A Conversation with Carnegie Ethics Fellow Harsh Suri

Was there a moment that made you interested in ethics in your professional or personal life?

This moment goes way back to when I was just eight years old. In 2008, there was an attack in Mumbai, India, by the Pakistan-based terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba, which took more than 150 lives. It was a very shocking incident for an eight-year-old to see live on television. I saw the commandos going down to secure the building and everything. It was a very big incident here in India and it changed our outlook in terms of foreign policy, counterintelligence, and other things. This is the cornerstone point that made me very much interested in international affairs and the basic structure of ethics around it.

Professionally, there was a moment in 2022, one year after I started Geostrata. We were a young think tank contributing to the Indian way of world affairs, which we particularly think lacks a youth viewpoint. That year, a major incident happened with us where we had to basically balance between agreeing to our partner's demands or being independent. For a bootstrapped youth organization, this came as a very difficult question, but we eventually decided that even if we let go of the funding that we had, which was so important for us, we should not let go of the morality and ethics in which we started. So we took that as the cornerstone or the Northern Light for us going forward.

When I look back at that decision today, I think we did good because it opened more doors for us. Eventually, the partner also understood where we were coming from. Being a CEO of a youth organization, often you face these big companies and partners who try to mold you in certain directions. And if you do it once, it won't stop you from doing it many times. Keeping that spine up in the start matters a lot. This also made our backer understand that these are our values and that is what defines us and makes us different.

How did you find out about the Carnegie Ethics Fellowship and why did you think that it would be a good fit for you?

One day, I was searching for some articles on ethics, and I found Carnegie Council. In this era, where ethics is always taking a backseat, I thought here is an organization that can envision and empower ethics. Looking through Geostrata's eyes, Carnegie Council is a very established, important institution which is doing real-world work. We strive to have such a level of impact. So I connected with Kevin Maloney, then the director of communications, to learn from the experiences of what the Council has done over the years and try to contribute in whatever way and multiply the effect back home.

Eventually, Kevin introduced me to the Carnegie Ethics Fellowship when he saw some of the ethical dilemmas that I am facing here as a young executive. In looking at the profiles of the Fellows from the first cohort I saw that they are from diverse places and have diverse viewpoints. Being around this helps you to build your own cheat sheet or toolkit to deal with ethical issues over time.

Among our current Fellows right now, they all have different challenges in their day-to-day lives. In terms of international relations and ethics problems that we are facing right now, I've heard some of the greatest explanations and solutions from various people around my cohort. That makes me feel that this particular Fellowship is not just about gathering together once and talking about these ethical issues, but it’s about really doing something about it.

You're a co-founder of The Geostrata, which you started at a young age. What was your inspiration for starting it? And what are the ethical values that you work towards at the organization?

The journey began in 2021 with my other co-founder, Pratyaksh Kumar. We were sitting in our houses because of COVID. We had just been in college for one year and we were trying to gain all these experiences. We were feeling like our college years were being spent in vain. We already had in our mind that we need to start something of our own on the lines of international affairs and geopolitical analysis, but we realized that we needed to make sure that the voice of the youth is put forward. If the pandemic hadn’t been happening I don’t think we would have grown at such speed. Being a youth-run organization, you already have less resources, so getting together in person is difficult. But because the world adapted itself to being on a screen, it made it a lot easier.

As far as our values, we are trying to create an impact for the youth here in India. Me being here as a Carnegie Ethics Fellow, I take my learnings back from each module and I try to make people understand that there is a different world outside and everyone has a different opinion. We need to make sure that the young voices are heard. That is key to our infrastructure and architecture.

One of the most important things that we stand for is the ethic of humanitarianism. We make sure that we support not just India, but other Global South countries in research in humanitarian aid and disaster relief assistance.

Another important issue for us is climate change, because if we do not stand for climate action as an organization, that becomes very problematic on our end. The youth are going to be at the forefront of the climate onslaught.

Finally, a value which I would also say is a mix of all these that is important to us, is standing for internationalism. While some countries are now moving away from this, we believe that this has created value for us here in India. If today the Indian youth is able to talk to people around the world with confidence, it is because the world is interconnected. These ethical value chains are very important for us.

Coming from the country of Mahatma Gandhi, the organization's main ethical message always is that the means should be ethical to achieve the ends. Your ends cannot alone be ethical. Regardless of what’s happening in the world, we need to make sure that someone stands for this. If we all give up on that—and especially if the youth gives up on it—then we have a doomsday scenario.

You organized the second NATO-India Youth Conference on March 8. What were the goals of the conference and what were some of the highlights?

NATO is an important player in Europe and is increasingly becoming a key player in the Indo-Pacific. You can see that in the conflict right now in Iran. For the first time, Turkey used NATO's missile defense system against Iran. This means that the theaters of the Indo-Pacific, Middle East, and Europe are strategically intertwined, which is a big development. Last year we realized that NATO needs to understand India better, and India needs to understand NATO better, and who better than the youth to do this? Right now, India and NATO have no formal settings of partnership, of agreements, of collaborations, but if we make sure that young leaders, young minds come together, we can build up understanding among each other.

So we were able to gather people, experts, leaders, members of parliaments from different countries, ambassadors. Our goal is to bring together understanding between democracies. We need to combine the learnings of democracies in order to build a better world. Autocracies already are collaborating so if democracies don't, we are going to be back on the back foot. That's what the NATO-India Youth Conference is about.

What have you learned about ethics and leadership in the Fellowship that you've brought back to your professional life?

The most important thing that I have taken from the Fellowship is a better understanding of international cooperation and humanitarianism. As someone who's coming from India and with most of the other Fellows based in New York and Washington, DC, you get to understand the American value system in a front-row basis. Like it or not, the global international system is dominated by the American viewpoint or what the U.S. does and it’s been very important for me to understand how ethically America faces this.

I realized that while there might be people in power speaking about different views and ideas, many Americans still stand for the ideals of international cooperation and humanitarianism—this is not something in silos, this is a majority. Those ethical values are something that I bring back with me, and I make sure that I let everyone here know that there is still light, because you need to understand that America is not just one person.

This is also one of the most inclusive Fellowships that I have seen. I have never felt like an outsider. That is something that is very important for someone coming from the Global South—you need to feel included wherever you are. Because of your economic background and the experiences that you’ve had, it is already very difficult for you to go into certain areas, not because of those areas being difficult, but because of your experiences, the baggage that you bring with you. So I think whoever applies for this Fellowship, if they ever have a question about how they’d be accepted, they should rest easy. Some of the greatest and nicest people that I've met, I’ve found in this Fellowship.

Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs is an independent and nonpartisan nonprofit. The views expressed within this article are those of the Fellow and do not necessarily reflect the position of Carnegie Council.