The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University (also referred to as The Fletcher School) is the oldest school in the United States dedicated solely to graduate studies in international affairs. Fletcher is regarded as one of the world's foremost graduate schools of international relations. The school’s alumni include hundreds of sitting ambassadors; award-winning journalists and authors; leaders of international peacekeeping, humanitarian and security initiatives; heads of global nonprofit organizations; and executive leadership of some of the world’s largest for-profit companies.
The Fletcher School was founded in 1933 with the bequest of Austin Barclay Fletcher, who left over $3 million to Tufts University upon his death in 1923. A third of these funds were dedicated to a school of law and diplomacy. Fletcher did not have in mind a school "of the usual kind, which prepares men for admission to the bar and for the active practice of law." Instead, Fletcher envisioned "a school to prepare men for the diplomatic service and to teach such matters as come within the scope of foreign relations [which] embraces within it as a fundamental and thorough knowledge of the principles of international law upon which diplomacy is founded, although the profession of a diplomat carries with it also a knowledge of many things of a geographic and economic nature which affect relations between nations."
The school opened in 1933 as a collaborative project between Harvard University and Tufts University. The Fletcher School is now administrated exclusively by Tufts University, but maintains close ties with Harvard. Fletcher students can register for graduate classes at Harvard, and conversely, Harvard cross registers at Fletcher. In addition, the Fletcher School has strong relationships, including joint degree programs, with several other universities around the metro Boston area and throughout the world. The two-year Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy (MALD) is the Fletcher School’s "flagship" international affairs degree.
The Fletcher School and Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) are the only non-law schools in the US that compete in the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition.
Organization and academic programs
Section reference The school’s dean is Admiral James Stavridis, U.S. Navy (retired), former Supreme Allied Commander at NATO and former head of the U.S. European Command. Admiral Stavridis received a MALD degree and a PhD from The Fletcher School in 1983 and 1984, respectively. He became the 12th dean of the school on July 1, 2013.
On its campus in Medford, Massachusetts, The Fletcher School offers multi-disciplinary instruction in international affairs through four masters programs and a Ph.D. program. Regardless of the degree program in which they are enrolled, students have the opportunity to select from among more than 170 courses across three divisions: International Law and Organization (ILO); Diplomacy, History and Politics (DHP); and Economics and International Business (EIB).
The school also offers an executive degree for mid-career professionals through its Global Master of Arts Program (GMAP). The year-long program combines three 2-week residencies with rigorous academic instruction covering topics such as negotiation, trade, economics and politics from a global perspective.
The Fletcher School employs more than 30 full-time tenured or tenure-track faculty as well as a variety of adjunct and visiting professors, and benefits from faculty at partner schools within Tufts, including the Friedman School of Nutrition. The full-time Fletcher faculty includes economists, international law theorists, historians, and political scientists who hold the academic ranks of professor, associate professor, assistant professor, and lecturer. All faculty members hold terminal degrees in their respective fields (Ph.Ds in the case of historians, political scientists, and economists; and JDs and LLMs in the case of lawyers). In 2013, the faculty to student ratio in Medford is 1:8.6.
Master of Arts in Law & Diplomacy
Master of International Business
Master of Laws in International Law
Master of Arts
Global Master of Arts Program
Master of Arts in Humanitarian Assistance
Master of Arts in Transatlantic Affairs
Doctor of Philosophy
Programs, institutes and research centers
The Center for International Environment and Resource Policy (CIERP) conducts scholarly and policy-relevant research on pressing environmental issues through the interdisciplinary lenses of science, policy, sociology, technology, business and the economy.
The Edward R. Murrow Center of Public Diplomacy was established in memory of the journalist and former head of the United States Information Agency . The center is home to Edward R. Murrow’s personal library and papers, including more than 2,000 documents, a number of awards, and certificates.
The Fares Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies organizes public lectures, conferences and roundtables to create a greater understanding of the region and its challenges. The center hosts a high-profile annual lecture series that has twice hosted former U.S. President Bill Clinton as its speaker.
The Hitachi Center for Technology and International Affairs focuses on the management of innovation and technological change and the advancement of economic and financial integration. The center sponsors a lecture series and conducts research and teaching on topics related to technology, economic integration and their role in international relations.
