Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzezinski (born March 28, 1928) is a Polish-American political scientist, geostrategist, and statesman. In Polish his name is written Brzezinski and pronounced [’zbig??v b??’?i?ski] (ZBEEG-nyev bzheh-ZHEEN-ski). In America, the common pronunciation is [ZBIG-new bru-ZHIN-ski].
Career He was born in Warsaw, Poland, the son of a diplomat, and lived in France and Germany before being raised in Canada after his father was posted there in 1938. He received a BA and MA from McGill University (1949 and 1950 respectively) and a PhD. in political science from Harvard University in 1953. In 1958, he became a United States citizen.
From 1966 to 1968, Brzezinski served as a member of the Policy Planning Council of the Department of State.
For the 1968 presidential campaign, Brzezinski was chairman of the Hubert H. Humphrey Foreign Policy Task Force.
Between 1973 and 1976 he helped to found the Trilateral Commission with David Rockefeller, becoming Director. The Trilateral Commission was a group of prominent political and business leaders and academics from the United States, Western Europe and Japan. Its purpose was to strengthen relations among the three most industrially advanced regions of the free world.
Future President Jimmy Carter was a member of the Trilateral Commission, and when he announced his candidacy for the 1976 presidential campaign Brzezinski, a critic of the Nixon-Kissinger foreign policy style, became his principal foreign policy advisor. After his victory in 1976, Carter made Brzezinski national security adviser.
From 1977 to 1981, Brzezinski served as National Security Advisor to U.S. President Jimmy Carter. In 1981, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom “for his role in the normalization of U.S.-Chinese relations and for his contributions to the human rights and national security policies of the United States.”
In 1985, under the Reagan administration, Brzezinski served as a member of the President’s Chemical Warfare Commission. From 1987 to 1988, he worked on the NSC-Defense Department Commission on Integrated Long-Term Strategy. From 1987 to 1989 he also served on the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board (a Presidential commission to oversee U.S. intelligence activities).
During the 1988 presidential campaign, Brzezinski was co-chairman of the Bush National Security Advisory Task Force.
Brzezinski lives in the Washington D.C. area. He is married to an internationally recognized sculptress, and has three children: one is Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Europe and NATO; another is a partner, McGuire Woods LLP, Washington, DC, and foreign policy advisor to the Kerry campaign; and the third is a reporter and occasional anchor for CBS-TV “Evening News.”