Professor, John F. Kennedy School of Government

Harvard University

 

Joseph S. Nye Jr. is university distinguished service professor, the sultan of Oman professor of international relations and former dean of the Kennedy School at Harvard University. 

 

Nye received his bachelor’s degree summa cum laude from Princeton University in 1958. He did postgraduate work at Oxford University on a Rhodes Scholarship and earned a Ph.D. in political science from Harvard University. He joined the Harvard faculty in 1964, and taught one of the largest core curriculum courses in the university.  In 1995, he became dean of the Kennedy School.  

 

Nye has worked in three government agencies. From 1977 to 1979, he served as deputy to the under secretary of state for security assistance, science and technology and chaired the National Security Council group on nonproliferation of nuclear weapons.  In recognition of his service, he received the highest Department of State commendation, the Distinguished Honor Award.  In 1993 and 1994, he was chairman of the National Intelligence Council, which coordinates intelligence estimates for the president.  He was awarded the Intelligence Community’s Distinguished Service Medal.  In 1994 and 1995, he served as assistant secretary of defense for international security affairs, where he also won the Distinguished Service Medal with an Oak Leaf Cluster.

 

A fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and of the Academy of Diplomacy, Nye has been a senior fellow of the Aspen Institute, director of the Aspen Strategy Group, and a member of the Executive Committee of the Trilateral Commission. He has served as a director of the Institute for East-West Security Studies, a director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a member of the advisory committee of the Institute of International Economics, and the American representative on the United Nations Advisory Committee on Disarmament Affairs. He has been a trustee of Wells College and Radcliffe College. A member of the editorial boards of Foreign Policy and International Security magazines, he is the author of numerous books and more than 150 articles in professional journals.