The Institute for Business in the Global Context (IBGC) conducts research and organizes interdisciplinary conferences on contemporary issues in international business. The institute offers a Master of International Business (MIB) degree and conducts scholarly research through its Council on Emerging Market Enterprises (CEME). Major research studies include the Sovereign Wealth Fund Initiative and an international series of studies on the “cost of cash” around the world.
The Institute for Human Security promotes research and education at the intersection between humanitarianism, development, human rights and conflict resolution. The institute also runs the Program on Human Rights and Conflict Resolution, which supports an interdisciplinary approach to peace-building and coordinates the student-run journal PRAXIS.
The International Security Studies Program (ISSP) is a distinct field of study within the multidisciplinary curriculum of The Fletcher School. In addition to graduate-level courses and seminars, the ISSP sponsors “outside the classroom” educational activities, including simulation exercises, a lecture series, field trips and publications. The ISSP also co-hosts an annual conference with the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis
The Maritime Studies Program views the ocean as an important sphere for international affairs, including as it relates to matters of international security, business, law and other disciplines. The program also runs annual research trips in connection with the Fletcher Maritime Club, a group of Fletcher students and alumni.
The World Peace Foundation, provides intellectual leadership on issues of peace, justice and security, and provides financial support only for projects that it has initiated itself. Among its thematic concerns are how mass atrocities end, Sudan and the Horn of Africa, memorialization and human rights, and reinventing peace for the 21st century.
Affiliated programs and initiatives at Tufts University
The Center for South Asian and Indian Ocean Studies
The Global Development and Environmental Institute
Refugees and Forced Migration Program
The Fletcher Forum of World Affairs a student-managed foreign policy journal, founded in 1975 and published biannually. Original web content and print archive also available online.
Fletcher Security Review online and print journal focused on security studies
PRAXIS: The Fletcher Journal of Human Security
al Nakhlah online journal on Southwest Asia and Islamic Civilization
Bhaskar Chakravorti, Senior Associate Dean, International Business & Finance, Director, Institute for Business in the Global Context
Antonia Chayes, Professor of International Politics and Law, former United States Under Secretary of the Air Force.
Alex de Waal, African development scholar, and director of the World Peace Foundation at the Fletcher School.
Daniel W. Drezner, Professor of International Politics, regular featured columnist in Foreign Policy Magazine
Leila Fawaz, Issam M. Fares Professor of Lebanese and Eastern Mediterranean Studies, Carnegie Scholar.
Michael J. Glennon, Professor of International Law, former legal counsel to Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
William Moomaw, Professor of International Environmental Policy, lead author of the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, developed the concept of New diplomacy.
Richard H. Shultz, Professor of International Politics.
Ayesha Jalal, Professor of History and the Director of the Center for South Asian and Indian Ocean Studies, former MacArthur Fellow.
Sung-Yoon Lee, Kim Koo-Korea Foundation Assistant Professor of Korean Studies.
Klaus Scharioth, Professor of Practice, former German Ambassador to the US and State Secretary of the German Foreign Office
Patrick Webb, Alexander McFarlane Professor of Nutrition, Policy and Evidence Adviser to the Global Panel on Agriculture and Food Systems for Nutrition, former Dean for Academic Affairs at the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, former Chief of Nutrition for the United Nations World Food Programme.
Ibrahim Warde, Professor of International Business.
Halford Lancaster Hoskins (Acting Dean 1933–1934, Dean 1934–1944)
Ruhl Jacob Bartlett (Acting Dean 1944–1945)
Robert Burgess Stewart (Dean 1945–1964)
Ambassador Edmund Asbury Gullion (Dean 1964–1978)
John P. Roche (Acting Dean 1978–1979, Dean ad interim 1985–1986)
Ambassador Theodore Lyman Eliot, Jr. (Dean 1979–1985)
Jeswald Salacuse (Dean 1986–1994)
Richard B. Mancke (Dean ad interim 1994–1995)
General John Galvin (Dean 1995–2000)
Joel P. Trachtman (Dean ad interim, 2000–2001)
Ambassador Stephen W. Bosworth (2001–2013)
Admiral James G. Stavridis (2013–present)
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The Fletcher School has over 9,000 alumni living around the world in 140 countries, including hundreds of sitting ambassadors, award-winning journalists and authors, global business executives and leaders of international peacekeeping, humanitarian and security initiatives.
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