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BOOKSHELF

National Security and Personal Politics

David J. Rothkopf ’77

Ask your average American who belongs to the National Security Council, and you might get a shrug or a vague response about the President and his advisers. Ask David J. Rothkopf ’77 about the NSC, and the answer is about 500 pages. His new book, Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power (PublicAffairs, $29.95), is an in-depth study of the secretive White House group.

Though the NSC comprises men and women who wield an enormous amount of power over national security, it is not widely understood who makes up the council and how it operates. Rothkopf attempts to change that by exposing the behind-the-scenes machinations of the NSC through research and more than 130 insider interviews with such policy makers as Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, Henry Kissinger, Madeleine Albright ’68 SIPA, ’68 GSAS, ’76 GSAS and senior Bush administration officials.

Officially consisting of the President, the Vice President, the secretaries of state and defense and other cabinet secretaries designated by the President, the NSC’s extended staff includes the President’s inner circle of foreign policy advisers assisted by as many as 200 staff members.

“It was time for a book to enter the world of the President and the group around him who make international decisions for the United States — a group of people who are arguably the most powerful committee in the history of the world — and reveal it in terms that were useful to the average American,” Rothkopf says.

“Since September 11, the U.S. has embarked on a massive reinvention of its national security community and the principles and objectives underlying it,” Rothkopf adds. “History provides useful insights to help assess the challenges we face today and also reminds us of the enormous importance of the things that often are overlooked in purely academic treatises, such as personality and interpersonal relationships or the self-interests of the players, things that often outstrip policy and process in terms of impacting outcomes.”

Running the World by David J. Rothkopf ’77

Rothkopf was well-prepared to pen the hefty NSC analysis, having served as deputy undersecretary of commerce in the Clinton administration. Knowing many key government players from the past 25 years allowed him to complete the book in just a year. Rothkopf’s connections smoothed the way for interviews on sensitive topics, as he already knew many of the interviewees, making them feel more comfortable and willing to speak candidly.

Running the World covers the period from the inception of the NSC in 1947 to the present, providing historical analysis and anecdotes about the council’s shifting form through the decades. Offering details on the council’s inner workings as well as the people on it and their relationships, Rothkopf traces the group’s evolution and offers insights into what must change if America is to continue as a world leader in the decades ahead.

In a way, Rothkopf has been preparing to write the book since his time at the College. An English major, he took a considerable number of economics, history and anthropology courses. He credits demanding professors with pushing him to excel, and names two former deans as great influences: “Peter Pouncey, who was the witty, urbane and brilliant dean of the College when I entered, and his associate dean, Michael Rosenthal, who still is there as a professor of English,” Rothkopf says without hesitation. “I worked closely [with them] on a wide range of student activities, and they became wise guides to Columbia and, as it turned out, the world beyond.”

After college, Rothkopf began a career focused on international economic and security issues, becoming at age 31 co-founder, chairman and chief executive of International Media Partners, publishers of CEO Magazine and Emerging Markets newspapers. He joined the Clinton administration in 1993 as deputy undersecretary of commerce for international trade policy development and rose to acting undersecretary for international trade before leaving government service to become managing director of Kissinger Associates. He subsequently co-founded Intellibridge Corp., a provider of open-source intelligence and analysis for government and business clients.

Following the sale of Intellibridge earlier this year, Rothkopf became president and CEO of Garten Rothkopf, a firm he helped establish that advises investors and corporate leaders in selected emerging markets. He also is a visiting scholar at and chairman of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and has been an adjunct professor of international affairs at SIPA for six of the past seven years. A well-known commentator and writer for leading newspapers and magazines, Rothkopf has written, co-authored or edited five other books on international and information age themes. His next book, The Super-class: The Global Power Elite and the World They are Making, is due in early 2007.

While balancing work and writing, Rothkopf also makes time for his wife and two daughters, with whom he resides in Bethesda, Md. Rothkopf is part of a long line of Columbians: “I attended the College and have taught there, my father had a chaired professorship at TC, my mother attended graduate school at Columbia, my grandfather went to the College and P&S and taught at the medical school, my great-grandfather went to the College, and my wife attended Barnard. I am proud of this, and hope that my two daughters follow suit.

“The Core Curriculum was, of itself, worth the price of admission,” Rothkopf adds. “It has been a boon to me throughout every aspect of my life, be it as a writer, a government official, a businessman or a father.”

Laura Butchy ’04 SOA

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