John Campbell (born 1944) was the acting director of the Office of the Historian within the Department of State.

He was appointed to the position in June 2009 and was succeeded as acting director by Edward P. Brynn the same year.

[2] He first served as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Human Resources at the State Department.

His numerous overseas postings include service as a political counselor in Nigeria in the late 1980s, in South Africa in the mid-1990s during the transition from apartheid to majority rule and also assignments in Lyon, Geneva and Paris.

[6] He left in September, after just two months, to work with the think tank Council on Foreign Relations, where he is the Ralph Bunche Senior Fellow for Africa policy studies.