Daniel S. Hamilton

Daniel S. Hamilton is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Center on the United States and Europe, president of the Transatlantic Leadership Network, and senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute of Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where he served as the Richard von Weizsäcker Professor (2003-12), the Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation Professor (2013-20), and founding director of the SAIS Center for Transatlantic Relations. For 15 years he served as executive director of the American Consortium on European Union Studies.

He has directed the Global Europe Program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and served as Richard von Weizsӓcker Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy; deputy director of the Aspen Institute Berlin, program officer at the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations; and senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he coordinated two national commissions on the future of U.S. foreign policy. He has also taught at the University of Innsbruck, the Hertie School of Governance, and the Free University of Berlin.

Hamilton has held a variety of senior positions in the U.S. Department of State, including deputy assistant secretary for European affairs, responsible for NATO, OSCE, trans-Atlantic security issues, and Nordic-Baltic and Balkan Affairs; U.S. special coordinator for Southeast European stabilization; associate director of the Policy Planning Staff for two U.S. secretaries of state; director for policy in the Bureau of European Affairs; and senior policy advisor to the U.S. ambassador and U.S. embassy in Germany.

Hamilton is a regular commentator for U.S. and international media, including The Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The New York Times, Politico, The San Francisco Chronicle, and The Washington Post. He served as host of The Washington Post/Newsweek International’s online discussion feature “Next Europe” and as faculty mentor for The Atlantic magazine’s content partnership with SAIS. He has published extensively on U.S. foreign policy and contemporary European, trans-Atlantic and international affairs. Select publications include “The Transatlantic Community and China in the Age of Disruption” (ed. with Joe Renouard); “Can America Win Over the World’s Middle Powers? How to Push Back Against Russia’s Persistent Influence” (with Angela Stent); “The promise of a free and open Atlantic” (with Bruce Jones); “One Plus Four: NATO’s Future Strategy”; “Strategic responsibility: Rebalancing European and trans-Atlantic defense” (with Hans Binnendijk and Alexander Vershbow); “Forward resilience: How to help Ukraine win on and off the battlefield”; “Can Germany Keep Pace in a Fast-Forward World?”; “The Future of the OSCE”; “Paradigm Lost? The European Union and the Challenges of a New World” (ed. with Gregor Kirchhof and Andreas Rödder); “The Transatlantic Economy” (with Joseph Quinlan, annual editions, 2004-2024), “Europe Whole and Free: Vision and Reality” (ed. with Slawomir Debski), “Exiting the Cold War, Entering a New World”; “Open Door: NATO and Euro-Atlantic Security After the Cold War” (ed, both with Kristina Spohr), “The Eastern Question: Russia, the West and Europe’s Grey Zone” (ed. with Stefan Meister); and “Rule Makers or Rule Takers? Exploring the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership” (ed. with Jacques Pelkmans).

Hamilton has been presented with Germany’s Cross of the Federal Order of Merit; France’s Knighthood of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques; Sweden’s Knighthood of the Royal Order of the Polar Star; Poland’s Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit; and the State Department’s Superior Honor Award. He received a doctorate and a master’s with distinction from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and an honorary doctorate from Concordia College. He received his undergraduate degree from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service.

Affiliations:

• American Council on Germany, member
• Austrian Institute for International Affairs, member, advisory board
• Council on Foreign Relations, member
• Danish Foreign Policy Review, member, editorial board
• Middle East Institute, Black Sea Program, member, advisory board
• Review of Central and East European Law, member, editorial board
• Riddle, member, advisory board
• Transatlantic Leadership Network, president