The panel seeks to answer this question in part by reflecting on America’s role in protecting and promoting open societies, democracy and human rights in the period since September 11.
In the intervening 20 years, there have been multiple challenges to America’s moral authority, both in its international engagements and its domestic policy, from Guantanamo Bay and extraordinary rendition, to Charlottesville.
Today, the humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan calls into question once again the limits of America’s role in protecting democracy and human rights. The Biden administration plans to lead an Alliance of Democracies and has adopted a strategic frame for its foreign policy which emphasizes the competition between democracies and autocracies.
Participants
Chair: Dr Leslie Vinjamuri, Director, US and the Americas Programme, Chatham House
Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, President, Open Society Foundations; UN Deputy Secretary General, 2006
Suzanne Nossel, CEO, PEN America; US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations, 2009-11
Professor Charles Kupchan, Professor of International Affairs, Georgetown University; Senior Director for European Affairs, US National Security Council (2014-17)