Madeleine K. Albright is Chair of Albright Stonebridge Group, Chair of Albright Capital Management, an affiliated investment advisory firm focused on emerging markets, and member of the Atlantic Council’s Board of Directors.

She was the sixty-fourth Secretary of State of the United States. In 2012, Albright received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, from President Obama.

In 1997, Albright was named the first female Secretary of State and became, at that time, the highest ranking woman in the history of the US government. As Secretary of State, Albright reinforced America’s alliances, advocated for democracy and human rights, and promoted American trade, business, labor, and environmental standards abroad. From 1993 to 1997, Albright served as the US Permanent Representative to the United Nations and was a member of the President’s Cabinet.

Prior to her service in the Clinton Administration, she served as President of the Center for National Policy; was a member of President Jimmy Carter’s National Security Council and White House staff; and served as Chief Legislative Assistant to US Senator Edmund Muskie.

Albright received a bachelor’s with honors from Wellesley College, and master’s and doctorate degrees from Columbia University’s Department of Public Law and Government, as well as a certificate from its Russian Institute.

Stephen J. Hadley is a Founding Partner of Rice Hadley Gates LLC and serves as Board Director for the Atlantic Council. He completed four years as the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs on January 20, 2009. In that capacity, he was the principal White House foreign policy adviser to then President George W. Bush, directed the National Security Council staff, and ran the interagency national security policy development and execution process.

From January 20, 2001, to January 20, 2005, Hadley was the Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor, serving under then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice. In addition to covering the full range of national security issues, he had special responsibilities in several specific areas including US relations with Russia, the Israeli disengagement from Gaza, developing a strategic relationship with India, and ballistic missile defense. From 1993 to 2001, Hadley was both a Partner in the Washington, DC law firm of Shea & Gardner and a Principal in the Scowcroft Group. From 1989 to 1993, Hadley served as the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy under then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney. Hadley represented the Defense Department on arms control matters, including negotiations with the Soviet Union and then Russia, on matters involving NATO and Western Europe, on ballistic missile defense, and on export and technology control matters.

Hadley graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Cornell University in 1969. In 1972, he received his juris doctor degree from Yale Law School, where he was Note and Comment Editor of the Yale Law Journal.