Joshua T. White is Professor of the Practice of International Affairs at Johns Hopkins SAIS, and serves as the inaugural director of the U.S.-ASEAN and U.S.-Pacific Institutes for Rising Leaders. He is also a Nonresident Fellow in the Foreign Policy program at The Brookings Institution. He previously served at the White House as Senior Advisor & Director for South Asian Affairs at the National Security Council, where he staffed the President and National Security Advisor on the full range of South Asia policy issues pertaining to India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the Indian subcontinent, and led efforts to integrate U.S. government policy planning across South and East Asia.
Prior to joining the White House, Dr. White was a Senior Associate and Co-Director of the South Asia program at The Stimson Center and, previously, Senior Advisor for Asian and Pacific Security Affairs in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, a position he held in conjunction with an International Affairs Fellowship from the Council on Foreign Relations. While at the Pentagon he supported Deputy Secretary of Defense Ash Carter in advancing the U.S.-India Defense Technology and Trade Initiative, and advised on a broad set of defense issues related to the department’s rebalance to the Asia-Pacific.
Dr. White has spent extensive time in Asia, and has written on a wide range of issues including defense policy, electoral politics, Islamic movements, and nuclear deterrence. He has held short-term visiting research fellowships at the Lahore University of Management Sciences, the International Islamic University in Islamabad, Pakistan’s National Defence University, and the Institute for Defence and Strategic Analyses in Delhi; testified before Congress; and served on U.S.-sponsored election observer delegations to both Pakistan and Bangladesh. He graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa from Williams College with a double major in history and mathematics, and received his PhD with distinction from Johns Hopkins SAIS.
- Joshua T. White, “After the Foundational Agreements: An Agenda for U.S.-India Defense and Security Cooperation,” Brookings Institution, January 2021.
- Joshua T. White, “China’s Indian Ocean Ambitions: Investment, Influence, and Military Advantage,” Global China Series, Brookings Institution, June 2020.
- Joshua T. White, “Navigating Two Asias: How Washington Deals with the Indo-Pacific’s Rising Powers,” India Review 18, no. 4 (2019): 407–436.
- Joshua T. White and Kyle Deming, “Dependent Trajectories: India’s MIRV Program and Deterrence Stability in South Asia,” in Deterrence Instability and Nuclear Weapons in South Asia, eds. Michael Krepon, Joshua T. White, Julia Thompson, and Shane Mason (Washington: Stimson Center, 2015).
- Joshua T. White, “A Cooperative Jihad? The Religious Logic of Hafiz Muhammad Saeed and the Limits of Pan-Sunni Cooperation in Pakistan,” in Pakistan’s Enduring Challenges, eds. C. Christine Fair and Sarah Watson (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015).
- Joshua T. White and Niloufer Siddiqui, “Syed Abul A’ala Maududi,” The Oxford Handbook of Islam and Politics, eds. John L. Esposito and Emad El-Din Shahin (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).
- Joshua T. White and Shuja Ali Malik, “Governance Reforms in Pakistan’s Tribal Areas: The Long Road to Nowhere?” U.S. Institute of Peace, PeaceBrief no. 135, October 15, 2012.
- Joshua T. White, “Beyond Moderation: Dynamics of Political Islam in Pakistan,” Contemporary South Asia 21, no. 2 (June 2012).
- Joshua T. White, “Vigilante Islamism in Pakistan: Religious Party Responses to the Lal Masjid Crisis,” Current Trends in Islamist Ideology 7 (Autumn 2008).
- Joshua T. White, “The Shape of Frontier Rule: Governance and Transition, from the Raj to the Modern Pakistani Frontier,” Asian Security 4, no. 3 (Autumn 2008).
Nowhere does the United States face greater long-term security and defense challenges than in Asia. This course, combining a thematic approach with weekly case studies, provides a rigorous examination of key security issues across the Indo-Pacific — from Pakistan to Japan — and their implications for U.S. interests and policy planning. Topics include the evolving Asian security order; defense challenges posed by the rise of China; trends in conventional military modernization; implications of the Sino-Indian rivalry on regional stability; emerging dynamics in Asian nuclear deterrence; and trends in security competition in the maritime, space and cyber domains. This course includes a practical focus on policy writing.
Click here to see evaluations, syllabi, and faculty bios
South Asia is home to two of the world’s largest militaries, the world’s leading arms importer, several major ethnic, religious, and nationalist insurgencies, an array of sophisticated terrorist groups, and two nuclear-armed powers that engage in frequent border skirmishes. This course takes a systematic and in-depth look at how states manage security challenges in this complex region. Topics include analysis of foreign policy decision-making processes and civil-military dynamics; the rise (and export) of Islamic extremism; comparative perspectives on counterinsurgency campaigns undertaken by India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka; India’s efforts at military modernization and preparations for China-related contingencies; and the ways in which evolving strategic capabilities and doctrines might affect the risk of nuclear escalation. This course includes a practical focus on policy writing.
Click here to see evaluations, syllabi, and faculty bios