Patrick Mendis
Encyclopedia
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
, University of Maryland University College
University of Maryland University College
The University of Maryland University College is located in the unincorporated community of Adelphi in Prince George's County, Maryland in the United States. Serving over 90,000 students worldwide, UMUC is the largest 4-year public university in Maryland and one of the largest distance learning...
, and Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
before joining the U.S. Department of State, where he served under Secretaries Madeleine Albright
Madeleine Albright
Madeleine Korbelová Albright is the first woman to become a United States Secretary of State. She was appointed by U.S. President Bill Clinton on December 5, 1996, and was unanimously confirmed by a U.S. Senate vote of 99–0...
and Colin Powell
Colin Powell
Colin Luther Powell is an American statesman and a retired four-star general in the United States Army. He was the 65th United States Secretary of State, serving under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005. He was the first African American to serve in that position. During his military...
. For his leadership, Mendis was honored with the State Department's Meritorious Honor Award
Meritorious Honor Award
The Meritorious Honor Award is an award of the United States Department of State. Similar versions of the same award exist for the former U.S. Information Agency, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, and USAID...
and the Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin
Dr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
Award. Previously, he worked at the Minnesota House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the World Bank, and the United Nations. Mendis is currently an affiliate professor of public and international affairs at George Mason University
George Mason University
George Mason University is a public university based in unincorporated Fairfax County, Virginia, United States, south of and adjacent to the city of Fairfax. Additional campuses are located nearby in Arlington County, Prince William County, and Loudoun County...
and a fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science
World Academy of Art and Science
The World Academy of Art and Science is an international non-governmental scientific organization, an informal and non-official world network of individual fellows elected for distinguished accomplishments in the fields of natural and social sciences, arts and the humanities...
.
Mendis has authored more than 100 journal articles, government reports, newspaper columns, and several books, including most recently, Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence: The Secret Destiny of the American Empire is a book written by Patrick Mendis in which he puts forward a new theory about the original conviction and commercial vision of the Founding Fathers of the United States...
: The Secret Destiny of the American Empire (2010) as well as TRADE for PEACE: How the DNA of America, Freemasonry, and Providence Created a New World Order with Nobody in Charge (2009). Professor Stephen Joel Trachtenberg
Stephen Joel Trachtenberg
Stephen Joel Trachtenberg was the 15th President of George Washington University, serving from 1988 to 2007. On August 1, 2007, he retired from the presidency and became President Emeritus and University Professor of Public Service.- Background :...
, president emeritus of the George Washington University and Professor J. Brian Atwood
J. Brian Atwood
John Brian Atwood is a diplomat and former Administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development. From 2002 to 2010, he was dean of the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota...
, dean of the University of Minnesota's Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs respectively wrote the forewords for these two internationally acclaimed books.
After his government service in the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Energy and State, Mendis returned to academia. He served as the vice president of the Osgood Center for International Studies
Osgood Center for International Studies
The Osgood Center for International Studies is a not-for-profit educational foundation located in Washington, D.C. It is named in honor of Robert E. Osgood and his wife Gretchen....
and as a foreign policy visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies
Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies
The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies , a division of Johns Hopkins University based in Washington, D.C., is one of the world's leading and most prestigious graduate schools devoted to the study of international affairs, economics, diplomacy, and policy research and...
(SAIS) in Washington, D.C. An adjunct professor of international diplomacy at Norwich University
Norwich University
Norwich University is a private university located in Northfield, Vermont . The university was founded in 1819 at Norwich, Vermont, as the American Literary, Scientific and Military Academy. It is the oldest of six Senior Military Colleges, and is recognized by the United States Department of...
, Mendis is an alumnus of Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government
John F. Kennedy School of Government
The John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University is a public policy and public administration school, and one of Harvard's graduate and professional schools...
and the University of Minnesota's Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs. Since 2010, he has been elected to serve on the board of the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) Alumni DC Council in Washington.
