# Europe in a Time of War: Anne Applebaum in Conversation with Serhii Plokhii ![The Forum. Europe in a Time of War](/sites/g/files/omnuum4931/files/styles/hwp_5_4__480x385/public/2026-02/2026.03.04%20The%20Forum-Applebaum-7-1920x1536-web-thumbnail.png?itok=a5bhUIvy) #### calendar\_today Date and Time **March 4, 2026** 05:30PM - 07:00PM EST #### pin\_drop Location **IN-PERSON** Tsai Auditorium (S010), CGIS South | 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 [ WATCH THE RECORDING arrow\_circle\_right ](https://youtu.be/3RtMeRSVa_c) ### [Anne Applebaum](https://www.anneapplebaum.com/), Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and journalist, in conversation with Harvard’s [Serhii Plokhii](https://www.huri.harvard.edu/people/serhii-plokhii). *The Forum: Europe in a Time of War* is a collaboration between the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, and the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard. Together, we host a series of lectures and discussions on themes of common interest. The current theme of the series is the ongoing war in Europe. **Please note that seating in the auditorium will be available on a first-come, first-served basis, including for guests with Eventbrite tickets. We anticipate a full house and possible overflow. To accommodate additional attendees, a live stream of the event will be available next door in the S020 room, next to the Tsai Auditorium, for overflow seating.** ## About the Event The conversation will focus on the rise of autocratic regimes and policies in the modern world, and the ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine, the themes Anne Applebaum discusses in her bestselling book *Autocracy, Inc.* (2025). Autocracies, she argues in the book, are connected by sophisticated national and transnational networks composed of kleptocratic financial structures, security services, and professional propagandists. They don't share an ideology, but they do have a common goal: to defeat the ideas and language of liberal democracy, inside their own countries and around the world. ## About the Speakers ![Anne Applebaum](/sites/g/files/omnuum4931/files/2026-02/2026.03.04%20The%20Forum-Applebaum-2-300x300-web-speaker1.png) Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, journalist, and commentator on geopolitics, **Anne Applebaum** examines the challenges and opportunities of global political and economic change through the lenses of world history and the contemporary political landscape. Informed by her expertise in Europe and her years of international reporting, Applebaum shares perspectives on, and the far-reaching implications of, today’s volatile world events. And as technology allows a new scale of media manipulation to authoritarian governments and changes the tenor of political discourse, she scrutinizes the misinformation, propaganda, and criminal exploitation that influence global affairs, as well. From Syrian refugees to Putin’s disinformation narratives, from the EU and the European financial crises to responding to terrorism, from solutions to transition-government corruption to political populists’ game-changing campaign language, Applebaum provides both background and up-to-the-minute insights that are vital to understanding the risks and opportunities of today’s world political and economic climate. Anne’s Pulitzer Prize-winning *Gulag: A History* is about the Soviet concentration camps. Her book, *Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine*, is the winner of her second Duff Cooper Prize and the 28th Lionel Gelber Prize 2018. In it, Anne proves what many suspected: Stalin set out to destroy the Ukrainian peasantry. Anne is the only author to win the Duff Cooper Prize twice. Her other books include *Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956*, which won a Cundill Prize for Historical Literature, and *Between East and West: Across the Borderlands of Europe* (updated edition published in 2023). In 2024, she was awarded the prestigious ‘Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels’ (Peace Prize of the German Book Trade) – previous winners include Salman Rushdie and Amartya Sen. In 2021, Anne was awarded the ICFJ’s Excellence in International Reporting Award. Also in 2021, Anne was presented with the 38th ‘Francisco Cerecedo’ journalism award. by King Felipe VI of Spain. In July 2024, her book *Autocracy, Inc: The Dictators Who Want to Run the World* was published by Penguin, it was a NY Times Bestseller. The book was recognized as a “Best Book of the Year” by multiple publications, including The Economist, Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, and The Times, indicating its significance and impact. Penguin also published *Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism* in 2020. In this book, she outlines with great eloquence why elites in democracies around