Tag: Rory Stewart

Roderick James Nugent Stewart (born 3 January 1973) is a British academic, broadcaster, writer, and former diplomat and politician. He served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Penrith and The Border between 2010 and 2019, representing the Conservative Party. Stewart served in the UK Government as Minister of State for Environment (2015–16), International Development (2015–16), Africa (2016–18) and Prisons (2018–19) and then as Secretary of State for International Development (2019). In 2019, Stewart stood for Leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister following the resignation of Theresa May. Since 2022, Stewart has co-hosted The Rest Is Politics podcast with Alastair Campbell, the inaugural Prime Minister's Official Spokesperson under Tony Blair.

Born in Hong Kong, Stewart was educated at the Dragon School, Eton College, and the University of Oxford as an undergraduate student of Balliol College, Oxford. Stewart worked for Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service as a diplomat in Indonesia and as British Representative to Montenegro. He left the diplomatic service to undertake a two-year walk across Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, India, and Nepal. He later wrote a best-selling book, The Places in Between, about his experiences. He subsequently served as Deputy Governor in Maysan and Dhi Qar for the Coalition Provisional Authority following the 2003 invasion of Iraq and wrote a second book covering this period, Occupational Hazards or The Prince of the Marshes. In 2005, he moved to Kabul to establish and run the Turquoise Mountain Foundation. He was the Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights and the director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard University from 2008 to 2010.

In 2010, Stewart was elected to the House of Commons and in 2014 was elected chair of the Defence Select Committee. He served under David Cameron as Minister for the Environment from 2015 to 2016. He was a minister throughout Theresa May's government: as Minister of State for International Development, Minister of State for Africa, and Minister of State for Prisons. He ultimately joined the Cabinet and National Security Council as Secretary of State for International Development.

After May resigned, Stewart stood as a candidate to be Leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in the 2019 leadership contest. His campaign was defined by his unorthodox use of social media and opposition to a no-deal Brexit. He stated at the beginning of his campaign that he would not serve under Boris Johnson. When Johnson became prime minister in July 2019, Stewart resigned from the cabinet.

On 3 September 2019, Stewart had the Conservative Whip removed after voting to back a motion paving the way for a law seeking to delay the UK's exit date from the European Union. On 3 October 2019, Stewart announced he had resigned from the Conservative Party and that he would stand down as an MP at the 2019 general election. He initially announced that he would stand as an independent candidate in the London mayoral election but withdrew on 6 May 2020 on the grounds of the election being postponed a year to 2021 on account of the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023 his book, Politics on the Edge, was published by Jonathan Cape.

Stewart was the president of GiveDirectly from 2022 to 2023 and was a visiting fellow at Yale Jackson from 2020 to 2022, teaching politics and international relations. In March 2022, Stewart and Alastair Campbell launched The Rest Is Politics podcast. He is the Brady-Johnson Professor of the Practice of Grand Strategy at Yale University's Jackson School of Global Affairs.