Ian Bremmer
GET UPDATES FROM Ian Bremmer
Ian Bremmer is the president of the world’s leading global political risk research and consulting firm, Eurasia Group.

Bremmer started the firm in 1998 with $25,000 in hand. Today, Eurasia Group employs more than 85 full-time employees in its New York City, Washington, and London offices. It also calls on the services of several hundred experts in 65 countries. The firm’s client base includes more than 200 multinational companies, leading financial institutions, government departments, and political leaders. Eurasia Group is widely respected for its objectivity and ability to explain how political risk is directly applicable to the global marketplace.

Bremmer has recently written articles for the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Newsweek, and Harvard Business Review. His six books include The J Curve: A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall, which was selected by The Economist as one of the best books of 2006. In March 2009, he published The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge for Strategic Investing with Preston Keat, a director of research at Eurasia Group. Nouriel Roubini described The Fat Tail as the definitive survey of the subject and indispensible for global investors. Bremmer’s May 2009 article for the Council on Foreign Relations’ Foreign Affairs magazine is the first to describe in detail the new global phenomenon of state capitalism and its geopolitical implications.

Bremmer has a PhD in political science from Stanford University (1994) and became the youngest-ever national fellow at the Hoover Institution. He has taught at Columbia University, the EastWest Institute, and the World Policy Institute, and in 2007 was named a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum. Much of his own analytical focus has been on emerging markets, which he defines as “those countries where politics matter at least as much as economics for market outcomes.”

Ian grew up in Boston and now lives in New York.

Blog Entries by Ian Bremmer

Welcome to the G-Zero Era

(36) Comments | Posted May 14, 2012 | 1:31 PM

In January, John Baird told me he was proud that his first trip as Canada's new foreign minister was to Beijing rather than Washington. Canada values its ties with America, he said, and wants to sign a trade pact with Europe. But building new bridges to Asia will help protect...

Read Post

The Power Of Political Myth

(13) Comments | Posted June 7, 2010 | 8:57 AM

Over the course of my book tour, I've gotten a thousand different kinds of questions. But there are two recurring themes in some of them that I want to address here. Both themes are based on myths.

Myth #1- The free market has failed.

Myths are tools we...

Read Post

Does 'The End Of The Free Market' Mean The End Of Big Oil And The Multi-National Corporation?

(18) Comments | Posted June 2, 2010 | 6:38 AM

Last week, I posed the question that serves as subtitle for my book: who wins the war between states and corporations?

The answer is pretty simple. A corporation that finds itself at war with a state these days is in big trouble. We've had one...

Read Post

Have We Really Come To 'The End Of The Free Market'?

(37) Comments | Posted May 24, 2010 | 7:45 AM

When you write a book called The End of the Free Market, you can be pretty sure what the first question is going to be: "Do you really believe we're seeing the end of the free market? Really?"

Yes, I do. But there are two important caveats. Not everywhere...

Read Post

'The End Of The Free Market': Why America Must Defend The Free Market Economy (VIDEO)

(79) Comments | Posted May 14, 2010 | 9:47 AM

Breaking News: This is not free market capitalism's finest hour.

Greece has provided the eurozone with its largest ever stress test. The EU and IMF have ridden to the rescue, but that's hardly a ringing endorsement for the world's largest ever experiment in capitalism without borders. Things aren't going...

Read Post

Hugo Chavez's Most Dangerous Enemy? It's Chavez Himself

(11) Comments | Posted November 14, 2007 | 5:03 PM

In proven and unproven reserves, Venezuela is believed to control some 270 billion barrels of oil, the deepest supply in the world. As crude prices lurch toward $100 per barrel, President Hugo Chavez would appear to hold the only weapon he needs to further tighten his grip on domestic political...

Read Post

Brazil's Economic Growth Shouldn't Be Overlooked

(6) Comments | Posted October 17, 2007 | 4:33 PM

When it comes to emerging-market success stories, Brazil is usually the most overlooked of the so-called BRIC countries, a group that includes Russia, India and China. Trends underlying Brazil's political development and the country's ability to profit from a favorable international investment climate suggest that's a mistake.

The story behind...

Read Post

Despite Russian Provocations, No New Cold War on Horizon

(11) Comments | Posted August 21, 2007 | 6:05 PM

Russia's newly assertive foreign policy has now reached the top of the world. On Aug. 2, a submarine crew planted a titanium Russian flag in the yellowish seabed more than two miles beneath the North Pole, laying Moscow's claim to nearly half the Arctic Ocean floor -- and its potentially...

Read Post

Zimbabwe's Ruined Economy May Signal End For Mugabe

(5) Comments | Posted August 7, 2007 | 11:10 AM

Robert Mugabe may finally be losing his grip on Zimbabwe's throat. The accelerated decline of what's left of Zimbabwe's economy might soon leave the embattled president without the cash to pay off those on whom his political survival will depend. As prices spike and waves of Zimbabweans flee the country...

Read Post

With Blair Gone, U.S.-U.K. Relations May be a Little Less 'Special'

(1) Comments | Posted July 26, 2007 | 5:27 PM

Tony Blair's passionate, articulate support for George W. Bush's decision to invade and occupy Iraq earned him considerable gratitude from the war's American supporters and ringing denunciations from its British critics. Blair proved to be Bush's indispensable ally. Friends and foes alike of Bush policy are now wondering if Britain's...

Read Post

Wary of Future, Russia Confronts U.S., EU Now

(0) Comments | Posted June 19, 2007 | 5:18 PM

Why have Russia's relations with the United States and the European Union deteriorated so far and so fast? Disputes over NATO and EU expansion, arms control, war in the Balkans, and international competition for influence within several of Russia's neighbors have generated plenty of mutual mistrust.

But Kremlin fears for...

Read Post

The Uncertain Future of Pervez Musharraf

(1) Comments | Posted June 4, 2007 | 12:19 PM

Reprinted from Tribune Media Services

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has dodged a lot of bullets over the years. He's survived multiple assassination attempts, managed intense U.S. pressure to drive jihadis from the country's northwest frontier no-man's land, and weathered domestic charges that he is a dictator and American puppet.

Some...

Read Post

Is Scotland on the Verge of Independence?

(5) Comments | Posted April 27, 2007 | 2:34 PM

Reprinted from Tribune Media Services:

On May 1, England and Scotland will mark the 300th anniversary of the treaty that wedded the two within the United Kingdom. The festivities won't last long. Two days later, Scottish voters are expected to hand dominance of Scotland's parliament to the separatist Scottish National...

Read Post

Tehran in No Mood for Compromise

(12) Comments | Posted April 20, 2007 | 4:39 PM


As Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad waved goodbye earlier this month to the 15 British sailors and marines his government held prisoner for almost two weeks, many around the world breathed a sigh of relief. Any easing of international tensions over Iran is welcome. But the respite is likely...

Read Post

New Cold War for U.S. with China or Russia Not on Horizon

(6) Comments | Posted April 2, 2007 | 7:55 PM

Too many U.S. foreign policy analysts, both in government and the media, still scan the horizon in search of America's next Cold War rival. They refuse to recognize that the forces that now generate change in the international order are fundamentally different than they were before 1990. Even China...

Read Post