Rediscovering Political Leadership, with John A. Burtka IV
The story is the same across much of the globe: citizens aren’t currently wild about their leaders. As John A. Burtka IV writes in the introduction to Gateway to Statesmanship, the “examples of elite failures are so ubiquitous that there is no reason to chronicle them all here.” Better, Burtka argues, to turn to history to “rediscover the time-tested principles of leadership.”
What can modern men and women hope to learn from the ancient writings of Xenophon, the medieval musings of Eusebius, the Renaissance recollections of Machiavelli? Perhaps the better question, Burtka might counter, is: what can we not learn? He joins the Institute to discuss.
About the Speaker
John A. Burtka IV is President and Chief Executive Officer of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. He graduated from Hillsdale College with degrees in French and Christian Studies and earned a graduate degree in theology from La Faculté Jean Calvin in Aix-en-Provence, France. Johnny began his career at ISI, where he served as a development officer. He returned to ISI after four years at The American Conservative magazine, where he served as Executive Director and Acting Editor. Johnny has appeared on Fox News and Fox Business and written for the Washington Post, the Richmond Times-Dispatch, First Things, the American Mind, and the Intercollegiate Review, among other publications. He has been a Lincoln Fellow at the Claremont Institute and has participated in academic fellowships at Washington College and the Trinity Forum.
Liam Julian | Moderator
Liam Julian is Vice President of Programs & Public Policy for the Sandra Day O’Connor Institute for American Democracy. He was previously managing editor of Policy Review magazine in Washington, D.C. His writing and commentary on public policy topics has appeared in a variety of publications such as The Washington Post, The Atlantic, City Journal, and National Review and on programs such as NPR’s Morning Edition and All Things Considered. Mr. Julian also spent time working with the College Board, where he oversaw development of Advanced Placement curricula, including the redesign of the AP U.S. Government and Politics course. From 2006 to 2013, he was a Hoover Institution research fellow at Stanford University.