Jared Cohen

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Biography

Jared Cohen is a former member of staff at the United States Department of State from 2006 under Condoleezza Rice [1] until 2010 under Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton. [2] Cohen left the State Department to take on a new role in Google as the Director of Google Ideas.

Cohen has a BA from Stanford University and a M.Phil in International Relations from Oxford University which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar. [3] He is also a co-founder and board member of the Alliance for Youth Movements and a member of a group called Gen Next [4], which was set up by fellow co-founder and board member Roman Tsunder [5] alongside Jason Liebman who is also a co-founder and board member of the Alliance for Youth Movements. [6]

Iran

Cohen has a keen interest in Iranian affairs. While a graduate at Oxford University, Cohen was able to gain a visa to go to Iran and in his own words, "interview members of the political resistance". [7] It was here he met people of his own age and he says that the youth of Iran are the most pro-American population in the Middle East. [8] During the Iranian Presidential Election of 2009, Cohen was again thrust into the media spotlight due to his close relationship with co-founder of the social networking site Twitter, Jack Dorsey. On the Monday after the disputed Iranian Presidential Election, Cohen asked Dorsey to put off a site maintenance update scheduled as this would have meant that Iranians would have been unable to inform the rest of the world through Twitter the events that were taking place in Tehran. [9] Cohen, working for Secretary Clinton under the administration of President Barack Obama, placed himself at odds with official policy which was to avoid the appearance of meddling in the Iranian elections, but according to Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs P.J. Crowley, Cohen was merely asking Twitter to maintain service to a situation that had already started days before this incident. [10]

Selected Bibliography

Cohen has written two books, which are: [11]

Children of Jihad: A Young American's Travel Among the Youth of the Middle East (2008)
One Hundred Days of Silence: America and the Rwanda Genocide (2007)

External Resources

Notes

  1. "Gen Next Membership Profiles Gen-Next.org, accessed on 12 October 2010
  2. "State Department Innovator Jared Cohen goes to Google ForeignPolicy.com, accessed on 12 October 2010
  3. "Alliance for Youth Movements: Team Movements.org, accessed on 14 October 2010
  4. "Gen Next Member Profiles" Gen-Next.org, accessed on 14 October 2010
  5. "Alliance for Youth Movements: Team Movements.org accessed on 14 October 2010
  6. "Gen Next Member Profiles" Gen-Next.org, accessed on 14 October 2010
  7. "Precocious: Condi's Party Starter: The New Yorker (5 November 2007)" accessed on 14 October 2010
  8. "Precocious: Condi's Party Starter: The New Yorker (5 November 2007)" NewYorker.com, accessed on 14 October 2010
  9. "Washington Taps Into a Potent New Force in Diplomacy: New York Times (16 June 2009)" NYTimes.com, accessed on 14 October 2010
  10. "Washington Taps Into a Potent New Force in Diplomacy: New York Times (16 June 2009)" NYTimes.com, accessed on 14 October 2010
  11. "Jared Cohen: Amazon.com" Amazon.com, accessed on 14 October 2010