UW-Madison alumnus and former professor Jeremi Suri returned to Madison Wednesday to present his newest book on nation-states and America's role as ""agenda-setters.""
Last May, Suri left his post as a UW-Madison history professor after ten years to take a new, higher-salaried position at the University of Texas at Austin.
Suri attributed the decision to pay cuts faculty would face as a result of Gov. Scott Walker's Budget Repair Bill, telling the Capital Times last May, ""I love this place and am very sad about leaving, but it's been a really hard year here. … And that's not the fault of the university, but the environment that we're operating in.""
Speaking to a packed Overture Hall Wednesday, Suri said he and his family were grateful ""for the life we had here and how we were really, deeply connected to Madison.""
""This place allowed me and taught me to become someone better than I was when I arrived,"" Suri said.
Suri described his new book, Liberty's Surest Guardian, as ""an effort to understand what nation-building is, and the connection between history and foreign policy.""
A nation-state refers to single or multiple nationalities joined together in a formal political union. The United States, among other countries, worked to establish these kinds of states out of both idealism and economic practicality, according to Suri.
""The fundamental question is… about the intersection between American ideals and the realities of making policy,"" Suri said.
Suri devoted the majority of his lecture to discussing the development of nation-states, and offering a historian's take on what he deemed the ""undeniably"" American role in the phenomenon, a role Suri fears is often reactionary today.
Instead of simply reacting to international situations and quickly becoming involved, Suri said, historians suggest asking questions about the past before making decisions.
By asking before establishing policy, Suri said Americans can return to setting cohesive plans rather than letting situations set the agenda for them.
""We should be agenda-setters for the world. Not imperialists, not imposers, not simply reacting as firemen every time a fire appears,"" Suri said. ""As limited as our resources are we can still be agenda-setters. In fact, all the more reason.""
