June 12, 2023 — Today, University of Florida President Dr. Ben Sasse announced that Dr. William Inboden will join UF as the director of the Hamilton Center. A nationally renowned historian, Inboden is executive director and William Powers, Jr. Chair at the Clements Center, and a professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, both at the University of Texas-Austin.
“Dr. Inboden is an outstanding scholar and teacher. We are thrilled to welcome him to Gainesville,” Sasse said. “The Hamilton Center is an important part of UF’s interdisciplinary commitment to rigorous scholarship, to excellent teaching, and to intellectual diversity. The Hamilton Center is uniquely positioned with Dr. Inboden at the helm. We want to thank Dr. John Stinneford, the founding director of the Hamilton Center, for his tireless work. I’m grateful for all his contributions to the University and thrilled that he will continue as a Senior Fellow at Hamilton when he returns to teaching.”
As the founding director of the Clements Center over the past 10 years, Inboden has built it into one of the nation’s premier multi-disciplinary academic centers on history, strategy, and statecraft. This has included sponsoring programs and classes for hundreds of undergraduate, masters, and doctoral students each year; recruiting a world-class cohort of scholars and practitioners; and raising over $70 million from public and private sources.
“I am overjoyed to lead the Hamilton Center,” said Inboden. “I am profoundly grateful for the excellent foundation built by inaugural director John Stinneford and am honored to lead the Hamilton Center’s next phase of growth into a college within the University of Florida. The mission of the Hamilton Center — of research and teaching on the knowledge, skills, and values that undergird a free society – could not be more vital in our present moment. It is my goal for the Hamilton Center to become a helpful resource for all Gator students and faculty, and a valued addition to one of the most diverse and dynamic universities in the nation.”
Inboden’s research expertise includes the American presidency, the Cold War, grand strategy, history and statecraft, and religion and international affairs. He has published or edited numerous books, book chapters, journal articles, essays, and op-eds. His most recent book is The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, the Cold War, and the World on the Brink (Dutton 2022).
At the University of Texas-Austin, Inboden has received multiple teaching awards including recognition as a “Texas 10” by the Texas Exes Alumni Association, selection as “Lecturer of the Year” at the LBJ School, and his classes Presidential Decision-making in National Security and Ethics and International Affairs have been voted as “Best Class in the LBJ School” and “Class Most Likely to Challenge Your Assumptions.” He has also chaired or served on 28 Ph.D. dissertation committees and has overseen an additional 33 pre- and postdoctoral fellows.
He is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and his commentary has appeared in numerous outlets including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Politico, The Hill, National Review, World, Weekly Standard, NPR, CNN, and BBC. Before academia, he served in several policy positions, including the National Security Council staff at the White House, the State Department, and as a staff member in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives.
Inboden received his Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in history from Yale University, and his B.A. in history with honors from Stanford University.
After an extraordinarily successful year as the inaugural director of the Hamilton Center for Classical and Civic Education, John Stinneford has asked to transition back to the faculty of the Levin College of Law while retaining a role as senior fellow of the Hamilton Center.
“I have loved my time helping get the Hamilton Center off the ground,” Stinneford said, “but as a professor my first loves are teaching and research. I look forward to returning to them full-time.”
Under Stinneford’s leadership, the Hamilton Center has established itself as an academic unit at UF; hired 9 tenured or tenure-track faculty and an additional 10 lecturers, visiting faculty, and postdoctoral fellows; developed six undergraduate courses; established the “Hamilton Fellows” program, in which undergraduate fellows read great books with Hamilton Center faculty and then travel to England for seminars with Oxford faculty; and instituted a program of public lectures, debates, and symposia designed to model the value of civil discourse.
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