Experts
Ian Lesser is Senior Fellow at the Policy Center for the New South (PCNS). Based in Brussels, he also serves as Distinguished Fellow and Advisor to the President at the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), where he has held several senior leadership roles, including Vice President and Acting President. Dr. Lesser has built a distinguished career at the intersection of transatlantic relations, strategy, and international security.
He holds the Chair in Transatlantic Affairs at the College of Europe in Bruges. Before joining GMF, he was a Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Vice President and Director of Studies at the Pacific Council on International Policy, and spent over a decade at the RAND Corporation focusing on strategic and security studies. He also served on the U.S. Department of State’s Policy Planning Staff.
A frequent commentator for international media, Dr. Lesser has written extensively on foreign and security policy. He serves on the advisory boards of the Antwerp-America Foundation, the NATO Defense College Foundation, and the Delphi Economic Forum. He holds a D.Phil. from Oxford University.
