Ian Lesser

Dr. Ian O. Lesser is a Brussels-based distinguished fellow and adviser to the president at GMF. His expertise includes US foreign and security policy, transatlantic relations, and Mediterranean and Middle Eastern affairs. He also holds the chair in transatlantic trade and economy at the College of Europe in Bruges and is a senior fellow at the Policy Center for the New South in Rabat.

Lesser has held numerous senior roles at GMF, including acting president, since joining the organization in 2006. He was executive director of the Brussels office for over a decade, leading GMF’s work on the Mediterranean, Türkiye, and the wider Atlantic. 

Prior to joining GMF, Lesser 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 a senior analyst and research manager specializing in strategic studies at the RAND Corporation. He was also a member of the policy planning staff at the US Department of State in 1994-95, responsible for Türkiye, southern Europe, North Africa, and the multilateral track of the Middle East peace process.

A frequent commentator for international media, Lesser has written extensively on foreign and security policy issues. He was educated at the University of Pennsylvania, the London School of Economics, and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and received a D. Phil from the University of Oxford. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the International Institute for Strategic Studies, and the Pacific Council on International Policy. He serves on the advisory boards of the NATO Defense College Foundation, the Antwerp-American Foundation, Atlantic Dialogues, and the Delphi Economic Forum, and has been a senior fellow of the Onassis Foundation and the Luso-American Development Foundation.