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Dr. Robert M. Cutler

Energy Security Specialist

Document Outline

• Key Qualifications
• Academic Credentials
• Countries of International Experience
• Selected Experience
  • Selected Consultancies
  • Selected Administrative Appointments
  • Selected Research and Teaching Appointments
• Selected Publications
• Languages
• Work History

Key Qualifications

Dr. Cutler, a specialist in energy security, has set out his innovative concept of regional energy security, Cooperative Energy Security, in a double-blind peer-reviewed 1999 article in Global Governance. Cooperative Energy Security places energy for sustainable development in the focus of governance. Bringing the international environmental and energy agendas together, it serves to integrate public, private, and civil-society stake-holders into transnational and transgovernmental coalitions that, in turn, sustain local participation in implementing appropriate energy development. Dr. Cutler has published five journal articles on Cooperative Energy Security and related topics, and given four noteworthy public addresses on it, including one in 2000 at U.N. Headquarters in New York in connection with the World Summit on Sustainable Development, and another at a UNIDO-sponsored Summit on Caspian Energy (Monaco, 1998). He frequently participates in meetings organized by the Energy Charter Secretariat.

He has produced briefings and analyses under consultancies with the Institute for East–West Studies (New York, now the EastWest Institute), the Centre for European Policy Studies (Brussels), the weekly analytical bulletin FSU [Former Soviet Union] Oil and Gas Monitor, and other clients including from the private sector. He is NGO Representative to the U.N.'s ECOSOC for the International Research Foundation for Development, of which he serves on the Executive Board. He has been in the op-ed pages of major U.S. and international newspapers and is regularly solicited for interviews by such media organizations as Voice of America, Radio Liberty, Radio Canada International, Radio Moscow, Iranian Students News Agency.

In twenty-four years of professional activity, Dr. Cutler has given 47 research papers to professional associations, 29 workshop and seminar presentations, and over a dozen public speeches of note. He has published 21 refereed scholarly articles, 12 chapters in edited books, four public speeches, a long list of policy briefings and working papers, and many dozens of analytical commentaries for professional Internet sites. He has edited two books and is on the editorial boards of four scholarly journals. He is noted for his ability to recognize significant developments in international economics and politics before they become generally evident.

Academic Credentials

• Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, The Harriman Institute, Columbia University, 1983–1984.
• IREX Postdoctoral Fellow, Moscow State University, 1982–1983.
• Ph.D., The University of Michigan, 1982, Political Science.
• Albert Gallatin Fellow, Graduate Institute of International Studies, Geneva, 1979–1980.
• M.A., Pennsylvania State University, 1976, Political Science.
• Sc.B., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1974, Political Science.
• Sc.B., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1974, History and Science.

Countries of International Experience

Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Canada, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Italy, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Russia, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan

Selected Experience

Selected Consultancies

• Consultant to the Special Assistant to the President, [a major international oil and gas exploration and development company], 2000–2004.
  • Evaluated client's proprietary information concerning financial and organizational conditions, together with specialized knowledge of geopolitical and economic risks.
  • Made recommendations concerning company's choices among export pipeline routes from the Caspian Sea basin to world markets and associated issues of investment in energy exploration.
  • Advised negotiating strategies based upon the foregoing, drawing on specialized knowledge of idiosyncratic local conditions including leadership psychology of national decision makers in the region.
     
• Consultant and "External Collaborator", Caucasus Working Group, Centre for European Policy Studies, Brussels, 2000–2002.
  • Brainstormed ideas for insuring stability, security, and development in the South Caucasus.
  • Advised on the role and problems of energy development and pipeline construction in such a process, emphasizing issues of organizational design and development in critiquing proposed security architectures for the region.
  • Evaluated the potentials for using of existing international institutions to implement regional security, as well as the feasibility of establishing new transnational regional institutions.
  • Made recommendations concerning all these matters later adopted in full by the Rapporteur of the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs and Industrial Development.
     
• Consulting Analyst, FSU [Former Soviet Union] Oil and Gas Monitor (weekly industry bulletin), Newsbase Ltd., 1998–2001.
  • Wrote periodic analyses several times per month (750–3500 words per article) on energy security in various regions of Eurasia, combining geopolitics, project analysis, leadership psychology, individual interviews, and "open-source intelligence".
  • Produced over 80,000 words in two and half years.
     
