Thierry de Montbrial is the chairman of the French Institute of International Relations, which he founded in 1979. He is an emeritus professor at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts. In 2008, he launched the World Policy Conference. He has been a member of the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences of the Institute of France since 1992 and an associate member of numerous foreign academies. 

Thierry de Montbrial headed the Department of Economics at the École Polytechnique from 1974 to 1992. He was the first president of the Foundation for Strategic Research (1993-2001). He established the Center for Analysis and Forecasting (currently the Center for Strategic Analysis and Forecasting) at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and was its first director (1973-1979). 

He is the author of more than twenty books, some of which have been translated into several languages. The latest published in France is “Vivre le temps des troubles,” Albin Michel, 2017, (“Living in Troubled Times. A New Political Era,” 2018). 

He is a Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor, a Grand Officer of the National Order of Merit, and holds numerous other French and foreign decorations. 

Thierry de Montbrial is a former student of the École Polytechnique, holds a doctorate in mathematical economics from the University of Berkeley (California), and is a former general engineer in the Corps des Mines.