Kurt Campbell, the former deputy secretary of state under former President Joe Biden, will join the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service (SFS) as a fellow teaching courses and engaging with community members, the university announced March 3.
Campbell, whose portfolio included U.S.-China relations during his tenure at the U.S. Department of State, will instruct Georgetown students and host speaking events, including at the new SFS location in Jakarta, Indonesia. Campbell worked on East Asian and Pacific affairs in various public and private capacities before joining the Biden administration, including as coordinator for Indo-Pacific affairs on the National Security Council, and recently rejoined his consulting and advisory firm, The Asia Group, as co-founder and chairman.
Campbell joins former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, who has delivered lectures and attended university events, as a distinguished fellow in the SFS. The school often recruits potential fellows from members of an outgoing presidential administration, according to SFS Dean Joel Hellman.
Hellman said Campbell contributes to Georgetown’s focus on providing students with opportunities to learn from practitioners.
“That’s what makes a Georgetown education so unique and kind of difficult to get anywhere else,” Hellman told The Hoya. “So we are proud to have someone like Ambassador Campbell here, because he brings what is most unique to the Georgetown experience. I know that students will really be thrilled to interact with him and learn from him.”
Judy Wang (CAS ’27), an international student from China majoring in political economy and studio art, said she looks forward to learning from Campbell as he incorporates elements from his practical experience into his work at Georgetown.
“A lot of professors at other universities tend to do more academic research — and that’s obviously great that they have that academia experience,” Wang told The Hoya. “But then for diplomacy specifically, you really need that real-world expertise and practice to be able to speak from an ‘I’ perspective for a lot of the experiences or the knowledge that they have.”
Hellman said he hopes Campbell will illuminate the potential impact of a diplomatic career amid rapid developments in domestic politics.
“We are at a moment in the U.S. political dialogue in which people who are engaging in service around the world have been denigrated — and in some cases even dehumanized, called corrupt,” Hellman said. “It is absolutely critical and an essential value of our institution that we are here to extol the virtue of engaging with the world to build principled public servants.”
“It’s critical to keep the flame lit that will motivate our students to think about how exciting a life of global service is and can be,” Hellman added. “That’s what we hope someone like Ambassador Campbell will bring to our campus, and this is the moment to do it.”
Since Jan. 20, officials acting under President Donald Trump have attempted to dismantle the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which administers foreign assistance, and reduce the State Department by eliminating embassies and diplomatic missions abroad.
Aidan Pritchard (CAS ’27), who is majoring in Chinese and government, said students interested in careers related to Asia would particularly benefit from Campbell’s expertise.
“That would be good especially for students that are looking to have careers in fields that have to do with Asian affairs, especially if he has government experience with those countries,” Pritchard told The Hoya. “Every region has its own particularity, so if he’s familiar with that and sharing his expertise with students, I think that would be really invaluable to students.”
Wang said Campbell will shed light on dialogue between Washington, D.C., and Beijing, amid evolving relations between the two countries.
“U.S.-China relations has been a hot topic for nearly a decade or more,” Wang said. “In this critical moment where there’s a lot of heated tensions between the United States and China, for a school so important for diplomacy, it’s important for us to hear from someone with real expertise, to hear from what they have to say in terms of a country and nation people that’s somewhat distant from the United States, instead of hearing from the textbook.”
Hellman said he urges Georgetown students to heed Campbell’s advice and consider a service-oriented career.
“I really hope that our students get a chance to engage with him to hear what it means to serve, to hear what it means to dedicate your life to service, and to think how they can do that as well as they think about their futures,” Hellman said.
Nora Toscano contributed to reporting.