• Consultant to the Special Assistant to the President, Institute for East–West Studies [now EastWest Institute], New York, 1998–1999.
  • Acted as Rapporteur for the Institute's Second East–West Leaders' Forum.
  • Prepared briefing book for high-level delegation of American businessmen to Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
  • Advised regarding activities of the Institute in its cooperation with international energy companies and consortia.

Selected Administrative Appointments

• NGO Representative to the Economic and Social Council, U.N. General Assembly, and Member, Executive Committee, International Research Foundation for Development, 2000–Present.
  • As NGO Representative to ECOSOC, participated in meetings at the New York U.N.'s New York headquarters of interest to the Foundation.
  • Delivered an invited public lecture, "The New Concept of Cooperative Energy Security," on the basis of the working paper circulated at the NGO Forum at the Preparatory Committee for the World Summit on Sustainable Development, Johannesburg, 2002.
  • As Member of Executive Board, advised on organizational strategies for promoting the Foundation's goals and facilitated the creation of inter-organizational networks in support of this.
     
• Editorial Board Service, various dates 1996–Present, all current.
  • Contributing Editor, Cahiers d'études sur la Méditerranée orientale et le monde turco-iranien.
  • "Perspectives" section editor, Central Eurasian Studies Review.
  • Associate Editor, Oil, Gas and Energy Law.
  • Editorial Board Member, Journal of Central Asia and the Caucasus.
  • Editorial Board Member, Electronic Journal of World Politics.
  • Academic Advisory Board Member, Turkistan-Newsletter.
     
• Member, Executive Board, Central Eurasian Studies Society, 2002–2005.
  • Key team member guiding organizational takeoff of a new international interdisciplinary scholarly organization: membership has doubled every year for the last five years, now approaching 1000 with nearly two-thirds outside North America, and important representation in Central, South, and Southwest Asia.
  • As Chair of the Institutional Linkages Committee: responsible for formulating and implementing strategies for developing inter-institutional linkages and cooperation with research and academic institutions, other professional associations, media organizations, and nongovernmental and intergovernmental organizations.
  • As Member of Publications Committee: responsible for consulting on integration of web-based technologies into the development strategy of the organization as a self-avowed "cyber-society" focused for the present on the production of its Review and the holding of its annual conference; advising on the development of publications activities, soliciting and editing articles for the flagship section of the flagship Central Eurasian Studies Review.

Selected Research and Teaching Appointments

• Senior Research Fellow, Institute of European and Russian Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa), 1996–Present.
  • Resource person on Central, South, and Southwest Asia, and the South Caucasus, as well as on selected topics of international relations theory.
  • Advising, lecturing, evaluating theses upon request.
  • Networking with foreign institutions, enhancing the visibility of the Institute and the University.
  • Scientific production attributable to specific research contracts is given below with the individual contract; scientific production (since 1996) not associated with any research contract includes: three refereed journal articles, two chapters in edited books, one published speech, one working paper, 10 research papers presented to professional associations, four invited workshop/seminar presentations, three policy briefings, and three public addresses.
     
• Principal Investigator, Research Grant, World Society Foundation, Zurich, 1996–1998.
  • Developed and wrote successful research proposal on "The Proliferation of International Parliamentary Institutions." Collected basic data on several dozen such institutions existing in the world, and on their activities.
  • Created and applied systematic framework for examining how such institutions grow and develop relationships with regional integration organizations (e.g., SAARC in the case of South Asia), so as to assess their potential for contributing to regional governance, such as Cooperative Energy Security.
  • Produced one double-blind peer-reviewed chapter in an edited book, one solicited chapter in an edited book, five research papers presented to professional associations, one invited workshop/seminar presentation, two policy briefings, and two working papers.
     
• Co-principal investigator, Research and Development Grant, [U.S.] Social Science Research Council, 1994–1996.
  • Mediated and coordinated among multiple individuals with competing bureaucratic interests a successful grant proposal for four interdisciplinary workshop sessionsPlanned and organized workshop series on post-Soviet affairs
  • Followed through to assure attendance and discussion.
     
