Alan Quasha: Chairman of WCIA Committee

The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs (WCIA)

Alan Quasha serves as the chairman of the Visiting Committee at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. This is just one of the many pursuits which Quasha is involved in, pursuits that lie outside of his own personal business activities. These pursuits are often leading sources of social advancement and change, and the members of these committees are often leaders in many spheres of society as well as the business and academic spheres. Serving a chairman of a prestigious concern illustrates the esteem Quasha has acquired, and the many previous chairmen and committee members have all been leading figures in various arenas of society.

Founded in 1958, The Center for International Affairs, was renamed The Weatherhead Center for International Affairs in 1998 after receiving a substantial endowment created by Albert and Celia Weatherhead and their Weatherhead Foundation. (The Weatherhead Foundation was founded by A. J. Weatherhead, Jr. in 1953, and since 1987 his son A. J. Weatherhead, III stands at the helm. The Weatherhead Foundation is a family foundation that focuses on endowments and grants in the sphere of higher education. It supports Harvard, Columbia University, Tulane University, Case Western Reserve University and the University of Texas.)

The purpose of the center and the reason for its creation is to serve as a medium for confronting the world’s condition. (This “condition” was described and defined in The Program of the Center for International Affairs by Robert Bowie and Henry Kissinger.) This condition states that countries no longer exist in isolation, nor are their realities governed solely by their own decision making, but as members of the Global Village, countries’ fates may be sealed by the actions of many other countries.

Alan Quasha has extensive international experience stemming from his investment and financial activities in a number of emerging markets. Quasha also understand the international arena from his first hand involvement with and participation in many international companies. Quasha is the chairman of the WCIA committee, the largest international research center within Harvard University’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences. There is no doubt that a reciprocal relationship exists between the Center and Quasha – the Center benefits from Quasha’s experience and genius, and Quasha gains from exposure to the leading academics and leaders who partake in the personal and intellectual interaction encouraged and implemented by the Weatherhead Center.