Roderick James Nugent Stewart OBE FRSGS FRSL (born 3 January 1973) is a British academic, diplomat, author, broadcaster, former soldier and former politician. He is the president of GiveDirectly and was a visiting fellow at Yale University's Jackson Institute for Global Affairs, where he taught politics and international relations. He hosts the podcast The Rest is Politics with Alastair Campbell. Previously, Stewart served as a minister in four different departments of the UK Government. He then became a Cabinet minister as Secretary of State for International Development from May to July 2019. He served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Penrith and The Border from 2010 to 2019.
Born in Hong Kong, Stewart was educated at the Dragon School and Eton College. After studying at Balliol College, Oxford, Stewart worked for Her Majesty's Diplomatic Service as a diplomat in Indonesia and as British Representative to Montenegro. He left the diplomatic service to undertake a two-year walk across Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal. He later wrote a best-selling book, The Places in Between, about his experiences. He subsequently served as Deputy Governor in Maysan and Dhi Qar for the Coalition Provisional Authority following the 2003 invasion of Iraq and wrote a second book covering this period, Occupational Hazards or The Prince of the Marshes. In 2005, he moved to Kabul to establish and run the Turquoise Mountain Foundation. He was the Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights and the director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard University from 2008 to 2010.
In 2010, Stewart was elected to the House of Commons and in 2014 he was elected chair of the Defence Select Committee. He served under David Cameron as Minister for the Environment from 2015 to 2016. He served as a minister throughout Theresa May’s government: as Minister of State for International Development, Minister of State for Africa and Minister of State for Prisons. He ultimately joined the Cabinet and National Security Council as Secretary of State for International Development. After May resigned, Stewart stood as a candidate to be Leader of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in the 2019 leadership contest. His campaign was defined by his unorthodox use of social media and opposition to a no-deal Brexit. He stated at the beginning of his campaign that he would not serve under Boris Johnson and when Johnson became Prime Minister, in July 2019, Stewart resigned from the Cabinet.

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