the world are turning towards nationalism and authoritarianism. The book became an immediate NYT best-seller in the non-fiction section. Barack Obama listed this book as one of his favorite reads of the year. She is a Senior Fellow of International Affairs and Agora Fellow in Residence at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC. Director of the Transitions Forum at the Legatum Institute from 2011-2015, an international think tank, Applebaum is the co-founder of the institute’s Democracy Lab, an online partnership between the institute and *Foreign Policy* magazine. An adjunct fellow of the Center for European Policy Analysis, she is former Philippe Roman Chair in History and International Affairs at the London School of Economics. For many years, Applebaum wrote a biweekly foreign affairs column for *The Washington Post* which is syndicated internationally. She is now a staff writer at *The Atlantic*. She has been a contributor to *Foreign Affairs*, the *New Republic* and *The New York Review of Books*. She was formerly a member of *The Washington Post*’s editorial board; foreign and deputy editor of the Spectator magazine; and political editor of the Evening Standard. From 1988 – 1991 she covered the collapse of communism as Warsaw correspondent for *The Economist*. Anne attended Yale University and was a Marshall Scholar at the London School of Economics and St. Antony’s College, Oxford. ![Serhii Plokhii](/sites/g/files/omnuum4931/files/2026-02/2026.03.04%20The%20Forum-Applebaum-4-300x300-web-speaker2.png) **Serhii Plokhii** is the Mykhailo Hrushevs'kyi Professor of History in the Department of History, Harvard University. His research interests include the intellectual, cultural, and international history of Eastern Europe, with an emphasis on Ukraine. He teaches courses and seminars on early modern and modern East European history that engage major problems in the history of Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, Poland, and Lithuania. Dr. Plokhii's many publications include the following monographs: *The Nuclear Age: An Epic Race for Arms, Power, and Survival* (W. W. Norton, 2025); *Chernobyl Roulette: War in the Nuclear Disaster Zone* (W. W. Norton, 2024); *The Russo-Ukrainian War: The Return of History* (W. W. Norton, 2023); *Atoms and Ashes: A Global History of Nuclear Disasters* (W. W. Norton, 2022); *Nuclear Folly: A History of the Cuban Missile Crisis* (W. W. Norton, 2021); *Forgotten Bastards of the Eastern Front: American Airmen behind the Soviet Lines and the Collapse of the Grand Alliance* (Oxford University Press, 2019); *Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe* (Basic Books, 2018); *The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine* (Basic Books, 2015); *The Last Empire: The Final Days of the Soviet Union* (Basic Books, 2015); *The Cossack Myth: History and Nationhood in the Age of Empires* (Cambridge University Press, 2012), *Yalta: The Price of Peace* (Viking/Penguin, 2010; 2011); *Ukraine and Russia: Representations of the Past* (University of Toronto Press, 2008); and *The Origins of the Slavic Nations: Premodern Identities in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus* (Cambridge University Press, 2006). His books have won numerous awards, including the Lionel Gelber Prize (2015), Antonovych Prize (2015), the Pushkin House Book Prize (2015 and 2019), Ballie Gifford Prize (2018), the Shevchenko National Prize (2018), and the Arenberg Prize (2024). Oxford University awarded Dr. Plokhii an honorary degree in 2025. --- #### This event is hosted by the [Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute](https://huri.harvard.edu/) and co-organized by the [Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies](https://daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu/) and the [Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies](https://ces.fas.harvard.edu/) as part of *The Forum* event series. --- Persons with disabilities who wish to request accommodations or who have questions about access should contact HURI at , at least two weeks in advance of the session. Watch videos of past HURI events on our [YouTube Channel](https://www.youtube.com/user/huriyt) and [subscribe](https://mailchi.mp/fas.harvard.edu/huri-subscribe) to our email list to receive announcements about events and other activities. See also:- [ Special Event ](/event-type/special-event) - [ Contemporary Ukraine ](/fields-expertise/contemporary-ukraine) - [ Global Affairs ](/fields-expertise/global-affairs) - [ Modern History ](/fields-expertise/modern-history) - [ Russia-Ukraine War ](/fields-expertise/russia-ukraine-war) - [ Public Event ](/event-categories/public-event) Share on:- [ Facebook ](#) - [ Twitter ](#) - [ Linkedin ](#) Save: [ Add to calendar calendar\_today ](https://www.huri.harvard.edu/node/1618561/event-feed.ics) Copy link link