Kahn was a physicist and military consultant known for envisioning nuclear war scenarios. The institute's research branched out from the military into various areas including economics, health, education, and gambling.[8] Kahn died in 1983 and the institute moved to Indianapolis the year after.[8][11] The institute helped design Wisconsin's influential workfare program in the mid-1990s.[8][12][13] Hudson relocated to Washington, D.C., in 2004.[14] It has been noted for work with governments and industries including defense and agribusiness.[15][16][17][18]
Kahn moved to Croton-on-Hudson, New York, intending to establish a new think tank that was less hierarchical and bureaucratic.[23] Along with Max Singer, a young government lawyer who had been Kahn's RAND colleague, and New York attorney Oscar Ruebhausen, Kahn founded the Hudson Institute on July 20, 1961.[24] Kahn has been described as Hudson's driving intellect while Singer developed the institute's organization.[25] Ruebhausen was an advisor to New York governor Nelson Rockefeller.[26]
Hudson's initial research projects largely represented Kahn's personal interests, which included the domestic and military use of nuclear power and scenario planning exercises about policy options and their possible outcomes.[27] The use of the word scenario in such exercises had been adapted from Hollywood storytelling as a more dignified word than "screenplay", and Kahn was an enthusiastic practitioner.[28][29] Kahn and his colleagues made pioneering contributions to nuclear deterrence theory and strategy during this period.[30][additional citation(s) needed]
Hudson's detailed analyses of "ladders of escalation"[31] and reports on the likely consequences of limited and unlimited nuclear exchanges, eventually published as Thinking About the Unthinkable in 1962[25] and On Escalation: Metaphors and Scenarios in 1965,[32] were influential within the Kennedy administration.[33] They helped the institute win its first major research contract from the Office of Civil Defense at the Pentagon.[34]
Meanwhile, in popular culture, Dr. Strangelove in 1964 borrowed many lines from Kahn's On Thermonuclear War,[20] and the methods of Kahn, Hudson and RAND also inspired the 1967 satirical book The Report From Iron Mountain, depicting a supposedly secret study on the dangers of peace.[35]
Kahn in 1962 predicted the rise of Japan as the world's second-largest economy and developed close ties to politicians and corporate leaders there.[43][9]
Hudson Institute used scenario-planning techniques to forecast long-term developments and was noted for its future studies.[citation needed] In 1967, Hudson published The Year 2000, a bestselling book commissioned by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[43] Many of the predictions proved correct, including technological developments like portable telephones and network-linked home and office computers.[44]
In 1970, The Emerging Japanese Superstate was published.[9] After the Club of Rome's 1972 report The Limits to Growth produced alarm about the possibility that population growth and resource depletion might result in a 21st-century global "collapse", Hudson responded with its own analysis, The Next 200 Years, which concluded instead that scientific and practical innovations were likely to significantly improve worldwide living standards.[42]
Hudson struggled with funding problems in the 1970s for reasons including increased competition from other think tanks for government grants.[45] It turned to grants from corporations such as IBM and Mobil.[46]
In his 1982 book The Coming Boom, Kahn argued that pro-growth tax and fiscal policies, information technology, and developments by the energy industry would make possible an unprecedented prosperity in the Western world by the early 21st century.[47][48] Kahn also foresaw unconventional extraction techniques like hydraulic fracturing.[42][46]
Shinzō Abe, Prime Minister of Japan, and Ken Weinstein At Hudson.Joni Ernst and Peter RoughPresident Tsai Accepts Hudson's Global Leadership Award, March 2023.Ukrainian Ambassador to the US Oksana Markarova gave a keynote address to mark the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion at Hudson Institute, February 2023.
In 1990, Daniels quit to become vice president of corporate affairs at Eli Lilly and Company.[63] He was succeeded as CEO by Leslie Lenkowsky, a social scientist,[64] and former consultant to Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan.[65]
Under Lenkowsky, Hudson emphasized domestic and social policy.[citation needed] During the early 1990s, the institute did work concerning education reform and applied research on charter schools and school choice.[66][67]
Also in 1990, Hudson Institute spun off a subsidiary non-profit organization that took the name the Discovery Institute.[68]
At the initiative of Wisconsin governor Tommy Thompson,[64] two members of Hudson were in the small planning group that designed the Wisconsin Works welfare-to-work program. Hudson also helped fund the planning and evaluated the results.[12][13][69] A version was adopted nationwide in the 1996 federal welfare-reform legislation signed by President Bill Clinton.[70] In 2001, President George W. Bush's initiative on charitable choice was based[71] on Hudson's research[72] into social-service programs administered by faith-based organizations.[73]
Other Hudson research from this period included 1987's "Workforce 2000",[74] the "Blue Ribbon Commission on Hungary" (1990)[75] "International Baltic Economic Commission" (1991–93), on market-oriented reforms in the newly independent states of Eastern Europe,[76] and the 1997 follow-up study "Workforce 2020".[74]
On March 30, 2023, President Tsai Ing-wen of Taiwan attended an event held by the Hudson Institute, where she accepted the institute's Global Leadership Award. In response to the award event, the Foreign Ministry of China imposed sanctions on the institute, its Board of Trustees Chair Sarah May Stern, and its President and CEO John P. Walters.[90]
European Commission PresidentUrsula von der Leyen chose the Hudson Institute to host a major address in October 2023 where she defended Israel's right to defend itself following Palestinian terror attacks.[91] In the speech, she voiced EU solidarity with Israel and drew parallels between acts of terror by Hamas and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.[91] The speech was coordinated with the White House as President Joe Biden urged Congress to approve additional aid to support Ukraine and Israel as key allies of the United States.[92]