• Principal Investigator, Research Grant, Cooperative Security Program, Department of External Affairs and International Trade, Government of Canada, 1993–1994; and Principal Investigator, Standard Research Grant, Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, 1991–1994; and Co-principal Investigator, "Special Competition" Grant for Development of Sovietology, Department of National Defence, Government of Canada, 1989–1991.
  • Developed and wrote successful research proposals respectively for: "Cooperative Security in Eurasia," "Post-Soviet Foreign Policies in the Emerging World Order," and (as team member) "Soviet Studies and Gorbachev." (Each grant in this "series" was obtained independently and not as a follow-on to the preceding one.)
  • Executed plans of work, supervised research assistants, and administered funds.
  • Produced (through the end of 1990s) seven peer-reviewed journal articles, one edited book, five chapters in other edited books, 18 research papers presented to professional associations, 16 invited workshop/seminar presentations, six policy briefings, and five public addresses.
  • Innovated the Cooperative Energy Security concept from work executed under the Cooperative Security Program grant.
     
• Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, Laval University (Quebec City), 1988–1996; and Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of California at Santa Barbara, 1985–1988; and Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Arizona, 1984–1985.
  • Mentored students, advised and supervised their research, including theses,
  • Taught (in English in the U.S. and in French in Canada) a total of 14 different subjects in international relations, comparative politics, and political philosophy, at all levels from introductory undergraduate to graduate research seminar, for a total of 46 semester-courses.
  • Research activities are listed separately according to the individual research contract.
     
• Principal Investigator [and Post-doctoral Research Fellow], Joint Committee on Soviet Studies, Social Science Research Council and American Council of Learned Societies 1985–1988.
  • Developed and wrote successful research proposal for studying "How the Soviet Press Works", with emphasis on the overlap between the foreign-propaganda making system and the foreign-policy making system).
  • Executed plan of work, supervised research assistants, and administered funds.
  • Produced one book manuscript, one published double-blind peer-reviewed article, one published review article, two published book chapters, one published working paper, four research papers presented to professional associations, four invited workshop/seminar presentations, and two public talks.

Selected Publications

• The Caspian Energy Conundrum, Journal of International Affairs 56 (Spring 2003): 89–102.
• Turkey and the Geopolitics of Turkmenistan's Natural Gas, Review of International Affairs 1 (Winter 2001): 20–33.
• Complexity Science and Knowledge-Creation in International Relations Theory, in Institutional and Infrastructural Resources, in Encyclopedia of Life Support Sciences (Oxford: EOLSS for UNESCO, 2002).
• The New Concept of Cooperative Energy Security, Occasional Working Paper (New York: International Research Foundation for Development, 2000). 20 pp.
• Kazakhstan and International Energy Development, Energy of Kazakhstan 2, no. 7 (December 1999): 49–56.
• Cooperative Energy Security in the Caspian Region: A New Paradigm for Sustainable Development? Global Governance 5 (April–June 1999): 251–271.
• Gorbachev as CEO Road Kill: How the Soviet Foreign Policy Establishment Failed to Manage Complexity, in Michael Lissack (ed.), Managing Complexity in Organizations (New York: Quorum, 1999), pp. 352–370.
• Finance Issues in Eurasian Energy Development, in Caspian Oil and Gas Resources: Transport Routes, Security and Economic Development — Second International Conference, November 7–8, 1998 (Tehran: Institute for International Energy Studies, 1999), pp. 68–71.
• Moskva riskuet okazat′sia izolirovannoi ot Kavkaza [Moscow Risks Finding Itself Isolated from the Caucasus], Nezavisimaia gazeta, 16 January 1998, p. 7. Abridged English translation: Russia's Dilemma in the Caucasus: Power Politics vs. Energy Cooperation, Analysis of Current Events 10, no. 2 (February 1998): 10–11.
• A Strategy for Cooperative Energy Security, Caspian Crossroads 3 (Summer 1997): 23–29.
• Towards Cooperative Energy Security in the South Caucasus, Caucasian Regional Studies, no. 1 (1996): 71–81. Russian translation: O sovmestnoi energeticheskoi bezopasnosti v Iuzhnom Kavkaze, Kavkazskie regional′nye issledovaniia, vyp. 1 (1996): 69–80.
• Plus a large number of shorter analyses of specific energy security issues and particular situations.

Languages

English (native language); French (fluent); Russian (good); German (basic); Italian (proficient reading); Spanish (proficient reading); Portuguese (proficient reading).

Work History

DR. ROBERT M. CUTLER was educated at MIT and The University of Michigan, where he earned a Ph.D. in Political Science, and has specialized and consulted in the international affairs of Europe, Russia, and Eurasia since the late 1970s. He has held research and teaching positions at major universities in the United States, Canada, France, Switzerland, and Russia, and contributed to leading policy reviews and academic journals as well as the print and electronic mass media in three languages.