Secretary of State

Institutional context

Rice is the second woman to serve as US Secretary of State, after Madeleine Albright. She is recorded in the dataset as part of the post-Albright continuity at the department — the period during which State became the first US Cabinet department to host successive female holders.

Career path

Rice earned a BA from the University of Denver, an MA from Notre Dame, and a PhD from the Graduate School of International Studies in Denver in Soviet and Eastern European studies. She joined the Stanford political-science faculty and served as Stanford's provost from 1993 to 1999. In the George H. W. Bush administration she served on the National Security Council staff as a Soviet specialist. She was National Security Advisor in George W. Bush's first term, from 2001 to 2005.

Appointment

President Bush nominated her as Secretary of State in November 2004; the Senate confirmed her on 26 January 2005 by 85–13. She succeeded Colin Powell and served the entirety of Bush's second term, departing on 20 January 2009.

Tenure

Four years. Her tenure included the Iraq surge, six-party talks with North Korea, the 2008 Russo-Georgian War, and the Israeli–Palestinian Annapolis Conference.

Cluster context

Rice's 2005 appointment is in the dataset's slow-rise middle period and is principally significant as a continuity event — the first time a US Cabinet department had two consecutive women in the senior role with no male holder between them. The first-woman event at the institution is Albright; Rice's appointment marks the institution's transition out of a "first" framing into an ongoing presence.

Sources

• US Department of State — Former Secretaries
• Hoover Institution — Rice biographical entry