Shanthi Kalathil | |
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![]() Official portrait, 2021 | |
Nationality | American |
Education | University of California, Berkeley (BA), London School of Economics (MSc) |
Occupation(s) | Foreign policy analyst, human rights advocate, former journalist |
Employer | University of Southern California |
Board member of | National Democratic Institute, Radio Free Asia |
Spouse | Jon Wolfsthal |
Shanthi Kalathil (born in 1972)[1] is an American foreign policy analyst, international affairs practitioner, human rights advocate, and former journalist, currently serving as a Washington D.C.-based senior fellow at the University of Southern California (USC)'s Center on Communication Leadership and Policy. She was formerly Deputy Assistant to the President and Coordinator for Democracy and Human Rights at the White House National Security Council during the Biden Administration.
Kalathil holds a B.A. in communications from the University of California, Berkeley and a M.Sc. in comparative politics from the London School of Economics and Political Science.[2][3]
In the late 1990s, Kalathil was a staff reporter for the Wall Street Journal Asia, based in Hong Kong. She joined the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace as an associate in 2000. Her research focused on the role of information and technology in international affairs.[4]
From 2004 to 2006, Kalathil was a senior democracy fellow at the US Agency for International Development (USAID).[5] She also worked for the World Bank as a consultant on media and development.[3]
Kalathil joined the NSC in January 2021 as Deputy Assistant to the President and Coordinator for Democracy and Human Rights after serving as Senior Director at the National Endowment for Democracy's International Forum for Democratic Studies. During her tenure, she was the lead organizer of the inaugural Summit for Democracy.[6] In February 2022, she left the NSC. She started private practice before joining USC's Center on Communication Leadership and Policy as a DC-based senior fellow in April 2023, leading the expansion of the Center's portfolio on the intersections of democratic development, the information environment, and national security.[7][8]
Kalathil is a board member of the National Democratic Institute[9] and Radio Free Asia,[10] which she described as having “filled a critical role in combating Chinese disinformation and providing timely news to millions in Asia who would otherwise be in the dark."[11]
In a 2022 article for the Brown Journal of International Affairs, Kalathil wrote: "As a nation with immense information resources, the United States should be studying and perhaps copying from relevant examples, doing all it can to utilize its touted soft power. Ultimately, policymakers should bear in mind that if America does not effectively craft its image in a globalizing, information-rich world, there are others more than happy to take up the task-with the potential for significantly different results."[12]
In her testimony to a 2018 House Foreign Affairs Committee Asia Subcommittee hearing, Kalathil said China's influence operations "wield influence that chills free expression within democracies around the world" and restrain speech and political sentiment outside China through surveillance. She added that Chinese Communist Party utilized both positive and negative market incentives to bolster this influence.[13]
Kalathil was raised in the US. Her parents are of Indian and Taiwanese descent. She is married to Jon Wolfsthal.[1][27]