Lectures on Tap - The Madman Theory: From Nixon to Trump

📍 Location: Exact address given in confirmation email

🧠 Lecture: "The Madman Theory: From Nixon to Trump"

🎤 Speaker: Dr James D. Boys

What happens when a president convinces the world he might just do the unthinkable? In this provocative talk, Dr James D. Boys explores how U.S. presidents Richard Nixon and Donald Trump weaponized unpredictability to keep allies guessing and adversaries on edge.

Drawing from his forthcoming book, US Grand Strategy and the Madman Theory, Dr Boys will examine how calculated irrationality can coerce opponents—while pushing global stability to the brink. From secret Cold War gambits to tweet-driven diplomacy, he’ll ask: where does strategy end and madness begin?

In an age when perception can dictate power, this lecture reveals how calculated chaos reshapes diplomacy, destabilizes norms, and forces nations to question whether the next move is genius or catastrophe.

Dr James D. Boys is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre on US Politics (CUSP) at University College London, the author of three books including Hillary Rising, and a frequent political analyst on CNN, the BBC, Bloomberg, and GB News.

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Agenda

6:30 PM – Doors open: find a seat (open seating!), order food & drinks, and expect a bar line—arriving early is key.

6:55 PM – Host introduction

7:00 PM – Lecture begins

7:45 PM – Audience Q&A

8:00 PM – Have 1:1 time with the speaker, mingle with fellow guests, and order another round

8:30 PM – Wrap up.

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