Dr. Sarah Sewall

Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Assistance

Sarah Sewall teaches at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government. She is the founder and faculty director of the Mass Atrocity Response Operations (MARO) Project. In 2010, she led a seminal study for the U.S. military on efforts to reduce civilian casualties. Dr. Sewall directed the Obama Transition’s National Security Agency Review process in 2008. During the Clinton Administration, she served as the first Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Peacekeeping and Humanitarian Assistance. From 1983-1996, she was Senior Foreign Policy Advisor to Senate Majority Leader George J. Mitchell. In addition to the MARO Planning Handbook, her more recent publications include Parameters of Partnership: U.S. Civil-Military Relations in the 21st Century (2009) and the introduction to the U.S. Army and Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Manual (2007). She is a member of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board, the Center for Naval Analyses’ Defense Advisory Committee, and the board of Oxfam America. She graduated from Harvard College and received her doctorate from Oxford University.