William Inboden

William Inboden is the Executive Vice President and Provost at the University of Texas at Austin. He also holds the William Powers Jr. Chair and a joint faculty appointment with the Department of History and the School of Civic Leadership. As the University’s chief academic officer, he leads UT Austin’s academic mission and ensures the excellence and continued innovation of research and teaching endeavors across campus.

Previously, he served as Professor and Director of the Alexander Hamilton Center for Classical and Civic Education at the University of Florida and as Peterson Senior Fellow with the Kissinger Center for Global Affairs at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.

Inboden’s other current roles include Associate with the National Intelligence Council, member of the CIA Historical Advisory Panel, presidentially-appointed Commissioner with the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America’s Heritage Abroad, and Senior Fellow with the Trinity Forum.

Previously he served as Senior Director for Strategic Planning on the National Security Council at the White House, where he worked on a range of foreign policy issues including the National Security Strategy, strategic forecasting, democracy and governance, contingency planning, counter-radicalization, and multilateral institutions and initiatives. Inboden’s other government service includes at the Department of State as a Member of the Policy Planning Staff and a Special Advisor in the Office of International Religious Freedom, and as a staff member in both the United States Senate and the House of Representatives. He also served as head of the London-based Legatum Institute, and as a Civitas Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

Inboden’s newest book is The Peacemaker: Ronald Reagan, The Cold War, and the World on the Brink (Dutton, a Penguin Random House imprint), an award-winning narrative overview of the Reagan Administration’s Cold War strategy and foreign and defense policies.  He is also the author of Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960: The Soul of Containment (Cambridge University Press), co-editor of The Last Card: Inside George W. Bush’s Decision to Surge in Iraq (Cornell University Press), co-editor of Hand-Off: The Foreign Policy That George W. Bush Bequeathed to Barack Obama (Brookings Institution Press), and has published numerous articles and book chapters on American foreign policy, the presidency, and American history.

Research interests:
American foreign policy
The presidency
American history

William Inboden sat down for an interview with JMC Resident Historian, Elliott Drago, to discuss his research on President Ronald Reagan as well as the uniqueness of the United States and its history. You can find that interview here.