We are immensely fortunate to have the opportunity of welcoming Dame Karen Pierce as our speaker for the return of the Somerville College Bryce Lecture.
Karen Pierce has garnered a number of impressive firsts in the course of her stellar diplomatic career. She currently serves as the first female special envoy to the Western Balkans, where she manages the UK’s strategic objectives in this sensitive region, while also serving as the first female Chair of The Ditchley Foundation. Even more notably, Pierce is the first woman to have served as UK ambassador to the US, a posting widely held to be the most prestigious in the British diplomatic service.
Karen Pierce’s tenure as ambassador to the US ran from 2020-24, during which time she represented UK interests under both the Trump and Biden administrations. She is widely held to have been a roaring success within DC circles: a thoroughly good egg who improved relations between Starmer and Trump, and advocated for UK business and cultural interests while retaining her unapologetic penchant for brightly coloured suits, kitten heels and glittering headbands.
Prior to arriving in Washington DC, Karen Pierce was the United Kingdom’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York (2018-20). Before that, Karen held multiple, multilateral roles within the FCO, including Director of South Asia and Afghanistan Unit and Director General for Political Affairs. From 2015-16, she was the UK’s Ambassador to Afghanistan.
The Bryce Lecture commemorates the legacy of the British academic, jurist, historian, and Liberal politician James Bryce, First Viscount Bryce (1838-1922). Bryce had strong connections to Oxford, having been a fellow of Oriel and serving as Regius Professor of Civil Law from 1870-93. He also shares the distinction with Dame Karen of having served as ambassador to the United States, and his tenure from 1907-1913 is acclaimed for having strengthened the ties and friendship between the two nations.