Publications
Mitch Ilbury’s published essays interrogate the philosophical foundations of strategy, leadership, and public truth. Rather than offering prescriptions, his work explores the tensions that define political and moral action—between ideals and expediency, freedom and order, narrative and reality.
Whether reflecting on the strategic necessity of dishonesty, the crisis of democratic capitalism, or the competing worldviews of Kissinger and Blair, Ilbury asks: what does it truly mean to lead in an age of uncertainty? His writing challenges readers to see beyond surface-level solutions and consider the deeper paradoxes that shape decision-making in power, politics, and public life.
Penguin Random House, 2021
Book
Do you know how to think about the future?
All our decisions are about the future, whether it’s tomorrow, next year or the next decade, yet our choices are often undermined by desires, expectations and common mental mistakes – making assumptions, worrying about things we can’t control, missing signals because we’re distracted by the noise.
But if you can learn how to think, you can learn how to look ahead.
Isaac Newton said: ‘If I have seen further than others, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.’ In Thinking the Future, Clem Sunter and Mitch Ilbury teach us the futurist’s art of decision-making by reimagining seminal concepts from some of history’s greatest thinkers. They encourage foxy, flexible mindsets and reject the popular but misleading self-help tenet that you can decide your fate through the relentless pursuit of a single goal.
An uncertain world demands a more dynamic approach. The point is not to forecast one outcome but to plot multiple scenarios of what could happen. Using scenario-planning techniques, we can all harness the power to work towards the future we want, avoid the ones we don’t, and prepare ourselves for the possible risks and opportunities no matter what transpires.
Journal Article
Leadership is not a ladder—it’s a climb.
Some scale with certainty, others cling to charisma. But the steepest sections—the crux—demand more than strength. They require judgment, balance, and the ability to read the rock.
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In this new article for Defence Strategic Communications, Mitch Ilbury explores what we can learn from two very different climbers: Tony Blair and Henry Kissinger. One leads from the limelight, the other from the shadows. One performs; the other maneuvers. Yet both show how strategy, communication, and the grip of leadership shape the world we live in.
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It’s a story of footholds, fractures, and the fog of decision-making. And why the real art of leadership lies in mastering uncertainty—not escaping it.
(2025). Defence Strategic Communications, 15. Riga: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence.
https://doi.org/10.30966/2018.RIGA.15
(2024). Defence Strategic Communications, 14. Riga: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence.
https://doi.org/10.30966/2018.RIGA.14
Journal Article
We live in a fractured world—economically uncertain, politically unstable, and strategically adrift.
In Permacrisis and The Crisis of Democratic Capitalism, some of the world’s sharpest economic minds try to offer a cure. But as Mitch Ilbury argues in this essay, their proposals fall into a deeper paradox: the very freedoms we cherish—democracy, markets, individual agency—are what make decisive collective action so difficult.
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Through vivid storytelling—from rock lyrics and Roman history to Chekhov’s asylum and Dubai’s skyscrapers—Ilbury probes the uncomfortable truth that liberal democracy may be structurally incapable of solving the very crises it produces. Political systems that prize individual freedom often lack the coherence needed to respond to global threats.
Meanwhile, models like the UAE raise a provocative question: is economic performance a new form of legitimacy? What emerges is not a rejection of democracy or ideals, but a challenge to our assumptions. Reform doesn’t fail because of bad ideas. It fails because of a lack of motivation, coherence, and shared narrative.
That’s where strategic communications enters—not just as messaging, but as meaning-making.
This is an essay about the limits of systems, the power of perspective, and the urgent need to see both sides now—ideals and action—not as opposites, but as forces we must reconcile if we are to fix a fractured world.
Book Chapter
We don’t like to admit it—but sometimes, the truth can be dangerous.
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In this provocative essay, When Dishonesty Is the Best Policy, Mitchell Ilbury explores the uncomfortable but essential role that lies play in leadership, diplomacy, and national security. Far from simply excusing deceit, Ilbury takes readers into the murky ethics of statecraft, asking: When is a lie not only justified, but necessary?
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From JFK’s denial of involvement in Cuba to John Major’s secret talks with the IRA, history offers examples where lies arguably saved lives. Through stories of hostage rescues, missile gaps, and Cold War bluffs, the essay outlines a compelling case for what Ilbury calls "lies for lives."
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But the essay doesn’t stop at strategy. It asks a deeper question: What happens when the lie becomes habit? Drawing on thinkers like Kant, Constant, Sissela Bok, and Plato, Ilbury warns of the slippery slope where noble lies morph into corrosive deceit. Leaders may lie for the right reasons—but they may also lie because it’s convenient, or worse, because they’ve convinced themselves they must.
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Ultimately, this is not a cynical endorsement of dishonesty. It’s a clear-eyed recognition that in a world of strategic ambiguity, weaponised information, and overlapping audiences, truth is rarely pure and never simple. Citizens must stay alert, not just to the lies they’re told, but to the motivations behind them.
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Because in the end, as Sartre asked: “Do you think you can govern innocently?”
