Edward Luce Keynote Speaker

U.S. National Editor and Columnist for The Financial Times, Edward Luce is one of the paper’s most popular writers and “one of the finest journalists of our time.” He is a former speechwriter for Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, he is highly regarded by policymakers, leaders, and political junkies. His articles are regularly the ‘most read’ on the FT website.

In his talks, Luce brings an insider/outsider perspective to American politics, economics, and geopolitics. His cross-border perspective provides a global insight to the future of work and the major challenges facing the West, including the rise of populism and the decline of the middle class. Luce’s book, The Retreat of Western Liberalism, examines the weakening of western hegemony and the crisis of democratic liberalism ― of which Donald Trump and his European counterparts are not the cause, but a symptom.

According to Luce, “What we do not yet know is whether the world’s democratic recession will turn into a global depression.” The New York Times called the book “insightful and harrowing.” An excerpt appeared in The Atlantic (The Changing of the Global Economic Guard). One of the Washington Post’s 50 notable works of nonfiction in 2017, ‘The Retreat of Western Liberalism‘ is an Amazon Top 100 book of the year and a Financial Times and Economist best book of the year. Luce’s previous book, Time to Start Thinking: America in the Age of Descent, was described as “a masterful portrait of America.” He also is the author of In Spite of the Gods, praised by The Economist as “likely to be the definitive book on India for some time to come.”At the FT, Luce has also served as Washington bureau chief, Capital Markets editor, correspondent to the Philippines, and South Asia bureau chief.

Articles and commentaries by Luce that have garnered a lot of attention in the past year have included: “The boy who escaped Trump country,” “Britain’s Voyage to Inglorious Isolation,” and “Donald Trump leaves Angela Merkel to stand up for liberal values.” With his FT colleague Rana Foroohar, he writes “Swamp Notes,” a twice weekly newsletter on money and power in Trump’s America and the big themes driving politics, business, and markets.

A Graduate of Oxford University in Politics, Philosophy and Economics, he received his post-graduate in journalism from City University, London. He is a frequent guest on PBS NewsHour, NPR, and C-SPAN