Mark C. Donfried (United States of America & Germany)

Mark C. Donfried is the Executive Director & Founder of the Institute of Cultural Diplomacy in Berlin.

After completing his undergraduate studies in European History and French at Columbia University, Mark Donfried then pursued graduate research at the Freie Universität Berlin and at the Institut des Études Politiques where he wrote his thesis on "la diplomatie du jazz.." He then worked as an Analyst and Fellow at the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik (German Council on Foreign Relations). In 1999 he founded the Institute for Cultural Diplomacy (ICD-www.culturaldiplomacy.org), a non-partisan, independent, and non-profit and non-governmental organization in New York City and then in 2002, he moved the International Headquarters of ICD to Berlin, Germany. Over the past decade the ICD has grown to become one of Europe’s leading cultural exchange organizations with programs extending to every continent of the world. Mark is the author of numerous articles as well as the book “Searching for a Cultural Diplomacy." (Berghahn Books, Nov 2010).