Hi, everybody. I’m Judah Grunstein, WPR’s editor-in-chief—but today will be the last time I’ll be able to write that.
That’s because starting Monday, I’ll be passing the baton to Elliot Waldman, who will be directing WPR’s coverage of global affairs as our new editor-in-chief from here on out. I’ll still be around to help out, but Elliot will be in charge of our day-to-day editorial operations, while I take a step back to manage some special projects.
Many of you might remember Elliot from the time he spent with WPR in the past. He began in 2018 as an associate editor, went on to host our podcast and manage our briefings channel, and left in 2021 as our managing editor. He’s a sharp and discerning observer of international politics, with particular expertise on Japan—where he grew up—and East Asia, but also a keen understanding of all the major trends and developments driving global affairs more broadly. Most importantly, his deep curiosity and critical nature make him a great fit for WPR’s mission of identifying important stories but also challenging conventional wisdoms and complacent thinking.
Next week will also be the last we’ll have Jakob Cansler with us. Jakob started in 2022 as our production associate, responsible for preparing our articles for publication and managing our newsletters and social media accounts. Since then, he has progressively taken on more and more responsibility, starting with working up the Daily Review each day, then moving on to writing about culture and international politics for the site, and finally editing articles as our assistant editor. In that time, he has become an indispensable part of the team. He’ll be heading off later this summer to Leiden University in the Netherlands, where he’ll be pursuing a master’s degree in international relations focusing on culture and politics. He’ll be sorely missed, and although he has no need of it, we wish him the best of luck.
Although I won’t be going anywhere, next week marks a transition that understandably makes me reflect back on the past 17 years I’ve spent managing WPR’s editorial content. When I began in the fall of 2008, the U.S. and the world were awaiting the start of Barack Obama’s presidency. For those—like us here at WPR—who believed that the liberal international order’s rules should apply to all nations, and that U.S. global leadership depends not only on championing and backstopping that order but on abiding by it, the preceding eight years had been bracing. Obama’s rhetoric of repairing the damage to Washington’s global image and renewing U.S. leadership by inviting the rising powers and emerging economies into a reimagined multilateralism inspired optimism and hope.
Looking back from our current vantage point, that seems painfully naïve. On practically every measure, the world today is more fractured and more conflictive than it was back then. And yet, it is also more prosperous. Similarly, the global order is more competitive and contested, but that hasn’t prevented us from making enormous progress on decarbonizing our economies as well as breakthrough advances on tackling diseases. Of course, that co-existence of the best and worst of our natures is a feature, not a bug, of human history. That’s why the most important time to recommit to our ideals is when it seems that collectively we find ourselves furthest from them. That is our deep-rooted belief here at WPR with regard to the principles of multilateralism and liberal internationalism today, without blinding ourselves to the fact that the world we live in will always be shaped by competition whose outcome is determined by the realities of power.
Since its origins as an online media start-up in 2006, WPR has grown into a well-respected resource for international affairs. Our institutional subscribers now include foreign and defense ministries, government agencies, international organizations, and leading think tanks and universities in the U.S. and worldwide. Our individual readers are similarly well-informed about global affairs, and many work in foreign policy themselves, whether as policymakers, analysts, academics or at NGOs. With our sister site, the GlobalPost newsletter, we are also now part of GlobalPost Media, with exciting plans for further growth ahead.
Through all of the past 17 years in which I have been a part of WPR’s evolution, my work has been dedicated to keeping abreast of the important events and developments of the day that cumulatively shaped our world, in order to help you, our readers, make sense of them as well. And over the weeks, months, years and closing in on two decades since then, we have spotted and passed along most of the most important ones.
And yet, it is still hard for me to avoid a sense of astonishment at where we find ourselves today—as if, having put all the pieces together, they just don’t add up to a coherent whole. After all this time of short-cycle deadlines, I’ll be taking advantage of my lighter duties at WPR to do some deeper and slower thinking about that, with the goal of a book-length work to come.
But for me, that sense of astonishment is also a sign that it’s time to pass the baton here at WPR to someone with fresher legs. As I do so, I’d like to thank all of WPR’s great contributors from whom I’ve learned so much over all these years, and all the talented editors who have helped us bring you the quality content we aspire to in that time. I’d also like to express my gratitude to Hampton Stephens, our publisher, for the trust he’s shown in me, and to you, our readers, for the trust you’ve shown in WPR.
You’ll be in great hands with Elliot moving forward!