CFR President Michael Froman on Trump, Global ‘Polyamory’ and AI

What’s the role of America’s most influential foreign-policy institution at a moment when the rules of U.S. engagement in the world are being completely rewritten? When I saw Michael Froman, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, in the first few days of the Trump Administration, he was already describing the current geopolitical moment as the most complex in 80 years. Since then, as he noted in an appearance at Princeton earlier this month, “the last five or six weeks may well have been the most important five or six weeks in American history in 80 years.” Questions that had long seemed resolved—about the nature of the global economy and America’s role in the world—are suddenly getting new answers.

That obviously complicates the task of leading an organization like the Council, which was founded after World War I to underscore the importance of U.S. engagement in the world. Over the years, its mission has evolved more toward informing than underscoring, but it has long had deep connections to the foreign policy establishment that Donald Trump came to power promising to upend. Steering it through this period, Froman notes in our interview, “puts a premium” on CFR’s nonpartisanship and independence. 

A veteran of the Clinton and Obama Administrations as well as the private sector at Citigroup and Mastercard, Froman took the helm of the Council two years ago, at a time of deepening global instability and growing distrust in institutions. In our conversation, edited for length and clarity, he discusses why the world is becoming more “polyamorous,” what Trump is right about, and why America’s economic and technological strength remains its greatest geopolitical asset.

You’ve said you believe we’re at the most complex moment in the world in the last 80 years. Why and what’s your level of alarm?

It’s hard to feel nostalgic for the Cold War. But in retrospect, the Cold War was pretty simple. It was us and them. You sort of knew where you stood. You knew what the tools were. It was bipolar. Then you had the end of the Cold War, and it became this unipolar moment, not necessarily American hegemony, but certainly the dominance of liberalism, democracy, the end of history, as some called it, lasting for 30 years. That period is over. This new period is much more complex. It’s not truly multipolar. Multipolar suggests that you’ve got three or four groups of countries that do everything together. I describe it as polyamory. You’ve got countries—India is a great example—that love the U.S. for our technology or for our civil nuclear cooperation. They love Russia for munitions. They love Iran for oil. And you can see a number of these countries that are working hard not to have to choose between the U.S. and the autocracies of China, Russia, Iran, North Korea. And that’s just a much more complicated world for the U.S. to engage with, because it means there won’t be that many countries where they can say you’re either with us or against us, because you’re going to be with us on some issues and you might be against us on other issues. This is going to require a lot more diplomacy, and it’s happening at a time when there are issues like pandemics, climate change and cyber security that require international cooperation, and when the institutions of international cooperation are weak or in need of reform. 

What’s your alarm level?

We can tackle this, but it does require a concerted strategy to bring other countries on board with us. Just take economics or trade. It’s hard to fight something with nothing. We know China is out there with trade agreements, with investments, with the Belt and Road Initiative, with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. We need to be on the field with the tools that we have. And we have some great tools, including the unique innovation ecosystem of the United States. Everybody wants to invest in the United States. 

The Council and TIME are about the same age, both a little over a century old. We obviously think a lot about not only the opportunity a legacy like that provides but of course the need to stay relevant. How do you approach that challenge?

The Council was founded just after World War I. It was initially focused on pushing back against isolationism and underscoring the importance of U.S. engagement in the world. What’s interesting is we’ve had those periods of isolationism back to the founding of the country—but certainly in the 1920s, then sort of in the 1950s. And now, once again, we’re having a debate about the role of the U.S. and the world. So in many respects, things have changed over 104 years but certain themes recur, and the Council is continuing to be focused on what it means for the U.S. to engage. The importance of U.S. leadership remains. That’s the role of the Council—helping policy makers with their efforts to define that engagement and reaching out to the rest of the American public, and to opinion leaders across various sectors, to deepen understanding of what’s at stake in the international system and how it impacts our lives here in the United States. 

Are we headed for a period of retreat or engagement?

I think we’re headed towards a period of redefinition. There are some [in the Administration] who are truly isolationists. There are others who feel like we should just be focused on China and let others deal with the Middle East and Europe. I don’t think there’s a clear view yet.

What are the early signals telling you?

President Trump has an unconventional way of pursuing his policies, but underneath some of those unconventional statements are elements of truth that we need to focus on. So for example, whether or not the issue is really about the U.S. buying Greenland or invading Greenland, Arctic security is a real issue, particularly in the context of climate change, where the North passage could become a major trade route, and where Russia and China are already keenly focused. In addition, there is the mineral opportunity that Greenland presents as an alternative to other sources of those minerals. Similarly with the Panama Canal, the President has put forward the issue of China’s role in Latin America, including in infrastructure. The U.S. should be focused on that. So I think we probably need to cut through the smoke and the noise to find the signal and take seriously the underlying issues that deserve attention. 

The interconnections between the Council and the federal foreign policy establishment run deep over the decades. How are you navigating this time of distrust in institutions and elite institutions in particular?

It puts a premium on ensuring that we remain nonpartisan, which is one of our core principles, and independent in our research and analysis. So we don’t take any money from governments, and we don’t take money from corporations to do research. We don’t take institutional positions at all. When we put out a research paper, it is the view of the researchers. We have fellows who represent a wide range of views. We think it’s vital for us to put all of those points of view on our website, on our stage, in our convenings, in our publications. We are, to one degree or another, an elite institution by definition, but I think ensuring that we have high-integrity independence helps address that trust issue. 

You’ve been in and out of the Council over a couple of decades. How has it changed?

What remains the same, and is important to maintain, is the high degree of professionalism. What’s important to modernize is the subject matter that we’re engaged in, broadening the notion of what foreign policy is. So today we’re dealing with climate change, technology, migration, and development issues. Also important is broadening how our content is made available and distributed to the broadest range possible, leveraging digital technology. 

So many of these challenges, in the past we’ve thought them of as government challenges. We’re actually exiting a period of some level of paralysis in government. We’re moving to a moment where there’s real momentum, but it’s not around government action in these areas, kind of the opposite. Are these private sector challenges now?

There are now very few issues that can be solved by government on its own, including core functions like national security. In the past, the government would set certain requirements and go out to a few major companies to produce a weapons system or a platform. Now, the military is trying to keep up with the innovation going on in the private sector—AI and autonomous vehicles, drones, etc. So it requires a different form of public-private cooperation, where the Council can play a role. We’re a membership organization of 5,300 members—individuals who tend to be leaders in business, finance, technology, science, journalism, government, arts. Being able to bring that expertise to the table together with policy makers gives us an opportunity to be a bridge between the public and the private sector, which is increasingly important in the era of technology.

Part of that of course is a competitive race with China in AI, in which we’ve got to move with speed but also think about safety. Where is this on your priority list of topics?

Very high, because it’s around economic security, it’s around technological leadership, and it’s around national security. So it brings together several of the priorities of the Council into one area.

I’ve launched four major strategic initiatives in addition to doing what the Council already does. One is reimagining American economic leadership on trade, investment, development and economic security. The second is China strategy, which is really focused on, what is China thinking and doing? How should we respond, and how should we engage? The third is what we’re calling climate realism—how do we ensure that we are unleashing the technology and finance necessary to address climate change in a pragmatic way? And the fourth is technology, not just the implications of AI, but quantum computing, synthetic biology, other emerging technologies on foreign policy, national security and international economics.