Vali Nasr
Middle East scholar and professor
Vali Nasr is an Iranian-American political scientist who studies the Middle East and the history of Islam. He has written Iran's Grand Strategy.
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American Born 1960 in Tehran, Iran
About Vali Nasr
Born in Tehran in 1960, Vali Nasr moved to the United States after the 1979 Revolution. He studied at Tufts University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and earned a PhD in political science from MIT in 1991. Nasr teaches at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, D.C., where he holds a chair in international affairs and Middle East studies and was dean from 2012 to 2019. From 2009 to 2011 he was a senior adviser to Richard Holbrooke, the US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. He has written Iran's Grand Strategy, a political history of the country, along with other books on Islam and the region. He has also held a MacArthur Foundation research fellowship.