Jeremy M. Weinstein named dean of Harvard Kennedy School — Harvard Gazette

Jeremy M. Weinstein, an accomplished political scientist, experienced academic leader and dedicated public servant, will become dean of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government on July 1, interim President Alan M. Garber announced Monday.

Weinstein, MA ’01, Ph.D. ’03, is currently the Kleinheinz Professor of International Studies at Stanford University and a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research. A faculty member at Stanford University since 2004, he has served that institution by developing and establishing cross-university initiatives and leading efforts to advance the social sciences, global and area studies, and issues of ethics, technology, and public policy.

“He is widely respected for his energetic and empowering leadership style, [Weinstein] “He is responsible for conceiving, creating and developing major initiatives,” Garber wrote in his letter to the HKS community. “Jeremy is an exceptional scholar and leader with significant high-level policy experience and will bring to the deanship a rare mix of talents at a pivotal moment for the University of Hong Kong.”

A tenured professor at Stanford University since 2009, Weinstein has worked extensively on issues of comparative politics and public policy, with expertise in civil wars and political violence, ethnic politics, the political economy of development, democracy and governance, policing, and migration.

His scholarship has been published widely in leading journals, including American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Science, and more. His first book, Inside Insurgency: The Politics of Insurgent Violence, won the William H. Riker Book Award from the American Political Science Association for Best Book on Political Economy. He is also co-author of Coexistence: Diversity and the Dilemmas of Collective Action, which won the Gregory Lubert Book Award for Best Book in Comparative Politics.

Weinstein is co-director of the Migration Policy Lab, a research team that aims to improve the lives of refugees, asylum seekers, and immigrants through partnerships with governments, nonprofits, and others to design and evaluate innovative policies and programs.

More recently, Weinstein has been teaching and writing about issues at the intersection of technology and democracy. Excerpts from his latest co-authored book, “What’s Wrong with the System: Where Big Tech Went Wrong and How We Can Reboot,” have been published in The Atlantic, Time, and Fast Company, and have been widely reviewed.

“The Harvard Kennedy School is a unique institution in the American higher education landscape known for its unique blend of cutting-edge social sciences, breadth of public policy, and unwavering commitment to public engagement. I am thrilled to return to Harvard to become dean, and I simply cannot imagine a better platform to work with.” Exceptional researchers, students, and practitioners to understand and address the most important policy challenges of the next decade.

In addition to his extensive scholarship, Weinstein is an innovative and experienced academic leader. Working with a team of faculty, he designed, launched, tested, and scaled the Stanford Impact Laboratories (SIL), a university-wide initiative that trains, tests, and scales teams of researchers who work with leaders in government, business, and communities. Faculty members. Addressing chronic social problems. As SIL’s faculty director, Weinstein is responsible for the leadership, management, and fundraising of Stanford’s flagship initiative to accelerate the public impact of the social sciences.

Weinstein has also played a critical role in curriculum innovations at the intersection of ethics, politics, and technology. He co-taught a popular computer science course titled “Ethics, Public Policy, and Technological Change.”

He also launched and directed a new undergraduate major in Data Science and Social Systems, which enables undergraduate students to develop expertise in computer science, statistics, and social sciences, and apply these skills to address important social problems.

Weinstein’s previous institutional leadership roles include serving as the Fisher Family Director of Stanford’s Department of Global Studies, a role in which he directed 15 centers and programs with a network of more than 400 affiliated faculty members. Earlier in his career, he served as the Ford Dorsey Director of the Center for African Studies twice from 2007 to 2008 and again from 2011 to 2013.

“We are pleased to welcome Jeremy back to Harvard,” said Interim Dean John Manning. “He is a proven institution builder who has helped drive innovation across disciplines and influentially linked his teaching and research to the real-world issues shaping the global landscape. He will be an outstanding and collaborative leader for the HKS community in the years ahead.”

A dedicated public servant, Weinstein has also worked at the highest level of government on key foreign policy and national security challenges. Between 2013 and 2015, Weinstein served as Deputy US Ambassador to the United Nations and before that as Chief of Staff at the US Mission to the United Nations. In these roles, he was Ambassador Samantha Power’s principal political advisor and chief strategist, and led a team of career diplomats, political appointees and civil servants.

He also served as a permanent member of the National Security Council Representatives Committee, which advises the Cabinet and the President on foreign policy issues. Before joining the State Department, Weinstein served in the White House as Director for Development and Democracy on the National Security Council from 2009 to 2011. He played a critical role in designing and launching President Barack Obama’s Open Government Partnership, a global coalition of more than 75 governments working to change the way The government serves its citizens.

Weinstein earned bachelor’s degrees in political science, economics, and public policy with highest honors from Swarthmore College in 1997 and has graduate degrees in political economy and government from Harvard University.

Among his many awards, Weinstein received the Karl Deutsch Award for significant contributions to the study of international relations, the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford University, and the Joseph Levenson Memorial Teaching Award, given to a distinguished teaching fellow at Harvard University when he was a Ph.D. student.

At Harvard, Weinstein will be joined by his wife, Rachel Gibson, a 2000 MPP graduate from HKS, and two children.

Weinstein will be succeeded by Douglas W. Elmendorf, AM ’85, Ph.D. ’89, who has served as dean since January 2016.