vailsymposium

Melanie Kirkpatrick is a writer-journalist based in Connecticut and a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. She contributes reviews and commentary to various publications including the opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal, for which she worked for 30 years. She is the author of two books: “Thanksgiving: The Holiday at the Heart of the American Experience” (2016) and “Escape from North Korea: The Untold Story of Asia’s Underground Railroad” (2012).

At The Wall Street Journal, Kirkpatrick was a longtime member of the editorial board and deputy editor of the editorial pages. Her responsibilities over the years included writing editorials, overseeing the opinion pages of the paper’s foreign editions, and serving as op-ed editor. In addition, Kirkpatrick was a co-editor of the Journal’s series, Whitewater, a six-volume collection of Journal commentary during the Bill Clinton Administration. She was also co-editor of several editions of the Index of Economic Freedom, published annually by the Journal and the Heritage Foundation.

Kirkpatrick is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations; a trustee emerita of Princeton in Asia, an internship program in Asia for young graduates of American universities; a member of the advisory board of the Human Freedom Program of the George W. Bush Institute in Dallas; a member of the Trollope Society and a director of the America for Bulgaria Foundation.