Jeane Kirkpatrick

Jeane Kirkpatrick
Born	Jeane Duane Jordan 19 11, 1926
Birthplace	Duncan, Oklahoma, U.S.
Died	Template:Death date and age Bethesda, Maryland, U.S.
Nationality	American
Occupation	Diplomat, political scientist, academic
Known for	First woman to serve as United States Ambassador to the United Nations; the Kirkpatrick Doctrine
Education	Columbia University (BA, MA, PhD)
Spouse(s)	Evron Kirkpatrick
Children	3
Awards	Presidential Medal of Freedom

Jeane Duane Kirkpatrick (née Jordan; November 19, 1926 – December 7, 2006) was an American diplomat, political scientist, and foreign policy intellectual who served as the United States Ambassador to the United Nations from 1981 to 1985 under President Ronald Reagan. She was the first woman to hold that position. A former Democrat who identified with the anticommunist wing of the party, Kirkpatrick became one of the central figures of the neoconservative movement in American politics and formally joined the Republican Party in 1985. She is perhaps best remembered for the "Kirkpatrick Doctrine," articulated in her influential 1979 essay "Dictatorships and Double Standards," which drew a distinction between authoritarian and totalitarian regimes and argued that the United States should be willing to support authoritarian governments aligned with American strategic interests against communist expansion. Beyond her government service, Kirkpatrick was a prolific academic and author whose scholarship on women in politics, political parties, and American foreign policy left a lasting mark on both the academy and the policy world. She served on Reagan's cabinet-level National Security Council, the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, and the Defense Policy Review Board, and after leaving government she wrote a syndicated newspaper column and remained an influential voice in foreign affairs until her death in 2006.

Early Life

Jeane Duane Jordan was born on November 19, 1926, in Duncan, Oklahoma, a small city in the southern part of the state. She grew up in a middle-class family in Oklahoma during the Depression era. Her father was an oil field wildcatter, and the family experienced the economic instability common to families dependent on the boom-and-bust cycles of the petroleum industry in the Southwest.

From an early age, Kirkpatrick demonstrated intellectual curiosity and a strong interest in politics and ideas. She came of age during World War II and the early Cold War, a formative period that shaped her lifelong preoccupation with questions of democracy, totalitarianism, and American power. As a young woman, she briefly identified with socialist politics, affiliating with the Socialist Party of America from 1945 to 1948, before moving to the Democratic Party, where she would remain for nearly four decades. This early flirtation with the left, followed by a gradual move rightward over the course of her career, placed Kirkpatrick squarely within the trajectory of many neoconservative intellectuals of her generation who began on the political left and migrated to the right in response to what they perceived as the Democratic Party's drift toward accommodation with the Soviet Union and a weakening of American resolve abroad.

Her Oklahoma roots remained an important part of her identity throughout her life. She has been recognized as one of the state's most prominent figures, particularly for women, and her trajectory from a small Oklahoma town to the highest levels of American diplomacy has been cited as an example of achievement against the expectations of the era.

Education

Kirkpatrick began her undergraduate education at Barnard College in New York City before transferring to and completing her Bachelor of Arts degree at Columbia University. She continued her graduate studies at Columbia, earning both a Master of Arts and a PhD in political science. Her doctoral work focused on comparative politics, particularly the politics of authoritarian and democratic regimes, themes that would define her scholarship and her public career for decades to come.

Columbia's political science department in the postwar years was one of the premier centers of the discipline in the United States, and Kirkpatrick's training there provided her with the analytical frameworks she would later deploy in government service and in her influential writings on foreign policy. Her academic credentials distinguished her in an era when few women attained doctoral degrees in political science, and her path from graduate school to a distinguished academic career and ultimately to the highest levels of American diplomacy was unusual for a woman of her generation.

Career

Academic Career

Following the completion of her doctorate, Kirkpatrick embarked on an academic career that spanned several decades. She joined the faculty of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., where she became a professor of political science and built a reputation as a rigorous scholar of American political institutions, political participation, and comparative government.

One of her most significant scholarly works was Political Woman, published in the early 1970s. The book was a pioneering study of women's participation in American politics, examining the status of women in state legislatures and analyzing the structural, cultural, and psychological barriers that limited female political participation. Political Woman explored questions about political socialization, ambition, and the institutional obstacles women faced in seeking and holding political office. The study drew on extensive interviews and data from female state legislators across the country, and it remains a foundational text in the study of women and politics.

