The purpose of the Project on International Order and Strategy (IOS) is to understand the changing power dynamics in the international system and the implications for U.S. strategy and international cooperation.
The Foreign Policy program at Brookings created the project in 2007, then called the Project on Managing Global Order, to address the burgeoning debate in the United States on the future of power, the international order, and U.S. strategy. This is being driven by numerous factors including: the rise of new great powers, the diffusion of military and political power, economic difficulties in the Western order, challenges to the regional order in the Middle East, and the reemergence of territorial disputes in Asia. These challenges to the order, and threats to state and human security, are evolving rapidly, while the United States is grappling with new constraints—as well as new opportunities. IOS examines these developments in their totality and not just as individual issues, and assess the implications for U.S. strategy.
IOS is a unique project, offering sustained research and policy engagement on the questions of international order and strategy, and features many leading thinkers on the subject, including staff members Thomas Wright, Bruce Jones, Robert Kagan, Ted Piccone, and Tanvi Madan; Nonresident Senior Fellows Daniel Drezner (Tufts), Rory Medcalf (Lowy Institute), and Jean-Marie Guéhenno (Columbia); Distinguished Fellow Javier Solana (ESADE); and Post-Doctoral Visiting Fellow Iskander Rehman. Research Assistant Laura Daniels supports the project. The project’s key research topics include the future of America’s global role, the behavior of the emerging powers, geopolitical competition in an interdependent world, and the revitalization of the West.
IOS promotes sustained dialogue with the emerging powers; convenes the emerging powers and foreign policy officials and experts from the United States and the Western allies, and engages key U.S. decision-makers on the challenge of adapting U.S. leadership and strategy to changing international realities.