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Dr. Michael Yaffe is Professor of International Relations and former Academic Dean at the Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies. He currently writes and lectures on the Middle East, Mediterranean Sea basin, Gulf regional security, diplomatic history, U.S. foreign policy and governmental decision-making process, strategic studies and forecasting, regionalism and security architectures, peace processes, “track two” diplomacy, weapons of mass destruction non-proliferation, confidence-building measures, border security, the Cold war and nuclear weapons, World War One, and George Washington. He also advises governmental and private organizations on program vision development and growth as well as strategic forecasting. He lectures at universities in the U.S. and abroad, and has testified before the U.S. Congress. During his tenure as the Academic Dean, 2004-2009, Dr. Yaffe expanded the Center’s curriculum and expertise in regional studies through a fourfold increase in programs and faculty members. He introduced thematic Executive Seminars, New Embassy Officers Orientation Seminars, monthly Washington Seminars for local embassies, Afghanistan-Pakistan confidence-building seminars, and regular alumni symposia, and augmented the Center’s involvement in Track Two diplomatic programs. He oversaw and hosted topical workshops focusing on functional subjects such as border security, health security, weapons of mass destruction proliferation, counterinsurgency, terrorism, and Provincial Reconstruction Teams as well as regional issues centered on Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Pakistan, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Turkey, and Yemen. In 2005, he established and became the founding director of the Regional Network of Strategic Study Centers, which continues to bring together scholars from over 30 think tanks from the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and elsewhere, for collaborative research on the major security issues of concern today and over the horizon. Prior to joining the NESA Center, Dr. Yaffe was a career Foreign Affairs Officer in the U.S. Department of State where he concentrated on Middle East regional security and nuclear weapon nonproliferation. From 1993 until 2001, he served on the U.S. delegation to the Middle East Peace Process, supporting multilateral negotiations in the Arms Control and Regional Security (ACRS) Working Group. He organized and managed the U.S. Government’s multi-million dollar Middle East regional security Track Two Program fostering regional security dialogue. As an expert on arms control and confidence building measures, he served as the senior advisor and lead U.S. negotiator on Middle East issues to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Preparatory Committees and Review Conferences, as well as the annual General Conferences of the International Atomic Energy Agency, NATO, Conference on Disarmament, and other international fora. In the immediate aftermath of the attack on September 11, 2001, he served as a coordinator on the counter-terrorism task force in support of “Operation Enduring Freedom.” During 1992 and 1993, Dr. Yaffe participated in “Operation Restore Hope” by managing a program in Mogadishu that provided 100 civilian translators for U.S. forces in Somalia. He was a recipient of two State Department Superior Honors Awards, a Group Meritorious Honors Award, Special Service Award, and a Department of the Army Certificate of Appreciation. Dr. Yaffe was a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University’s John M. Olin Institute for Strategic Studies and Harvard’s Center for Science and International Affairs at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, a Peace Scholar at the U.S. Institute of Peace, an American Friends of the London School of Economic graduate scholar, a Salvatori fellow, and other academic awards.
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Michael Yaffe, Supervisory Professor
"Peace is a daily, a weekly, a monthly process, gradually changing opinions, slowly eroding old barriers, quietly building new structures." ~ President John F. Kennedy
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