Until the election of Barack Obama as president in 2008, Rice and her predecessor, Colin Powell, were the highest-ranking African Americans in the history of the federal executive branch (by virtue of the secretary of state standing fourth in the presidential line of succession).

Following her confirmation as secretary of state, Rice pioneered the policy of Transformational Diplomacy directed toward expanding the number of responsible democratic governments in the world and especially in the Greater Middle East.

That policy faced challenges as Hamas captured a popular majority in Palestinian elections, and influential countries including Saudi Arabia and Egypt maintained authoritarian systems (with U.S. backing).

[3] In March 2009, Rice returned to Stanford University as a political science professor and the Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution.

Rice discovered on the PBS series Finding Your Roots[13] that she is of 51% African, 40% European, and 9% Asian or Native American genetic descent, while her mtDNA is traced back to the Tikar people of Cameroon.

[27] From 1980 to 1981, she was a fellow at Stanford University's Arms Control and Disarmament Program, having won a Ford Foundation Dual Expertise Fellowship in Soviet Studies and International Security.

At a 1985 meeting of arms control experts at Stanford, Rice's performance drew the attention of Brent Scowcroft, who had served as National Security Advisor under Gerald Ford.

Casper met Rice during this search, and was so impressed that in 1993, he appointed her as Stanford's provost, the chief budget and academic officer of the university in 1993[33] and she also was granted tenure and became full professor.

Former Stanford president Gerhard Casper said the university was "most fortunate in persuading someone of Professor Rice's exceptional talents and proven ability in critical situations to take on this task.

[41] Rice drew protests when, as the provost, she departed from the practice of applying affirmative action to tenure decisions and unsuccessfully sought to consolidate the university's ethnic community centers.

[40] During a farewell interview in early December 2008, Rice indicated she would return to Stanford and the Hoover Institution, "back west of the Mississippi where I belong," but beyond writing and teaching did not specify what her role would be.

[1] In 1986, Rice was appointed special assistant to the director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to work on nuclear strategic planning as part of a Council on Foreign Relations fellowship.

In 1992, Rice founded the Center for New Generation, an after-school program created to raise the high school graduation numbers of East Palo Alto and eastern Menlo Park, California.

[51] After her tenure as secretary of state, Rice was approached in February 2009 to fill an open position as a Pac-10 Commissioner,[52] but chose instead to return to Stanford University as a political science professor and the Thomas and Barbara Stephenson Senior Fellow on Public Policy at the Hoover Institution.

"[67] Sean Wilentz of Salon magazine suggested that the PDB contained current information based on continuing investigations, including that Bin Laden wanted to "bring the fighting to America.

[80] A Senate Intelligence Committee reported that on July 17, 2002, Rice met with CIA director George Tenet to personally convey the Bush administration's approval of the proposed waterboarding of alleged Al Qaeda leader Abu Zubaydah.

[92] In 2003 Rice, Vice President Dick Cheney and Attorney General John Ashcroft met with the CIA again and were briefed on the use of waterboarding and other methods including week-long sleep deprivation, forced nudity and the use of stress positions.

"[81] At that time, she had acknowledged attending meetings to discuss the CIA's use of torture, but she claimed that she could not recall the details, and she "omitted her direct role in approving the program in her written statement to the committee.

"[100] "An international order that reflects our values is the best guarantee of our enduring national interest ..."[101] Rice stated that the September 11 attacks in 2001 were rooted in "oppression and despair" and so, the U.S. must advance democratic reform and support basic rights throughout the greater Middle East.

"[119] In 2015, Rice initially declined taking a public position on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action "because I know how hard it is to be in there as opposed to out here", but added, "This particular deal I think has some good elements but the price that was paid was pretty high.

"[136] In August 2021, Rice wrote an op-ed arguing that the United States withdrew from Afghanistan too quickly and called claims that Afghans were to blame for the Taliban takeover a "corrosive and deeply unfair narrative".

[137] In October, Rice appeared as a guest cohost on The View, where she asserted that Americans were more interested in household issues than continuing to investigate the January 6 United States Capitol attack.

[144] In October, Rice met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the Hoover Institution Hauck Auditorium and asked the incumbent about issues such as protests in Iran and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Crown reported that Rice would "combine candid narrative and acute analysis to tell the story of her time in the White House and as America's top diplomat, and her role in protecting American security and shaping foreign policy during the extraordinary period from 2001-2009.

[154][155][156] In an interview with George Stephanopoulos, Rice explained that she chose the title "because there really is no higher honor than serving your country" and named the Bush administration's attempts to consider "a different kind of Middle East" the hardest challenge they faced.

[157] Susan Chira wrote that the book "shows us two Condoleezza Rices: one, the impatient unilateralist who was national security adviser, the other the born-again diplomat who, as secretary of state, worked to repair some of the damage that had been done to American credibility by its unilateralism.

Several video spots with other notable spokespersons including Beyoncé, Jennifer Garner and others were produced along with a web site providing school training material, leadership tips, and an online pledge form to which visitors can promise not to use the word.

"[217] According to The Washington Post in late July 2008, former undersecretary of state and U.N. ambassador John R. Bolton was referring to Rice and her allies in the Bush Administration whom he believes abandoned earlier hard-line principles when he said: "Once the collapse begins, adversaries have a real opportunity to gain advantage.

[216] In the 1970s, she dated and was briefly engaged to professional American football player Rick Upchurch but left him because, according to biographer Marcus Mabry, she "knew the relationship wasn't going to work.

She accompanied cellist Yo-Yo Ma in playing Johannes Brahms' Violin Sonata in D minor at Constitution Hall in April 2002 for the National Medal of Arts Awards.