Eleanor (Freund) Atkins

Eleanor Atkins is a 2026-27 China and the World Program Fellow. Concurrently, she is a Stanton Nuclear Security Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations. She received her PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2025, with concentrations in security studies and international relations. Her research examines Chinese foreign policy, with a focus on the intersection of diplomatic statecraft and military power. Her dissertation, which she is developing into a book, analyzes variation in China's alliances and security partnerships.

Previously, Atkins was a predoctoral fellow in the International Security Program at the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, a Morgenthau Grand Strategy Fellow at the University of Notre Dame, a Peace Scholar Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, and a James C. Gaither Junior Fellow in the China Studies Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She also served as a research assistant at the Belfer Center. Atkins holds a BA in political science with highest honors from University of California, Berkeley and an MA in global affairs from Tsinghua University, where she was a Schwarzman Scholar.