The Institute provides several briefing services, such as the Keystone Defense Initiative, where Rebecca Heinrichs is the Senior Fellow and Director.[93][94]
As of 2021, the organization reported revenue of over $37m with under $20m in expenses and an endowment of $81m.[13]
Hudson Institute has accepted $7.9m from Donors Trust.[18] It has received $25,000 from Exxon Mobil since 1998 and less than $100,000 from Koch family foundations, both of which actively minimize climate change.[106]
The New York Times commented on Dennis Avery's attacks on organic farming: "The attack on organic food by a well-financed research organization suggests that, though organic food accounts for only 1 percent of food sales in the United States, the conventional food industry is worried".[107]
Another employee of the institute, Michael Fumento, was revealed to have received funding from Monsanto for his 1999 book Bio-Evolution. Monsanto's spokesman said: "It's our practice, that if we're dealing with an organization like this, that any funds we're giving should be unrestricted." Hudson's CEO and President Kenneth R. Weinstein told BusinessWeek that he was uncertain if the payment should have been disclosed. "That's a good question, period," he said.[17]
The New York Times suggested Huntington Ingalls Industries had used the Hudson Institute to enhance the company's argument for more nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, at a cost of US$11 billion each. The Times alleged that a former naval officer was paid by Hudson to publish an analysis endorsing more funding. The report was delivered to the House Armed Services subcommittee without disclosing that Huntington Ingalls had paid for part of the report. Hudson acknowledged the misconduct, describing it as a "mistake".[15]
The institute, which publishes frequent reports concerning China, has received funding from the Taiwanese government as have other prominent think tanks.[108]
Politics
Employees of Hudson Institute have made substantial political donations. During the 2022 election cycle, they donated $128,893 to federal campaigns the vast majority of which went to Republican candidates and PACs.[109] A major recipient was Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY).
The institute is generally described as conservative[8][9][77][87][10] and sometimes neoconservative.[110] Hudson says it hosts policymakers, foreign policy experts, and elected officials from across the political spectrum. According to its website, Hudson “challenges conventional thinking and helps manage strategic transitions through interdisciplinary studies in defense, international relations, economics, energy, technology, culture, and law.”[111]
Policy Centers
The Hudson Institute operates a number of policy centers focused on various issue areas. Many of them have prominent chairs and advisory board members.
Center for Peace and Security in the Middle East
Led by Michael Doran, the center studies challenges for America and its allies in the middle east in responding to the threats posed by inimical forces such as the Islamic Republic of Iran, Russia, and China to promote peace.[112][113]
China Center
The China Center at the Hudson Institute studies China with the "central goal of engendering America’s value-based, non-partisan, sound and effective responses to the China challenge."[114] The center was launched in May 2022.[115] It is directed by Miles Yu while Michael Pompeo serves as chair of the advisory board, which consists of Scott Morrison, Paula J. Dobriansky, Morgan Ortagus, and Kyle Bass as of August 2023.[116][117]
Center on Europe and Eurasia
The Center on Europe and Eurasia, led by Peter Rough, is focused on "checking Russia’s military aggression in Ukraine, countering China’s subversion of the continent, extricating Europe from strategic vulnerabilities, forging key links in Central Asia, and modernizing our transatlantic military posture and economic ties".[118][119] The center was launched in 2022.[120]
Japan Chair
The Japan Chair at the Hudson Institute is led by Kenneth R. Weinstein, a fellow at the Institute and its former CEO.[121] It is focused on strengthening the U.S.-Japan alliance. The Chair was founded in Spring 2009 under the leadership of General H.R. McMaster who now serves as chair of its advisory board.[122][123]
Hamilton Commission on Securing America’s National Security Innovation Base
The Hudson Institute houses this bipartisan commission which explores economic sectors critical to national security with the purpose of proposing policy recommendations to reduce dependence and advance U.S. leadership in these industries.
In 2016, Hudson's Kleptocracy Initiative issued a report, authored by Ben Judah, sounding the alarm about offshore financial flows, and calling for the end of anonymous shell companies as a US national security priority.[125][third-party source needed] The Hudson Institute received criticism by a member of its Kleptocracy Initiative advisory board when its 2018 awards gala was funded in part by Len Blavatnik, a magnate who had business dealings with Russian oligarchs who were on the United States sanctions list.[97]
^ abConant, James K. (2006). Wisconsin Politics and Government: America's Laboratory of Democracy. University of Nebraska Press. p. 229. ISBN9780803215481.
^ abcCabezas, Amalia L.; Reese, Ellen; Waller, Marguerite (2015). Wages of Empire: Neoliberal Policies, Repression, and Women's Poverty. United Kingdom: Taylor & Francis. ISBN9781317249474.
^Sayers, Nicola (2010). A Guide to Scenario Planning in Higher Education. London: Leadership Foundation for Higher Education. p. 3. ISBN978-1906627171.
^Duval, Steven J. (January 29, 2014). "James Lee Byars and the Hudson Institute". ARC (Arts Research Collaboration at the Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas). Retrieved February 25, 2019.
^Frohnen, Bruce; Nelson, Jeffrey O.; Beer, Jeremy (2014). American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia. United States: Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ORD). ISBN9781497651579.
White, Andrew. "New York in the 1960s". The American Prospect, October 22, 2001: 40. [Book rev. of The Ungovernable City: John Lindsay and His Struggle to Save New York, by Vincent J. Cannato (New York: Basic Books, 2001).]
