Rowson to Serve as President of the Council For a Community of Democracies

March 24, 2003. The Board of Directors of the Council for a Community of Democracies (CCD) has elected Richard C. Rowson to serve as President of the non-governmental organization (NGO) incorporated in the District of Columbia. Mr. Rowson succeeds Walter Raymond whose retirement for health reasons was announced by CCD Chairman, Robert Hunter, former U. S. Ambassador to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, at a CCD board meeting earlier this week.

Dick Rowson, a 1950 graduate of the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, was previously Director of the Executive Service Corps of Washington, D. C., Director of Policy and Planning at Radio Free Europe, and head of several publishing houses in New York. A native of Hollywood, California, Mr. Rowson has lived in Washington, D. C., since 1990. He was Vice President of CCD before assuming his current responsibilities.

CCD was a participant at the founding of the Community of Democracies in 2000 at Warsaw, Poland. CCD was a key participant in the 2002 conference in Seoul, Korea, and played a leading role in coordinating the participation of other American NGOs and private citizens from other countries in the NGO forum, which met in parallel with the Ministerial Conference. The next meeting of the Community of Democracies and NGO forum is to be held at Santiago, Chile, in February, 2005.

At the Seoul meeting, CCD proposed a global initiative in civic education in democracy and is co-sponsoring an international strategic planning conference on this initiative to be held at the Pocantico Conference Center in New York. In support of the Community of Democracies concept, CCD is planning to expand its domestic outreach to include key leaders, organizations, institutions and civic enterprises in Europe and Asia. This network will seek to support governments in advancing democratic practices and cooperation among democracies.

The obvious importance of this task is demonstrated by recent developments in the Middle East. A major source of CCD funding is expected to be provided by companies with international operations, since their business and the economic development it helps make possible are dependent on the political and social stability that results from democratic governance and institutions.