David M. Malone

David M. Malone' s appointment in February as president of the International Development Research Centre seems a natural step for a man whose career embodies the worldview of the crown corporation. Both Malone and IDRC, which aims to assist developing countries in nurturing local research groups to tackle social, economic, and political issues, are familiar with the problems facing such countries and the potential the global research community has to address them. Most recently, Malone was Canada's high commissioner in Delhi, where IDRC has a regional office, and his selection has been met with praise in the two worlds that he has known best - diplomacy and research.Malone was born in 1954 in Ottawa, the son of an Australian mother and Canadian father who was recruited by the then- Department of External Affairs. Thus began a childhood spent in the Netherlands, France, and Iran, a country he returned to in 2004 for the first time in 25 years. The early exposure to a cosmopolitan lifestyle appealed to the young Malone, who says his parents' frequent travels encouraged him to seek a job that would enable him to do the same.Kids often default into the sort of professional lives of their parents and think did that very much, having grown up internationally, says Malone. I think simply having moved around as a kid and lived in different societies, all of which I'd liked and had liked learning from, it was something wanted to continue to do during my life.He studied business at Montreal's Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales before following his father's footsteps by joining the Department of External Affairs for a career that would lead him to postings in Egypt, Jordan, and Kuwait, among other countries. After completing a master's degree in public administration at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Malone returned to External Affairs to assist Ostry, then deputy minister of international trade and one of Canada's key players in international economic diplomacy.He credits Ostry with teaching him a thing or two about the delicate art of diplomatic negotiation. I learned a tremendous amount from working with her, both on the substance ofthe issues, but also on how much personal style can matter, says Malone. Sylvia had a tremendous personal style that was a major force in international economic relations.He would put those lessons to use while working for two of Canada's permanent representatives at the United Nations in the early 1990s, Yves Fortier and Louise Frechette, before becoming deputy permanent representative from 1992-94. He also took charge ofthe working group ofthe UN's special committee on peacekeeping during Canada's ill-fated deployment to Somalia, which partially contributed to the country's reluctance to participate directly in future missions. But there are other reasons for a decreased Canadian presence in UN peacekeeping operations in recent times, according to Malone. He points to Canada's participation in NATO operations in Kosovo and Afghanistan as part of a trend seen in many western countries, whereby increasing numbers of governments are bypassing the UN in favour of more practical and efficient regional organizations and coalitions ofthe willing. But a reduced ground presence in conflict- ridden countries hasn't stopped western nations from being the primary funders ofthe UN budget, including most of its peacekeeping expenses.Malone says that because Canada was actively involved in peacekeeping missions in Haiti and Somalia while he was at the the views of Canadian ambassadors were always sought out and held in high regard, allowing the country to speak authoritatively on those and other conflicts.Canada had the capacity to punch above its weight at the UN, says Malone. This was due in no small part to the influence of Fortier and Frechette. I concluded that personal engagement by Canadian ambassadors, their capacity to add value to UN processes, often by being rather critical of the way business was done, made Canada matter more than simply going with the flow. …

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