James Zogby

James Zogby co-founded the Arab American Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that serves as the political and policy research arm of the Arab American community, in 1985 and continues to serve as its president. He is also Director of Zogby Research Services, a firm that has conducted groundbreaking surveys across the Middle East.

Dr. Zogby is featured frequently in national and international media as an expert on Middle East affairs. Since 1992, he has written a weekly column that is published in 12 countries. In 2010, he published the highly acclaimed book Arab Voices . His 2013 e-books - Looking at Iran: The Rise and Fall of Iran in Arab Public Opinion; and 20 Years After Oslo - are drawn from his extensive polling across the Middle East. His most recent book, The Tumultuous Decade: Arab, Turkish, and Iranian Public Opinion – 2010–2019 , analyzes the transformations taking place across the Middle East following the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and the Arab Spring.

From 1993 to 1996, Dr. Zogby co-Chaired a project launched by Vice-President Al Gore to promote economic development in the Palestinian Occupied Territories. In September 2013, President Obama appointed Dr.Zogby to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. He was reappointed to a second term in 2015, served until May 2017, and was twice elected Vice Chair.

Dr. Zogby has long been involved in US politics, serving as a Deputy Campaign Manager of Jesse Jackson’s 1984 and 1998 presidential campaigns and senior advisors to the Gore, Obama, and Sanders’ campaigns.

In 1975, Dr. Zogby received his doctorate from Temple University's Department of Religion, where he studied under the Islamic scholar Dr. Ismail al-Faruqi. He was a National Endowment for the Humanities Post-Doctoral Fellow at Princeton University in 1976 and is the recipient of a number of honorary doctorate degrees.