Iran's Long Reach
Iran as a Pivotal State in the Muslim World
October 2008
As the third book in the series from the Institute’s Muslim World Initiative on pivotal states in the Muslim world, this lucid and timely volume sheds much-needed light on Iran’s strikingly complex political system and foreign policy and its central role in the region.
“Suzanne Maloney has written an insightful and sober analysis of Iran as a ‘pivotal state’ that poses a major strategic challenge to its neighbors and to the security interests of the United States. She captures the external factors that have increased Iranian influence in recent years and the internal contradictions that could dramatically alter Iran’s path. She has also suggested sensible ways to engage a country that will remain pivotal for the foreseeable future because of its location, resources, and revolutionary ideology. Iran’s Long Reach is a valuable addition to current scholarship on Iran.”
—Barbara Slavin, author of Bitter Friends, Bosom Enemies: Iran, the U.S. and the Twisted Path to Confrontation
Suzanne Maloney
Suzanne Maloney is the vice president and director of the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution, where her research focuses on Iran and Persian Gulf energy. Before becoming interim vice president and director in 2020, she served as the deputy director for Foreign Policy for five years. Her books include the 2008 monograph "Iran's Long Reach" (United States Institute of Peace, 2008) as well as "Iran's Political Economy since the Revolution," published in August 2015 by Cambridge University Press. Her Brookings Essay, "Iran Surprises Itself And The World," was released in September 2013, and she has also published articles in a variety of academic and policy journals.
Maloney previously served as an external advisor to senior State Department officials on long-term issues related to Iran. Before joining Brookings, she served on the secretary of state's policy planning staff, as Middle East advisor for ExxonMobil Corporation, and director of the 2004 Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on U.S. policy toward Iran, chaired by former National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and Defense Secretary Robert Gates.
She holds a doctorate from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.