The MacMillan Center Announces Fall 2025 Signature Programming

Peter Pomerantsev, George Herbert Walker, Jr. Lecture
Thursday, Sept. 18, 4:30 p.m.

Renowned journalist and author Peter Pomerantsev will deliver the MacMillan Center’s annual George Herbert Walker, Jr. Lecture. Pomerantsev is a Soviet-born, British journalist who is the author of the recently published, How to Win an Information War: The Propagandist Who Outwitted Hitler.” Pomerantsev is a Senior Fellow at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University, where he co-directs the Arena Initiative. 

Established in 1988, the George Herbert Walker, Jr. Lecture at the MacMillan Center has highlighted speakers and topics of global significance. Previous speakers include Permanent Representative of Myanmar to the United Nations Kyaw Moe Tun, former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, and former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs and Ambassador to the Republic of Korea Christopher Hill.

Kenneth Rogoff, Henry L. Stimson Lectures on World Affairs
Monday, Oct. 6, 4:30 p.m.

Kenneth Rogoff (’75) is an award-winning economist and a professor of economics and public policy at Harvard University. This event will feature his book, Our Dollar, Your Problem: An Insider's View of Seven Turbulent Decades of Global Finance, and the Road Ahead (Yale University Press, 2025), which “argues that America’s currency might not have reached today’s lofty pinnacle without a certain amount of good luck. Rogoff is Maurits C. Boas Professor at Harvard University, and former chief economist at the IMF. His influential 2009 book with Carmen Reinhart, This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly, shows the remarkable quantitative similarities across time and countries in the roots and aftermath of debt and financial crises.

Created in 1998 to honor Yale alumnus Henry L. Stimson, an attorney and statesman whose government service culminated with his tenure as U.S. secretary of war during World War II, the Stimson Lecture Series brings to campus distinguished diplomats and foreign policy experts who have published books with Yale University Press.

Venerable Jeong Kwan, Yale Global Table Chef's Lecture and Dinner
Wednesday, Oct. 22, 6 p.m.

For the third iteration of Global Table, the MacMillan Center's Council on East Asian Studies will welcome Venerable Jeong Kwan, a renowned Seon Buddhist nun and chef of Korean temple cuisine, celebrated for her sustainable and eco-conscious eating practices founded on Buddhist philosophy. She resides in the Chunjinam Hermitage at the Baegyangsa temple in South Korea, located south of Seoul, where she cooks for fellow nuns and monks, as well as occasional visitors. As a Seon Buddhist, she lives on a strictly vegan diet, excluding certain varieties of Allium (garlic and onions are common Allium foods), and uses only ingredients that she grows herself on the temple grounds.

Global Table, a collaboration between Yale MacMillan Center, Yale Schwarzman Center, and Yale Hospitality, aims to illuminate the connections between sustainability, health, culture, and community. It centers around bringing culinary thought leaders from around the world to campus. While in residence, each fellow trains staff, connects with students and researchers, and offers remarks followed by a reception with a menu inspired by the chef.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Coca-Cola World Lecture Fund
Tuesday, Oct. 28, 4:30 p.m.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (’08 M.A.) is an internationally acclaimed Nigerian author and poet who is widely recognized for her postcolonial feminist literature, including her most recent novel, Dream Count. She graduated summa cum laude from Eastern Connecticut State University with a degree in Communication and Political Science. She has an M.A. in Creative Writing from Johns Hopkins University and an M.A. in African History from Yale University. She was awarded a Hodder fellowship at Princeton University for the 2005-2006 academic year and a fellowship at the Radcliffe Institute of Harvard University for the 2011-2012 academic year. In 2008, she received a MacArthur Fellowship.

Since 1992, the Coca-Cola World Fund at Yale University has supported an annual lecture on topics of international significance by a major public figure. Recent Coca-Cola World Lecturers include: Ban Ki-Moon, Michael Doyle, Gary Hart, Tom Friedman, Nicholas Kristof, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, Sam Nunn, Sadako Ogata, Samantha Power, Mary Robinson, Raghuram Rajan, Eboo Patel, Mo Ibrahim, Marwan Muasher, Raila Odinga, John Githongo, Deborah Brautigam, Mahmood Mamdani, Sarah Chayes, and Sergio Jaramillo.