John F. Clark

Biography

Professor Clark specializes in the state-society relations of African polities and the international relations of sub-Saharan Africa. He is co-editor of Political Reform in Francophone Africa (1997, with David Gardinier), editor of The African Stakes of the Congo War (2002), author of The Failure of Democracy in the Republic of Congo (2008), and co-author of the Historical Dictionary of Congo (2012, with Samuel Decalo) and Africa’s International Relations (2018, with Beth Whitaker). He has also published over fifty articles and book chapters, including articles in / African Affairs/, the Journal of Democracy,/ the Journal of Modern African Studies/, Comparative Studies in Society and History, African Security, and the Africa Spectrum. During the 1999-2000 academic year he was a Fulbright lecturer and research scholar at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, and he made numerous research trips to the Republic of Congo and the Democratic Republic of Congo between 1990 and 2012. In the summer of 2014, Professor Clark was a Fulbright Specialist consultant at the Mbarara University of Science and Technology, where he was also Visiting Professor. He was awarded, with three collaborators, a grant by the American Political Science Association to organize a two-week workshop on Conflict and Political Violence in Nairobi, Kenya, in July 2015. He is currently studying the foreign policies of African states. Professor Clark served 6 years (2002-2008) as Chairperson of the International Relations Department at FIU and another 4 years (2016-2020) as the Chairperson of the Politics and International Relations Department at FIU.

Areas of Expertise

Sub-Saharan African Politics, Foreign Policy Analysis, Politics and Democratization, State-Society Relations

Degrees

BA, Georgia Southern University, Political Science, 1986
MA, University of Virginia, Foreign Affairs, 1988
PhD, University of Virginia, Foreign Affairs, 1992