In addition to Political Woman, Kirkpatrick authored and edited several other books and numerous articles on American political parties, democratic theory, and foreign affairs. Her scholarship was characterized by a commitment to empirical analysis and a concern with the practical implications of political theory. Throughout the 1970s, she became increasingly involved in foreign policy debates within the Democratic Party, gravitating toward the party's anticommunist, hawkish wing.

"Dictatorships and Double Standards" and the Kirkpatrick Doctrine

Kirkpatrick's most famous intellectual contribution came in November 1979 with the publication of her essay "Dictatorships and Double Standards" in Commentary magazine. The essay articulated what would become known as the "Kirkpatrick Doctrine," a framework for American foreign policy that distinguished between authoritarian regimes and totalitarian ones. Kirkpatrick argued that traditional authoritarian governments, while repressive, were less systematically oppressive than revolutionary totalitarian regimes, particularly communist ones. She contended that authoritarian governments were more susceptible to liberalization over time and that they were more likely to be allied with American interests, whereas totalitarian regimes sought to control every aspect of society and were fundamentally hostile to the West.

In the essay, she wrote that "traditional authoritarian governments are less repressive than revolutionary autocracies," and she criticized the Carter administration's foreign policy for what she regarded as its tendency to undermine friendly authoritarian allies—such as the Shah of Iran and Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua—while failing to confront the expansion of Soviet-aligned communist regimes. The essay was a direct response to what Kirkpatrick and other neoconservatives saw as the naivety and inconsistency of the Carter administration's human rights policy.

The article attracted the attention of Ronald Reagan, then the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, and his foreign policy advisers. Reagan found Kirkpatrick's arguments compelling and consistent with his own instincts about American foreign policy. He invited her to serve as a foreign policy adviser during his 1980 presidential campaign, marking the beginning of her transition from academic life to the center of American government.

The Kirkpatrick Doctrine proved to be one of the most debated frameworks in Cold War foreign policy. Supporters argued that it provided a realistic and pragmatic basis for American engagement with the developing world, one that prioritized strategic interests and the containment of communism without the moralistic overreach that had, in their view, characterized the Carter years. Critics charged that it provided intellectual cover for American support of brutal dictatorships in Latin America, Asia, and elsewhere, and that it cynically subordinated human rights to geopolitical calculation. The doctrine's legacy continued to be debated well into the 21st century, with commentators drawing parallels between the Kirkpatrick Doctrine and subsequent American foreign policy approaches to authoritarian allies.

United States Ambassador to the United Nations

Following Reagan's election in November 1980, Kirkpatrick was appointed United States Ambassador to the United Nations, taking office on February 4, 1981. She succeeded Donald McHenry in the post and became the first woman to serve as the U.S. permanent representative to the UN. Reagan elevated the position to cabinet rank, and Kirkpatrick also served on the National Security Council, giving her a direct role in shaping administration foreign policy beyond the confines of the United Nations.

At the UN, Kirkpatrick was known for her forceful and often confrontational style. She was a vocal critic of what she regarded as the anti-American and anti-Israel biases of the United Nations General Assembly and of various UN agencies. She pushed back against resolutions she considered hostile to American interests and challenged the prevailing diplomatic culture at Turtle Bay, which she viewed as unduly influenced by the Soviet bloc and the Non-Aligned Movement. Her tenure was marked by sharp rhetorical exchanges with representatives of communist and developing nations, and she became a prominent public figure in the broader culture wars of the early 1980s.

One of the most significant foreign policy episodes during her ambassadorship was the Falklands War of 1982 between the United Kingdom and Argentina. Kirkpatrick's sympathies lay with the Argentine military junta, which she regarded as a strategic ally of the United States in the struggle against communism in Latin America. She favored maintaining close ties with Buenos Aires and was reluctant to support the British position. President Reagan, however, ultimately sided with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and the United States provided logistical and intelligence support to the British war effort. The episode highlighted tensions within the Reagan administration between those who prioritized the anticommunist alliance with Latin American military governments and those who favored solidarity with a NATO ally and fellow democracy.

Kirkpatrick also played a role in shaping American policy toward Central America during a period of intense Cold War conflict in the region. The Reagan administration supported anticommunist governments and insurgent movements in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua, and Kirkpatrick was among the administration's most outspoken advocates of these policies. In August 1981, she traveled to Santiago, Chile, to meet with the military dictator Augusto Pinochet, a visit that embodied the practical application of the Kirkpatrick Doctrine and drew criticism from human rights organizations and others who objected to American engagement with one of Latin America's most repressive regimes.

Her service at the UN was not without internal friction. Kirkpatrick reportedly experienced conflict with Secretary of State Alexander Haig and, later, George Shultz, over control of foreign policy and her access to the president. Despite these tensions, she maintained a close relationship with Reagan and remained an influential voice within the administration throughout her four-year tenure.

