United States | President, Inter-American Dialogue
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Michael Shifter is president of the Inter-American Dialogue. He was previously vice president for policy and director of the Dialogue’s democratic governance program. Since 1994, Shifter has played a key role in shaping the Dialogue’s agenda, commissioning policy-relevant articles and reports.
Shifter writes and talks widely on US-Latin American relations and hemispheric affairs. His recent articles have appeared in The New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, Financial Times, Current History, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, Journal of Democracy, Harvard International Review and in newspapers and journals in Colombia, Peru, Mexico, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Jamaica, Chile, Panama, Argentina and Brazil. He is often interviewed by US, Latin American, European and Chinese media, and appears frequently on CNN and BBC. Shifter has lectured about hemispheric policy at leading universities in Latin America and Europe and has testified regularly before the US Congress about US policy towards Latin America and the Caribbean.
Prior to joining the Dialogue, Shifter directed the Latin American and Caribbean program at the National Endowment for Democracy and, before that, the Ford Foundation’s governance and human rights program in the Andean region and Southern Cone, where he was based, first, in Lima, Peru and then in Santiago, Chile. In the 1980s, he was representative in Brazil with the Inter-American Foundation, and also worked at the Woodrow Wilson Center’s Latin American Program.
Since 1993, Shifter has been an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, where he teaches Latin American politics. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Latin American Studies Association and is a contributing editor to Current History. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Washington Office on Latin America and on the Advisory Committee of Human Rights Watch/Americas Division, and the Social Science Foundation of the Graduate School of International Relations at the University of Denver.
Shifter graduated Phi Beta Kappa and Summa Cum Laude from Oberlin College and holds a MA in sociology from Harvard University, where he taught Latin American development and politics for four years.
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El 23 de marzo 2022 Michael Shifter, presidente del Diálogo Interamericano, conversó con el programa 8 En Punto del Canal 33 El Salvador sobre la política exterior de los Estados Unidos hacia Centroamérica y la situación de estado de derecho y corrupción en la región.
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El 18 de marzo 2022, Michael Shifter, presidente del Diálogo Interamericano, dialogó con Deutsche Welle sobre los impactos de la invasión Rusa de Ucrania en la región Latinoamericana. Al centro de la discusión estuvieron los efectos sobre las cadenas de suministro globales de commodities, la inflación que ha generado el conflicto y las demandas sociales.
Michael Shifter, presidente del Diálogo Interamericano, conversó con El Mercurio sobre el viaje a Caracas de altos funcionarios de Washington con el objetivo de encontrar alternativas al petróleo proveniente de Rusia en marco de la invasion rusa a Ucrania.
Given the huge demands on Washington – domestic and international – and today’s ravaged, fragmented, and leaderless region, this is probably not the right time for bold, ambitious initiatives. But the Biden administration should move quickly to renew partnerships with select countries, emphasizing recovery from Covid-19 and restoring economic and political stability.
The country is perhaps more profoundly and bitterly polarized than ever, with a high level of mutual distrust. Trumpism proved not to be a fleeting phenomenon, but a movement that is likely to persist and be part of the US political landscape for some time.
Brent Scowcroft was truly one of the giants of the US foreign policy establishment. We admire his wisdom, prowess as a strategist, and humility as a person. Like few others, he understood the importance of building and sustaining US alliances and respectful relations. At the Dialogue, we are inspired by Scowcroft’s rich legacy.
The Cuban government sees the United States, which continues to impose harsh sanctions, as being chiefly responsible for the island’s profound economic woes and for worsening its humanitarian crisis. Unleashing significant levels of Cuban migrants to the United States can serve as a means of retribution.
It is plausible that Nicaragua struck a deal with the Cubans to facilitate the push northward to express both regimes’ opposition to Biden administration policies. All signs suggest the flows will continue to mount, intensifying pressure on the US border and giving the Biden administration another huge political headache.
