Kal Raustiala, an expert in international law who studies and teaches about international cooperation and global governance, has been named director of the UCLA Ronald W. Burkle Center for International Relations.

As director of the Burkle Center, Raustiala assumes leadership of UCLA's primary academic unit that fosters interdisciplinary research and policy-oriented teaching on the role of the United States in global cooperation and conflict, and military, political, social and economic affairs.  

"We are very fortunate to have a scholar and academic innovator of Kal's stature in this role," said Ronald Rogowski, interim vice provost for international studies and dean of the UCLA International Institute, who announced the appointment. "His leadership will strengthen the center's interdisciplinary focus and expand its ongoing efforts to create better understanding of global issues."

Raustiala holds appointments in the UCLA School of Law and the UCLA International Institute — the home organization of the Burkle Center and a unit within the College of Letters and Science. 

"Professor Raustiala brings exciting new energy and a fresh perspective to the leadership of the center," said Patricia O'Brien, executive dean of the UCLA College of Letters and Science. "I am confident that Kal will make the center an even more visible and important source of expertise and commentary on the critical issues facing our nation and our world today."

Raustiala has been a fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies Program at The Brookings Institution, a Peccei Scholar at the International Institute for Applied Systems in Austria, and a fellow in the Program in Law and Public Affairs at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy and the American Society of International Law and has served as a consultant on legal matters to numerous international organizations.

Raustiala has written extensively about global legal issues. His article on international agreements in the American Journal of International Law won the 2006 Francis Deak Prize from the American Society of International Law.

The Ronald W. Burkle Center for International Relations

The UCLA Burkle Center (http://www.international.ucla.edu/bcir) supports research initiatives and sponsors innovative teaching programs on global studies. Among the center's most prominent programs is the Burkle Forum, which brings to campus internationally renowned political leaders, policy-makers and analysts to present their perspectives on global issues. 

Recent Burkle Forums have featured a number of high-ranking and influential former government officials, including President Jimmy Carter, Secretaries of State Warren Christopher and George Shultz, Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castañeda, Secretaries of Defense William Cohen and William Perry, Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volker, Russian Finance Minister Yegor Gaidar and Special Middle East Coordinator under President Clinton Dennis Ross, as well as Nobel laureates Shirin Ebadi and Robert Mundell, current State Department Policy Planning Director Stephen Krasner, syndicated columnist Thomas Friedman, scholars Alan Dershowitz and Edward Said, and ambassadors from a dozen countries.

In September 2006, Gen. Wesley Clark, former supreme allied commander of NATO and author of "Waging Modern War," joined the Burkle Center as a senior fellow. Clark will teach seminars, publish opinion articles and commentaries, and host the center's inaugural conference on national security. The first conference, to be held March 6–7, 2007, will explore the emerging challenges of nuclear weapons in the 21st century. Beginning next year, Francisco Gil Diaz, Mexican finance minister in the outgoing Fox administration, will also join the center as a senior fellow.

The Burkle Center also sponsors innovative teaching programs at UCLA, including a seminar taught by former Secretary of State Warren Christopher on international flash points and an undergraduate course taught by UCLA law professor Richard Steinberg on international law and politics. The center also supports student-led initiatives, such as the UCLA Darfur Action Committee and the UCLA Undergraduate International Relations Society.

About UCLA

California's largest university, UCLA enrolls approximately 38,000 students per year and offers degrees from the UCLA College of Letters and Science and 11 professional schools in dozens of varied disciplines. UCLA consistently ranks among the top five universities and colleges nationwide in total research-and-development spending, receiving more than $820 million a year in competitively awarded federal and state grants and contracts. For every $1 state taxpayers invest in UCLA, the university generates almost $9 in economic activity, resulting in an annual $6 billion economic impact on the Greater Los Angeles region. The university's health care network treats 450,000 patients per year. UCLA employs more than 27,000 faculty and staff, has more than 350,000 living alumni, and has been home to five Nobel Prize recipients.

-UCLA-

JL573