A student of philosophy and history, Kishore Mahbubani has had the good fortune of enjoying a career in government and, at the same time, in writing on public issues. With the Singapore Foreign Service from 1971 to 2004, he had postings in Cambodia (where he served during the war in 1973-74), Malaysia, Washington DC and New York, where he served two stints as Singapore’s Ambassador to the UN and as President of the UN Security Council in January 2001 and May 2002. He was Permanent Secretary at the Foreign Ministry from 1993 to 1998. Currently, he is the Dean and Professor in the Practice of Public Policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKYSPP) of the National University of Singapore. He is also a Faculty Associate for the LKYSPP’s Centre on Asia and Globalisation (CAG). Concurrently, Prof Mahbubani continues to serve in Boards and Councils of several institutions in Singapore, Europe and North America, including the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) Council, the Asia Society's International Council, the Yale President's Council on International Activities (PCIA), and the Singapore-China Foundation - Scholarship Committee.

In the world of ideas, Prof Mahbubani has spoken and published globally. His articles have appeared in a wide range of journals and newspapers, including Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, the Washington Quarterly, Survival, American Interest, the National Interest, Time, Newsweek and New York Times. He has also been profiled in the Economist and in Time Magazine. He is the author of “Can Asians Think?” (published in Singapore, Canada, US, Mexico, India, China and Malaysia) and of “Beyond The Age Of Innocence: Rebuilding Trust between America and the World” (published in New York). His new book entitled “The New Asian Hemisphere: the irresistible shift of global power to the East” was published in New York in February 2008. More information on his writings can be found on www.mahbubani.net.