Gildenhorn Book Series discussion with Kurt Campbell on “The Pivot”
The Alma and Joseph Gildenhorn Book Series featured Kurt Campbell, Chairman and CEO of The Asia Group, LLC and former Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, discussing his latest book The Pivot: The Future of American Statecraft in Asia (Twelve). The discussion was moderated by David Sanger, Chief Washington Correspondent at The New York Times.
Watch the discussion:
About The Pivot:
From former Assistant Secretary of State Kurt M. Campbell comes the definitive analysis and explanation of the new major shift in American foreign policy, its interests and assets, to Asia.
There is a quiet drama playing out in American foreign policy far from the dark contours of upheaval in the Middle East and South Asia and the hovering drone attacks of the war on terror. The United States is in the midst of a substantial and long-term national project, which is proceeding in fits and starts, to reorient its foreign policy to the East. The central tenet of this policy shift, aka the Pivot, is that the United States will need to do more with and in the Asia-Pacific hemisphere to help revitalize its own economy, to realize the full potential of the region’s dramatic innovation, and to keep the peace in the world’s most dynamic region where the lion’s share of the history of the twenty-first century will be written. This book is about a necessary course correction for American diplomacy, commercial engagement, and military innovation during a time of unrelenting and largely unrewarding conflict. While the United States has intensified its focus on the Asia-Pacific arena relative to previous administrations, much more remains to be done. The Pivot is about that future. It explores how the United States should construct a strategy that will position it to maneuver across the East and offers a clarion call for cunning, dexterity, and ingenuity in the period ahead for American statecraft in the Asia-Pacific region.
About the Author:
Kurt M. Campbell is chairman and CEO of the Asia Group, LLC, and served as the assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of State from 2009 to 2013. For his service, he received the Secretary of State’s Distinguished Service Award-the nation’s highest diplomatic medal-and has been recognized with top national honors across Asia. He is chairman of the board at the Center for a New American Security, a non-resident fellow at Harvard’s Belfer Center, on the board for Standard Chartered PLC, and is a member of the Aspen Strategy Group. Dr. Campbell is the author or editor of 10 books, including Difficult Transitions: Why Presidents Fail in Foreign Policy at the Outset of Power and Hard Power: The New Politics of National Security. He is married to Dr. Lael Brainard, governor on the US Federal Reserve Board and former under secretary of Treasury for International Affairs. Together, they live in Washington, DC with their three daughters.