Jean-Marc Coicaud
Director, United Nations University

Jean-Marc Coicaud heads the United Nations University (UNU) Office at the United Nations in New York. He was Senior Academic Officer in the Peace and Governance Programme at UNU in Tokyo from 1996 to 2003. Before joining UNU, he served in the Executive Office of the United Nations Secretary-General as a speechwriter for Dr. Boutros Boutros-Ghali (1992-1996). A former fellow at Harvard University (Center for International Affairs, Department of Philosophy and Harvard Law School from 1986 to 1992), Coicaud has held appointments such as Cultural Attaché with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Legislative Aide with the European Parliament (Financial Committee), Associate Professor at the University of Paris, and Visiting Professor at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. He has also taught at the New School for Social Research (New York). He has been a Senior Fellow at the United States Institute of Peace (Washington, D.C.), and a Global Research Fellow at New York University School of Law. Coicaud holds a Ph.D. in political science-law from the Sorbonne and a Doctorat d’Etat from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques of Paris. In addition, He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in literature and linguistics.

Jean-Marc Coicaud is the author of L’introuvable démocratie autoritaire (1996), Légitimité et Politique (Presses Universitaires de France, 1997), translated in Japanese as Seijiteki Seitoseitoha Nanika: Ho, Dotoku, Sekinin ni Kansuru Kosatsu (Fujiwara Shoten, Tokyo, 2000), Politics and Legitimacy: A Contribution to the Study of Political Right and Political Responsibility (Cambridge University Press, 2002) (also available in Spanish, Chinese and Arabic). He co-authored (with Charles A. Kupchan, Emmanuel Adler, and Yuen Foong Khong) Power in Transition: The Peaceful Change of International Order (United Nations University Press, 2001). He co-edited, with Daniel Warner, Ethics and International Affairs: Extent and Limits (UNU Press, 2001), with Veijo Heiskanen, The Legitimacy of International Organizations (UNU Press, 2001), and with Michael W. Doyle and Anne-Marie Gardner, The Globalization of Human Rights (UNU Press, 2003). In 2006, he published a co-edited volume, with Daniel A. Bell, Ethics in Action: The Ethical Challenges of International Human Rights Nongovernmental Organizations (Cambridge University Press). In 2007, he has published the following books: Beyond the National Interest (United States Institute of Peace Press), and Limits of the UN/Future of the UN (in Japanese with Fujiwara Shoten).

Jean-Marc Coicaud is a member of the Board of Directors of the Academic Council for the United Nations Systems (ACUNS) and a member of the Advisory Board of Global Policy Innovations (New York). He also serves as an adviser for the Fondation pour l’innovation politique (Paris).