The nationally recognized policy scholar and former ambassador will lead a global advisory firm in D.C.

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. — Lee Feinstein, founding dean of the Indiana University Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies, will step down from his executive role Jan. 31, 2022. Feinstein will begin a new position as president of Washington, D.C.-based McLarty Associates, a leading advisory firm founded by former White House Chief of Staff Mack McLarty, that helps navigate strategic and diplomatic challenges worldwide.

“Lee has firmly established the Hamilton Lugar School as a widely recognized and admired institution in the study of international affairs and strategic languages and cultures,” Interim IU Bloomington Provost and Executive Vice President John Applegate said. “His work has deepened Indiana University’s long history of excellence in global education, honoring and extending the remarkable legacy of Representative Lee Hamilton and the late Senator Richard Lugar. We thank him for his exceptional service to the university.”

Applegate said he hopes the connection between Feinstein and IU will continue in some form moving forward.

Feinstein played a key role in the naming of the school in 2018 for two Hoosier statesmen: former Rep. Lee H. Hamilton and the late Sen. Richard G. Lugar. He also established the nationally recognized annual conference on America’s Role in the World in 2015, and a new series on Race, Gender and Power in 2020.

“Dean Feinstein has been an exemplary leader of the global school, which has grown to national prominence since he assumed the role of founding dean,” Hamilton said. “He has set a tone that fosters in our students a commitment to global engagement and the principles to which our country aspires, filling a need that has never been more important.”

In addition to serving as founding dean, Feinstein has been a professor of international studies in the Hamilton Lugar School and an adjunct professor in the Maurer School of Law. A nationally recognized policy scholar, Feinstein has served in senior U.S. government positions that include principal deputy director of the secretary of state’s policy planning staff; U.S. ambassador to Poland; and a presidentially appointed trustee of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

During Feinstein’s seven-year tenure, the Hamilton Lugar School has grown into one of the nation’s largest international affairs schools, offering instruction in over 80 languages, with 1,100 students and 120 full-time faculty. In 2018, the school led the effort to establish IU as the national leader in the number of Department of Education-funded Title VI National Resource Centers it hosts, providing expertise in area studies and critical languages and outreach. The school is home to Language Flagship programs in Arabic and Mandarin.

Under Feinstein’s leadership, the Hamilton Lugar School has established a new degree program in cybersecurity and global policy with the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering; a degree in international law and institutions with the Maurer School of Law; and a joint master’s degree in international affairs with the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. In 2021, the Hamilton Lugar School gained national recognition for its support of Afghan evacuees at Camp Atterbury in south-central Indiana.

During the IU Bicentennial Campaign, the school raised $32 million to endow seven professorships, three new institutes, and 250 endowed scholarships and fellowships.

“It has been the honor of a lifetime to serve Indiana University as founding dean of the Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies,” Feinstein said. “I am deeply grateful to the university leadership for this opportunity and for their support. I am immensely proud to have played a part with HLS’ dedicated faculty and staff — and our polymath and polyglot students — to deepen and extend our university’s remarkable, two-century tradition of excellence in global studies.”

Applegate said he will appoint an interim dean promptly, in consultation with the school’s faculty policy committee.