About

Michael Beckley is a professor of political science at Tufts University and a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He writes and speaks about geopolitics, U.S.–China competition, and the forces reshaping the global economy.

His research asks which countries are truly strong, why troubles at home can make them dangerous abroad, and how their changing fortunes affect the rest of the world. He looks beneath GDP rankings and military budgets to weigh national strengths against hidden vulnerabilities. His work connects these longer-term forces to the decisions facing governments and businesses today, from managing geopolitical risk to navigating technological competition and a fragmenting world economy.

Beckley is the author of Unrivaled and coauthor, with Hal Brands, of Danger Zone. His next book, The End of Easy Growth and the Struggle for Power, forthcoming from W. W. Norton in 2028, explores what happens when the economic expansion that transformed the modern world can no longer be taken for granted.

His scholarship has received multiple awards from the American Political Science Association and the International Studies Association. He writes regularly for Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Atlantic. His work has also been featured by The Economist, the Financial Times, NPR, CNN, and other major media.

Beckley advises senior U.S. defense and intelligence officials and delivers keynotes to business, policy, and leadership audiences around the world. Previously, he was an International Security Fellow at Harvard’s Kennedy School and worked for the U.S. Department of Defense, the RAND Corporation, and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He holds a PhD in political science from Columbia University.