Sarah Sewall

Lecturer in Public Policy
Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy,
Carr Center for Human Rights Policy
Office Address
Rubenstein-214
Mailing Address
John F. Kennedy School of Government
Mailbox 14
79 JFK Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
Contact
Phone: 617-496-4843
Fax: 617-495-4297
Email: Sarah_Sewall@ksg.harvard.edu
Assistant
Steven Brzozowski (617-496-6086)
Sarah Sewall

Profile

Sarah Sewall is the Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Her current research focuses on counterinsurgency and terrorism. She also runs the Carr Center's National Security and Human Rights Program, which facilitates dialogue between the humanitarian and military perspectives. During the Clinton Administration, Sewall served in the Department of Defense as the first Deputy Assistant Secretary for Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Assistance. From 1987-1993, she served as Senior Foreign Policy Advisor to Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell, delegate to the Senate Arms Control Observer Group, and on the Senate Democratic Policy Committee. Sewall has also worked at a variety of defense research organizations and as Associate Director of the Committee on International Security Studies at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She was lead editor of The United States and the International Criminal Court: National Security and International Law (2000) and has written widely on U.S. foreign policy, national security, and military intervention. She is a member of the Center for Naval Analyses Defense Advisory Committee, the National Academies Committee on Offensive Information Warfare, and founder of the White House Projects National Security Boot Camp. She is writing a book about civilian harm in war. Sewall graduated from Harvard College and Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar.

Courses

Fall

  • ISP-344 American Warfare and the Humanitarian Ethic: Law, Norms and Practice

Media Expertise

Sarah Sewall welcomes media inquiries on the following subjects:

Additional experts may be found by clicking on each subject listed. You may contact faculty directly or if you need assistance contact the Communications Office at 617-495-1115.

Research

Research for a complete list of faculty citations from 2001 - present, please visit the Harvard Kennedy School Research Report Online.

Selected Publication Citations:

  • Book Chapters
    • Sewall, Sarah. "Introduction to the University of Chicago Press edition. A Radical Field Manual." The U.S. Army/Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual. Ed. United States Army and United States Marine Corps. University of Chicago Press, 2007, xxi-xliii.
  • Magazine and Newspaper Articles
    • Sewall, Sarah. "Crafting a New Counterinsurgency Doctrine." Foreign Service Journal (September 2007): 33-40.
  • Op-Eds
    • Sewall, Sarah. "Just How Is This Drawdown Supposed to Work, Anyway?" Niemanwatchdog.org, January 4, 2008.
    • Sewall, Sarah. "Ethics on the Battlefield." San Francisco Chronicle, July 1, 2007.
    • Sewall, Sarah. "A Heavy Hand in Afghanistan." Boston Globe, June 15, 2007.
    • Sewall, Sarah. "He Wrote the Book: Can He Follow It?" Washington Post, February 25, 2007.
  • Research Papers/Reports
    • Sewall, Sarah, ed. "Learning and Integration: Escalation of Force Procedures and Traffic Control Point Operations." Project on the Means of Intervention, Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and U.S. Army PKSOI, with U.S. Army CALL, March 26-27, 2007.
    • Sewall, Sarah, ed. "Implementing the Rule of Law and Human Rights in Stability Operations." Project on the Means of Intervention, Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and U.S. Army Judge Advocate General's Legal Center, September 25-26, 2006.