Early years in Sri Lanka and Minnesota
Patrick Mendis was born in the medieval capital of PolonnaruwaPolonnaruwa
The second most ancient of Sri Lanka's kingdoms, was first declared the capital city by King Vijayabahu I, who defeated the Chola invaders in 1070 AD to reunite the country once more under a local leader.-History:While Vijayabahu's victory and shifting of Kingdoms to the more strategic Polonnaruwa...
in Ceylon (Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
) and grew up in Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
, USA. He was a Boy Scout, a Sarvodaya volunteer, a Police Cadets sergeant, and a commander of the Army Cadets Corps of Sri Lanka. At Sarvodaya, Mendis worked with his mentor, A. T. Ariyaratne
A. T. Ariyaratne
Sri Lankabhimanya Ahangamage Tudor Ariyaratne is the founder and president of the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement in Sri Lanka.-Biography:...
, the "Gandhi of Sri Lanka" and founder of Sarvodaya and later established a number of tsunami scholarships and the Sarvodaya Peace Prize. For his contributions to his native country, Mendis is recognized with the UNESCO Award sponsored by the United Nations Association of Sri Lanka, the Sarvodaya International Peace Award, and the Sri Lanka Foundation's Outstanding Leadership Award for International Diplomacy (in Los Angeles, California, USA).
At the age of 18, he won one of the nine AFS
AFS Intercultural Programs
AFS Intercultural Programs was established in 1915 by A. Piatt Andrew, a onetime economics professor at Harvard University and former U.S. Assistant Secretary of the Treasury...
scholarships among over 100,000 applicants in Sri Lanka and attended American high school in Perham, Minnesota
Perham, Minnesota
As of the census of 2000, there were 2,559 people, 1,104 households, and 642 families residing in the city. The population density was 976.2 people per square mile . There were 1,167 housing units at an average density of 445.2 per square mile...
. At the end of his graduation in 1979, Mendis traveled by bus to Washington, D.C., where he met President Jimmy Carter's Vice President Walter Mondale
Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...
(D-Minnesota) and U.S. Senator Rudy Boschwitz
Rudy Boschwitz
Rudolph Ely "Rudy" Boschwitz is a former Independent-Republican United States Senator from Minnesota. He served in the Senate from December 1978 to January 1991, in the 96th, 97th, 98th, 99th, 100th, and 101st congresses. He was then defeated by Paul Wellstone.-Life and career:Boschwitz was born...
(R-Minnesota), who have been friends and supporters of Mendis all these years. After receiving his American diploma from Perham High School in Minnesota, he returned to the University of Sri Jayewardenepura
University of Sri Jayewardenepura
The University of Sri Jayewardenepura is one of the Universities in Sri Lanka. It is located in Gangodawila, Nugegoda, near Sri Jayewardenepura Kotte, the capital city of Sri Lanka...
, where Mendis endowed two annual scholarships in leadership and management studies in 1993. Mendis served as the vice president of the World University Service, the president of the University Sports Council, and a member of the University’s badminton, athletic, and swimming teams for which he won the University Colours. He earned his BS in business administration and economics (First Class Honours) before he returned to the United States on scholarship for graduate studies at the University of Minnesota’s Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs.
In Minnesota, he worked in the Minnesota House of Representatives
Minnesota House of Representatives
The Minnesota House of Representatives is the lower house in the Minnesota State Legislature. There are 134 members elected to two-year terms, twice the number of members in the Minnesota Senate. Each senate district is divided in half and given the suffix A or B...
with the parliamentarian and chief clerk of the Minnesota House of Representatives Edward A. Burdick
Edward A. Burdick
Edward Arthur Burdick was a nonpartisan former chief clerk and parliamentarian of the Minnesota House of Representatives and the past national president of the American Society of Legislative Clerks and Secretaries ....
, who later became an "adopted" father to Mendis for more than 25 years (Honorable Burdick passed away in 2011). During these years, Mendis studied under the late NATO Ambassador Harlan Cleveland
Harlan Cleveland
Harlan Cleveland was an American diplomat, educator, and author. He served as Lyndon Johnson's U.S. Ambassador to NATO, 1965–1969, and earlier as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, 1961-1965...
, the founding dean of the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs and served as his special assistant when Cleveland became the president of the World Academy of Art and Science.
After earning his PhD in Geography/Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
in 1989, Mendis served as a Lecturer in International Relations and a Visiting Scholar in Agricultural and Applied Economics at the University of Minnesota from 1990 to 1997. During his tenure, Mendis worked with the late Regents Professor Vernon Ruttan and authored a book, Human Environment and Spatial Relations in Agricultural Production and four Staff Papers published by the University of Minnesota's Department of Applied Economics.
