Jonathan Fanton, President of MacArthur, announced that Barry Lowenkron will serve as Vice President for the Foundation’s international program, beginning September 1, 2007.
Lowenkron, who is currently Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, will head MacArthur’s international program. Through the Global Security and Sustainability Program, MacArthur makes grants of over $80 million annually in 65 countries. Areas of emphasis include human rights and international justice, conservation, peace and security, population and reproductive health, and a new initiative on migration and human mobility. In addition to its headquarters in Chicago, MacArthur has offices in India, Mexico, Nigeria, and Russia.
“I am delighted that Barry Lowenkron will lead MacArthur’s international programs at a time when the Foundation is deepening its commitment in Africa and Asia,” said MacArthur President Jonathan Fanton. “He shares MacArthur’s belief that human security and opportunity are twin goals advanced by appreciating how its fields of environment, population, human rights, migration and conflict prevention all must work together. He also respects the essential role that non-governmental organizations play in enabling people to take hold of their own destinies.”
Lowenkron is our nation’s senior human rights and democracy officer, representing the President and the Secretary of State abroad as well as before the U.S. Congress, the press and the public. He leads a bureau of over 100 staff, which currently administers over $300 million in democracy programming worldwide. His work has taken him across the globe, including to Russia, China, Cambodia, Vietnam, Azerbaijan, and, most recently, Ethiopia and Sudan.
Mr. Lowenkron spearheaded the establishment of a global human rights defenders fund and a set of core principles for protection of non-governmental organization that are now official U.S. policy. He has led high-level human rights and democracy dialogues in key countries and with regional institutions such as the European Union and the African Union. He was one of the architects of a path-breaking initiative for the broader Middle East – a multilateral effort to nurture indigenous reform efforts in economics, politics, education, and women’s rights known as the Forum for the Future.
In earlier posts spanning five Administrations, Lowenkron worked on a range on international issues across a number of federal agencies. He helped fashion post-Cold War security policies for Europe, and was principal drafter of the landmark National Intelligence Publication, Global Trends 2010, which studied how demographics, food and water, and environment impact traditional national security interests. Lowenkron also served as Special Assistant to the Director of Central Intelligence, directed European Security Affairs at the White House National Security Council, and worked as a senior member of Secretary Colin Powell’s Policy and Planning staff. His work has focused on issues ranging from post-conflict operations to United Nations reform to combating HIV/AIDS.
From 1979 until assuming his present post, Lowenkron was an Adjunct Lecturer in American Foreign Policy at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of the Johns Hopkins University, where he taught a course on American Foreign Policy. He has been a Ford Foundation Fellow on Arms Control and Eastern Europe and a Hubert H. Humphrey Fellow. Mr. Lowenkron is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Mr. Lowenkron received his M.A. with distinction in 1977 from the Nitze School of Advanced International studies and his B.A. with high honors in 1973 from Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts.
As Vice President for Global Security and Sustainability at MacArthur, Barry Lowenkron will succeed John Hurley, who is retiring from the Foundation at the end of this year.