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Chairman Bruce Kovner and
President Christopher DeMuth |
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This report summarizes an exceptionally intense and productive year at the American Enterprise Institute. From the war in the Middle East to the reform of health care policy, from global climate change to the changing role of religion in American culture and politics, AEI scholars contributed research, ideas, and reform proposals that tangibly improved public debate and the substance of government policy.
AEI's Iraq Planning Group, whose proposals led to a dramatic and successful transformation in U.S. military strategy in that beleaguered land, has received a great deal of well-deserved attention. But AEI research prompted specific improvements in many other areas as well--including life-saving reforms in malaria control and other international health efforts, better financial reporting using advanced information technologies, more realistic measures of poverty, and continued judicial progress in cabining the litigation explosion.
The Institute also published incisive critiques of the No Child Left Behind Act, federal preemption policies, and ominous developments in the regulation of pharmaceuticals and medical care--and contributed detailed proposals for better tax, regulatory, antitrust, health care, trade, and environmental policies. These assessments are producing more informed debate for the present--and, we trust, are laying the groundwork for more productive policies in the future. As ever, much of AEI's most influential work was addressed not to policy itself but to important trends in culture and society, in economic well-being, and in domestic and international politics.
The quantity and quality of AEI's publications were high throughout 2007. The AEI Press had its busiest year ever editing, designing, and producing our books and monographs. We are now publishing fifteen Outlooks--periodic essays on subjects ranging from Latin America to school reform, ideally suited for electronic distribution to specialized audiences. Our magazine, The American, aimed beyond the Beltway to an audience of business and financial executives, completed a highly successful first year under Jim Glassman's superb editorial direction. The magazine's website, www.american.com, is one of several subdivisions of the main AEI website, which offers a cornucopia of research, conference videos, and fresh daily content and is now entering its fourth design phase, which will be launched in 2008.
And AEI scholars have done especially well when editorial judgments were made elsewhere. They appeared in the leading national newspaper and television media much more often than those of any other think tank, and published many commercial books that were widely reviewed and sold well (with at least one major bestseller, Ayaan Hirsi Ali's Infidel).
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Roger Hertog |
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The year was one of many transitions and significant growth in all of our research divisions. We welcomed back to the Institute several colleagues who had served with tremendous distinction in senior government posts--John Bolton from the United Nations and the Department of State, Scott Gottlieb and Mark McClellan from the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, and Paul Wolfowitz from the World Bank and the Department of Defense. Bill Thomas, the redoubtable chairman of the Ways and Means Committee for many years, joined our ranks following his retirement from the House of Representatives, adding his rare combination of intellect and political know-how to our work on tax and trade policy.
And we were fortunate to attract two highly perspicacious economists from government service to AEI: Philip Levy, who had served as a senior economist at the President's Council of Economic Advisers and on the State Department's policy planning staff, and Vincent Reinhart, a twenty-four-year veteran of the Federal Reserve who, in recent years, was director of the Fed's Division of Monetary Affairs and secretary of its Open Market Committee.
As these examples suggest, AEI benefits significantly from the work of individuals who are not only academically gifted but knowledgeable about the inside mysteries (and frustrations) of government and politics. At the same time, the Institute is becoming an increasingly attractive home for scholars who in earlier times would have made their careers at universities. In 2007, one of America's leading young experts on Japan, Michael Auslin of Yale University, joined AEI as a resident scholar in our burgeoning Asian studies program. Arthur Brooks of Syracuse University, whose arresting work on social trends and attitudes is attracting growing national attention, became a visiting scholar. And polymath political analyst and author Michael Barone, a longtime member of AEI's extended family, moved in as a resident fellow to pursue research on U.S. political history and demographic trends (with, no doubt, many excursions into current politics during the 2008 elections and beyond).
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Tully M. Friedman, Friedman Fleischer & Lowe, LLC; and John V. Faraci, International Paper Company |
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We also note with sorrow the deaths of four cherished colleagues--one great practitioner of politics and three brilliant students of the art. Gerald R. Ford's stellar personal qualities have long been admired, and his many accomplishments as our thirty-eighth president are now widely recognized. His association with AEI began shortly after he entered Congress in 1948 and intensified when he and several of his top officials came to AEI when he departed the White House in 1977; his wisdom and devotion to the public good have left a permanent mark on the Institute's work. Senior fellow Jeane Kirkpatrick had worked at AEI long before becoming one of the most admired women in American politics during the Reagan administration; her highly penetrating final book, Making War to Keep Peace, was published posthumously in April. Adjunct scholar Seymour Martin Lipset, whose scholarly landmarks included American Exceptionalism: A Double-Edged Sword and Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics, was coeditor of AEI's Public Opinion magazine in the 1970s and 1980s and remained active in our councils for many years thereafter. Nelson Polsby, a longtime member of the AEI Council of Academic Advisers, was the author of more than twenty original studies of American politics and political institutions, including the classic Presidential Elections (now in its eleventh edition) and his final work, How Congress Evolves: Social Bases of Institutional Change.
A final, impending transition is in the Institute's leadership. Chris DeMuth, who has been AEI's president since 1986, has announced his intention to relinquish his position before the end of 2008. (He will remain at AEI pursuing his own research and writing.) Think tanks such as AEI have become increasingly important institutions in American public life, but their succession procedures have remained relatively informal and underdeveloped. We believe that facing the succession issue now--on our own time, when AEI's work and finances are thriving--is the best approach to achieving a successful result and a useful precedent for the future. A careful search process is underway, and we anticipate a happy result well in time for AEI's next annual report.
Bruce Kovner
Chairman
Christopher DeMuth
President
Sections within the Annual Report:
