Bruce Chapman

Founder and Chairman of the Board of Discovery Institute

Bruce Kerry Chapman is an author and former elected and appointed official who serves as Chairman of the Board of Discovery Institute, a public policy think tank he founded in Seattle in 1990/91. He also is a fellow in the institute’s Chapman Center on Citizen Leadership. In 2018, Mr. Chapman’s latest book appeared, entitled, Politicians: The Worst Kind of People to Run the Government, Except for All the Others. It critiques the growing power of “middlemen” in politics — bureaucracy, media, academics and special interests — and the loss of responsibility by the people’s elected representatives.

Born in Evanston, Illinois (December 1, 1940), Mr. Chapman attended public schools in Monmouth, Illinois and was graduated from Harvard College, with honors, in 1962.  At Harvard, he and George Gilder started a magazine, later moved to Washington, DC, called Advance:  A Journal of Republican Thought. In 1965/66 Mr. Chapman was an editorial writer at The New York Herald Tribune, writing on politics and the military draft. He authored (with George Gilder) The Party That Lost its Head (published 1966), an indictment of the 1964 Goldwater campaign’s abandonment of the civil rights issue and a call for “conservative answers” to public problems, rather than mere opposition to liberal policies.

Mr. Chapman’s book, The Wrong Man in Uniform, (1967), and its paperback successor (Our Unfair and Obsolete Draft), made a popular and influential case against conscription and for an all-volunteer military. In 1969, he authored the report of the Washington State Commission on the Causes and Prevention of Civil Disorders.

Mr. Chapman was an elected member of the Seattle City Council (1971-75), innovating on historic preservation and championing parks development.  As Secretary of State of the State of Washington (1975-81) he headed the state’s Bicentennial committee, promoted the teaching of civics and wrote a statistical report comparing the 50 states. He was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor in the Republican primary of 1980. Appointed by President Reagan as Director of the U.S. Census Bureau (1981-83), he later served on the White House Staff as Deputy Assistant to the President (1983-85), where, among other things, he promoted family policy initiatives. In 1985 he was nominated and confirmed as U. S. Ambassador to the United Nations Organizations in Vienna, where he served until 1988. He was a Hudson Institute fellow in 1989/90 in Indianapolis, before founding Discovery Institute in Seattle.

Mr. Chapman and his wife, Sarah, live in Seattle, where their two grown sons and their families also reside.

Archives

Left-Wing Activists Have Made Homelessness a Political Business

Scott Walter and Bruce Chapman
November 4, 2025
Moves by President Trump to crack down on cities drowning in crime and public disorder are long overdue. For years, liberal jurisdictions have let chaos run wild, with banners calling for defunding the police waving high, antisemitism parading through public parks and drug use running rampant. As Uncle Sam works to reclaim the streets, another battle is taking place elsewhere. The same left-wing groups whose antics helped drive urban disorder have also infiltrated the sprawling network of nonprofits that are supposedly addressing the homelessness crisis. Newsflash: The groups are collecting billions of dollars to support politics over people and smart reform. According to new research — the result of collaboration between the Capital Research Center and the Discovery Institute …

Report To Reveal Infiltration of Homelessness Movement

Bruce Chapman
October 7, 2025
***UPDATE 10/9/2025*** Capital Research Center’s report, “Infiltrated: The Ideological Capture of Homelessness Advocacy,” is out now! Read “Infiltrated” Here You see a man in a shop doorway shooting up. A block away a man outside a tent bends over in the “dope fiend lean” that supposedly intensifies a “hit.” A woman is in the middle of the street nearby, swaying to and fro and shouting in distress at unseen ghosts. But there is also a rally forming two blocks north, in front of the courthouse, where black-clad, masked youth might again set a dumpster or two on fire to mark their righteous protest against one thing or another. What is going on? Seattle is not a war zone, it is true, nor is Portland or Los Angeles or …

New Report Urges Congress to Embrace Competition to Revitalize U.S. Passenger Rail

Center on Wealth & Poverty, Bruce Chapman and Ray B. Chambers
August 12, 2025
A new report from Discovery Institute outlines a bold vision for restoring America passenger rail through competition, private sector innovation, and targeted infrastructure investment. The report was written by Chapman and Ray Chambers, head of the Association for Innovative Passenger Rail Operations and a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute.

