Professional Affiliation

Distinguished Professor and Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies, School of International Service, American University; Former Pakistan High Commissioner to the United Kingdom and Ireland

Expert Bio

Ambassador Akbar Ahmed is the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University in Washington, DC. Ahmed’s career has included distinguished posts in both academia and public service. Highlights from the past four decades of Ahmed’s academic career include appointments such as Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution; the First Distinguished Chair of Middle East and Islamic Studies at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD; the Iqbal Fellow (Chair in Pakistan Studies) and Fellow of Selwyn College at the University of Cambridge; and teaching positions at Harvard and Princeton Universities. Ahmed dedicated more than three decades to the Civil Service of Pakistan, where his posts included Commissioner in Balochistan, Political Agent in the Tribal Areas, and Pakistan High Commissioner to the UK and Ireland. Ahmed’s expertise has earned high praise around the world. The BBC called him, “The world’s leading authority on contemporary Islam,” and the Saudi Gazette lauded him as, “Perhaps the most influential living authority on contemporary Muslim societies.”

Expertise

• Conflict Resolution and Peacebuilding
• Society and Culture

Wilson Center Project

The Mingling of the Oceans - Publication and Documentary; Gandhi and Jinnah Return Home - Stageplay

Project Summary

The Mingling project is a comparative study of some of the main religious and philosophical systems of the world in an effort to discover their philosophies of life and, crucially, how they see people of differing religions and cultures. The mingling project also analyzes these traditions "in action" by looking at the "minglers," those people in history who drew upon their traditions in attempting to "mingle" with those different from themselves and with humanity in general--to bridge divisions including those of religion, race, culture, and ethnicity. The goal is to learn from these global traditions and figures who embodied them in finding our own path through life and in the context of the challenges that face us today such as pandemics, climate change, and religious, racial, and ethnic strife. The project is about finding those aspects of world traditions that are of use to us now, which can allow the people of the world to "comingle."

Major Publications

• Journey into Europe: Islam, Immigration, and Identity (Brookings Institution Press 2018)
• The Thistle and the Drone: How America's War on Terror Became a Global War on Tribal Islam (Brookings Institution Press 2013)
• Journey into America: Islam, Immigration, and Identity (Brookings Institution Press 2010)