Paula D. Dobriansky

Ambassador Paula J. Dobriansky is a Senior Fellow at Harvard University's JFK Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Chair of the National Board of Directors of the World Affairs Councils of America. From 2010-2012, she was Senior Vice President and Global Head of Government and Regulatory Affairs at Thomson Reuters and also held the Distinguished National Security Chair at the U.S. Naval Academy.

From May 2001 to January 2009, she served as Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs; in February 2007, she was appointed the President's Special Envoy to Northern Ireland. She received the Secretary of State’s highest honor, the Distinguished Service Medal for her work in these positions. Other government appointments include: Associate Director for Policy and Programs at the United States Information Agency, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs, Deputy Head of the U.S. Delegation to the 1990 Copenhagen Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, and Director of European and Soviet Affairs at the National Security Council, the White House. From 1997-2001, she served on the Presidentially-appointed U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy.

Ambassador Dobriansky also served as Senior Vice President and Director of the Washington Office of the Council on Foreign Relations and was the Council's first George F. Kennan Senior Fellow for Russian and Eurasian Studies. From 1994-98, she was appointed to George Mason University’s Board of Visitors.

She received a B.S.F.S. summa cum laude in International Politics from Georgetown University School of Foreign Service and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Soviet political/military affairs from Harvard University.