Ralph Munro Touched the Heart of the People

Bruce Chapman
March 21, 2025
Many of the accolades for Ralph Munro will describe his policy innovations as a long-time Secretary of State. Actually, a few of those innovations at the time made me uncomfortable. But, meanwhile, as the third ranking elected official in Washington State, Ralph, wrapped in his distinct position, embarked on a decades-long effort to ennoble citizen efforts to make Washington a better place and to recognize volunteer public service wherever he found it.

Campus Antisemitism Continues

Bruce Chapman
January 13, 2025
A largely failed attempt to place ads for a pro-Israel book in ten universities' student papers illustrates the double standard by which many students as well as faculty and administrators treat anti-Israel protestors, on one hand, and Israel supporters on the other. Every university approached recently by Seattle-based Discovery Institute on behalf of The Israel Test by George Gilder, a pro-Israel work published by Encounter Books, has experienced anti-Israel demonstrations. Some had riots. Yet most were treated by authorities with appeasement or even encouragement.

Israel’s Coming Attack Will Also Assist Ukraine

Bruce Chapman
October 25, 2024
The next battle in the Middle East may be played out in the skies above Iran. The outcome obviously is meant to help Israel, but may well assist Ukraine, too. If "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," Israel and Ukraine are friends already, and even quiet allies.

His Two Cents’ Worth: The Penny Is Useless

Bruce Chapman
September 10, 2024
Discovery Institute Board member Edmund Moy is quoted by The New York Times in an article entitled "America Must Free Itself from the Tyranny of the Penny," (September 1, 2024), noting that he tried, as the Director of the U.S. Mint from 2006 to 2011, to retire one of the oldest, and surely the tiniest, members of the American currency.

An Interview with George Gilder Asks, Can You Pass the Israel Test?

Bruce Chapman and George Gilder
July 29, 2024
Anti-Israel protests in universities, antisemite propaganda on social media and riots in American cities have given shocking new force to old prejudices about Jews and Israel. In The Israel Test, newly revised and republished by Encounter Books, George Gilder answers the antisemites, and explains the meaning of Israel as the most economically dynamic, democratic and pro-Western state in the Middle East — and a crucial US economic and defense ally.

Published Today: The Conservative Environmentalist

Bruce Chapman
April 16, 2024
Published today is Benji Backer's book on how government ties up sound conservation policy in red tape that immobilizes real reform. Benji is a University of Washington grad I was proud to have as a Chapman Fellow at Discovery Institute a few years back.

Myth and Reality of Israel’s Success

Bruce Chapman
October 16, 2023
Allysia Finley of the Wall Street Journal does us all a favor in her column, “Our enemies are the CEO’s…Our comrades are in Gaza,” describing the labor Union SEIU units that are seeking to portray Israel’s vital and pathfinding  economy as the product capitalism and colonialism. They get the historical facts wrong, she writes, quoting at length from George Gilder.

Myth and Reality of Israel’s Success

Bruce Chapman
October 16, 2023
Allysia Finley of the Wall Street Journal does us all a favor in her column, "Our enemies are the CEO’s…Our comrades are in Gaza," describing the labor Union SEIU units that are seeking to portray Israel’s vital and pathfinding  economy as the product capitalism and colonialism. They get the historical facts wrong, she writes, quoting at length from George Gilder.

The Story of Mental Illness in One Graph

Bruce Chapman
July 18, 2023
Discovery fellow Robert Marbut provides this telling graph on the correlation of falling support for psychiatric beds and the rise of the mentally ill population in prison. Deinstitutionalization since the ‘60’s went overboard and helped create the current crisis.