Murray Feshbach is a scholar focusing on the demographics of the Soviet Union

Demographics of the Soviet Union

According to data from the 1989 Soviet census, the population of the Soviet Union was 70% East Slavs, 12% Turkic peoples, and all other ethnic groups below 10%. Alongside the atheist majority of 60% there were sizable minorities of Russian Orthodox followers and Muslims According to data from the...

 and demographics of Russia

Demographics of Russia

The demographics of Russia is about the demographic features of the population of the Russian Federation, including population growth, population density, ethnic composition, education level, health, economic status, and other aspects of the population....

 (population, health, and environment}. Currently, he is a Senior Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center where he conducts research on the policy implications of the demographic, health and environmental crises in Russia.

Feshbach was born in New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

. He received his Bachelor of Arts

Bachelor of Arts

A Bachelor of Arts , from the Latin artium baccalaureus, is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate course or program in either the liberal arts, the sciences, or both...

 degree

Academic degree

An academic degree is a position and title within a college or university that is usually awarded in recognition of the recipient having either satisfactorily completed a prescribed course of study or having conducted a scholarly endeavour deemed worthy of his or her admission to the degree...

 in history

History

History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...

 from Syracuse University

Syracuse University

Syracuse University is a private research university located in Syracuse, New York, United States. Its roots can be traced back to Genesee Wesleyan Seminary, founded by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1832, which also later founded Genesee College...

, his Master of Arts

Master of Arts (postgraduate)

A Master of Arts from the Latin Magister Artium, is a type of Master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The M.A. is usually contrasted with the M.S. or M.Sc. degrees...

 in European diplomatic history

Diplomatic history

Diplomatic history deals with the history of international relations between states. Diplomatic history can be different from international relations in that the former can concern itself with the foreign policy of one state while the latter deals with relations between two or more states...

 from Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

, and his Ph.D.

Doctor of Philosophy

Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...

 in economics

Economics

Economics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...

 from American University

American University

American University is a private, Methodist, liberal arts, and research university in Washington, D.C. The university was chartered by an Act of Congress on December 5, 1892 as "The American University", which was approved by President Benjamin Harrison on February 24, 1893...

.

He served as Chief of the USSR Population, Employment and Research and Development Branch of the Foreign Demographic Analysis Division (now the Center for International Research) of the Census Bureau

United States Census Bureau

The United States Census Bureau is the government agency that is responsible for the United States Census. It also gathers other national demographic and economic data...

 from 1957 to 1981. In 1979-1980 he was a Fellow of the Kennan Institute. After his retirement from the U.S. government

Federal government of the United States

The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...

 in 1981, he worked as a Research Professor at Georgetown University

Georgetown University

Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...

 until 2000, when he retired as Professor Emeritus. At the request of the Department of State

United States Department of State

The United States Department of State , is the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations of the United States, equivalent to the foreign ministries of other countries...

, in 1986-1987 he served as the first (experimental) Sovietologist-in-Residence, in the Office of the Secretary General of NATO

Secretary General of NATO

The Secretary General of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is the chairman of the North Atlantic Council, the supreme decision-making organisation of the defence alliance. The Secretary-General also serves as the leader of the organisation's staff and as its chief spokesman...

.

Major publications

Feshbach has published a number of books and over 115 articles and book chapters, and has presented papers at numerous international and domestic conferences, as well as testimony for the U.S. Congress.

• His book, Ecocide in the USSR: Health and Nature Under Siege (with Alfred Friendly, Jr.), New York, Basic Books, was published in April 1992. The book also was translated into Russian and published in Moscow in January 1993.
• His book on Ecological Disaster: Cleaning Up the Hidden Legacy of the Soviet Regime was published by the Twentieth Century Fund in February 1995.
• Under his chief editorship, an Environmental and Health Atlas of Russia was simultaneously published in Russian and English in June 1995 in Moscow.
• Another book, Russia's Health and Demographic Crises was published by the Chemical and Biological Arms Control Institute in April 2003.

Other publications of note include:

• The Early Days of the HIV/AIDS Epidemic in the Former Soviet Union, Prepared for the Conference on “Health and Demography in the Former Soviet Union,” Harvard University, April 2005
• HIV/AIDS in Ukraine: An Analysis of Statistics, with Cristina M. Galvin, Research Associate, March 2005
• HIV/AIDS in the Russian Military – Update*, Prepared for UNAIDS Meeting, 22-23 February 2005, Copenhagen, Denmark
• Potential Social Disarray in Russia Due to Health Factors
• HIV/AIDS in Russia: An Analysis of Statistics, written with Cristina M. Galvin, Research Associate, January 2005
• “Russia's Health and Demographic Crises: Policy Implications and Consequences,” Health and National Security Series (Chemical and Biological Arms Control Institute, April 2003)
• "A Country on the Verge," op-ed, The New York Times, May 31, 2003
• “Russia's Demographic and Health Meltdown,” U.S. Congress, Joint Economic Committee, Russia's Uncertain Economic Future, 107th Congress, 1st Session (Government Printing Office, December 2001)

External links

• Drug-Resistant TB in Russia July 24, 2007, Woodrow Wilson Center event featuring Salmaan Keshavjee and Murray Feshbach