Meghan O’Sullivan Appointed as Director of Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center

Harvard Kennedy School professor Meghan L. O’Sullivan will serve as the next director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, the Kennedy School announced Tuesday.

O’Sullivan will take over the role from former Pentagon Chief of Staff Eric B. Rosenbach starting July 1. Rosenbach co-directed the center with former Secretary of Defense Ashton B. Carter until Carter’s unexpected death in October 2022.

“I am honored to lead the Center and follow in the footsteps of intellectual giants like Ash Carter and Graham Allison and to work with Belfer’s phenomenal faculty, staff, and students on the world’s toughest problems,” O’Sullivan said in a Tuesday press release announcing her appointment.

O’Sullivan served as special assistant to former President George W. Bush from 2004 to 2007 and deputy national security advisor for Iraq and Afghanistan in the final two years of her term. Previously, she served as the senior director for Iraq in the U.S. National Security Council.

“I believe that my experience working for and advising people in both Democratic and Republican positions will help the Center continue its tradition on non-partisan, evidence based, policy-relevant research, regardless of who is in control in Washington,” she wrote in an email to HKS affiliates shortly after her appointment was announced.

Founding Dean of the Kennedy School and former Director of the Belfer Center Graham T. Allison ’62 expressed his support for O’Sullivan’s appointment in a press release Tuesday. When O’Sullivan joined the Kennedy School in 2008, Allison co-taught one of her first courses, “Central Challenges of American Foreign Policy.”

“While of course no single individual could possibly replace Ash Carter, Meghan O’Sullivan will be a great successor,” Allison said in the press release. “I look forward to supporting her as she leads the Belfer Center up the mountain to the next horizon.”

In October of last year, O’Sullivan’s class was interrupted by anti-war activists who were critical of her association with Raytheon Technologies, a defense contractor, and for her role in Bush’s Iraq and Afghanistan policies. The protest was co-organized by an activist group called Resist and Abolish the Military Industrial Complex that had staged other protests against Raytheon.

RAM INC condemned the Kennedy School’s appointment of O’Sullivan “in the face of student and community outrage” in a statement to The Crimson, referencing the incoming director’s role in the Iraq War and the Belfer Center’s influence on defense policy.

Harvard Kennedy School spokesperson James F. Smith declined to comment.

O’Sullivan will step down from her position on the Raytheon Board of Directors, on which she has served since 2017, before assuming her role at the Belfer Center.

O’Sullivan wrote in her email to HKS affiliates that she will focus on outreach during the beginning of her appointment.

“I will spend the early part of my tenure talking to a wide range of stakeholders — including current policymakers — to help me identify where the Center can and should focus going forward,” she wrote.

O’Sullivan added that she plans on further developing the Technology and Public Purpose program, which was established by former co-directors Carter and Rosenbach, as well as preserving the Center’s work on nuclear threats.

“Building on those programs will not only be a way to strengthen Ash’s legacy, but also to help fill a critical gap between technologists and policymakers that is evident,” she wrote.

Instead of co-directing the Center with O’Sullivan, Rosenbach, a lecturer in public policy, will be stepping down to focus on research, teaching, and writing.

“She is the perfect person to lead the Belfer Center. She is an outstanding academic, thought-leader, and policymaker,” Rosenbach wrote in an email. “Beyond all her impressive professional accomplishments, she’s also a great human. And it’s pretty awesome — and historic — that we’ll have an all female leadership team at the center.”

—Staff writer Asher J. Montgomery can be reached at asher.montgomery@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @asherjmont.