About Professor Baskin

University Expert

Mark A. Baskin is a Senior Associate for Academic Affairs at SUNY/CID and a Research Professor in the political science department at Rockefeller College at the University at Albany, where he teaches courses in comparative and international politics. At SUNY/CID, Dr. Baskin has managed democratization and development programs in Iraq, Jordan and Serbia, and oversees our organization’s academic programs, including the International Speakers Forum, roundtables, SUNY/CID publications, as well as internship and fellowship programs.

Dr. Baskin is an experienced field practitioner in conflict and post-conflict administration, peace operations, rule of law, legislative strengthening, and local government and administration. He worked more than three decades in the Eurasia region and most recently in the Mideast and Asia. Dr. Baskin spent nearly a decade as a Civil Affairs Officer and Political Officer working for United Nations (UN) peacekeeping operations in the Balkans, both in the field and at mission headquarters in Zagreb, Vukovar, and Sarajevo. Among his many posts were Chief Reporting Officer of the UN Mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina (1997-1999), Deputy Regional Administrator in Prizren, Kosovo, and as Prizren’s Municipal Administrator in 1999 and 2000.

Dr. Baskin was the Director of Research at the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre in Canada, and has taught at universities in Michigan, North Carolina and New York. He has consulted for the United Nations, the World Bank, the Government of Canada, USAID, IDEA. Published in scholarly journals and the popular press, Dr. Baskin is frequently invited to give public presentations.

A Public Policy Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., from 2002-2003, he most recently held a U.S. State Department Title VIII Policy Connect Fellowship administered by IREX for 2007-2008, that explored international participation in domestic policy-making. He is fluent in Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, and Russian. Dr. Baskin holds a doctorate in political science from the University of Michigan and a recipient of numerous fellowships.

Selected Publications

• "Constituency Development Funds as a Tool of Decentralized Development,” 56th Commonwealth Parliamentary Conference Nairobi, Kenya 10-19 September 2010
• "What Is To Be Done: Succession from the League of Communists of Croatia,” Communist and Post-Communist Studies, vol. 41 (2008), pp. 521-540. (co-authored with Paula Pickering)
• “Interim Notions of Statehood in Bosnia: a Permanent Transition?” Interim Governments: Institutional Bridges to Peace and Democracy? eds. Karen Guttieri and Jessica Piombo, Washington: United States Institute of Peace Press (2007), pp. 257-280.
• “Between Exit and Engagement: On the Division of Authority in Transitional Administrations,” Global Governance, vol. 10 (2004), pp. 119-137.
• “Developing Local Democracy in Kosovo,” Stockholm: International IDEA (2005)