Drawing on their decades of government service-in the corridors of Capitol Hill, the intimate confines of the White House, the State Department, and the bare-knuckles Pentagon bureaucracy-Campbell and Steinberg identify the major foreign policy pitfalls that face a new presidential administration. They explain clearly and concisely what it takes to get foreign policy right from the start.
Kurt M. Campbell is CEO and cofounder of the Center for a New American Security. He served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for Asia and the Pacific in the Clinton administration. Before that, he taught at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government and served in the Navy. His books include Climatic Cataclysm: The Foreign Policy and National Security Implications of Climate Change (Brookings, 2008) and Hard Power:The New Politics of National Security, written with Michael O'Hanlon (Basic Books, 2006). James B. Steinberg is dean of the LBJ School of Government at the University of Texas-Austin. A former director of Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, he was deputy national security adviser to President Clinton from 1996 to 2000. He previously served as director of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff and as deputy assistant secretary of state, with responsibility for the Bureau of Intelligence and Research. His books include Protecting the Homeland 2006/2007, written with Michael d'Arcy, Michael O'Hanlon, Peter Orszag, and Jeremy Shapiro (Brookings, 2006).
" Difficult Transitions is unquestionably a book that members of the Obama administration should read and reread." -Ernest R. May, The National Interest |"A thoughtful book on presidential transitions and foreign-policy challenges, anchored in the lessons of history." -Will Inboden, The New ForeignPolicy.com |"Sensible prescriptions for stopgap measures to overcome the time-specific vulnerabilities between Election Day and Jan. 20 can be found in [this] engrossing new book... If you are a history or government junkie, you will want to read it. It is clear to me that Obama and his inner circle have, and with great attention." -Jim Hoagland, Washington Post |"Their advice is based on personal observations and a thorough effort to mine White House memoirs for insights about transition issues. The book ends with a detailed, useful bibliographical essay that reviews the limited literature on foreign policy in presidential transitions. This is a book that is likely to be consulted at regular four- or eight-year intervals. Recommended." - CHOICE |"[a] comprehensive and useful guide" -Walter Russell Mead, Foreign Affairs
