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Karl Schonberg
Assistant Professor of Government

Karl Schonberg has been a member of the faculty since 1999. He earned his B.A. from Colgate University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Virginia. Schonberg specializes in United States foreign and national policy, and in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, has spoken on civil liberties on several campus- wide panels. He was named Outstanding Faculty Member of the Year for 2001-2002 by the St. Lawrence Greek societies, and has been as the faculty advisor for the St. Lawrence unit of the national political science undergraduate honorary society, Pi Sigma Alpha.

He is the author of the 2003 book Pursuing the National Interest: Moments of Transition in 20th Century American Foreign Policy , and of an article on war powers after 9/11 appearing in the Winter 2003/04 issue of Political Science Quarterly, entitled "Global Security and Legal Restraint."

“In the wake of September 11 it's been very interesting studying politics and the world,” he says. “I love the fact that we can have one-on-one interaction with students and have great discussions of current issues in our small classes. I taught a class on International Security that I decided to offer because I felt it was necessary – it's been an interesting time for the U.S., and challenging for political scientists who have had to adapt to the current world situation. Many students are taking these ‘current issues' classes for no other reason than wanting to understand what is going on.

“St. Lawrence is very generous with travel money,” Schonberg continues. “I went to Hong Kong for the International Studies Conference during 2001 and went to Iran during May 2003 for the Workshop on Political Science and the Dialogue Among Civilizations. I also headed to a conference in Thailand on Religion and Globalization, which was funded by a grant from the Freeman Foundation – because of this grant I've started doing research on human rights in East Asia .”