Brzezinski, Zbigniew, 1928-2017

Zbigniew Kazimierz Brzezinski was born on March 28, 1928 in Warsaw, Poland. His father was Polish consul-general in Montreal during World War II. After the communists seized control of the Polish government in 1945, his family remained in Canada. He received a B.A. and M.A. from McGill University in 1949 and 1950, and a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1953. He remained at Harvard, first as a research fellow at the Russian Research Center, 1953 to 1956, and then as assistant professor of government, 1956 to 1960. He became a naturalized American citizen in 1958. In 1960 Brzezinski moved to Columbia University, where he was an associate professor of public law and government, and a member of the faculty of the Research Institute in Communist Affairs, 1960 to 1962. He was promoted to full professor in 1962, and became director of the Research Institute in Communist Affairs (later the Research Institute on International Change), serving with both until 1977. Brzezinski was a member of the Joint Committee on Contemporary China of the Social Science Research Council, from 1961 to 1962. In 1964 he was a member of the steering committee of Young Citizens for Johnson, and from 1966 to 1968 he was a member of the Department of State's Policy Planning Council. In 1973 he became director of the Trilateral Commission and recruited the generally unknown governor of Georgia, Jimmy Carter for membership. He served as director until 1976, when he became Carter's principal adviser on foreign policy issues during the 1976 presidential campaign. He served as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs in the Carter White House from 1977 to 1981, and an official of the National Security Council from 1977 to 1981. After the Carter presidency, Brzezinski served as a consultant to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in 1981, and returned to teaching at Columbia, 1981 to 1989. In 1989 he was a professor at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, and was a member of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board from 1987 to 1991. He wrote a number of books on international affairs, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1981 and The Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest civilian decoration, in 1995.

From the description of Brzezinski, Zbigniew K., 1928- (U.S. National Archives and Records Administration). naId: 10581849

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