Penelope Naas To Lead GMF Allied Strategic Competitiveness Initiative
Washington, DC – The German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF) is proud to announce that Penelope Naas will lead a new initiative focused on Allied Strategic Competitiveness. The program will showcase the ability of Europe, the United States, and their allies to compete in a rapidly shifting global economic environment. Naas is a global public policy leader with extensive experience in designing strategies on international economic issues at the nexus of geopolitics, trade, and the environment.
Economic tools—taxes, trade, tariffs, and economic security instruments that aim to prevent critical and sensitive technologies from reaching hostile governments —are becoming preferred tools in geopolitical and security policy, ones that impact individual and collective prosperity in democracies. The initiative will explore the intersecting priorities of competitiveness, security, and resilience as the global order is reshaped by geopolitics, digitalization, and energy transformation.
The Allied Strategic Competitiveness initiative will harness GMF's extensive research, networks, and convening capacity, to provide practical policy recommendations for updating transatlantic economic rules and practices. “Alliances matter and strengthen citizen’s prosperity and security,” said Naas. “Promoting and improving our competitiveness, partnering with allies on innovative and critical technologies, and protecting allied economic advances are needed now more than ever. The Allied Strategic Competitiveness initiative seeks to make strategic competitiveness the backbone of the transatlantic economic strategy.”
Naas has created innovative regulatory policy, trade, climate change, and digitalization strategies and solutions for Citigroup, UPS, and the US government. She holds a bachelor's degree in economics and a master's degree in public policy from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She has co-chaired the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Trade and Investment and serves on several boards.
“Europe and the United States face mounting challenges to their global competitive advantage as economic landscapes rapidly evolve. Ensuring we remain competitive is key to our collective security and prosperity”, said Dr. Alexandra de Hoop Scheffer, acting president of GMF. "GMF is confident that the Allied Strategic Competitiveness initiative, led by Penny Naas, will play a pivotal role in crafting the future of transatlantic economic strategy and ensuring the competitiveness of allied democracies in the 21st century.”