Mona Yacoubian is senior adviser and director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She has more than thirty years of experience working on the Middle East and North Africa, with a focus on conflict analysis, governance and stabilization challenges, and conflict prevention. She was previously vice president of the Middle East and North Africa Center at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), where she managed field programming in Iraq, Libya, and Tunisia as well as Washington, D.C.–based staff. In 2019, she served as executive director of the congressionally appointed Syria Study Group. From 2014 to 2017, Yacoubian served as deputy assistant administrator in the Middle East Bureau at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), where she had responsibility for programming across Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Iraq. Prior to joining USAID, Yacoubian was a senior adviser at the Stimson Center and a special adviser on the Middle East at USIP. From 1990 to 1998, Yacoubian served as the North Africa analyst in the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. Her opinion pieces have appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and various other outlets, and she has testified to Congress six times. Yacoubian was a Fulbright scholar in Syria, where she studied Arabic at the University of Damascus from 1985 to 1986. She has held an international affairs fellowship with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and is a CFR member. She earned a master’s in public administration from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and a bachelor’s in public policy from Duke University.
The NonProfit Center
Mona Yacoubian is senior adviser and director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). She has more than thirty years of experience working on the Middle East and North Africa, with a focus on conflict analysis, governance and stabilization challenges, and conflict prevention. She was previously vice president of the Middle East and North Africa Center at the U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP), where she managed field programming in Iraq, Libya, and Tunisia as well as Washington, D.C.–based staff. In 2019, she served as executive director of the congressionally appointed Syria Study Group. From 2014 to 2017, Yacoubian served as deputy assistant administrator in the Middle East Bureau at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), where she had responsibility for programming across Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, and Iraq. Prior to joining USAID, Yacoubian was a senior adviser at the Stimson Center and a special adviser on the Middle East at USIP. From 1990 to 1998, Yacoubian served as the North Africa analyst in the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. Her opinion pieces have appeared in the New York Times, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, and various other outlets, and she has testified to Congress six times. Yacoubian was a Fulbright scholar in Syria, where she studied Arabic at the University of Damascus from 1985 to 1986. She has held an international affairs fellowship with the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and is a CFR member. She earned a master’s in public administration from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and a bachelor’s in public policy from Duke University.
The NonProfit Center
Peniel Joseph and Brandon Terry
John F. Kennedy Library
Kelly Sims Gallagher is the tenth Dean of The Fletcher School, Tufts University. A Professor of Energy and Environmental Policy, she also directs the Climate Policy Lab and co-directs the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy at Fletcher. The Climate Policy Lab is dedicated to identifying which climate policies work, which don’t, and why in countries around the world, with particular emphasis on major emerging economies including China, India, Ethiopia, South Africa, Indonesia, Mexico, and Brazil. Gallagher served in the second term of Obama Administration as a Senior Policy Advisor in The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and as Senior China Advisor in the Special Envoy for Climate Change office at the U.S. State Department. Gallagher is a non-resident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She is a member of the board of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. Broadly, she focuses on U.S.-China relations, green industrialization, climate policy, energy innovation, and low-carbon, resilient models for achieving sustainable prosperity. She is the author of Titans of the Climate (The MIT Press 2018), The Global Diffusion of Clean Energy Technologies: Lessons from China (MIT Press 2014), China Shifts Gears: Automakers, Oil, Pollution, and Development (The MIT Press 2006), and dozens of other articles and book chapters.
The NonProfit Center
New England Aquarium
Jim O’Connell’s latest book is Boston and the Making of a Global City. He teaches in the City Planning-Urban Affairs Program at Boston University. Jim’s other books include The Hub’s Metropolis: Boston’s Suburban Development, From Railroad Suburbs to Smart Growth; Dining Out in Boston: A Culinary History; and Becoming Cape Cod: Creating a Seaside Resort. Jim has a Ph.D. in Urban History from the University of Chicago. He formerly was a planner for National Park sites in New England and New York State. He leads urban planning/design tours of different areas of Boston and Cambridge.
Foley & Lardner LLP
Seán Hemingway, Michael Deagler, and Alex George
John F. Kennedy Library
For the latest information regarding each event please contact the presenting organization.