Renato Cruz De Castro is a distinguished professor at the Department of International Studies, De La Salle University, Manila, and holds the Dr. Aurelio Calderon Chair in Philippines-American Relations. As a member of the Board of Trustees of the Albert Del Rosario Institute of Strategic and International Studies (ADRI), he writes monthly opinion columns for the Philippine Star and Business World. In 2019, the Board of Trustees of the Philippine Political Science Association (PPSA) declared Professor De Castro to be the most prolific Filipino political scientist in terms of scholarly publications and one of the top ten Filipino political scientists in terms of the number of citations. He earned his PhD from the Government and International Studies Department of the University of South Carolina as a Fulbright scholar in 2001. He obtained his bachelor's and two master’s degrees from the University of the Philippines.