For three years, the Coming Home project has offered military veterans the opportunity to explore the moral, psychological, and spiritual impacts of war on the warrior as she or he returns home. Coming Home is a partnership between the Institute and the U.S. Naval Academy's Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership with support from Arizona State University and New America.
On December 10, 2019, the Institute co-sponsored a a half-day Coming Home conference hosted at New America. The event brought together academics, military leaders, veterans, journalists and clinicians engaged with moral injury and the impact of the lived experience of war.
Event Program
Welcome
Dr. Jesse Kirkpatrick, Research Assistant Professor, George Mason University, Assistant Director, Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy and Fellow, New America International Security Program Dr. Daniel Rothenberg, Co-Director, Center on the Future of War, Professor of Practice, School of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University and Senior Fellow, New America
Panel I - Moral Injury and Torture
Dr. David Luban, moderator, University Professor and Professor of Law and Philosophy, Georgetown University and Distinguished Chair in Ethics, Stockdale Center for Ethical Leadership, U.S. Naval Academy
Lt. Col. Bill Edmonds, author of God Is Not Here: A Soldier’s Struggle with Torture, Trauma, and the Moral Injuries of War, and former Special Forces officer with combat deployments in Iraq
Maj. (ret.) Ian Fishback, former Special Forces officer named by TIME magazine as one of the 100 most influential people in the world after sending Sen. John McCain a letter on prisoner abuse in Iraq and currently a PhD candidate in Philosophy at the University of Michigan
Dr. Kate McGraw, Deputy Division Chief, Psychological Health Center of Excellence, Defense Health Agency
Keynote - Moral Injury: When Two Worlds Collide
David Wood, writer-at-large, Texas Monthly, winner of a Pulitzer Prize for his work on moral injury and a former ASU Future of War Fellow at New America
Introduced by Candace Rondeaux, Professor of Practice, School of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University, Senior Fellow, New America International Security Program and former Afghanistan/Pakistan bureau chief for The Washington Post
Panel II - Moral Injury and Combat: Personal, Policy and Philosophical Reflections
Dr. C. Anthony Pfaff, moderator, Research Professor for the Military Profession and Ethics, Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army War College Caroline Johnson, author of Jet Girl: My life in peace, war, and the cockpit of the Navy's most lethal aircraft, the F/A-18 Super Hornet Lt. Col. Michael Manning, National Security Fellow, Fletcher School, Tufts University, preparing a report on moral injury among U.S. special operations forces Dr. Nancy Sherman, University Professor and Professor of Philosophy, Georgetown University, author of Afterwar: Healing the Moral Wounds of Our Soldiers Drew Trojanowski, Office of Veteran and Military Engagement, Arizona State University, former Special Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, The White House