Kirkpatrick left the ambassadorship on April 1, 1985, and was succeeded by Vernon Walters.

Post-Government Career

After leaving the United Nations, Kirkpatrick formally switched her party affiliation from Democrat to Republican in 1985, completing a political migration that had been underway for years. She returned to Georgetown University and also became a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a prominent conservative think tank in Washington, D.C., where she continued to write and speak on foreign policy issues.

Kirkpatrick wrote a syndicated newspaper column that specialized in analysis of United Nations activities and broader foreign policy questions. She remained an active participant in Republican Party politics and conservative intellectual circles, and she served on a number of government advisory bodies, including the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, the Defense Policy Review Board, and the Secretary of Defense Commission on Fail Safe and Risk Reduction of the Nuclear Command and Control System.

She also continued her academic work and public speaking, and she was a regular presence at conservative conferences and forums. Kirkpatrick was considered a potential candidate for higher office on several occasions, and her name was mentioned in connection with the vice-presidential nomination in 1984 and with the presidential race in subsequent years, though she never sought elected office.

The Council on Foreign Relations later established the Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Chair in National Security Studies, reflecting her lasting influence on the field of national security policy and international affairs.

Personal Life

Jeane Jordan married Evron Kirkpatrick, a political scientist and longtime executive director of the American Political Science Association, in 1955. Evron Kirkpatrick was himself a significant figure in American political science, and the couple shared a deep engagement with the intellectual and policy worlds of Washington, D.C. They had three sons together.

Evron Kirkpatrick died in 1995. Jeane Kirkpatrick continued her professional activities in the years following his death, remaining active in public life well into her late seventies.

Jeane Kirkpatrick died on December 7, 2006, at her home in Bethesda, Maryland. She was 80 years old. The cause of death was congestive heart failure. Her death prompted tributes from political figures across the spectrum, with particular praise from conservatives and neoconservatives who credited her with helping to reshape American foreign policy during a decisive period of the Cold War.

Recognition

Kirkpatrick received numerous honors and awards over the course of her career. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States, in recognition of her contributions to American foreign policy and public life.

The Anti-Defamation League honored Kirkpatrick for her work at the United Nations, recognizing her efforts to combat anti-Israel bias within the organization.

The Universidad Francisco Marroquín in Guatemala conferred an honorary doctoral degree on Kirkpatrick, recognizing her scholarship and her advocacy for democratic governance and free markets in the developing world.

The Council on Foreign Relations named a chair in national security studies after her, the Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Chair in National Security Studies, a tribute to her intellectual contributions to the field.

Kirkpatrick's role as the first female United States Ambassador to the United Nations has been recognized as a milestone in the history of American women in government and diplomacy. Her career has been cited as an example for women in international affairs and public service.

Legacy

Jeane Kirkpatrick's legacy is defined by her role in shaping American foreign policy during the final decade of the Cold War and by her intellectual contributions to the neoconservative movement. The Kirkpatrick Doctrine, with its distinction between authoritarian and totalitarian regimes and its emphasis on pragmatic engagement with anticommunist allies, became one of the defining frameworks of Reagan-era foreign policy. It influenced American decisions regarding support for governments and movements in Latin America, the Middle East, and elsewhere, and its reverberations continued to be felt in policy debates decades after its articulation.

Commentators and scholars have continued to invoke Kirkpatrick's ideas in analyzing subsequent American foreign policy decisions, particularly regarding American relationships with authoritarian partners. In the 2020s, analysts drew parallels between the Kirkpatrick Doctrine and American policies toward authoritarian governments in Latin America and elsewhere, demonstrating the enduring relevance—and enduring controversy—of her ideas.

As a scholar, Kirkpatrick's early work on women in politics, particularly Political Woman, contributed to the development of the academic study of gender and political participation. Her research documented the barriers women faced in American political life at a time when such scholarship was in its infancy, and the book has been recognized as a foundational contribution to the field.

Kirkpatrick's career also represents a significant chapter in the history of American women in government. As the first woman to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and as a cabinet-level participant in the Reagan administration's national security deliberations, she broke barriers in a realm that had been overwhelmingly dominated by men. Her Oklahoma origins and her rise through the academic world to the highest levels of American diplomacy have been cited as emblematic of the possibilities available to American women in the latter half of the twentieth century, even as her political positions remained subjects of intense debate.

The New York Times described Kirkpatrick as "a beacon of neoconservative thought" who "helped chart foreign policy from 1981 to 1985," a characterization that captures both the influence and the polarizing nature of her career.