Kishore Mahbubani

Kishore Mahbubani began his career in 1971 as a diplomat with the Singapore Foreign Service, in which he served until 2004, with postings in Cambodia, Malaysia, Washington D.C. and New York. He served two postings as Singapore’s ambassador to the UN and as President of the UN Security Council in January 2001 and May 2002. Mr. Mahbubani was permanent secretary of the Singapore Foreign Ministry from 1993 to 1998. He served as Founding Dean at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy of the National University of Singapore (NUS) from 2004 until the end of 2017. In July 2019 he became a Distinguished Fellow at the Asia Research Institute (ARI) of NUS. He has spoken and published extensively on geopolitical and economic issues. In 2013 the Financial Times chose one of his books, ‘The Great Convergence: Asia, the West and the Logic of One World,’ as one of the best books about economics in that year. His latest book, ‘Has the West Lost It?,’ published in London in April 2018, was described by Martin Wolf as “a compelling warning.” He has been a member of the Boards of Zurich Insurance Group Ltd and of Zurich Insurance Company Ltd since April 2015.