is the author of Wahhābism: The History of a Militant Islamic Movement (Princeton University Press, 2023) and has written widely on Middle Eastern politics and Islamism, including for Foreign Affairs and Foreign Policy. His research spans the religious thought of Ibn Taymiyya and his followers in the fourteenth century to present-day Salafism/Wahhabism and the political dynamics of the Arab Gulf states.