Ukraine Virtual Forum

Examining the ongoing situation between 

Russia  and Ukraine

PANELISTS:

Erik Herron (Ph.D. Michigan State, 2000) is the Eberly Family Distinguished Professor of Political Science at West Virginia University. Herron has conducted research across Eastern Europe and Eurasia, including a term as a Fulbright scholar in Ukraine and fifteen election observation missions. He has published research about political institutions, governance, and elections in many academic journals, and four books. His most recent book, Normalizing Corruption: Failures of Accountability in Ukraine, was published in 2020.

Ralph S. Clem (Ph.D., Columbia University, 1976) is Professor Emeritus of Geography and formerly director of the Center for Transnational and Comparative Studies (1999-2005) at Florida International University in Miami where he was a faculty member from 1974-2009. Clem is currently a senior fellow in the Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs at FIU and a research affiliate at the Russian, East European, and Eurasian Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His primary research interest is on the study of the geopolitics of Russia and Eastern Europe, with a focus on military and national security issues. He retired from the Air Force after 35 years of active and Reserve service with the rank of Major General, having served in a fighter squadron and at the National Security Agency, the Air Intelligence Agency, and in the Pentagon on the Air Staff.

Khrystyna Pelchar was born and raised in Ukraine. In 2020, she graduated from law school at the Ivan Franko National University of Lviv. In 2021, she came to Morgantown to complete the Transatlantic Dual Master's Degree Program in International History and Security Studies between Collegium Civitas (Poland, Warsaw) and the Department of History at West Virginia University. Pelchar is a Ph.D. student in political science at WVU. 

MODERATOR:

Lisa Di Bartolomeo (Ph.D., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2001) is a Teaching Professor in the Department of World Languages Literatures, and Linguistics at WVU. Di Bartolomeo coordinates the Russian studies program as well as the Slavic and East European studies program.