Lectures - Event View

Susan Thornton 
Retired senior U.S. diplomat with almost 30 years of experience with the U.S. State Department in Eurasia and East Asia. She is currently a senior fellow and research scholar at the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale University Law School; director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at the National Committee on American Foreign Policy; and a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Until July 2018, Thornton was acting assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of State and led East Asia policymaking amid crises with North Korea, escalating trade tensions with China, and a fast-changing international environment. 

Wednesday, January 15, 2025
1:00- 2:00pm

The New York City Bar Association
42 West 44th Street
New York City
Also available on Zoom

About the Topic
The world order is changing with China taking on a more obvious and aggressive role in world affairs. The old Cold War bifurcation between Russia and the U.S., between communism and democracy now seems to have fractured and grown to include China, North Korea and Iran versus the U.S., Western Europe and Japan with a number of other countries on both sides of the equation. There is no doubt that U.S. and China relations are tense with a continuing tariff war, disagreements over the future of Taiwan, a digital race, and jockeying for economic influence around the world to name just a few issues. That said, China is still one of the most important trading partners for the U.S. even as it is continuing to build its military arsenal. So, a new world order appears to be emerging but what will it look like? Will the U.S. China relationship be the fulcrum to the next world balance of power?

About the Speaker
A retired senior U.S. diplomat with almost 30 years of experience with the U.S. State Department in Eurasia and East Asia, Susan Thornton is currently a Senior Fellow and Research Scholar at the Paul Tsai China Center at Yale University Law School, and she is the Director of the Forum on Asia-Pacific Security at the National Committee on American Foreign Policy. Susan Thornton is also a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. Until July 2018, Thornton was acting assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the Department of State and led East Asia policymaking amid crises with North Korea, escalating trade tensions with China, and a fast-changing international environment. Susan Thornton received her B.A. from Bowdoin College, her M.A. from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in 1991 and her M.S. from the National Defense University in 2010.