Political scientist and international relations scholar Francis Fukuyama will be the 2026 College of William and Mary Commencement ceremony speaker.
Fukuyama is known for his 1992 book, “The End of History and the Last Man,” which discusses the Cold War, Soviet Union and Western liberal democracy. Fukuyama is a current fellow of the National Academy for Public Administration and a member of the American Political Science Association and of the Council on Foreign Relations. He serves as the Olivier Nomellini Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.
Fukuyama visited the College most recently in October 2025, where he discussed current political actors in modern bureaucratic delegation.
At the ceremony, Fukuyama will be awarded an honorary degree alongside Holocaust survivor and journalist Frank Shatz HON ’15. Shatz helped establish the College’s Reves Center for International Studies in 1989 with his wife Jaroslava Shatz and philanthropist Wendy Reves. Shatz was formerly sent to a Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust, but he escaped and fled to Budapest, Hungary, where he became a resistance fighter.
Shatz eventually became a journalist for the Virginia Gazette in the 1980s after he and his wife immigrated to the United States in 1958. He became an honorary alumnus of the College in 2015. On his 100th birthday, James City County created “Frank Shatz Day” to celebrate his life’s work and dedication.
Fukuyama and Shatz’s legacies fall in line with the College’s Year of Civic Leadership.
“We will celebrate the Class of 2026 with two thoughtful leaders who share William &
Mary’s dedication to our pluralistic democracy,” College President Katherine Rowe wrote. “Our nation’s alma mater looks forward to honoring them during this year dedicated to civic leadership.”
The Commencement ceremony is scheduled for 6 p.m. Friday, May 15 in Zable Stadium.
