Inflection Point: Biden, Trump, and the Future World Order

From a Biden administration insider, an account of how global crises were managed and a warning of what is to come.

“I would like to share with you what I saw.”

The old international order has collapsed, and a global contest is underway to determine what will replace it. Inflection Point is an insider’s account of the Biden administration’s attempt to shape this new world. Written by a senior member of President Biden’s National Security Council, it traces how the White House confronted overlapping crises involving Russia, China, the Middle East, and the global economy—and how those choices will define America’s role for decades to come.

Clear-eyed and urgent, Inflection Point reveals the debates, decisions, and strategic dilemmas inside an administration governing at a moment of extraordinary upheaval. It also looks ahead: How much damage could Donald Trump inflict on the international system if he returns to power—and could a future president repair what remains?

Thomas Wright is one of the United States’ leading analysts of geopolitics and American foreign policy. He is a senior fellow with the Strobe Talbott Center for Security, Strategy, and Technology at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., and a contributing writer at The Atlantic.

From 2021 to 2023, Wright served in the Biden administration as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Strategic Planning at the National Security Council.

He is the author of All Measures Short of War and the co-author of Aftershocks: Pandemic Politics and the End of the Old International Order.

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