Engaging Africa in the Era of America First
Location
Fairhaven Auditorium
(FA 300)
The current U.S. administration has challenged the paradigm that governed decades of American foreign policy, dismissing the importance of traditional alliances and often questioning the value of U.S. engagement beyond our borders, including assistance to the Third World. To the extent the Trump administration has an Africa policy — unclear a year into his presidency — it can best be characterized by malign neglect, with expletives substituting for engagement with a continent of 1.2 billion people. This discussion will examine the traditional pillars of U.S. policy toward sub-Saharan Africa, and suggest that promoting human rights, good governance, construction of democratic institutions, regional security and economic development are more effective in advancing American interests and putting “America First.”
Speaker Name
Date
Quarter
Speaker Bio
Terence McCulley is a retired American diplomat, with more than three decades of experience in Africa. He served as U.S. Ambassador to Mali, Nigeria, and Côte d’Ivoire, and in senior roles at U.S. Embassies in Togo, Senegal, Tunisia and Denmark. Ambassador McCulley worked on Central African affairs during the Rwanda genocide. In 2016 and 2017, he was the Senior Advisor for Africa at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations in New York.
Ambassador McCulley was born in Oregon, and he is a graduate of the University of Oregon in Eugene. As a Rotary Foundation Graduate Fellow, he studied political science at the Université de Haute Bretagne in Rennes, France, and attended the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He is fluent in French.