Alumnus of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Mendis raised fund for a number of tsunami projects in Sri Lanka in working with the Embassy of Sri Lanka and the Harvard University Club of Washington, D.C. He has established a range of tsunami scholarships, a micro-loan program, and a peace prize in Sri Lanka in collaboration with the Calvert Foundation in Maryland, USA.
International Relations
Before attending the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs, Mendis worked at the Minnesota House of RepresentativesMinnesota House of Representatives
The Minnesota House of Representatives is the lower house in the Minnesota State Legislature. There are 134 members elected to two-year terms, twice the number of members in the Minnesota Senate. Each senate district is divided in half and given the suffix A or B...
under Honorable Edward A. Burdick
Edward A. Burdick
Edward Arthur Burdick was a nonpartisan former chief clerk and parliamentarian of the Minnesota House of Representatives and the past national president of the American Society of Legislative Clerks and Secretaries ....
, the chief clerk and parliamentarian of the House. He also served on the staff of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee under Senator Rudy Boschwitz
Rudy Boschwitz
Rudolph Ely "Rudy" Boschwitz is a former Independent-Republican United States Senator from Minnesota. He served in the Senate from December 1978 to January 1991, in the 96th, 97th, 98th, 99th, 100th, and 101st congresses. He was then defeated by Paul Wellstone.-Life and career:Boschwitz was born...
(R-Minnesota) dealing with the Middle East and Asian affairs.
Mendis obtained his MA in international development and foreign affairs from the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs in 1986. At the graduation ceremony, he received the first Hubert H. Humphrey Alumni Award for Outstanding Leadership. Other three Humphrey Leadership Award recipients were U.S. Vice President Walter Mondale
Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale is an American Democratic Party politician, who served as the 42nd Vice President of the United States , under President Jimmy Carter, and as a United States Senator for Minnesota...
(under President Jimmy Carter), President Ronald Reagan's Ambassador Max Kampelman
Max Kampelman
Max Kampelman, born Max Kampelmacher , is former head of the American delegation to the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. He was born in New York...
, and UNEP Executive Director Mustafa Tolba
Mostafa Kamal Tolba
Mostafa Kamal Tolba is an Egyptian scientist most famous for his 17-year tenure as Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme ....
.
With Ambassador Jayantha Dhanapala
Jayantha Dhanapala
Professor Jayantha Dhanapala is a member of the Board of Sponsors of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists and a governing board member of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Dr. Dhanapala was Sri Lanka's official candidate for the post of Secretary-General of the United Nations,...
, Mendis represented the Government of Sri Lanka as “Youth Ambassador” at the 1985 UN International Year of the Youth (IYY) in New York. It was a political appointment by the Government of Sri Lanka (at the suggestion of the late President Ranasinghe Premadasa
Ranasinghe Premadasa
Ranasinghe Premadasa was the 3rd President of Sri Lanka from January 2, 1989 to May 1, 1993. Before that, he served as the Prime Minister in the government headed by J. R. Jayewardene from February 6, 1978 to January 1, 1989...
to honor Mendis' service at the University of Sri Jayewardenepura. Professor Karunasena Koddituwakku, the Vice Chancellor of the University, recommended Mendis to the Minister of Youth and Sports Affairs, Ranil Wickramasinghe, who later became the Prime Minister of Sri Lanka. Mendis also worked at the World Bank and served as a consultant to the U.S. Department of State after representing the Government of Sri Lanka at the UN, where he received the UN Medal for the IYY.
In Minnesota, Mendis served as the President of the Society for International Development
Society for International Development
The Society for International Development , founded in Washington, D.C. in 1957, is committed to stimulating dialogue and cooperation on global development issues, enhancing skills, knowledge and understanding among development practitioners, and providing a network for individuals and...
, the Vice President of the United Nations Association of the United States of America
United Nations Association of the United States of America
The United Nations Association of the United States of America or UNA-USA is a nonprofit membership organization dedicated to building understanding of and support for the ideals and work of the United Nations among the American people. Its education, policy and advocacy programs emphasize the...
, a public speaker at the Minnesota International Center and the Founding Chairman of The Saint Paul Foundation’s Asian-Pacific Endowment for Community Development.
Ambassador Harlan Cleveland
Harlan Cleveland
Harlan Cleveland was an American diplomat, educator, and author. He served as Lyndon Johnson's U.S. Ambassador to NATO, 1965–1969, and earlier as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs, 1961-1965...
