Biography of Ian Bremmer

His focus has been global emerging markets--Bremmer, those countries where political will matters at least as much to the market as economic fundamentals.  Bremmer's work to define the business of politics has accordingly focused on making political science relevant to global decision making.         

Ian Bremmer received his PhD in political science from Stanford University in 1994, specializing in nation- and state-building in the former Soviet Union. Bremmer went on to the faculty of the Hoover Institution where, at 25, he became the Institution's youngest ever National Fellow.  He has held research and faculty positions at Columbia University (where he presently teaches), the EastWest Institute, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and the World Policy Institute, where he has served as Senior Fellow since 1997.        

Bremmer's research focuses on states in transition, global political risk, and US foreign policy.  His five books include Nations and Politics in the Soviet Successor States (Cambridge University Press, 1993), which became the standard college text on the post-Soviet states, and the forthcoming The J Curve: A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall (Simon & Schuster, 2006).  Bremmer has also published over 200 articles and essays in The Harvard Business Review, The New Republic, Survival, The New Statesman, Fortune, The Los Angeles Times, The Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times.  He is a columnist for The International Herald Tribune and the webzine Slate, contributing editor at The National Interest, and a political commentator on CNN, FoxNews and CNBC.         

In 1998, with $25,000 in hand, Bremmer founded the research and consulting firm Eurasia Group.  Today, Eurasia Group is the preeminent global political risk consultancy, with 70 full-time employees in New York, London, and Washington; as well as 480 experts in 65 countries worldwide.  Widely respected for its objectivity, Eurasia Group has worked with government leaders (as well as opposition leaders) throughout the world.  AIG, Bear Stearns, Boeing, British Petroleum, CSFB, ExxonMobil, Fidelity, Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, News Corporation, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and Shell are among Eurasia Group's more than 200 multinational clients.         

In 2001, Bremmer authored Wall Street's first global political risk index, now the DESIX (Deutsche Bank Eurasia Group Stability Index)--a joint venture with investment bank Deutsche Bank.  The DESIX brings together Eurasia Group political scientists with Deutsche economists and strategists, and represents the first time political science methodology has ever been used on Wall Street to assess risk.        

Throughout his career, Dr. Bremmer has been firmly committed to a pro-engagement US foreign policy towards the developing world, assessing the relative weight of political and economic interests.  He has spent much of his time assisting those who share a commitment to these goals, and has advised world leaders including US Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Russian Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko, and Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe.