Robert Kagan

Robert Kagan is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. His most recent book is "The Return of History and the End of Dreams" (Knopf 2008). His previous book, "Dangerous Nation: America’s Place in the World from its Earliest Days to the Dawn of the 20th Century," (Knopf 2006) was the winner of the 2008 Lepgold Prize and a 2007 Finalist for the Lionel Gelber Prize. His acclaimed book "Of Paradise and Power" (Knopf, 2003), was on the New York Times bestseller list for ten weeks and the Washington Post bestseller list for fourteen weeks. It was also a bestseller in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, and Canada and has been translated into more than 25 languages.

Dr. Kagan writes a monthly column on world affairs, especially on US policy toward China, for the Washington Post, and is a contributing editor at both the Weekly Standard and the New Republic. He is listed as one of the world’s “Top 100 Public Intellectuals” by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines. He served in the State Department from 1984 to 1988 as a member of the Policy Planning Staff, as principal speechwriter for Secretary of State George P. Shultz, and as deputy for policy in the Bureau of Inter-American Affairs. He is a graduate of Yale University and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and holds a Ph.D. in American History from American University.

He is also author of "A Twilight Struggle: American Power and Nicaragua, 1977-1990" (Free Press, 1996), and is co-editor with William Kristol of "Present Dangers: Crisis and Opportunity in American Foreign Policy" (Encounter Books, June 2000.) He was born in Athens, Greece, in 1958.