Department News
Department Hosts Regents' Lecturer
One of Canada’s most experienced diplomats, Jeremy Kinsman was born in Montreal and educated at Princeton University, Princeton, N.J., and the Institut d’Etudes Politiques, Paris, before joining the Canadian Foreign Service in 1966 .
In the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, after service as Chairman of Policy Planning and later Political Director, he was named Canada’s Ambassador in Moscow in 1992. He was subsequently Ambassador in Rome (1996-2000), High Commissioner in London (2000-2002), and Ambassador to the EU in Brussels (2002-2006). Earlier postings abroad included being Deputy Permanent Representative to the UN in New York and Minister for Political Affairs in Washington. From 1985 to 1989 he was the senior federal official responsible for Cultural Affairs and Broadcasting where he was responsible for preparing the still-current Broadcasting Act, on which he continues to consult.
Today Ambassador Kinsman is a regular commentator for CBC News (cbc.ca/news), a Contributing Writer for Policy Options magazine, and is published widely elsewhere. A frequent speaker and lecturer in Europe and North America, he is at present Diplomat in Residence at the Woodrow Wilson School of Princeton University, Princeton, N.J., where he headed a project for the Community of Democracies and has recently produced a “Diplomat’s Handbook on Democracy Development Support” (www.diplomatshandbook.org).
He has been a member of numerous Boards, including the Imperial War Museum, London, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, and the European Policy Centre, and several non-profit Boards. His principal business contribution is to the Dundee Group of companies, and he sits on the Board of Dundee Precious Metals.
He and his wife Hana are based in Victoria, British Columbia, where he also acts as a consultant for the British Columbia Government on immigration policy