Charles A. Kupchan
The Promise and Peril of Trump's America First
Obama’s former special advisor offers insight into the inner workings of U.S. government—and the collapse of the liberal world order.
Dates
8/22/25
6:00 PM
For over 30 years, Charles A. Kupchan has analyzed transatlantic relations and U.S. foreign policy. The American political scientist is a professor at Georgetown University and has served as Director for European Affairs on the U.S. National Security Council and as Special Assistant to Barack Obama. Amid the global rise of the far right, Kupchan views Trump more as a symptom than a cause of the unraveling of the liberal order. He comes to Hamburg at the invitation of the Bucerius Summer School on Global Governance by Zeit Stiftung Bucerius, which annually hosts a day at the Summer Festival. In a lecture followed by a conversation, Kupchan explores the West’s weakening from within – due to the erosion of the social contract and the decline of the political center – and external challenges, such as the diffusion of power from West to East and from North to South. He provocatively asks: Will Trump help us transition from the old order to a new one? Or will he simply tear down the old order and leave the world standing in rubble?