, the President of World Academy of Art and Science, appointed Mendis as an associate fellow of the Academy in 1994. In the same year, he was elected as a member of the Council on Foreign Relations
Council on Foreign Relations
The Council on Foreign Relations is an American nonprofit nonpartisan membership organization, publisher, and think tank specializing in U.S. foreign policy and international affairs...
(Saint Paul-Minneapolis Committee). In 2000, Mendis was elected as a fellow of the World Academy. He currently serves as an executive committee member of the Geneva-based World Network of Young Leaders and Entrepreneurs.
For his leadership and scholarship, he received the State of Minnesota’s Asian-Pacific Heritage Award, the Minnesota Governor Rudy Perpich
Rudy Perpich
Rudolph George "Rudy" Perpich, Sr. was an American politician and the longest-serving governor of Minnesota. A member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, he served as the 34th and 36th Governor of Minnesota from December 29, 1976 to January 4, 1979, and from January 3, 1983, to January 7, 1991...
's Certificate of Honorary Citizenship, the Minnesota Governor Harold Stassen
Harold Stassen
Harold Edward Stassen was the 25th Governor of Minnesota from 1939 to 1943. After service in World War II, from 1948 to 1953 he was president of the University of Pennsylvania...
Award for United Nations Affairs, the University of Minnesota President’s Leadership and Service Award, and the 21st Century Trust Fellowship to attend the Merton College at Oxford University in the United Kingdom.
Government and Military Service
After becoming a naturalized United States citizen, Mendis served as a military professor through the University of Maryland University CollegeUniversity of Maryland University College
The University of Maryland University College is located in the unincorporated community of Adelphi in Prince George's County, Maryland in the United States. Serving over 90,000 students worldwide, UMUC is the largest 4-year public university in Maryland and one of the largest distance learning...
. He taught MBA/MPA and International Relations courses to American military forces in the NATO and Pacific Commands of the U.S. Department of Defense (in Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Spain, Turkey, and the United Kingdom). For his service to Pentagon, Mendis received UMUC’s Stanley J. Drazek Teaching Excellence Award.
Mendis joined the U.S. Department of State in 2000 as a foreign affairs officer to serve under Secretary Madeleine Albright. Under her direction, he served as the chairman of the U.S. Government Inter-agency Policy Working Group on Sustainable Development and the science & technology coordinator for the White House
White House
The White House is the official residence and principal workplace of the president of the United States. Located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., the house was designed by Irish-born James Hoban, and built between 1792 and 1800 of white-painted Aquia sandstone in the Neoclassical...
Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) under President Bill Clinton. When Secretary Colin Powell came to the State Department, Mendis was appointed as the secretariat director of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (former U.S. Information Agency) and a special assistant to the Assistant Secretary of State for ECA under President George W. Bush. Mendis was also elected by both State and USAID civilian and foreign service employees to serve as the vice chairman of Secretary Colin Powell’s Open Forum.
Later, Mendis was invited to participate as a consultant and economist in a multi-year science and national security project, headed by Ambassador Ronald Lehman, the Director of the Center for Global Security Research at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Ambassador Lehman and Professor Mendis worked on a number of national security projects, including one involving the late Sir Arthur C. Clarke
Arthur C. Clarke
Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, CBE, FRAS was a British science fiction author, inventor, and futurist, famous for his short stories and novels, among them 2001: A Space Odyssey, and as a host and commentator in the British television series Mysterious World. For many years, Robert A. Heinlein,...
, the science-fiction writer, who lived in Sri Lanka. Sri Clarke, a fellow of the World Academy of Art and Science, wrote the foreword for Mendis' book on Glocalization.
To transform the U.S. Government national security decision-making process in the 21st century, Patrick Mendis authored (with Leah Green) the U.S.-India Civil Nuclear Agreement case study for the Project on National Security Reform
Project on National Security Reform
The Project on National Security Reform is a nonpartisan non-profit organization mandated by the United States Congress to recommend improvements to the U.S. national security system. Advocates of reform of the U.S...
, a nonpartisan non-profit organization mandated by the United States Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
to recommend improvements to the U.S. national security system.
