“As we mark our 35th anniversary, we are excited that Ambassador Munter will be leading the EastWest Institute into the next chapter in our history,” Ross Perot Jr., Chairman of the Board, said. “As a diplomat who worked at the highest levels in Pakistan, Iraq, Serbia, and other critical countries, Munter can help us bring global leaders together to help build trust and identify new solutions to international challenges, while helping to ease tensions in difficult regions. Ambassador Munter has the experience, spirit, energy and vision to expand EWI’s efforts to reduce conflict in an increasingly dangerous world.”

For the past three decades, Munter has been a career diplomat, serving in some of the most conflict-ridden areas of the globe. He served as U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan from 2010-2012, where he guided U.S.-Pakistani relations through a strained period, including the operation against Osama bin Laden, while leading a 2,500-employee embassy. Previously he served as Ambassador to Serbia, where he negotiated Serbian domestic consensus for European integration and managed the Kosovo independence crisis. 

Munter also served at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, overseeing U.S. civilian and military cooperation in planning the drawdown of U.S. troops. In Europe, he served in the Czech Republic and Poland, where he helped manage the American contribution to those countries’ integration into the global economy. He was a Director at the National Security Council at the White House, and had numerous other domestic assignments at the State Department in Washington.

“In these volatile times, when trust is so important and global cooperation is critical, I’m eager to help build bridges, create new ideas for solving international problems and advance practical solutions,” Munter said.

Before joining the Foreign Service, Munter taught European history at the University of California in Los Angeles. He also taught at Columbia University School of Law and has two honorary doctoral degrees. For the past two years, Munter has been Professor of International Relations at Pomona College in Claremont, California, as well as a Fellow at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Born in California in 1954, Munter graduated magna cum laude from Cornell University and earned a doctorate in Modern European History from Johns Hopkins University.

To read an announcement of Munter's appointment in The Chronicle of Philanthropy, click here.

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