National Affairs

National Affairs models itself after the now-defunct quarterly public policy journal The Public Interest, which was founded in 1965 by Daniel Bell and Irving Kristol. The complete archive of The Public Interest  is available on National Affairs’ website. ²

National Affairs is housed at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute. ¹

Activities

National Affairs features essays on a range of domestic-policy issues, including economics, health care, education, and welfare, along with legal debates and societal and cultural dilemmas. National Affairs aims to include a broad range of authors, representing different backgrounds and points of view, including academics, policy experts, political practitioners, and journalists. National Affairs claims to not represent any specific political agenda, and bases its ideals in democratic capitalism, liberty and equality under the law, and Western traditions. ¹

National Affairs has published a series of three brief policy books under its Unleashing Opportunity branding intended to help policymakers with challenges having to do with innovation, higher education, and regulatory policy. The Unleashing Opportunity series includes Policy Reforms to Advance Innovation, Policy Reforms for an Accountable Administrative State, and Policy Reforms to Strengthen Higher Education. ³

Funding

National Affairs is funded by donations from individuals, foundations, and businesses. While National Affairs does not disclose its donors, tax filings confirm donations from the Searle Freedom Trust ($250,000 in 2021), ⁴ the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation ($100,000 in 2019), ⁵ and the Democracy Fund ($100,000 in 2018). ⁶

Editorial Staff

Yuval Levin is the founder and editor of National Affairs and the director of Social, Cultural, and Constitutional Studies at the American Enterprise Institute. Levin is a senior editor at The New Atlantis, a contributing editor at National Review, and a contributing opinion writer at the New York Times. ⁷

Christina Kopp is the managing editor of National Affairs. Kopp formerly worked as an editorial manager at the R Street Institute, copy editor at the Institute for Justice, and a legal affairs fellow at the Committee for Justice. ⁸

Daniel Wiser, Jr. is the associate editor of National Affairs and a former reporter for the Washington Free Beacon. ⁹

Publication Committee

James W. Ceaser is the director of the Program for Constitutionalism and Democracy at the University of Virginia and a former senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. ¹⁰

Eric Cohen is the executive director of the Tikvah Fund and the founder and editor-at-large of The New Atlantis. Cohen sits on the boards of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the Witherspoon Institute. ¹¹

John J. DiIulio Jr. is the Frederic Fox Leadership Professor of Politics, Religion, and Civil Society at the University of Pennsylvania. DiIulio formerly worked as the director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives during the George W. Bush and Obama administrations. ¹²

Nicholas Eberstadt is the Henry Wendt Chair in Political Economy at the American Enterprise Institute. ¹³

Robert P. George is the director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. George formerly sat as the chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom is a former presidential appointee of both the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and the President’s Council on Bioethics. ¹⁴

Michael W. Grebe is a former president and CEO of the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, a former director of the Hoover Institution, and a former board chair of the Philanthropy Roundtable .¹⁵

Roger Hertog is president of the Hertog Foundation. Hertog is a former chair of the Tikvah Fund and the Manhattan Institute, and formerly sat on the boards of the American Enterprise Institute, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, and the Washington Institute for Near-East Policy. ¹⁶

Kay Hymowitz is the William E. Simon Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. ¹⁷

Leon R. Kass is a senior fellow emeritus at the American Enterprise Institute. Kass is a former vice chair and research committee chair at the National Council on the Humanities, former chair of the President’s Council on Bioethics, and former advisory board member of the National Endowment for the Humanities. ¹⁸

Bruce Kovner is the chair of the Kovner Foundation and a former chair of the board of the American Enterprise Institute. Kovner’s philanthropy supports organizations such as the Institute for Justice, the Innocence Project, and Lambda Legal. ¹⁹

William Kristol is the editor-at-large of The Bulwark and a founder of The Weekly Standard. Kristol formerly led the Project for the Republican Future. ²⁰

Jay Lefkowitz is a partner at Kirkland & Ellis LLP and an adjunct professor at Columbia Law School. Lefkowitz formerly worked as a senior White House advisor to both George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, and as U.S. Special Envoy on Human Rights in North Korea. ²¹

Lawrence Lindsey is a former assistant to the President and director of the White House National Economic Council, a former governor of the Federal Reserve System, and a former Arthur F. Burns Chair for Economic Research at the American Enterprise Institute. ²²

Wilfred M. McClay is a senior fellow at the Trinity Forum, a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and a Society of Scholars fellow at the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University. McClay sits on the board of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and is a former president of the Philadelphia Society. ²³

James Piereson is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and the president of the William E. Simon Foundation. Piereson is a former executive director and trustee of the John M. Olin Foundation. Piereson sits on the boards of the Pinkerton Foundation, the Thomas W. Smith Foundation, the Center for Individual Rights, the Philanthropy Roundtable, the Foundation for Cultural Review, the American Spectator Foundation, the Hoover Institution, and DonorsTrust. ²⁴

Diana Schaub is a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. ²⁵

Irwin M. Stelzer is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, an U.S. economic and business columnist for The Sunday Times in London, and a member of the advisory board of the American Antitrust Institute. Stelzer formerly worked as director of regulatory policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. ²⁶

Tevi Troy is a presidential historian, an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute, and a senior fellow at the Potomac Institute. Troy sits on the board of fellows at the Jewish Policy Center and is a member of the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense. ²⁷

Other members of the Publication Committee include Gerard Alexander and Tad Smith. ¹