Philip Zelikow

White Burkett Miller Emeritus Professor of History

Fast Facts

Former Miller Center director
Executive Director, 9/11 Commission
Elected member, American Academy of Diplomacy
Expertise in American foreign policy, military history, European military history, Cuban missile crisis

Areas Of Expertise

Foreign Affairs
American Defense and Security
War and Terrorism
Domestic Affairs
Governance
Congress
Leadership
Politics
The Presidency

Philip Zelikow is the White Burkett Miller Emeritus Professor of History at the University of Virginia, where he has also served as dean of the Graduate School and director of the Miller Center. His scholarly work has focused on critical episodes in American and world history.

He was a trial and appellate lawyer and then a career diplomat before taking academic positions at Harvard, then Virginia. Before and during his academic career, he has served at all levels of American government. His federal service during five administrations has included positions in the White House, State Department, and the Pentagon. His last full-time government position was as the counselor of the Department of State, a deputy to Secretary Condoleezza Rice.

He directed a small and short-lived federal agency, the 9/11 Commission. He also directed an earlier bipartisan commission on election reform, chaired by former Presidents Carter and Ford, that led to successful passage of the Help America Vote Act of 2002. More recently he was managing director of “Rework America,” a landmark project on American economic opportunity in the digital age, organized by the Markle Foundation.

He is one of the few individuals ever to serve on the President’s Intelligence Advisory Boards for presidents of both parties, in the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He has also been a member of the Defense Policy Board for Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and a member of the board of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. In 2020, he was elected a member of the American Academy of Diplomacy.

Philip Zelikow News Feed

Two decades after 9/11 inquiry, a similar plan for Covid stalls in Congress

"Partisan pressures almost tore apart our commission,” said Philip D. Zelikow, a former government official and White Burkett Miller Professor at the University of Virginia's Miller Center, who was the executive director of the Sept. 11 panel. The problem is even worse today, he said.

Philip Zelikow New York Times

Diplomacy, military power combined to settle superpower dispute over missiles in Cuba

“We’re in another crisis that could escalate to a nuclear war that involves the United States and a government in Moscow,” said Philip Zelikow, the White Burkett Miller Professor of History at the University of Virginia. “Those points aside, I don’t think the crises are very much alike.”

Philip Zelikow UVA Today

Lessons from the pandemic: the need for a national COVID commission

In the final episode of a series of video interviews on lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic, Brink Lindsey speaks with diplomat, historian, and University of Virginia's Miller Center former director Philip Zelikow.

Philip Zelikow Niskanen Center