Professor Steven David sat in his office in a checkered shirt and khakis, listening to the cuckoo clock on his wall tweet out the next hour. The wind blustered outside, but inside it was sunny and warm as the professor of contemporary international politics talked about his roots, his inspirations and his career.
"I grew up in the south Bronx," David began, his hands on his knees. "You learn a lot about life there. You learn about anarchy, the use of force, the futility of appeasement, and the rottenness of human nature: all important things in realism."
"I went to an all-boys public school, with 7,000 boys. It was a pretty tough place, an inner city school. For a while we had the distinction of having the most graduates in the NBA. As you can probably guess, I was not one of those."
"A great majority of the students not only did not go on to college, they did not graduate. The school convinced me about the importance of family. I come from a Jewish background, and education was always understood as something you pursued. Even more important than the school you go to are the attitudes, values and environment you get at home."
David's father worked in the garment industry, while his mother was a housewife. He has two sisters, one of whom married a doctor and the other a dentist. "I'm the failure in the family, having a Ph.D., because I never made it to med school," he joked.
David's interest in political science blossomed at an early age. "I grew up during the Cold War, and I was always curious about America's role in the world, and the threat posed by the Soviet Union. I was also affected by reading about the Holocaust. It fascinated me that so-called civilized people could kill so many just because of their religion or ethnicity. The Holocaust indicated that, my gosh, there's a lot of hatred and anger in people. It convinced me about the capacity of evil in human kind, and the necessity to be strong to be able to counter that hatred when it's necessary."
David's theories and attitudes toward political science were also influenced by his time as a Watson Fellow in Africa.
"All those countries in Africa were very different from the ideal model of how international relations works," he said. "Government didn't really exist; it had no real presence beyond the main cities. The Congo is not France. So much of the theory of international relations that I'd learned up to that point didn't really speak to most countries of the world, or most people of the world."
While at Harvard, David's mentor was Samuel Huntington, author of the influential article "The Clash of Civilizations?". His classmates included current political science heavyweights Eliot Cohen, John Mearsheimer, Aaron Friedberg and Stephen P. Rosen. He keeps a framed photograph of the group near his desk.
"It was the Cold War, and it was an exciting time," he said. "I studied China at first, at Stanford, but China was pretty closed to America. So I became academically interested in security studies. It just kind of evolved. I tend to second guess a lot of things I do. Like, should I have gone on vacation here, or there? But the big things have really fallen into place. I learned that I made the right choice in my career."
David has taught the same contemporary international politics course at Hopkins for 25 years, but still finds teaching invigorating because of the enthusiasm of his students. "Undergraduates are filled with enthusiasm, with an open mind, with a real thirst for understanding things."
David recalled a memorable moments from lectures. "Once I was giving a seminar on the spread of nuclear weapons. I leaned back in my chair and fell head over heels. For the rest of the class, I could see the students trying to suppress their laughter."
"There's a lot of little moments in teaching. When you see students getting it, being excited by what excites you. And teaching forces you to constantly question the theories and assumptions you hold. Sometimes in class I try to explain something and realize that it doesn't ring true. That helps me modify and change my own opinions."
The war in Iraq also forced him to reconsider some of his ideas. "Now I have a great deal more skepticism about the government, and I'm much more wary of its power. But I still believe strongly that the world is better with America as a great power than a world without it. Think about what the world would be like if the dominant power was China. I can't believe that would be a better situation. Of course, the United States has to do more on the humanitarian side."
"This world is much more dangerous than the world I grew up in. It was never likely in my view that there would be a major nuclear conflict. The Soviet Union was a rational actor, with a return address. Al Qaeda is not. Now the very weak can for the first time wreak catastrophic damage on the very strong. This is unprecedented in world history. It terrifies me."
"Young people can approach these problems with a creative mind. It's important in international relations to not be complacent. It's important to understand the past, but not be bound by it."
