Walt, Stephen

Stephen Martin Walt ( July 2, 1955 , Los Alamos , New Mexico , USA ) is an American political scientist, professor at Harvard University , and a specialist in international relations. A supporter of the school of political realism , he developed the theory of a “balance of threats” , the author of a study of the influence of the Israeli lobby in the USA on the country's foreign policy (“Israeli lobby and US foreign policy”, together with John Mirseimer ).

Stephen Walt was born in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where his father, a physicist by profession, worked in the nuclear laboratory of the US government. Soon after Steven was born, his parents moved to California , where he spent his childhood. After graduation, he entered Stanford University , where he first specialized in chemistry, but later moved to the Department of History. Only a year later, under the influence of prominent teachers of the political science department, he began to study political science as well. After graduating from university in 1977, he continued his studies at the University of California at Berkeley . After receiving a master's degree in 1978 and a doctorate in 1983, he began working in the structures of the Navy, and later at Harvard University. For several years he taught at Princeton and the University of Chicago . Since 1999 he has been teaching at Harvard University, and since 2002 he is dean of the School of Government named after John F. Kennedy.