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Juliana Geran Pilon

Director, Center for Culture and Security; Professor of Politics and Culture

Dr. Juliana Geran Pilon is Director of the Center for Culture and Security at the Institute of World Politics in Washington, D.C.  She also teaches at the National Defense University and the Air University’s Air Force Culture and Language Center. Her most recent anthology, entitled Cultural Intelligence for Winning the Peace, was published by IWP Press in September 2009

Her previous book, Why America is Such a Hard Sell: Beyond Pride and Prejudice was published in 2007, as was Every Vote Counts: The Role of Elections in Building Democracy, which she co-edited with Richard Soudriette.  Her book The Bloody Flag: Post-Communist Nationalism in Eastern Europe -- Spotlight on Romania was published by Rutgers University Press in 1991, and her autobiographical book Notes From the Other Side of Night was published in the U.S. in 1979 (republished in 1994) then translated into Romanian in 1993.

Her anthology on civic education, funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts, Ironic Points of Light, was published in Estonian and Russian in 1998. She has also written and edited a textbook on civic education, which is being used, in country-specific versions, throughout Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, endorsed by the Departments of Education in these countries.  She has published over two hundred articles and reviews on international affairs, human rights, literature, and philosophy, and has made frequent appearances on radio and television.

During the 1990s, she was first the Director and later the Vice President for Programs at IFES, where she designed, conducted, and managed projects related to a wide variety of democratization projects. Born in Romania, she emigrated with her family and arrived in the U.S. as a teenager. After receiving her Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Chicago, she held post-doctoral fellowships in international relations at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and at the Institute of Humane Studies. She has also taught at Roosevelt University, Indiana University, Emory University, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, Johns Hopkins University, George Washington University, American University, the Center for Advanced Defense Studies, and Rochester Institute of Technology. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Affairs and has served on the board of advisors of the Auschwitz-based human rights organization Oswiencim Institute for Human Rights and the International Advisory Board of B‘nai Brith.

Upon her departure from IFES, on Sept. 10, 2002, the Board of Directors passed a resolution in gratitude “for her many years of distinguished service and her tremendous contributions to [IFES’] cause,” commending her “for her efforts in demonstrating that freedom and democratic ideals matter and that they are the primary tools needed to achieve a more peaceful and democratic world.”

To view all of Dr. Pilon's publications, please visit her website: http://julianageranpilon.yolasite.com/.

Professional Experience


  • Formerly Vice President, International Foundation for Election Systems;
  • Senior Policy Analyst, The Heritage Foundation; and
  • Adjunct Professor at George Washington University, Johns Hopkins University SAIS, and St. Mary's College (MD).
  • Member, Council on Foreign Relations.

Dr. Pilon is the author of The Bloody Flag: Post-Communist Nationalism in Eastern Europe (Transaction, 1992); Notes from the Other Side of Night (University Press of America, 1994); and Why America is Such a Hard Sell: Beyond Pride and Prejudice (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007).

Download file Pilon Resume 

Education


  • B.A., 1969, University of Chicago
  • M.A., 1971, University of Chicago
  • Ph.D., 1974, University of Chicago

Contact: jpilon@iwp.edu

Courses


  Cultural Implications for Strategy and Analysis
  Democratization, Nation Building, and U.S. Foreign Policy
  Nationalism and Islamism

Publications


  Dr. Pilon reviews "The Abuse of Holocaust Memory: Distortions and Responses"
  The Russian ‘Spies’: Information vs. Influence
  Prof. Pilon reviews Anthropologists in Arms: The Ethics of Military Anthropology
[List All]

Books


  Soulmates: Resurrecting Eve
  Cultural Intelligence for Winning the Peace
  Why America is Such a Hard Sell
[List All]

Expert Areas

  • Global Issues
  • International Organizations
  • Public Diplomacy
  • Foreign Culture

Cultural Implications for Strategy and Analysis

"It is impossible to understand the current national security challenges facing the United States without appreciating the role of culture in counterinsurgency and the fight against terrorism."
-Dr. Juliana Pilon

Principal Professor

  Juliana Geran Pilon

Democratization, Nation Building, and U.S. Foreign Policy

"Democratization, sometimes known as 'nation-building' and, most recently, as 'stability and reconstruction,' has played an increasingly central role in U.S. foreign policy. But neither the strategic objectives nor the tactics have been properly thought out in every instance, despite the heavy investment by the U.S. and its allies, and high stakes for world peace."

-Dr. Juliana Pilon

Principal Professor

  Juliana Geran Pilon

Nationalism and Islamism

This course examines the meaning of nationalism, its origins in Western Europe subsequently spread throughout the world, as well as the relationship between nationalism, ethnicity, historic tradition, linguistic and religious identity, with specific emphasis on the various mindsets of Islamists.

Principal Professor

  Juliana Geran Pilon

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