Former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is said to be taking a temporary position at Harvard University later this year. The report comes after it was revealed that Ardern would be stepping away from politics, joining Prince William’s Earthshot Prize.
Douglas Elmendorf, the Dean of Kennedy School at Harvard, made known Ardern would be taking on dual fellowships during her time at the prestigious university. She will apparently serve as the 2023 Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow and a Hauser Leader in the institution’s Center for Public Leadership, per the Toronto Sun.
Ardern will reportedly take up these posts at Harvard after she said she stepped out of politics because she just did not have “enough in the tank.” She has already accepted the position of trustee at Prince William’s Earthshot Prize, following her departure from politics. Though Ardern experienced political popularity when she initially took office in 2017, it quickly plunged in 2021, as New Zealand had to deal with the delta Covid-19 strain.
However, this has not stopped Elmendorf from saying that “Jacinda Ardern showed the world strong and emphatic political leadership,” adding that she would “bring important insights for our students and will generate vital conversations about the public policy choices facing leaders at all levels.”
Ardern has made known that she feels the Harvard opportunity will not only afford her the ability to share her experiences, but it will also allow her to learn from others, saying: “As leaders, there’s often very little time for reflection, but reflection is critical if we are to properly support the next generation of leaders.”
The Sun also reported that Ardern would be taking up the post as the first tech governance leadership fellow at the institution’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. The center reportedly played a pivotal role in New Zealand’s efforts to confront online extremism after a gunman killed 51 people at two mosques in Christchurch in 2019. To make matters more grim, the gunman had live-streamed the massacre for 17 minutes on Facebook before the video was eventually taken down.
It was only a couple months after the shooting that Ardern partnered with French President Emmanuel Macron to kick off the Christchurch Call, which was an initiative meant to mitigate violent extremism online. The effort was subsequently supported by 50 other countries around the world, including the US, Britain, South Korea, and Germany, per the report.
Jonathan Zittrain, co-founder of the Berkman Klein Center, noted that it was uncommon for the head of state to get involved in such a deeply complex issue as digital police, saying: “Jacinda Ardern’s hard-won expertise — including her ability to bring diverse people and institutions together — will be invaluable as we all search for workable solutions to some of the deepest online problems.”
Ardern has made known that she intends to return to New Zealand after the fellowships conclude.