Mendis also served as an Uhuru ‘Freedom’ Fellow at the International Republican Institute (IRI) and the governing board of the USDA Graduate School
Graduate School, USDA
The Graduate School is an independent educational institution headquartered in Washington, DC with regional campuses around the United States. The Graduate School was created in 1921 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to provide adult continuing education...
, an appointment by the U.S. Secretary of Agriculture and the White House. He serves on the editorial board of The Public Manager.
Visiting Professor to China, Russia, and SAS
Through the University of Maryland University CollegeUniversity of Maryland University College
The University of Maryland University College is located in the unincorporated community of Adelphi in Prince George's County, Maryland in the United States. Serving over 90,000 students worldwide, UMUC is the largest 4-year public university in Maryland and one of the largest distance learning...
's faculty exchange program, Professor Mendis taught courses in American government, English, and culture to Chinese students at the Northwestern Polytechnic University in Xian. He traveled throughout China, including Hong Kong, Macau, and Tibet. After publishing his latest two books, TRADE for PEACE and Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence: The Secret Destiny of the American Empire is a book written by Patrick Mendis in which he puts forward a new theory about the original conviction and commercial vision of the Founding Fathers of the United States...
, Mendis was invited to China to give a series of lectures at prestigious universities in Beijing, Chengdu, Guangdong, Hong Kong, Nanjing, and Shanghai. The Center for International Strategic and Security Studies at the Guangdong University of Foreign Studies
Guangdong University of Foreign Studies
Guangdong University of Foreign Studies is one of the prestigious universities in China which specializes in international studies and one of the key institutions of higher learning in Guangdong Province in South China. The University was established in June 1995 through the merger of Guangzhou...
has appointed him as a consulting professor of international relations. Professor Mendis is an advisor to The Encyclopedia of Sri Lanka Diaspora project at the National University of Singapore
National University of Singapore
The National University of Singapore is Singapore's oldest university. It is the largest university in the country in terms of student enrollment and curriculum offered....
.
While at the University of Minnesota
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...
, he also led the U.S. team selected to teach market economics and management to a group of former KGB officers, young Russian entrepreneurs, and faculty members at Saint Petersburg State University
Saint Petersburg State University
Saint Petersburg State University is a Russian federal state-owned higher education institution based in Saint Petersburg and one of the oldest and largest universities in Russia....
(previously known as Leningrad State University in the former Soviet Union). During the historic 1991 summer in the former Soviet Union, Professor Mendis also lectured at the Moscow State University
Moscow State University
Lomonosov Moscow State University , previously known as Lomonosov University or MSU , is the largest university in Russia. Founded in 1755, it also claims to be one of the oldest university in Russia and to have the tallest educational building in the world. Its current rector is Viktor Sadovnichiy...
and toured the Kremlin
Kremlin
A kremlin , same root as in kremen is a major fortified central complex found in historic Russian cities. This word is often used to refer to the best-known one, the Moscow Kremlin, or metonymically to the government that is based there...
and the Russian White House in Moscow.
As a visiting professor of economics and public policy at the University of Pittsburgh’s Semester at Sea
Semester at Sea
Semester at Sea is a study abroad program founded in 1963, now managed by the Institute for Shipboard Education in Charlottesville, Virginia. The University of Virginia is the current academic sponsor for the program while the program, itself, is run on a cruise ship called the MV Explorer...
(SAS) program, Professor Mendis traveled to the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa and Asia. Based on his first-hand observations of globalization and Americanization, he authored a series of articles, which later expanded into a book, the Human Side of Globalization, in which he explained his experience in meeting with Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz is a Cuban revolutionary and politician, having held the position of Prime Minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976, and then President from 1976 to 2008. He also served as the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from the party's foundation in 1961 until 2011...
of Cuba in 2004. He has worked in, and traveled to, more than 80 countries and visited all 50 states in the United States.
Proceeds from the sales of his latest two books -- Human Side of Globalization and TRADE for PEACE -- are donated to establish scholarships and a peace prize in Sri Lanka and a number of microloan projects through Kiva.org in more than thirty countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Through his latest book Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence
Commercial Providence: The Secret Destiny of the American Empire is a book written by Patrick Mendis in which he puts forward a new theory about the original conviction and commercial vision of the Founding Fathers of the United States...
Mendis has contributed additional funds for his philanthropic activities. He and his family live in the Washington, D.C., area in the United States.