- 16 Jul 2024
[Virtual Book Talk] Lost Decade: The US Pivot to Asia and the Rise of Chinese Power
This event is organised by MEI Political Economy Cluster in collaboration with S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS).
Lost Decade is an essential guide for understanding the historic shift to Asia-centric geopolitics and its implications for the United States’ present and future.
Across the political spectrum, there is wide agreement that Asia should stand at the center of U.S. foreign policy. But this worldview, first represented in the Barack Obama administration’s 2011 “Pivot to Asia,” marks a dramatic departure from the entire history of American grand strategy. More than a decade on, we now have the perspective to evaluate it in depth. In Lost Decade, Robert D. Blackwill and Richard Fontaine—two eminent figures in American foreign policy—take this long view. They conclude that while the Pivot’s strategic logic is strong, there are few successes to speak of, and that we need a far more coherent approach to the Indo-Pacific region. They examine the Pivot through various lenses: situating it historically in the context of U.S. global foreign policy, revealing the inside story of how it came about, assessing the effort thus far, identifying the ramifications in other regions (namely Europe and the Middle East), and proposing a path forward.
The authors stress that the United States has far less margin for foreign policy error today than a decade ago. As the international order becomes more unstable, Blackwill and Fontaine argue that it is imperative that policymakers fully understand what the Pivot to Asia aimed to achieve—and where it fell short—in order to muster the resources, alliances, and resolve to preserve an open order in Asia and the world. Crafting an effective policy for the region, they contend, is crucial for preserving American security, prosperity, and democratic values.
This virtual event will be conducted on Tuesday, 16 July 2024 from 9.00am to 10.30am (SGT) | Monday, 15 July 2024 9.00pm – 10.30pm (EST). The event is free, and open to all. However, registration is compulsory.
Book discount code: ASFLYQ6 for 30% off the book on Oxford University Press
Cover Image: Book Cover of Lost Decade: The US Pivot to Asia and the Rise of Chinese Power
About the Speakers
Henry A. Kissinger senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy
Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)
Robert D. Blackwill is the Henry A. Kissinger senior fellow for U.S. foreign policy at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). His current work focuses on U.S. foreign policy writ large as well as on China, Russia, the Middle East, South Asia, and geoeconomics. The Ambassador’s new book coauthored with Richard Fontaine, Lost Decade: The US Pivot to Asia and the Rise of Chinese Power, will be published by Oxford University Press in June 2024.
As deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security advisor for strategic planning under President George W. Bush, Blackwill was responsible for government-wide policy planning to help develop and coordinate the mid- and long-term direction of U.S. foreign policy. He also served as presidential envoy to Iraq. Blackwill went to the National Security Council (NSC) after serving as the U.S. ambassador to India from 2001 to 2003. He is the recipient of the 2007 Bridge-Builder Award for his role in transforming U.S.-India relations. In 2016 he became the first U.S. Ambassador to India since John Kenneth Galbraith to receive the Padma Bhushan Award from the government of India for distinguished service of a high order.
Prior to reentering government in 2001, Blackwill was the Belfer lecturer in international security at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government. During his fourteen years as a Harvard faculty member, he was associate dean of the Kennedy School, where he taught foreign and defense policy and public policy analysis. He was faculty chair for executive training programs for business and government leaders from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the Palestinian Authority, Israel, and Kazakhstan, as well as military general officers from Russia and the People’s Republic of China. From 1989 to 1990, he was special assistant to President George H.W. Bush for European and Soviet affairs, during which he was awarded the Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit by the Federal Republic of Germany for his contribution to German unification. Earlier in his career, he was the U.S. ambassador to conventional arms negotiations with the Warsaw Pact, director for European affairs at the NSC, principal deputy assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs, and principal deputy assistant secretary of state for European affairs.
Blackwill’s best-selling book, Lee Kuan Yew: The Grand Master’s Insights on China, the United States, and the World (MIT Press, February 2013), coauthored with Graham Allison of the Harvard Kennedy School, has sold over 300,000 copies. His most recent book, War by Other Means: Geoeconomics and Statecraft (Harvard University Press, April 2016), coauthored with Jennifer M. Harris, was named one of the best foreign policy books of 2016 by Foreign Affairs. His latest Council Special Reports are Implementing Grand Strategy Toward China: Twenty-Two U.S. Policy Prescriptions (January 2020), The End of World Order and American Foreign Policy (May 2020), coauthored with Thomas Wright of the Brookings Institution, and The United States, China, and Taiwan: A Strategy to Prevent War (February 2021), coauthored with Dr. Philip Zelikow of the University of Virginia. They also wrote a March 1, 2021 War on the Rocks article on Taiwan military contingencies titled “Can the United States Prevent a War Over Taiwan?,” which addresses reactions to the February 2021 CFR Special Report.
Blackwill is a member of CFR, the Aspen Strategy Group, the Trilateral Commission, and the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
Chief Executive Officer
Center for a New American Security (CNAS)
Richard Fontaine is the Chief Executive Officer of CNAS. He served as President of CNAS from 2012–19 and as Senior Fellow from 2009–12. Prior to CNAS, he was foreign policy advisor to Senator John McCain and worked at the State Department, the National Security Council (NSC), and on the staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Fontaine served as foreign policy advisor to the McCain 2008 presidential campaign and subsequently as the minority deputy staff director on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Prior to that, he served as Associate Director for Near Eastern Affairs at the NSC from 2003–04. He also worked on Southeast Asian issues in the NSC’s Asian Affairs directorate.
At the State Department, Fontaine worked for the deputy secretary and in the department’s South Asia bureau. Fontaine began his foreign policy career as a staff member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, focusing on the Middle East and South Asia. He also spent a year teaching English in Japan.
Fontaine currently serves as executive director of the Trilateral Commission and on the Defense Policy Board. He has been an adjunct professor in the security studies program at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.
A native of New Orleans, Fontaine graduated summa cum laude with a BA in international relations from Tulane University. He also holds an MA in international affairs from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, and he attended Oxford University. He lives in Virginia with his wife and their four children.
Chairman, Middle East Institute, NUS
Mr Bilahari Kausikan is the Chairman of the Middle East Institute, an autonomous institute of the National University of Singapore. Mr Kausikan was Permanent Secretary of Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 2010 to 2013, having served as Second Permanent Secretary since 2001. He was subsequently Ambassador-at-Large until May 2018. His earlier appointments at the Ministry include Deputy Secretary for South-east Asia, Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York, and Ambassador to the Russian Federation. He was educated at Raffles Institution, the University of Singapore and Columbia University in New York.
Executive Deputy Chairman, RSIS Director of Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies
Head of International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research
Ambassador Ong Keng Yong is Executive Deputy Chairman of the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He is concurrently Director of the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies (IDSS) and Head of International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) at RSIS. Mr Ong continues to hold the position of Ambassador-at-Large at the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He is also Singapore’s Non-Resident High Commissioner to Pakistan and Non-Resident Ambassador to Iran. Mr Ong was the Chairman of the Singapore International Foundation (SIF) from 2015 to 2023.
Mr Ong was High Commissioner of Singapore to Malaysia from July 2011 to October 2014. He served as Secretary-General of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), based in Jakarta, Indonesia, for five years from January 2003.
He was Singapore’s High Commissioner to India and concurrently Ambassador to Nepal from 1996 to 1998. From September 1998 to December 2002, he was Press Secretary to the then Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr Goh Chok Tong. From 2008 to 2011, he served as Director of the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) in the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore.
Event Details
Tuesday, 16 July 2024 from 9.00am to 10.30am (SGT)
Monday, 15 July 2024 9.00pm – 10.30pm (EST)
