Dr. Kenneth Maxwell

Dr. Kenneth Maxwell was the founding Director of the Brazil Studies Program at Harvard University’s David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies (DRCLAS) (2006-2008) and a Visiting Professor in Harvard’s Department of History (2004-2008).

From 1989 to 2004 he was Director of the Latin America Program at the Council on Foreign Relations, and in 1995 became the first holder of the Nelson and David Rockefeller Chair in Inter-American Studies.

He served as Vice President and Director of Studies of the Council in 1996.

Maxwell previously taught at Yale, Princeton, Columbia, and the University of Kansas.

He founded and was Director of the Camões Center for the Portuguese-speaking World at Columbia and was the Program Director of the Tinker Foundation, Inc.

From 1993 to 2004, he was the Western Hemisphere book reviewer for Foreign Affairs. He has been a regular contributor to the New York Review of Books and is a weekly columnist since 2007 for Folha de São Paulo.

Maxwell was the Herodotus Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, and a Guggenheim Fellow.

He served on the Board of Directors of The Tinker Foundation, Inc., and the Consultative Council of the Luso-American Foundation.

He is also a member of the Advisory Boards of the Brazil Foundation and Human Rights Watch/Americas.

Maxwell received his B.A. and M.A. from St. John’s College, Cambridge University, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton University.

For an overview on Professor Maxwell’s assessments, please see the following:

Maxwell Perspectives