Khatuna Salukvadze

Khatuna Salukvadze is a scholar and leading practitioner in diplomacy, international security, democratic governance, and institutional reform.

 

She has served as a Fellow and Senior Fellow at Harvard University's Advanced Leadership Initiative (ALI), where her work has focused on strengthening democratic governance and institutional resilience in an era of geopolitical uncertainty. She was also a Fellow at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, where her research focuses on exploring how institutional erosion reshapes democratic legitimacy, human rights, institutional resilience, and governance outcomes in geopolitically contested environments.

 

Prior to joining Harvard, Ambassador Salukvadze served in senior leadership positions in the Government of Georgia for more than two decades, including as Ambassador of Georgia to Lithuania. She played a central role in advancing Georgia's Euro-Atlantic integration, helping develop the U.S.–Georgia Strategic Partnership Charter and contributing to Georgia's national security and foreign policy concepts. Throughout her diplomatic career, she worked extensively on transatlantic relations, democracy, security policy, regional cooperation, and institutional reform.

 

She has taught and conducted research at Tbilisi State University and the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). Her academic and policy work bridges scholarship and practice, with a particular focus on democratic governance, institutional resilience, and international security.

 

Ambassador Salukvadze is a member of the UN Senior Women Talent Pipeline and was selected through the UN Secretary-General's Global Call for Leaders for senior leadership in United Nations peace operations. She serves on the Harvard Kennedy School Alumni Board and is Senior Editor for the Democracy, Law & Human Rights section of the Harvard Social Impact Review. She holds degrees from Harvard University, the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), and Tbilisi State University.

Fellowship Project: Democratic Legitimacy Under Pressure: Human Rights, Institutions, and Responsibility in Contemporary Democracies

 

This project examines how institutional erosion, shrinking civic space, and weakening rule-of-law institutions undermine democratic legitimacy and the protection of human rights in contemporary democracies. Using comparative case studies from Eurasia, with broader relevance to transatlantic democratic challenges, it explores how geopolitical pressures, foreign policy choices, and declining institutional accountability reshape democratic governance long before democratic breakdown becomes visible. Drawing on both comparative research and practitioner experience, the project develops a framework for understanding democratic resilience through the lens of human rights, institutional responsibility, and governance under pressure.