Kenneth Spencer Yalowitz

Kenneth Spencer Yalowitz is an American retired diplomat. A Foreign Service Officer, he twice served as a U.S. Ambassador. He most recently served as a Woodrow [Wilson International Center for Scholars|Wilson Center] Global Fellow.

Early life and education

Yalowitz was born on May 28, 1941 in Chicago, Illinois He graduated from Columbia University with a M.Phil and the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a B.A.

During Yalowitz’s 36 year career with the Foreign Service, Yalowitz served as Ambassador to Belarus from 1994-1997 and Georgia from 1998-2001. He received the “Ambassador Robert Frasure award for peacemaking and conflict prevention in 2000 for his work preventing spillover of the Chechen war into Georgia.” As an academic, he’s served as Director of the Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth College and as an adjunct professor at several universities including Georgetown University and Washington and Lee University. Yalowitz was elected to the American Academy of Diplomacy in 2009.