Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzeziński, known as Zbig, was a Polish-American diplomat and political scientist. He served as a counselor to Lyndon B. Johnson from 1966 to 1968 and was Jimmy Carter's National Security Advisor from 1977 to 1981. As a scholar, Brzezinski belonged to the realist school of international relations, standing in the geopolitical tradition of Halford Mackinder and Nicholas J. Spykman, while elements of liberal idealism have also been identified in his outlook. Brzezinski was the primary organizer of The Trilateral Commission.
The Bilderberg Meeting is an annual off-the-record forum established in 1954 to foster dialogue between Europe and North America. The group's agenda, originally to prevent another world war, is now defined as bolstering a consensus around free market Western capitalism and its interests around the globe. Participants include political leaders, experts, captains of industry, finance, academia, numbering between 120 and 150. Attendees are entitled to use information gained at meetings, but not attribute it to a named speaker. The group states that the purpose of this is to encourage candid debate while at the same time maintaining privacy, but critics from a wide range of viewpoints have called it into question, and it has provoked conspiracy theories from both the left and right.
The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an American think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international relations. Founded in 1921, it is an independent and nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. CFR is based in New York City, with an additional office in Washington, D.C. Its membership has included senior politicians, secretaries of state, CIA directors, bankers, lawyers, professors, corporate directors, CEOs, and prominent media figures.
Richard Charles Albert Holbrooke was an American diplomat and author. He was the only person to have held the position of Assistant Secretary of State for two different regions of the world.
Brent Scowcroft was a United States Air Force officer who was a two-time United States National Security Advisor, first under U.S. President Gerald Ford and then under George H. W. Bush. He served as Military Assistant to President Richard Nixon and as Deputy Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs in the Nixon and Ford administrations. He served as Chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005, and advised President Barack Obama on choosing his national security team.
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is an American think tank based in Washington, D.C. From its founding in 1962 until 1987, it was an affiliate of Georgetown University, initially named the Center for Strategic and International Studies of Georgetown University. The center conducts policy studies and strategic analyses of political, economic and security issues throughout the world, with a focus on issues concerning international relations, trade, technology, finance, energy and geostrategy.
Joseph Samuel Nye Jr. is an American political scientist. He and Robert Keohane co-founded the international relations theory of neoliberalism, which they developed in their 1977 book Power and Interdependence. Together with Keohane, he developed the concepts of asymmetrical and complex interdependence. They also explored transnational relations and world politics in an edited volume in the 1970s. More recently, he pioneered the theory of soft power. His notion of "smart power" became popular with the use of this phrase by members of the Clinton Administration and the Obama Administration.
David Rockefeller was an American economist and investment banker who served as chairman and chief executive of Chase Manhattan Corporation. He was the oldest living member of the third generation of the Rockefeller family, and family patriarch from 2004 until his death in 2017. Rockefeller was the fifth son and youngest child of John D. Rockefeller Jr. and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, and a grandson of John D. Rockefeller and Laura Spelman Rockefeller.
Winston Lord is a retired American diplomat. As Special Assistant to the National Security Advisor and then as Director of Policy Planning at the United States Department of State, Lord was a close adviser to Henry Kissinger and was instrumental in bringing about the renormalization of U.S.-China relations in the 1970s.
Robert Bruce Zoellick is an American public official and lawyer who was the 11th president of the World Bank Group, a position he held from July 1, 2007 to June 30, 2012. He was previously chairman of international advisors at Goldman Sachs from 2006 to 2007, United States Deputy Secretary of State from 2005 to 2006, and U.S. Trade Representative from 2001 to 2005. Prior to those posts, from 1985 to 2001 he served in a variety of capacities in the administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, and the presidential campaign of George W. Bush, in addition to positions in various think tanks and academia.
Graham Tillett Allison Jr. is an American political scientist and the Douglas Dillon Professor of Government at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He is known for his contributions in the late 1960s and early 1970s to the bureaucratic analysis of decision making, especially during times of crisis. His book Remaking Foreign Policy: The Organizational Connection, co-written with Peter L. Szanton, was published in 1976 and influenced the foreign policy of the Carter administration. Since the 1970s, Allison has also been a leading analyst of U.S. national security and defense policy, with a special interest in nuclear weapons and terrorism.
Kurt Michael Campbell is an American diplomat and businessman serving as the United States deputy secretary of state since 2024. He previously served as deputy assistant advisor to President Biden and National Security Council coordinator for the Indo-Pacific from 2021 to 2024. In this capacity, Campbell had been referred to as the Biden administration's "Asia coordinator" or "Asia czar"—chief architect of Joe Biden's Asia strategy.
Membership in the Council on Foreign Relations comes in two types: Individual and Corporate. Individual memberships are further subdivided into two types: Life Membership and Term Membership, the latter of which is for a single period of five years and is available to those between the ages of 30 and 36 at the time of their application. Only U.S. citizens and permanent residents who have applied for U.S. citizenship are eligible. A candidate for life membership must be nominated in writing by one Council member and seconded by a minimum of three others.
Henry David Owen was a diplomat, Brookings Institution Director (1969–78) and United States Ambassador at Large for Economic Summit Affairs from 1977 to 1981, on the National Security Council.
Robert David "Bob" Hormats is Vice Chairman of Kissinger Associates. Immediately prior he served as Under Secretary of State for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment from 2009 to 2013. Hormats was formerly Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs (International), which he joined in 1982. He served as Senior Deputy Assistant Secretary, from 1977 to 1979, and Assistant Secretary of State, from 1981 to 1982, at the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs. He was Ambassador and Deputy U.S. Trade Representative from 1979 to 1981. He served as a senior staff member for International Economic Affairs on the United States National Security Council from 1969 to 1977, where he was senior economic adviser to Henry Kissinger, General Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski. He helped to manage the Nixon administration's opening of diplomatic relations with China's communist government. He was a recipient of the French Legion of Honor in 1982 and the Arthur S. Flemming Award in 1974.
The 2013 Bilderberg Conference took place June 6–9, 2013, at The Grove hotel in Watford, Hertfordshire, England. It was the first Bilderberg Group conference to be held in the United Kingdom since the 1998 meeting in Turnberry, Scotland.
Jane Wales is an American non-profit executive and former US government official who has served on the boards of directors of and founded many institutions. She is a Vice President of the Aspen Institute, and was the CEO of the World Affairs Council of Northern California for 20 years before resigning in 2019. She was also the founder and CEO of the Global Philanthropy Forum, She helped found the African Philanthropy Forum and the Brazilian Philanthropy Forum, and was the initial Executive Director of the Elders. Moreover, she advises many philanthropists and is a member of the board of the Center for a New American Security. She serves as co-chair of the Generosity Commission. Her articles have appeared in The Guardian, the Stanford Social Science Review, Aspen Ideas Magazine and other publications. She is frequently interviewed on national security and economic development issues on television and public radio.
The 2015 Bilderberg Conference took place between 11 and 14 June 2015 at the Interalpen-Hotel Tyrol in Telfs-Buchen, Austria. The hotel had previously held the Bilderberg Conference in 1988.
Marta Dassù is an Italian politician who served as Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs in the government led by Mario Monti from 2011 to 2013 and as Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs in the government of Enrico Letta from 2013 to 2014. She serves as Senior Director of European Affairs at the Aspen Institute and Editor-in-Chief of Aspen Institute Italia's journal, Aspenia. She is a regular contributor to the Italian newspaper La Stampa.
