The Chicago Project on Security and Threats’ 2026 Hagel Lecture will feature Kurt M. Campbell, the former U.S. deputy secretary of state, offering insights into the wide-ranging effects United States-China relations will have on global economics, technology and security.
The lecture, titled America's Role in Asia: Prospects for Peace and Stability in the Context of War with Iran, will be held April 17 at the University of Chicago’s Rubenstein Forum. The event is free and open to all.
The conversation between Campbell and former Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel will take place near the anticipated date of President Donald Trump’s upcoming summit with President Xi Jinping. The event also comes on the tail of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision that declared parts of Trump’s tariffs illegal, and ahead of China’s target 2027 date for a military takeover of Taiwan.
“Our conversation with Secretary Campbell and Secretary Hagel could not be happening at a more important time for America's relationship with China,” said UChicago Prof. Robert Pape, event moderator and director of the Chicago Project on Security and Threats. “There's so much at stake.”
Prior to serving as the U.S. deputy secretary of state from 2024 to 2025, Campbell was deputy assistant advisor to President Joe Biden and National Security Council coordinator for the Indo-Pacific from 2021 to 2024. Often referred to as Biden's "Asia coordinator" or "Asia czar," Campbell was chief architect of the administration’s Asia strategy. Previously, he served as assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs under President Barack Obama and was the chairman and CEO of The Asia Group, a strategic advisory firm focused on the Asia-Pacific region that he founded in February 2013.
“There's so much at stake.”
—Prof. Robert Pape
“The relationship between the United States and China is the most pivotal great power relationship in the world,” Pape said. “America remains the No. 1 country in the world, but fast on America's heels is China, and in some areas, it's possible China may even be ahead.”
This Hagel Lecture will be held on campus at Friedman Hall in the Rubenstein Forum and streamed across the globe, including to military audiences through a partnership with the United States Military Academy. The event is free and open to all. Register here.
Previous Hagel Lectures focused on U.S. foreign policy with former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in 2019, former U.S. Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul in 2023, former DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson in 2024, and former CIA Director William J. Burns in 2025.
—A version of this story was first published by the UChicago Department of Political Science.
